Anything For Rachel – Epilogue
✏#EPILOGUE ✔
✏ Calvin P•O•V.
To Rose,
Five years, five months, two weeks, four days; 47,832 hours.
Five years, five months, two weeks, and four days that I’ve truly lived.
Truly and fully lived with the ones I love the most at my side.
47,832 hours spent with the reasons for my existence.
I’ve know from damn near the moment I saw this beautiful creature walk into that ballroom all those years ago, that this woman was going to mean trouble for me. I saw her, and it was like my eyes opened for the first time. I wish more than anything that I hadn’t wasted so much time. I wish I would have flown from my seat, up the stairs to meet her. I should have wrapped my arms around her, kissed her endlessly, and begged her to marry me right then and there.
I still feel the pain and torment of the time I’d let her go.
It haunts me in my dreams, a dark and scary world where I exist without her light to guide me through. Every time I wake up to her loving arms around me, her hair cascading down over me, she steadies me. My world turns only with Rachel’s help.
I know I’ll never make the same mistakes again. I know now what life with her, long and happy, is truly like, and nothing will ever make me leave her side again.
God, Mother Nature, and the universe itself tried to keep us apart, but we showed them just how written in the stars we truly were. Rachel’s ferocity bent their will, and the last five years, five months, two weeks, and four days have been nothing but pure, unadulterated, unshakable happiness.
“Calvin, are you sure about this?” Her voice always brought me back out of my own head.
I chuckled at her, shaking my head at her worried expression.
“Do you honestly think I’d let you try if I wasn’t one hundred and twenty thousand percent sure?”
She crinkled her nose adorably and shook her head as she bit into her lip.
“No, but I’m still a little…I don’t know.” She shrugged.
I put my hand on the back of her neck and pulled her over to me, tipping her head back to make her look into my eyes. Her beautiful, crystal blue, dazzling eyes set in that beyond perfection face of hers. “It’s alright to be nervous.” I assured her confidently as I rubbed my hand up and down between her shoulder blades. “I certainly was before I did it for the first time, and it has been so long since you gave this all up.” I reminded her.
I’d been purely petrified before I’d tried, even though I trusted the science.
She inched up on her toes and kissed me gently.
47,832 hours of her kisses and they never lose their power.
“I haven’t regretted it a single time.” She whispered to me sweetly. “I’d do it over again.”
I sighed in relief. Even though she’s told me this plenty of times over the last five years, I always fear that the decision she made in the heat of the moment might eventually come back to haunt her after the threat was gone and nearly forgotten and she was still cursed to the vampire life. It never hurt to hear her tell me otherwise.
“Come on.” I smiled, holding out my hand to her and walking towards our door.
Rachel stalled, biting her lip some more. “I, um.” She mumbled, then her eyes lit up and she turned back. “I forgot my earrings.” She called. “Be right back.” She flashed out of the room.
I knew she wasn’t worried about her earrings. She was just stalling some more.
She wasn’t ‘right back’ either. She was clearly taking her time looking through her things in our room. I stood in our living room and looked around at all of our family photos on the walls.
Mine and Rachel’s candlelit wedding ceremony from four years ago, the picture of Rachel in her gorgeous lace dress holding Rose in her matching lace flower girl dress will always be my favorite. Then there were the pictures from last Christmas.
Rose’s eyes as big as saucers as we took her outback to the newly built stables and she saw Papa Pedro walk out with her very own white horse who she fittingly named Kingsly.
Pedro does his best to sneak away on holidays to come and visit, and he discreetly keeps me in the loop on all things happening in Castrum de Petra. I was surprised after the first few months away when I found myself missing it at times, but those woes are easily forgotten anytime I look at Rose or Rachel.
Pedro is a good king. Heavy handed when necessary, and easily likable. After the debacle that Patrick made out of mine and my father’s rules, the people were happy to try something new and they for the most part rallied under the coupe.
I heard Rachel’s slow footsteps coming back into the room and I chuckled when I saw her.
“What?” She asked, furrowing her brows.
I shook my head. “You still aren’t wearing any earrings.” I pointed out and she tried to hold back her smile.
“Oh, right.” She nodded, then went to turn back to leave again but I flashed across the room and stopped her.
