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“These wereto stopas I can Understand?”

“Yes,” I lad I found you”

“That’s funny,” he laughs

“What?”

He s used to It’s the sym owner, the family man

It’s the smile of my soulmate

“I was just going to say the sa down for another sweet kiss

Extended Epilogue

One Year Later

Damian

I clutch Harainst er’s booth looking down onto the concert venue

The crowd is packed out for theact, the debut of up and coer Dakota Drake, my woman, my wife, ainst my chest

“She’s alhter’s cheeks

She makes a cute baby noise and huffs her way back to dreamland I turn to Sparky, curled up in the corner of the roo widely

“Don’t think I’ve forgotten about you, little soldier,” I say

His tail wags and then he, too, returns to his own personal dreamland

I look down across the darkened crowd – ht – to the spotlighted stage Finally,dress, obsidian-black but inlaid with jewels like stars sparkling in a night sky

I fight the urge to search the crowd for ht now is to let out the beast withinit back when I see the way her dress drapes over those hips Her body is evenher delicious juices since the pregnancy, as though er for my cock

I push it down and focus onin my chest

“There was a songbird,” she sings, slow and shy at first but then louder, with more sweet confidence “And its na, and baby, baby, this one’s for you … A songbird, a songbird, and yet inside bird, but your heart is still black as coal”