KEPT: A Second Chance Fairy Tale (48 page)

Four months later…

Lucy

“T
ELL ME I’M BEAUTIFUL,” SHANNAN
insists, standing in front of the mirror in our changing area. “Tell me I’m as beautiful as Corbin. I don’t want to walk out there looking cheap next to him.”

Nothing about my best friend is cheap.

“You look beautiful,” I reply, rolling my eyes for the third time. How she made my wedding about her is beyond me, but she has.

When Michael brought Dillon home from his first official baseball practice, his expression was ponderous. Dillon stood at his side, smiling from ear to ear, but said nothing.

“Lucy,” Shannan says quietly as we stand side by side, looking at each other in the reflection. “I’m losing you,” she whispers. “You’re getting married today.”

Again, all about her.

“You’re not,” I assure her. “I’m still me.”

Standing in her pink dress and silver shoes, Shannan turns to look at me. She grabs my arms and squeezes as if offering reassurance. “I’m so happy for you.”

“Me, too.”

“I’m heading out. One last check.” She smiles, ensuring I inspect her teeth. When I give the okay, she turns around for me to inspect the back of her dress, which dips far down, showing so much of her flawless skin. “Everything where it needs to be?”

“It is,” I tell her, but with more meaning than she could understand.

Michael’s proposal wasn’t a traditional one. He didn’t wine me, dine me, then pop the question. Instead, he was standing in the doorway of what’s now our home with a smirk I couldn’t place. He and Dillon had been out shopping, he said. He told me they found exactly what I’d been missing for too long.

Dillon giggled and I basked in the sound, but remained understandably suspicious.

When Michael came to stand in front of me, he dropped to a knee and pulled out a traditional black box. Rather than ask the question himself, he turned his gaze to my son, who clenched my right hand in excitement.

There, Dillon asked for him.

“Mom, he really likes you,” he said. The tears that pooled in my eyes fell across my cheeks as I looked from the man I’d come to love to the little man I always have. “He said he’s not my dad, but told me he’d be in my life like one.”

“Dillon,” I breathed. I couldn’t help the swell of my heart, along with more tears in my eyes.

“I think you should say yes,” he told me. “He makes you happy, and I like when you’re happy.”

My eyes moved back to Michael. He pushed the box closer to me, then opened it.

There it is.

My hope.

His promise.

Our forever.

“Dillon’s right. I do like you, Lucy.” Michael smiled so big through his words, I almost missed them. “I like you a lot.” He winked.

With that, my whole body shivered. Dillon squeezed my hand, but I didn’t look at him. I couldn’t take my gaze from Michael’s. Lifting the ring higher, he straightened his posture.

“Lucy, you drive me to the brink of my sanity, and not in spite of that, I love you,” he told me, still smiling.

I closed my eyes, taken back to all those months ago when I would’ve given anything for Michael to smile the way he was then. He had changed so much. Because the ghosts of our pasts were finally laid to rest, Michael’s soul was free. I couldn’t love him more. It wasn’t possible.

“Yes,” I agreed.

To be honest, I wasn’t expecting the proposal so soon. We’d only just moved in weeks before. I was certain Michael and I would have those awkward adjustments you hear of people having. Laundry duties being passed, closet space feeling unfair, and whatever else came with learning to live with another person.

We had none of it.

“Fuck, woman, if only you were my type,” Corbin breathes as he stands at the door and pauses to take me in.

My dress is simple but elegant. White satin frames all the places Michael’s memorized by touch. The hair he’s constantly threading his fingers through is drawn up, spindles of it falling here and there. A set of pearls his mother gave me hang around my neck, the same pearls Michael’s father gave to her on their wedding day. I cried when she draped them over me, telling me how thankful she was that I was in Michael’s life, soon to be part of their family.

“What’s your type?” I question, stealing a moment between Corbin and myself, mirroring one of the same conversations we’d had long ago.

“If you weren’t his,” he warns, walking to me with a smirk. “Well, I wouldn’t want you, but I know a few better guys for you who would.”

I punch his stomach and he laughs.

“Everyone’s ready. Are you good?”

Nodding, I answer, “Yeah.”

“Your dad isn’t what I, ah, pictured he’d be. Is that a fish hook in the front pocket of his jacket?”

Oh, Dad.

When I told my parents I agreed to marry Michael, it was more of a shock to my dad than my mother. I only see my dad about once a year, but he’s always faithful in staying in touch as much as his life will let him.

“He likes to fish,” I defend.

“At your wedding?”

“Shut up. Tell him I’m almost ready. Tell Dillon to behave. And tell Michael I love him.”

“Dillon.” He shakes his head. “Dillon has his shit together, Lucy. Your boy is out there calming Michael down as we speak.”

My eyebrows rise. “Michael’s nervous?”

Corbin shakes his head. “Not how you think. He’s wanting this done only because it
really
makes you his.”

I look into the mirror again, looking over myself one last time. I’ve been on my own so long, feeling the effects but never truly realizing how empty my life made me.

“I’m ready to be his,” I whisper to Corbin’s back as he starts to walk away.

Michael

When the music Lucy told me would play begins, I chance a look behind me at Corbin, who’s rolling his eyes. My best man has no better understanding of Disney than I do. However, you can bet Lucy was sure to explain.

“A Dream Is a Wish Your Heart Makes” is her life’s theme song, or so she said.