“Enough stalling, Rachel.” I smiled. “Aren’t you ready to get out of this basement?”
She shrugged, the white strap of her little springy dress falling off of her freckled shoulder. “You have to admit,” She smiled innocently. “It’s quite a nice basement.” She countered and I narrowed my eyes at her.
Shortly after getting out of England and saying goodbye to Pedro, Cromley, and Renard, the rest of us moved to Connecticut, the state in the US with the smallest concentration of vampires.
Pedro sent us plenty of money to work with and we bought a nice ranch house on five acres of land. The house had a full basement, and Rachel oversaw the renovations to make it into a homey apartment below the main house. Logan and Rose live upstairs while Rachel and I reside below. Octavia spent the first few years going back and forth between here and serving with Pedro, but last year she and Logan finally made it official, having a small intimate ceremony and she moved in permantly afterwards.
I slid her strap back up, ignoring the feeling of her skin against my fingers because I didn’t need to give her any other way to distract away from what
we were doing. “You’re the only woman I know who can kick some major vampire ass, and then also be afraid to walk up the stairs with your husband.”Kindly share out stories from generalloaded.com using the floating social media icon buttons on the bottom of the screen
“I’m not scared.” She fired back, then stuck her tongue out at me.
“Come on, beautiful.” I cooed. “You deserve this.”
“Mom? Dad?” Rose’s voice called from upstairs. “Are you guys coming?”
As many times as I’ve heard it, being called dad will never get old.
Now I know I’m breaking Rachel’s rules here, but I want to speak directly to you, just for a moment. We’d planned to explain everything to you when you turned sixteen. We were all going to be there when your mom gave you this book she’s been working on for years. It is the story of us, how we came to be, and how much we all love each other and you. Your mother left nothing out, and the parts I added I tried to do the same. We wanted you to understand fully what the world you came from was like, and what finding the one your heart truly loves means. My beautiful, too smart for your own good, not so little anymore, Rose. You were supposed to find out the truth of you paternity on your sixteenth birthday when you finally are given this book that we’ve all poured our hearts and souls into, but in true Rose fashion, you figured it out too soon…
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Rose was only seven years old the night that she and I were at the movies in town. It had been a normal day, she went to school, then came home to spend time with Rachel and I. The movie was nearing the end, and we both reached our hands into the popcorn bucket at the same time. She giggled, looking up at me as she scooped up the last handful. She ate it all, then turned back to look at me, in the middle of the theater, she put her small hand on mine again and her face turned very serious.
“Are you really my dad?” She asked me.
I was glad I hadn’t been able to get any of the last of the popcorn, or I’d have surely choked on it. I was at a loss for a moment, she wasn’t supposed to know yet. I wasn’t supposed to be the one to tell her, and yet here she was, asking me point blank, her eyes looking to mine expectantly for my answer.
I didn’t want to lie. “Yes.” I said simply, watching her face carefully for her reaction.
I expected an onslaught of follow up questions, or for her to break into tears, or at the very least be angry for being lied to. Instead, she smiled, picked up her soda, took a sip, put it back and nodded. “I thought so.” End of discussion. She never brought it up again, but from then on out, she called me Dad, and Logan continued to be Daddy.
“Dad? Mom?” Rose called again.
I turned to look at Rachel, holding her face in both of my hands.
“This is our new beginning.”
Rachel sighed happily into me and smiled. “Let’s do it.” She said confidently and I took her hand in mine, checking my watch. We have exactly three hours before we’d need to be back.
I followed Rachel up the stairs to where Rose was waiting in all of her riding gear. I was going to be in trouble in a few more years. She looks more and more like her mother every single day. Lord help the first boy who tries to come here to take my daughter out.
Rose grinned broadly when she saw us. “I’m so excited!” She clapped her hands. “You guys haven’t ever been able to come see me ride before.” She beamed, giving Rachel and I both hugs.
I’m sure that she knows that there is something different about us, but she either hasn’t put it together yet, or she just hasn’t gotten around to asking. “You’ll get to meet my instructors, and my friends, and I think we’re going to do barrels today.”
Rose could go on and on about her competitive horseback riding.
“I can’t wait.” I told her and she grabbed Rachel and I by the hands and led us right up to the front door.
