The final part of The Princess's Bodyguard series

No smut (not enough to count): Sam and Mercedes married and set up their nest on the coast. As three years passed, Sam worked hard to keep his wife happy, but he knew that, deep down, she saw their life as a little less than perfect.

Mercedes slumped over the countertop as she began to reread the recipe. "How do I stuff a chicken breast if I'm not allowed to cut it?" she growled into the book. She promised that she'd never buy another cookbook without pictures. She was so hypnotized by her reading that she missed the arms trying to reach around her.

The ten year old huffed when he realized that he couldn't reach the pan of sweets without help. "May I have a cookie?" he softly asked. He knew that there was enough to spare.

Unable to take her mind off the recipe, her body moved on autopilot. She dropped several chocolate chip cookies on a plate and sent the child off with "Please share them with your brothers." Her face dropped back into the book as the boy paraded off with his treat.

"I'm home," Sam cheered as he entered the kitchen from the garage. He kicked off his snow covered boots, but did nothing else before kissing his wife. He moved her book, knowing that she hadn't done anything new since he left. "I told you that the holidays aren't the time to try new foods and I wasn't going to let you worry this week." He dropped bags on the counter and reached out to cuddle her pregnant belly.

After walking away from the crown, Mercedes and Sam build a beautiful life together. They had a quiet home on the beach. They were raising three boys- soon to be four. In their three years of marriage, they had shared so much happiness.

She almost had everything she wanted.

Peeking into the bags, Mercedes asked, "What's this?"

Sam unpacked and separated the food containers and cases into two piles. Pointing to the smaller group, he announced, "This is tonight's dinner." He moved to the other group. "That is for tomorrow."

She buried her face into her husband's chest to cover her laugh. "You can't order Christmas dinner from a restaurant. That's cheating."

"But it's smart. We move it to a dish and heat it, no one will know."

The door into the kitchen flung open, and a scream overpowered the parents' conversation.

"Outside!" Matt, two years old, screeched as he tried to escape his older brother's hold. "I like outside!"

Cyrus was going back on his promise to watch after his brother as he played in the snow. "No, it's too cold." He warned the boy to stay still and ignored his pout as he removed his boots and coat. When they were out of their outerwear, he hugged his stepmother. The ten year old leaned down to her belly and whispered a greeting, and the mother smiled at the behavior that he had continued through her seven months of pregnancy.

Mercedes brushed his bangs aside and asked, "You just got here?" With confirmation, she began to call out for the other ten year old. She found him nibbling on a cookie as he worked on a worksheet at the dining table. "Malcolm, were you in the kitchen a minute ago?"

He nodded.

She smiled as she slid into the chair beside him. "You asked for a cookie," she cheered. She covered him with kisses as he playfully rolled his eyes and nudged her away.

Like his doctors promised, Malcolm talked when he was ready. He was far from being a "blabbermouth," but he spoke up when he decided it was needed. His voice was mostly saved to joke with his stepbrother. He had become immune to the way his mother exaggerated his words, but felt proud that his voice could put a smile on her face.

Malcolm was ordered to put his schoolwork away and take time to play before dinner.

That night's activities were usual to Mercedes. After dinner, she settled in to watch a movie with her boys. She always fell asleep during the movie, but the further into her pregnancy, the less fight she had to stay awake; she didn't make it through the first scene that night. She'd get to enjoy her nap while her husband put the kids to bed before returning to get her.

Sam was late to do his last activity, but still happy to do it. He helped her to their room. Before he could get her into bed, he was pulled in for a kiss too passionate to be their feathery goodnight kiss. He leaned away, and her silky lips moved to his jawline then his neck. "You're tired. You need to get some sleep."

"I need you."

He chuckled and took her face into his hands. "I have a lot of gifts to wrap." He gave a quick peck to her lips. Like many parents were telling their kids that night, he promised her, "The sooner you go to sleep, the sooner you can have your surprise." He didn't give her the chance to argue before he closed himself off in their walk-in closet.

