by Katy Regnery
And because she’s right—so very, very right—I kiss her like I will every day for the rest of my life, and then I worship her body with mine until dawn.
Epilogue
Faye
Though my in-laws, Barb and Linus, ask us to spend our second Christmas Eve with them, Trevor and I make other plans. We tell his parents we’ll see them, and the rest of the family, tomorrow at the farm for Christmas Day.
The rest of the family now includes Aurora, who is five months old, and doted on by her grandparents, parents, uncles, and aunts...and Harry, who spent her spring break and most of her summer vacation in Fairbanks with us and acted as my maid of honor at our August wedding.
She arrived yesterday and decided to stay at Starling Farms tonight, where she is very welcome and well loved. The Starlings have more or less adopted Harry as the daughter they never had, and Barb, especially, has taken Harry under her colorful wings.
Harry even invited Barb and Linus to join me and Trevor at Cornell parent’s weekend in October, an invitation they accepted with pleasure. I love that Harry has a mother figure in her life now, in addition to a big sister who tries very hard to be there for her in any and every way she needs me. And, of course, there’s her “best friend in the whole world,” Baz, who adores her.
Poor Baz, who picked up Harry at the airport yesterday, follows her around with his eyes whenever they are in the same room together. He is utterly in love with her, though he seems to recognize that biding his time is wise, for now. She’s twenty-one and finishing college in June, after which she’ll attend business school at University of Washington in Foster.
At twenty-one, Harry still has a good deal of growing and learning to do, and at twenty-six, Baz would be wise to wait for her and not to push her to grow up too quickly.
Though I admire his patience, I do not envy it.
Then again, Trevor once told me that Baz moves at the speed of glacial ice when it comes to women...so maybe a long wait for Harry is exactly what he needs. Only time will tell.
“Faye!”
Brandy reaches over the bar and gives me a hug, and I squeeze her back as best I can. Though we don’t make it down to the Golden Buddha very often, being here on Christmas Eve felt right.
“Is T coming?”
“He is! He’ll be here any second.”
“What can I get you? A martini?”
“Umm. No. Thanks. How about sparkling water in a lowball glass with a lime?”
“Water? Are you planning to take a bath or somethi—” Suddenly she gasps in realization, placing her hands over her mouth. “Wait a second! Are you...?”
I grin at her, putting a finger over my lips and saying nothing. No one knows yet. Not Harry. Not the Starlings. Not Trevor. And frankly, I think he should be the first to hear it, directly from me.
Brandy holds up her hands in understanding, then pretends to zip her mouth shut. “Mum’s the word! He won’t hear a peep from me. Don’t you worry.”
“Thanks,” I say, looking around the bar as she makes my drink. I feel a little nostalgic, remembering last year. “We met here.”
“I remember,” says Brandy. “You thought we were a couple, and T was a jerk to you.”
“He was hurting,” I remind her. “But I might have left without knowing his story if you hadn’t invited me to dinner. You told me everything. You helped me see him. I owe you, Brandy.”
“Bartenders and matchmakers have a lot in common, Faye,” she tells me, putting a cocktail napkin on the bar and my drink on top of it. From all outward appearances, I could be drinking a gin and tonic.
“Maybe you were both that night. Bartender and matchmaker.”
“Maybe I was,” she says, winking at me before stepping to the end of the bar to take someone else’s order.
I sip my drink for a moment before I hear a familiar voice close to my ear. “So what’s the verdict?”
The first words he ever spoke to me.
I turn to look at him. “I’m sorry, sir, but I’m meeting my husband here in a little bit.”
“Can I keep you company until he gets here?”
“I don’t think it’s a good idea,” I say, trying not to smile.
“Jealous type?”
“Not jealous, per se, but I’m just not the sort of girl who cheats.”
“I bet he loves that about you,” says T, leaning forward to claim my lips with his. He cradles my cheeks between his warm hands, and when he draws back from me, he looks as drunk as he did the first time he kissed me. “In fact, I know he does.”
“How was your day, Mr. Starling?” I ask him as he settles his body on the stool I reserved for him beside me.
“Excellent, Mrs. Starling. How was yours?”