Even Rose stalled for a second before she opened it, watching the both of us carefully. Rachel looked nervous, her whole bottom lip in her mouth, but she nodded to Rose.
She pulled it open, and the midday sunlight washed into the room, bathing Rachel and I in it. The warmth was intoxicating. I’d only tried the day walking once before, and I hadn’t stayed out long because I wanted to have the full experience with Rachel.
The team of researchers had made this major breakthrough only a year after getting the synthetic blood on the markets. Day walking is still a top secret mission that only a handful of people know about, and we have to be careful. There is still a lot of work being done on it, and we can’t do it all of the time, but Rachel’s birthday is a special occasion.
I couldn’t help but waiting out on the front porch and watching in amazement as Rose and Rachel ran out into the yard, chasing each other
around in the daisies and laughing. The two most beautiful girls in the world, inside and out. I’d never seen either of them like this. Their skin glowing and their hair reflecting the sun as it fanned out behind them. Their eyes so bright and warm as they giggled.
I stepped back into the house for a moment to grab the bouquet of flowers I’d hidden, then I walked out into the yard with them.
“Momma!” Rose called when she saw me. “Look what Dad has for you!”
Rachel turned around, her thin white dress spinning around her legs and she tilted her head and watched me walking towards her with her three dozen red roses. I held them out to her and she took them graciously, leaning her face down into them and inhaling deeply. “Thank you, Calvin.” She smiled up at me over them.
“Another birthday, countless more to go.” I told her, leaning down to kiss her full red lips.
“Happy birthday, Momma.” Rose cheered, hugging her side.
“Thank you both.” Rachel laughed glowing in the love and sun. She was so beautiful.
“Let’s go!” Rose called, running towards the car in the driveway. “Race you there!”
Of course we let her win, but it was a close call on whether I or Rachel was going to get there next. Since it was her birthday, I let her have it.
Rachel drove, all the windows down, the wind in our hair, and she and Rose sang along to the radio at the top of their lungs. It felt utterly normal. Just a
little family on the way to the riding stables, like it was a typical day in the life.
Rachel parked the car in the back of the lot, and Rose ran ahead of us to meet up with her friends to gossip about who was going to win today and to my dismay what the new boy in schools name was.
I walked around the car to open Rachel’s door for her, offering my hand.
“My lady.” I grinned.
Rachel rolled her eyes, but she took my hand. “Well, thank you, kind Sir.”
I put my arm over her shoulders and she put hers around my waist as we followed behind all of the other parents.
I stopped when I remembered what I hadn’t done yet. I spun her back to face me and I almost forgot what I was going to say when I looked down at her sun bathed face, and I reveled in the fact that she looked just as awed by me.
“Have I told you today how much I love you?” I asked her, and she laughed lightly, going slightly weak in her knees.
“I don’t believe so.” She shook her head.
I held her face between my hands and kissed her carefully, not caring if people stared. “I love you.” I whispered. “Today, tomorrow, next week, and for all of eternity. I do.”
“I love you.” She told me, her voice warm. “Today, tomorrow, next week, for all of eternity. I do.” She smiled at me, her eyes sparkling. “I love you up to the sky, the moon, the sun, and the stars.”
“I’m especially enjoying the sun part today.” I chuckled.
“Me too.” She laughed. “Thank you so much for this, Calvin. For everything actually.” She added. “I don’t think I ever thanked you for all that you’ve done. You mean everything to me, and without you my world wouldn’t be complete.” She professed. “You’ve given me the greatest gifts of all.” She told me and I held her tighter. “Because of you I have Rose, and because of you, I have eternity to spend with her and with you. I love you so much.”
I kissed her quickly, taking her hand as we began to walk again.
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“You know,” I smirked down at her as we went. “You forgot one other thing that you love dearly that I gave you.” I told her, and she began to crack a smile, probably already knowing what I was going to say. “I also gave you cobbler.” I reminded her.
“God, I love you, Calvin.”
“Even more than cobbler.” I smiled.
The sun on our faces, and her hand in mine, we disappeared into the crowd; just two people forever in love.
THE END.
Big thanks to Everyone who took their precious Time to go through the just Concluded novel :
{ ANYTHING For RACHEL: [by✒ S•V Painter}
#God_Bless
&
#STAY_Safe
