She couldn’t see who the hand belonged to at first, but when the woman rose from her chair, her floral dress catching the breeze, she lifted her face to the sun, a beautiful peach flower in her free hand, making George gasp.
“It’s Effie…”
Dex nodded as he tucked her into his side. “It is.”
“Wait, is that David?” she almost squealed, joy filling her soul to the brim.
“Yeah,” Dex said warmly. “Yeah, it is.”
“Oh, Dex,” she breathed. “He came to Cabo to be with her?”
He nodded and smiled. “He did. She told him why she was coming, and he asked to be with her when she decided it was her time to go.”
Gripping Dex’s arm, her heart exploded with happiness. “How wonderful! But who is the woman with him?”
“David’s adoptive mother. She asked to come to support them both.”
How selfless. How supportive and loving.
George rested her head on Dex’s shoulder. Tears stung her eyes, but she was smiling. Effie, with the support of David and his adoptive mother, would be surrounded by love when she left this plane—so much love, and that was all that really mattered to George. That she leave knowing someone cared.
The trio walked down along the beach arm in arm, their footprints quickly washed away by the incoming tide. They passed palm trees, swaying in what George imagined was a warm breeze, their fronds bending and dancing on the wind as their soft laughter rose upward.
At the end of the long stretch, where little huts dotted the horizon, a man held his arms out and to David, embracing him when he walked into them.
“David’s husband?”
Dex dropped a kiss on her wet cheek. “Yep.”
As David’s husband joined the trio, they all linked arms and walked toward the huts, the butterball sun tucking itself into its resting place for the night, shining one last time on their backs before setting.
Effie stopped for a moment and held up the peach flower to the sky, and she mouthed the words thank you, before she dropped the bud in the ocean.
When they all faded into the distance, Dex waved his hand as though he were turning the page of a book and the scene disappeared, leaving them on a cloud, high above the world.
He tipped her chin up with his finger to gaze into her eyes. “You okay?”
Wiping her tears away, she smiled up at him. “I’m very okay. I’m so glad Effie told David, I could burst. She reached out, and that’s all that matters to me. She made a connection David will always have, that she’ll take with her when she’s gone. That’s a beautiful thing.”
Dex pulled her into his arms and kissed the tip of her nose, surely red from crying. “You’re a beautiful thing,” he said, before finding her lips and kissing her soundly.
Epilogue
Six months later…
One newly minted warrior-ish guardian angel who’d finally found her purpose and continues to grab everything she can by the balls (okay, not everything) and is responsible for starting a program for her seniors to foster pets and volunteer two hours a week at The Fluffy Gates Rescue; another guardian angel, hot as the day is long and kind to boot, who loves animals, who’d also found his purpose beside the woman he fell in love with long before she knew he wasn’t really a barista; an impossibly gorgeous vampire with a potty mouth who has a brand-new addition to her family by the name of Waffles; an elegant halfsie who’s fostering a litter of kittens and up every two hours to bottle-feed them like the good mama she is; a pretty blonde werewolf who’s donating her time volunteering in the brand-new section of the rescue for disabled and abandoned pigs, and loving it; a teddy bear demon who comes to the rescue once a week to play with the animals and take them to their vet appointments; a gentle, broccoli-loving zombie who proudly shows off his tech skills and heads up the online foster program; a very British manservant troll with blue hair who insists upon bringing freshly made food once a week to the adoptees prepared in his new Instant pot; an outrageously large angel with red hair who enjoys a bit of the hair of the dog and a smoke, all gathered on a beautiful summer day at a ceremony/picnic to celebrate two very special people preparing to receive their permanent wings (phew!)…
“Wings!” Nina shouted with a wave as the women made their way to the lush backyard through the arbor covered in roses at The Furry Gates Rescue.
George threw herself at Nina, giving her a hug and a sloppy kiss on the cheek. “Tower of Terror! I’m so happy to see you. Where’s Waffles?”
She hitched a thumb over her shoulder at the playpen, where the French bulldog played with the other animals from the rescue. Having only two legs didn’t stop him from taking life by the britches. Nina had a wheelchair made for him and now he zoomed around with the rest of the dogs, his tongue lolling from his mouth, happy as a clam.
And he adored Nina, Greg, Charlie, and especially Carl. Every night he cuddled with Carl, who read him a bedtime story. Nina texted her pictures all the time, and it never failed to make George grin from ear to ear.
“Hangin’ out with his buddies. So how ya been? I feel like I haven’t seen you in a fucking year.”
She linked her arm through Nina’s and pulled her to deeper into the backyard, where they had sectioned off places for the animals according to their species and special needs.
George grinned at her new friends. “You saw me just last week when you helped Wanda bring the foster kittens over for adoption day.”
“Oh, those little beasts,” Wanda chirped on a chuckle and a sigh, pretty in her floral button-down dress and floppy sunhat with a big pink ribbon around