“Tremendous. Big deal out of Seattle today. It’s going to make us the biggest distributor of Asian beer on the West Coast.”
“The acquisitions guy you hired is working out?”
“He’s great,” I say, thinking of all the new hires I made this year and how the lessons of delegation that I learned during my days with a broken foot have changed my life for the better.
“T!” says Brandy. “Merry Christmas!”
“Hey, there,” says Trevor. “You gonna be here tomorrow?”
“Of course! You?”
“We said we’d spend the day with my folks,” says Trevor, flicking a glance at me, “but how would you feel about ending the night here?”
“I’d love it,” I tell him, remembering the smorgasbord of offerings on Ping’s Christmas table last year. “Two years in a row makes it a tradition!”
“Awesome,” says Brandy. “What’re you drinking? Hard cider? Vodka on the rocks?”
“My wife’s taste in drinks is excellent.” He grins. “I’ll have whatever she’s having.”
Brandy blinks at him. “You want...what she’s having?”
“Absolutely,” he says, turning his body to face me. Before I can stop him, he picks up the glass and takes a big sip, then puts it back down on the bar slowly. “Is that...seltzer?”
“I’ll give you two a minute,” says Brandy, sliding away.
“It is,” I say, trying desperately not to smile as I watch him trying to figure this out.
“Why in the world are you drinking water?”
I can’t help myself. My smile comes bursting forth, and I just sit there, on a barstool at the Golden Buddha on Christmas Eve, smiling like it’s the happiest day of my life...and in a year that’s offered me one beautiful day after another, it just might be.
“Hmm,” I tease. “Why would a newly married young woman, who has sex with her husband every night and ten times on the weekend, be drinking water instead of—”
His gasp is so loud, it cuts me off, and his mint-colored eyes are wider than I’ve ever seen them before. “Oh, my God! Faye! Sweetheart! Are you...are you...?”
“Pregnant?” I ask him, giggling as tears track down my face. “Yes!”
I’m in his arms a second later, and he’s dragging me off the barstool so he can kiss me. Finally, he leans away, looking at me with glistening eyes.
“You’re carrying my baby.”
“I am. Yes.”
He pulls me close again and I can feel the fierce and thunderous beat of his heart.
Outside the snow is falling, and I definitely won’t be drinking a scorpion bowl (or two) tonight, but everything I hoped for when I flew to Fairbanks that Christmas Eve last year has already come true.
Including the fact that Mr. Fairbanks, who gave himself a zero percent chance of love, now has enough to last him a lifetime.
THE END
COMING IN
FEBRUARY 2020
When Los Angeles lawyer Addison receives a desperate voice mail from her adventure-seeking brother, she hires Alaskan helicopter pilot Dakota (whom she finds via an ad in the Odds Are Good) to take her to her brother’s last-known location. As the two venture farther into the harsh Alaskan wilderness on a dangerous rescue mission, t
hey quickly discover they’ll have to safeguard their lives...and their hearts.
PREORDER MY VALDEZ VALENTINE NOW!
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More Odds Are Good Stand-Alone Romances are coming this fall!
~ALL BOOKS AVAILABLE FOR PREORDER~
SINGLE IN SITKA (October 7, 2019) – Thank you for reading!
When Seattle journalist Amanda heads north to Sitka to research a story, she answers the Odds Are Good personal ad of single dad Luke, hoping for some no-strings-attached fun. But could the sweet, widowed father of three—who just happens to be a smokin’-hot state trooper—turn out to be the man of her dreams?
NOME-O SEEKS JULIET (November 4, 2019) – Thank you for reading!
Upon learning that his entry in the Qimmiq dog race will be canceled if he doesn’t have a female teammate, Cody places an ad in the Odds Are Good magazine, desperately searching for a woman in the Lower Forty-Eight to enter the competition with him. Luckily, he recruits Montana-born Juliet, a veterinary student with an agenda of her own.
A FAIRBANKS AFFAIR (December 2, 2019) – Thank you for reading!