She groaned at her inability to fall back asleep. She decided to check on the kids; Cyrus first because his light was still on. As she opened the door, the boy rushed across his room, but she didn't miss the bag that he kicked under his bed. Leaning against the doorframe, she asked, "What are you doing? It's almost midnight."

"Oh, um, just getting ready for bed," he lied, sliding under his comforter.

Mercedes could see through him as if he was made of glass. "I can't sleep. Do you mind talking to me for a while?" She sat across from him. "We have a lot of catching up to do. Two weeks feels like years when you're gone."

He shrugged, "There's nothing to talk about."

"So you don't want to talk about it?" Her heel kicked back and hit the hidden bag. "It's hard to talk about a lot of things, but if it really hurts you or makes you feel a way that you don't like, it's good to talk to someone that loves you." She preached of a lesson she had to learn the hard way.

Cyrus lowered his blue eyes and chewed at his bottom lip.

Soft, but straight to the point, Mercedes asked, "Are you thinking of running away?"

He waited a moment before nodding.

"I understand. I ran away plenty of times, and I was a lot older than you," she admitted with a giggle. "I thought if I could get away, then all my problems- I knew they wouldn't disappear. I thought they would stay where I left them, but they found me wherever I went. They didn't leave until I figured out what I needed to do."

He murmured, "But I don't know what to do."

"It's hard to get help if you keep it inside… Someone really smart took the time to teach me that."

He finally found the strength to look back up at his stepmother. "I don't want to go back to school." He wasn't going to ruin his family's holiday, but he couldn't stand to see Monday morning. "I feel stupid there."

Mercedes quickly argued, "But you're not. Having dyslexia means that you learn things in your own special way. You need teachers to be patient with you."

"Malcolm doesn't go to school. Why can't you be my teacher too?"

She frowned at the sadness in his eyes. "I could ask, but I can't force your mom and dad to take you out of school." She warned him that there were downsides to being homeschooled. "Your parents know what's best for you. Maybe meeting new people and having a few weeks off in the year is best for you. Malcolm doesn't have the chance to make new friends, and his only break from schoolwork is his weekend."

"It's what I want," he declared. He forced down a big gulp and asked, "You're not going to tell my dad that I wanted to run away, are you?"

She shook her head and promised, "As long as you don't do it. You'd break all of our hearts if you left." She smiled and gave his cheek a few strokes with her thumb. "Get a good night of sleep and tell me if you feel the same tomorrow." She tucked him in for a few hours of sleep before the excitement of Christmas morning took over the house.

To Sam, Christmas had taken on a new type of magic as a father. The kids were playing with their toys. His wife was relaxing in his arms. His dinner was in the oven.

Then he got the call that Mercedes' gift had arrived.

He led her to the front door and ordered, "Close your eyes."

Mercedes filled her body with a single breath and followed his command. She heard the door open, and before she could question what was happening, she was squeezed between a pair of long arms that gave her a warmth that could only come from her brother. "Miles," she called into his shoulder. She leaned back, but couldn't let him go. "You're- Wow."

Twenty years had passed since they were last together, and it took P.I. Stacey Evans twenty-four hours to discover that Miles' life was seventy minutes away from his sister's.

Miles introduced his husband, and when Mercedes began to introduce her family, he promised, "Sam told me everything." He greeted their children. He slid the older boys money and stopped his sister from arguing. "Let me be the cool, rich uncle that I had to wait all these years to be," he laughed; the real estate business was good to him.

Listening to the timer, Sam excused himself to get dinner out.

Miles' husband volunteered to help. "I'm a wiz at setting a table." Loving his husband's smile, he encouraged the host, "Let them be alone for a while."

