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“I’m so sure,” I say, laying my hand over hers and putting my recent movie education to good use. “Are you checking to see if it grew three sizes?”

Cami laughs. “You were never the Grinch. Maybe Scrooge! But you didn’t try to steal anyone’s Christmas, so⁠—”

I chance another quick kiss on her lips, smiling. “I mean, I’m pretty sure I just stole yours.”

“No. You made it better, Patrick. This might just be the best Christmas I’ve ever had.”

“And that’s saying something, considering you basically grew up in Santa’s village.”

Cami rolls her eyes, and we spend several stupid beats just smiling at one another, cast in the warm glow of the night-light of her childhood bedroom. Everything about the moment is soft, easy. Vulnerable.

The opposite of what my life was all the way up to the second I brought her into it.

And I tell her as much. Quietly, I tell her that she brought real light into my life. That I’ve always told myself I didn’t need a family, but being around the Morenos, and then her, changed my mind.

Something like relief passes over her face then, at the admission that I want to have a family with her. Before, thinking about taking the leap and having kids would have been terrifying. Now, it feels like the only right thing.

And it won’t happen tomorrow. I’ll have plenty of time to spend around this family, to learn from all the great dads around me.

“I love you,” I say again, because she’s here in my arms and I can.

“I love you, too,” she says, just as her sister appears in the doorway, announcing another movie for the two of them to watch in her bedroom.

“Good night,” Cami says, darting back to place a quick kiss on my lips. Under her breath, she whispers, “Are you sure you don’t want to marry me just so we can share a room?”

Holding the lapels of her pajamas and smiling against her kiss, I whisper, “I can’t believe it, but this Scrooge is already excited for next Christmas, Camille Aaronson.”

EPILOGUE

ONE YEAR LATER: CAMI

Ido my best not to fidget and mess with my hair, but it’s very difficult. Sitting in the back of the car, I keep crossing and uncrossing my legs, keep fidgeting and pulling out my compact to check my appearance in the mirror. I want to look put together. I want to seem like a completely different person from the last time the Morenos saw me.

“Hey,” Patrick says, leaning over and putting a hand on my arm. “Take a deep breath. It’s going to be fine.”

Snapping shut my compact, I do what he says. I take a deep breath. I tell myself that everything is going to be okay. Then, I lean over and kiss him, long and hard, until we’re both breathing a little harder than we were before.

“Good-luck kiss,” I say, laughing a little before I pull back and fix my lipstick.

Patrick wipes at his lips, a sort of goofy smile on his face as he gazes at me. The way he looks at me makes me feel like the most beautiful woman in the world. “Good-luck kiss.”

New York City flashes by outside our windows as we continue on our path toward the building downtown. This deal has been in the works for months now, but it takes a long time for these sorts of things to go through. Lots of legal work that needs to happen, a contract getting drawn up, negotiations going back and forth.

And now, after nearly a year of all that back and forth, it’s time for Patrick to sign the papers and finalize everything.

David was the main reason for it. Apparently, when he told his father he was going to buy the company, it was just to stall for time. After thinking on it, he realized he and Patrick were a lot alike. He wanted to talk to him, see if there might be a way for them to work out a co-ownership deal. But when Patrick finally got back to him after the holidays with me and revealed that he was actually planning on proposing, that changed Chris Moreno’s tune.

Of course, he was still upset that we lied. But he was much happier to find out that we weren’t nearly as good at acting as we claimed to be. And he was tickled over the fact that I told Patrick he had to wait at least a year to actually propose to me.

We arrive at the building and step out onto the sidewalk and into the cold air. I can’t help it; I tip my head up and take a deep breath of the frigid air. I’ve always wanted to see New York City at Christmastime, and now we’re here just a week before the holidays to finalize the deal before they come.

I tuck my coat around myself and take the arm Patrick offers as we walk inside. Once outside the conference room, I start to pull my arm out, to give him a kiss on the cheek and wish him good luck, but he holds tight to me.

“Where do you think you’re going?” he asks, brow furrowing.

“Uh…I figured I would just wait out here for you.”

“I think the lawyers are going to expect the co-owner of Moreno Toys to sign some papers, Cami.”