Tired of being treated like a freak when men discover that Faye is a thirty-year-old virgin, she answers an ad in the Odds Are Good magazine, hoping to trek up to Fairbanks over New Year’s and turn over her v-card to a sexy Alaskan. But when her chemistry with businessman Trevor turns out to be stronger than she ever could have imagined, what started out as a one-and-done mission becomes much more complicated.
MY VALDEZ VALENTINE (February 10, 2020) – Preorder on Amazon, Apple, B&N, Kobo
When Los Angeles lawyer Addison receives a desperate voice mail from her adventure-seeking brother, she hires Alaskan helicopter pilot Dakota (whom she finds via an ad in the Odds Are Good) to take her to her brother’s last-known location. As the two venture farther into the harsh Alaskan wilderness on a dangerous rescue mission, they quickly discover they’ll have to safeguard their lives...and their hearts.
KODIAK LUMBERJACK (April 20, 2020) – Preorder on Amazon, Apple, B&N, Kobo
Activist Casey has never met a cause she won’t champion, and that includes a new antiforestry initiative by the nonprofit group Trees Are Friends. Hired to write a smear piece about Alaskan logging operations, she answers a personal ad in the Odds Are Good, seeking an inside contact, not romance. Once she meets hot lumberjack Soren, however, she discovers that people, like causes, are often more layered than they originally appear.
ALSO AVAILABLE
from Katy Regnery
a m o d e r n f a i r y t a l e
(A collection)
The Vixen and the Vet
Never Let You Go
Ginger’s Heart
Dark Sexy Knight
Don’t Speak
Shear Heaven
Fragments of Ash
THE BLUEBERRY LANE SERIES
THE ENGLISH BROTHERS
(Blueberry Lane Books #1–7)
Breaking Up with Barrett
Falling for Fitz
Anyone but Alex
Seduced by Stratton
Wild about Weston
Kiss Me Kate
Marrying Mr. English
THE WINSLOW BROTHERS
(Blueberry Lane Books #8–11)
Bidding on Brooks
Proposing to Preston
Crazy about Cameron
Campaigning for Christopher
THE ROUSSEAUS
(Blueberry Lane Books #12–14)
Jonquils for Jax
Marry Me Mad
J.C. and the Bijoux Jolis
THE STORY SISTERS
(Blueberry Lane Books #15–17)
The Bohemian and the Businessman
The Director and Don Juan
Countdown to Midnight
THE SUMMERHAVEN SERIES
Fighting Irish
Smiling Irish
Loving Irish
Catching Irish
THE ARRANGED DUO
Arrange Me
Arrange Us
ODDS ARE GOOD SERIES
Single in Sitka
Nome-o Seeks Juliet
A Fairbanks Affair
My Valdez Valentine – preorder now!
Kodiak Lumberjack – preorder now!
STAND-ALONE BOOKS:
After We Break
(a stand-alone second-chance romance)
Frosted
(a stand-alone romance novella for mature readers)
Unloved, a love story
(a stand-alone suspenseful romance)
Under the sweet-romance pen name
Katy Paige
THE LINDSTROMS
Proxy Bride
Missy’s Wish
Sweet Hearts
Choose Me
Virtually Mine
Unforgettable You
My Treasure – all new!
Summer’s Winter – all new!
Under the paranormal pen name
K. P. Kelley
It’s You, Book 1
It’s You, Book 2
Under the YA pen name
Callie Henry
A Date for Hannah
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
New York Times and USA Today bestselling author Katy Regnery started her writing career by enrolling in a short story class in January 2012. One year later, she signed her first contract, and Katy’s first novel was published in September 2013.
Over forty-five books and three RITA® nominations later, Katy claims authorship of the multititled Blueberry Lane series, the A Modern Fairytale collection, the Summerhaven series, the Arranged duo, and several other stand-alone romances, including the critically acclaimed mainstream fiction novel Unloved, a love story.
Katy’s books are available in English, French, German, Hebrew, Italian, Polish, Portuguese, and Turkish.
Pen names:
Katy Regnery (Contemporary Romance)
K. P. Kelley (Paranormal Romance)
Katy Paige (Sweet/Clean Romance)
Callie Henry (YA Romance)
Check out Katy’s Website: http://www.katyregnery.com
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