Page 159 of Valor

“You could have. But I knew you’d want to come back.”

“How?”

“Lani Hunt doesn’t run,” he replies with an easy smile. “You’re a fighter straight down to your soul. And even though it’s hard, I knew you were going to want to come back if only to prove she didn’t take that from you too. Just as I knew you were going to want to face her. Didn’t keep me from trying to talk you out of it though.”

Tears fill my eyes. He knows me so well. My heart. My thoughts. It makes sense that we went straight from friendship to love. Which is wholeheartedly where I am now.

I turn toward him. “I love you, Gibson Lawson.”

He cups the side of my face and gently tugs me forward, thumb stroking my cheek as he leans down and rests his forehead against mine. “I love you too, Lani Hunt. And I intend to spend the rest of my life proving it to you.” He kisses me gently, then releases me. “But this isn’t the end of the surprise.”

“No?” I pull back.

“Nope.” With a grin, he steps out into the breezeway and waves at someone.

Seconds later, every single one of my brothers come into the apartment. Tucker is first, with his twin, Dylan, at his side. Riley comes through next, a wide grin on his face, followed by Elliot. And then Bradyn steps into the room, with the most adorable little ball of fluff in his arms.

The puppy turns to me and offers a sweet bark, and my eyes fill. “What is this?”

“This is your new service dog,” Bradyn says. “We’ll work together to train her, that way you’ll know all the commands too.”

Tears slip down my cheeks. This means I’ll never be alone. Even when I am, I’ll have this little one to protect me. And that means the world to me. “You got me a puppy?”

“We did,” Riley says. “Just wanted to make it clear it was a joint effort. Bradyn doesn’t need any additional big brother brownie points.”

Laughing, I wrap my arms around his waist. “You all get the points, Riley. Not that you guys needed them. You’re already the best brothers a girl could ask for.”

He hugs me back, a warm, safe embrace that feels like home.

After releasing Riley, I turn toward Bradyn and run my hand over the soft fluffy fur of my own little German shepherd. My own partner.

“Her name is Lima,” Bradyn tells me.

“Lima?” I smile. “My little Lima.”

“If you want to change it, you can,” Dylan says. “But given our dogs’ names, we thought it was fitting. Keeping to the phonetic alphabet and all.”

“It’s perfect,” I tell them, then take the sweet pup into my arms as I turn to Gibson. He’s watching me with a wide smile, his eyes full of love. “Thank you,” I say, turning in a slow circle so I can see my brothers too. “Thank all of you.”

“We’ll do anything for you, little sister,” Tucker says. “You know that.”

“I do,” I say as I hug the puppy close. She wiggles in my arms, so I set her down and watch as she makes her way around the living room, smelling everything.

I’d had my doubts when I first decided I wanted to come back to this place. Even as Gibson has faith that I’m strong enough to do it, I can’t say I share that same belief in myself.

But this is a reminder that I’m not alone.

My brothers will always have my back.

Gibson will always have my heart.

And God will never leave my side. Even when life is not, He isalwaysgood.

EPILOGUE: LANI

One Year Later

“You got that?” Bianca Williamson, my cousin’s wife, calls out as I lift two cases of medicine and carry them toward the private plane parked on a tarmac just outside of Hope Springs, Maine.

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