As Miles followed his sister to the corner of the sitting room, he peaked over his shoulder at the men leaving for the kitchen. He sat and poked, "If I was told that you ran off with a guard, I would have guessed Puckerman." His smile remained as he watched Mercedes sit back and unconsciously begin to pet her belly; his younger sister was in her fourth pregnancy, and he finally got to see her glow in person.

"And I would have thought that you'd be married to that director."

He huffed as he remembered how fast that flame went out. "When Dad hated him, I needed him. When I could have him, I didn't want him," he explained, making his sister frown. "It's not that shocking, Mercedes. You and me, we were hell-bent on doing everything that Dad told us not to. Maybe I used him as an excuse to do what I had wanted to do for years.

"I know I married the right person. He's a doctor, and he likes to volunteer… Before him, I never met someone so friendly but awkward. It's cute until we start getting looks for creeping out homeless people." He cheered that his brother-in-law helped spare them from the stares that holiday. "Maybe you and Sam could bring the boys to help at one of the centers. It's not a lot of work, and the people are nice."

She agreed but asked, "No one recognizes you?"

"The people I'm around have too many problems to care if the person listening is dead or alive."

The two could talk for hours, but Mercedes had to ask, "Did you feel any regret for leaving?" She decided to get the question out of the way early. It always floated around in her head when she thought about Miles.

"Only for leaving you behind," he admitted. "When you took off, and everyone in the country went on alert to find you, I was scared. I tried to think of all the things Dad could have done to make you leave without taking help from anyone, but then you came back and married Tank, who popped up out of nowhere. You two looked happy, so I focused on getting my life together.

"I kept up with you online. I didn't worry until a few years ago. You disappeared again. Your name was taken off all the official royal websites. They cleared all the pictures of you and Little Malcolm." He leaned into her direction and continued, "I thought about if you had left and gave up the crown, but it didn't seem right. After all the training and work you did, after all the years with Dad, you gave up becoming queen?"

She promised him that she had thought long and hard about her decision. "Having peace was more important. I was never going to find it there." She looked out at her kids, and Matt caught her eye as he bounced and danced to a song that played from his toy. She knew what her sacrifices were for. "Whitney will be a great queen… Maybe sooner than we know."

Miles gasped, "Is Dad sick?"

Mercedes took her brother's hand to calm him. "No, he had a check-up last month, and the doctor said that he's still the picture of health." Every phone call she received from her father, she listened to him brag. She explained, "He doesn't have to be sick to pass her the crown, but I told Whitney that she couldn't be queen until she finished college. I thought I was putting off her coronation until she was at least twenty-five. I didn't expect her to graduate high school early, and now she's breezing through college, thinking of choosing an additional program for next year."

The girl was smart, no one could deny that.

"I had to put my foot down and make rules. If I had just left, Whitney would have felt that she won. I couldn't let her think that after what she did. I- " She stopped. It was a mix of her rambling and being comfortable with her brother that made her slip up. She liked to keep that night buried- a night she didn't remember most of. "I don't care that it was just fruits and grasses. You can't do that to people."

Telling the story of the spiked drink didn't make her cry or feel angry. She only felt disappointed. Her brother had taught her to be careful with people that offered her drinks in nightclubs, but she didn't expect her own daughter to be the violator.

Regardless of her mindset, tears always lined her low lid when she admitted, "I still love her, and I miss her so much." After leaving the palace, Mercedes visited, but the princess was always too busy to talk. She was only given a few minutes to congratulate her at her high school graduation, and then Whitney left for college in her father's home country. The mother couldn't get her calls returned after that.

Miles promised, "Whitney isn't the first person to do something dangerous for the crown." He could have told her the story of the bloody night that got their family to the throne, but he didn't have to go back that far. "You were too young to remember that we had an uncle. He was Dad's twin."

In their late teenage years, the twins fought daily. It was easy to assume they were arguing over who would get the crown, but the witnesses that had to listen to them swore they didn't know what the boys were going on about. Each fight was worse than the last, and one day, the older brother stabbed his twin in the chest; the jab was opposite to his heart and too shallow to catch his lung. He was labeled "sick in the head" and locked away, leaving no one to stand between the younger twin and the power of ruling the country.