“It’s a passage through every little girl’s heart. In turn, it acts as a compass, getting her where she dreams to be,” she explained. “I wouldn’t marry a man who said I couldn’t have it played at my wedding.”

Whatever
.

Lucy can have anything her heart desires today. This is for her. I’m dressed up in a tuxedo, looking out into the crowd of people before us, wishing to find her face within it.

Lillie is sitting front and center, smiling proudly at me as she holds a Kleenex in her fist, dabbing her eyes carefully.

My mom and Deni are chatting back and forth, every now and then looking to me. Deni keeps giving me a thumbs up, knowing she’s driving me nuts, but doing it all the same.

Grace is dressed in frills of pink as she stands at Shannan’s side after throwing the petals to the floor as only she could. Her basket was empty halfway down the aisle.

When the doors open and I find Lucy’s father holding her close, I finally breathe a sigh of relief. She’s truly going to marry me. She’s going to be mine forever.

“You’re a bastard,” I hear Corbin in my ear, then feel the slap on my shoulder as he steps away.

I may be a bastard, but I’m in love with a woman who holds the power to change me, who loves me for all I am, and who has given me a family I never thought I’d have again.

Corbin, ever the pain in my ass, leans in again. “Her friend is hot. Shit could get interesting.”

Angry that I’m tearing my eyes from Lucy, I turn to him and hiss, “Cool it.”

My irritated expression is met with his feigned innocence.

Right
.

Once Lucy’s standing close, all others in the room fade away. There are no echoes of chatter, no music to drown my nerves, and no ghosts to threaten our future.

It’s just us.

After the pastor leads us through prayer, Lucy and I exchange our own vows. Our promises are rich in fulfilling a life we were meant to share. Her tears of happiness glisten from her eyes as she holds both my hands between us.

We’ve come so far.

The first day I saw Lucy pass my office door, I knew. The parts of me that wanted to deny her had somehow already known we’d eventually make our way here. Maybe our path wasn’t the easiest route to take, steep and unforgiving, but we made it.

Together.

Once the vows are stated and the pastor has offered the kiss, my hand rests against her cheek my thumb tracing the length of her jaw. I get as close as I can, then rest my forehead to hers.

The crowd has started to clap, but before closing up my forever, I steal one more moment. “You are my life’s reward. I was drowning and you saved me, Lucy.”

Her lips part for breath as I feel it on my face.

“Kiss me, Michael.”

And I do.

Five years later…

Lucy

“M
AYBE YOU SHOULD NAME HIM
Corbin. It’s a great name for a kid,” Corbin attempts to convince me as he leans his hip against my kitchen counter, watching me work. He’s also smiling from ear to ear while holding an olive I told him not to take.

“Maybe you should have your own kids, then you can name them whatever you want,” I answer, grabbing said olive and putting it next to the bowl it came from.

My stomach, holding seven months’ worth of pregnancy, brushes against his as I try to squeeze past him. He gives me an honest look of disappointment regarding the namesake veto, but doesn’t argue further.

We’re not naming our son Corbin. We’ve chosen Carsen, after Michael’s father. The man I have to thank for giving his son to me, if only by name.

“You’re cranky when you’re pregnant,” Corbin voices at my back as we walk into the living room where everyone is seated. “Bigger, too.”

Looking behind me, I give him a scowl, which he mockingly reciprocates.

“Where’s Michael and birthday girl Belle anyway?” he questions, coming to stand at my side.

When our eyes scan the busy room in front of us, we find Michael on the floor with our three-year-old daughter on his lap as Grace, now nine, leans against his shoulder. A colorful Disney book is open in front of them as Belle points to the pictures page by page, following along as Michael reads. Grace giggles when Belle pushes the pages down so her father can’t flip through them too quickly.

He’s still not used to his daughter’s, or her mother’s, love of Disney. At this point, I doubt he’ll ever be.

“Some men are born to walk this earth as fathers,” Corbin whispers in my ear before kissing my cheek and making his way to sit on the couch between Deni and her mom.

He’s right about that. Michael was put on this earth to love his children. When Belle arrived, I worried for a few reasons.

I feared that Michael would take one look at her and only see Caleb. She came into this world with his dark blue eyes and dark hair. The pictures I’ve seen of Caleb were exactly the same. They were both gifted with Michael’s strong physical traits.

Instantly, I took a breath of relief when he immediately grabbed her from the doctor, much to the poor man’s dismay, and whispered something I still haven’t had the privilege of learning in her ear. When I asked what he said to her, he told me those words were meant to stay between a father and his daughter. From that moment on, I knew everything was going to be all right.

I also worried how Dillon would accept a sibling. So far, he’s only played the doting older brother. Being eleven now, though, he’s starting to resent her always in his face, but in the quiet time throughout the day, I watch him with her. He’s protective and nurturing. Together, the two of them remind me of Deni and Michael. Even Michael recognizes the dynamic of their relationship being nearly the same.

Michael and Dillon have formed a bond just as strong as Michael has with Belle. Dillon goes anywhere with Michael that he can. Michael has yet to miss one of Dillon’s baseball practices. He adjusts his work schedule around games. They go to at least two ballgames a year together. According to Dillon, each one is more exciting than the last. Listening to the play-by-play after, loving his enthusiasm, I smile and nod, pretending to care.

“Hey.” Michael’s head lifts up and above the rush of people surrounding him in our living room.