“Elijah,” she gasps, pressing a hand to her lips. I force air into my lungs and stare deeply into Bailey’s eyes.
“Since the moment I met you, I knew you were it for me. I loved you then, and I love you now and will continue to with each passing day. You and our daughter are the most important women in my life, and I want to show you just how much you mean to me by giving you my last name. So, Bailey Marie Renshaw, will you do me the honor of being my wife?”
I open the velvet box, showing her the beautiful diamond ring I had made just for her.
“Yes! Yes!” she cries, pushing from her chair to stand. Her eyes don’t even go to the ring, instead they stay on me. And then I realize that she said yes, she fucking said yes.
“Holy shit,” I whisper, putting the ring on her finger. “You, said yes.” I lean down, pressing my forehead to hers, relief flooding my veins.
“Did you think I wouldn’t?”
“I… I didn’t know.” Admitting my fears, my insecurities, has been hard for me, but when it comes to Bailey and our unborn daughter, I’ll do whatever I have to do, climb any mountain, fight any fear.
“I love you.” She presses up onto her tiptoes and kisses the side of my mouth. Her lips on me stir a primal need inside of me and I lean down, taking her face into my hands and kissing her until she can’t breathe. Everyone around us hoots and hollers, and when I pull away, I see Bailey’s very flustered.
I’d bet she’s wet with need for me. A huge grin spreads across my face and I have a feeling it’s going to stay there for a long time. I barely register the rest of the dinner, I am so full of happiness that all I can do is smile and think about the fact that she said yes.
She said yes. I can’t believe there was ever a time when I didn’t want this. I was so scared of being in a relationship, and now I’m getting married and have a kid.
Thinking back on it, I realize how ridiculous it was.
We get cake for dessert. It’s vanilla that has some kind of fruit filling inside of it. And it’s fucking delicious.
“Can this be our wedding cake?” I ask after scraping the plate clean with my fork.
“I didn’t think you were a guy who wants to be involved in wedding planning,” Bailey laughs.
“I’m not, I just know what I want and what I like to eat. I want to eat this cake,” I say. Then I lean in and whisper into her ear, “And I also want to eat you, right here, right now.”
Her cheeks turn bright red and all I can think about is tongue fucking her pretty pink pussy. I call for the check and everyone says their goodbyes. Asher, Bailey, and I stay behind and pay the bill before walking out together.
“So who is going to be your best man?” Asher asks as we walk out.
“Not sure, maybe Steve from accounting?” I shrug. Bailey gives me a playful jab in my ribs, which causes me to wrap my arm around her and pull her into my side.
“You fucker, you better make me your best man. I’ll knock Steve the fuck out, whoever the hell he is,” Asher warns and we all break out into laughter.
A moment later, that laughter comes to a sudden halt. As do we. All three of us stop walking and start staring at the man walking down the sidewalk toward us. Only then does he look up and see us, coming to a stop himself.
“Boys?” my father greets us, a look of shock overtaking his features.
When no one says anything for a few moments, he asks, “How have you been?”
Ever since my dad pulled that whole stunt with Kelly, neither me nor Asher has talked to him. He’s tried tirelessly to reach out, but I didn’t want to have anything to do with him after he betrayed me like that. Asher stuck with me, appalled by what our father had done.
“We’ve been great without you, thanks for asking,” I sneer.
“Come on, can’t we just get over this? You’ve been ignoring me for months. I’m your father, not some random chick in your life.”
“And I plan on ignoring you for a lot longer. I don’t want someone like you exposed to my family.”
“All I’ve ever done was to protect you. Protect you from your mother and from yourself. You’ll understand once you’re a father yourself…” He pauses briefly, his eyes flickering over Bailey. “Which I see is going to be sooner rather than later.”
I have the sudden urge to throw something at him. I don’t want him looking at her. Tainting her. Asher must catch onto my hostility because he opens his mouth to start talking.
“Look, maybe you thought you did what was right, but I can assure you it wasn’t right. What you did was fucked up to say the least,” Asher says, but in a calm voice. He has a much better grip on his anger than I do.
“She will betray you.” My father points at Bailey and I almost lose it. “All women do. Your mom would have betrayed you again as well. I shielded you from her, and I will shield you from everything else bad in this world. I’ve always done right by you boys. As your father, that is my job. You’ll realize that, soon.”
I freeze. Would have betrayed you? I don’t know why, but that one single statement sticks out to me like a brightly colored sign.
“What do you mean, ‘mom would have betrayed you?’”
“Your mom told you she wanted to see you back then.” He snorts. “Yeah right. She was going to do something again. I know she would have!”
My heart sinks into my throat. He can’t be saying what I think he’s saying.
“But she didn’t?”
“She would have!” my father repeats, fire in his eyes. “As soon as I found out that she was coming around the house to see you, I knew she was after my money.”
“What the fuck did you do?” I take a threatening step forward, demanding he give me the truth even if I know I don’t want to hear it.
My father’s face doesn’t change, he doesn’t flinch, in fact, he doesn’t react at all really. “I did what I had to, to protect you, to protect your brother. I did what any man would have done.”
Gritting my teeth, I repeat my last question, “What. Did. You. Do?”
“I made her go away before she could do something stupid again.”
“Made her go away? How do you just make someone go away? Did you send her away? Did you threaten her?” I’m so close to throttling him that I clench my hands into fists at my sides to stop myself. I can’t face some type of charge for beating the shit out of my father, not with a baby on the way, not when Bailey needs me, but that doesn’t mean I don’t want to do it, that doesn’t mean it’s not burning in my veins to punch him square in the jaw.
As if he can see my barely restrained anger, he smiles. “I told her to leave, or I would make sure she ended up in prison for taking my money years ago. The way I look at it, if she really loved you, she would’ve made another attempt to come into your lives. You’re adults now, surely if she wanted to see you, she could.”
“You piece of shit,” Asher spits, and surges forward, his fists flying through the air, and connecting with our father’s face before I can stop him. “You fucked with our heads, convinced us for years than our mother didn’t want to see us. Because of you, we couldn’t even be in a relationship. You fucked up both of our lives and blamed Mom.”