His blood boiled as news channels repeatedly covered how beautifully his brother's life fell into place. Full of anger, he referred to his first nephew as a "thing born of demon seed that needed to be suffocated in his bed." Watching the country wish their princess a happy fourth birthday was his breaking point. He took plenty of time to plan his escape from his prison but not as much to plan to get to his family. His life was ended by a royal guard as he tried to creep into the palace.

Mercedes' mouth hung open through the entire story, and when he finished, Miles laughed at her expression.

"I can tell you so many more twisted stories, but they're all about one sibling refusing to believe that the other is better." He huffed. "We might have been the first ones to never fight over the crown because we were always told that Malcolm was the only one fit to have it. As bad as it seemed, Dad saved us… because Malcolm would have caught and killed us in under a minute. He liked to read books all day, so I don't know why God made him as fast as he was," he joked. He was happy to see his sister's smile return.

He was ready to close the darker chapter, but assured, "I don't have to meet Whitney to know that you did a great job raising her. She made a mistake, and every kid does stupid stuff." He couldn't keep his laughter in as he started, "Remember when we…"

They went through the rest of the day floating on air. They talked through thousands of topics and shared every little detail of their new lives. When the night ended, they frowned at their goodbyes. The siblings promised to call each other often, and Miles liked the idea of hosting the next gatherings- but only when the days were warm.

Sam insisted that he could clean up the holiday cheer alone. After he was finished and had checked that the kids were deep in their dreams, he found his wife at their bathroom sink. He kissed her cheek that was exposed as she brushed her black hair back. He teased, "Is it too late for me to unwrap my gift?" He reached for the knot in her robe, but Mercedes pushed his hand away.

Of all the things that she took from her talk with Miles, one quote made her doubt her husband: "When I could have him, I didn't want him." Mercedes promised that she always has and will continue to love Sam Evans, but his actions didn't make her feel the love he had before. She swore that he gave her just enough kisses to keep her from whining and he took months to build up the nerve to give her sex that night.

The husband denied it all and tried to kiss her pout away. He admitted, "I think about sex with you a lot- like, all the time." He promised that the only reason he neglected her was because he was putting all his energy into planning the holiday. "It's one day, and I wanted to make it as good as you make the others."

She gave him a deep and slow kiss, and unlike the night before, he didn't fight his enjoyment.

Sam stripped her out of her robe and dropped it to the side. He turned her to face the mirror. From behind her, he flattered, "How do I not love you?" He ordered her to look at her beauty, and his eyes followed the reflection of hers until the shine of her smile put everything around them into the shadows.

Mercedes pulled his touch to her rounded belly and asked, "So you still love me even though I'm moody and I can't see my toes?"

He started to nod at her first word. "You're amazing. You always will be." His hands released her to work on his pants, but his kisses began on a wild trail on her neck and shoulder. He helped her angle and balance her body to accept him, and he adored the sweet moan that pushed out of her as they became one.

The couple put no limits on showing their feelings, but the worst part of making love all night was waking up the next morning.

Mercedes groaned as Sam shook her shoulder. "Ten more minutes, please. I'm still tired." She moved his hand and snuggled the covers up to her neck.

"Someone is here to see you," he smiled.

"Who did you invite?"

He refused to spoil the moment, but announced, "She surprised me too."

A silvery voice floated through the air and caused the mother's heart to ache as it overflowed with joy. After giving gifts to the two boys, Whitney sat with her back straight and her legs tightly held together at an angle- like a lady. "I don't know what little boys like. I assumed a toy with lights and loud sound effects that would make me cheer that I don't live under the same roof as it." Her smile quickly faded when she caught the boys sneaking a sideways glance to each other. She pointed to the neglected gift on the coffee table, and she warned, "There's a board game if you don't like the toys."

Beginning to tear through the shiny wrapping paper, Cyrus approved, "I like it."

Malcolm slowly traded his gift for the one on the table and moved it into his lap. He peeked up at his sister, and just as he thought, she was watching him. "Thank you," he murmured. He turned to Cyrus and waited for him to steal the attention like he naturally did.

Cyrus hopped up and admitted, "I got you a gift too, but I have to go find it, okay?" Before she could respond, he agreed, "Okay." He rushed out of the room, dodging his father to get up the hallway.

Although she noticed the adults, Whitney tried to make a conversation with her brother. "How's homeschooling?... Is Mom a good teacher?... Are there any books you like?..." She frowned at every head shake and nod. The harder she tried to melt him, the more awkward the pair felt. She took in a deep breath and agreed to give the boy his wanted space. "I hope you enjoy your game."

Approaching the parents, the teen promised to greet them properly, but only after she got one question out. Pointing up the hallway behind them, she asked, "Does he get coffee?" She was only half teasing. She and her bodyguard were let into the home by Cyrus, and she hadn't seen the ten year old sit still yet.

Sam knew his son too well, and confidently assumed, "He woke up early to sneak into the candy left from yesterday."

She nodded at the information and began her hellos. "I was supposed to come in yesterday, but there was a storm. Maybe it was for the best. The day after Christmas is unexpecting." The eighteen year old posed as her mother took in her presence, and after the woman had her eyeful, she pulled her into a hug. Into her hair, Whitney whispered only for her to hear, "I missed you."

"Really?"

Absence makes the heart grow fonder, and updates from her grandfather weren't enough to fill her need.

Whitney nodded against her shoulder. She felt her mother's hold tighten, and when she began to return the feeling, she remembered that her brother was between them. She warned, "If you squeeze me any harder, you'll hurt the baby." She ordered her release to get the couple their gifts. Beginning to shuffle through her bag for the small boxes, she admitted, "Honestly, they were for your anniversary. I got busy writing an article for the site, and I couldn't send them out on time." She returned to the two, but before she could pass out the gifts, she was taken back into her mother's arms.

She passed Sam his gift from under Mercedes' arm, and with her hand free, she began to pet her back. "If I visited more, would you be a little less physically affectionate?" She giggled as Mercedes' hair brushed her cheek as she shook her head no. "Maybe, you could tell me what you think."

"I don't know what to say," Mercedes sniffled, slowly loosening her hold.

She stepped back and pointed at her bag. "The last gift is for, um, the kid." She hadn't met Matt to have his name stuck in her head, and the family already had a new 'the baby.'

Her stepfather offered, "If you wait a while, you can give it to him yourself."

Her lips twisted as she began to contemplate her decision. Her fingers got busy by twisting at the gold elephant charm of her necklace; elephants were Tank's favorite animal, and they became his kids' favorite too. When the decision became too hard, she looked at the young guard that was forgotten at the door.

With only a shrug, he silently encouraged, "Do what you want."

Whitney deflated at the lack of guidance. When she turned, she noticed the hopeful twinkle that filled the adults' eyes. The teen realized that the couple would cherish every minute she gave better than if she had given them bricks of gold. She shared, "Grandfather isn't expecting me until dinner."

"I found it!" Cyrus crashed through the couple, but stopped to apologize to his stepmother and baby brother. He took Whitney's hand and dragged her back to the sitting area. His blood continued to rush as he watched the girl open the gift that he had held for a year.

Mercedes was pulled close by her husband, who knew she still had a few hugs left to give. She rested her head against his chest and looked out at their kids. Her body fell under an indescribable calm as the family she dreamt of was finally whole.

Truly, thank you for reading!

I felt so motivated to write this chapter. Y'all were right, there was a need for another. I tried to put a nice little bow on this cute family, and I'm happy to move into giving you stories again.