Broken Course (43 page)

He gives me a suspicious look as tears fill my eyes. Immediately standing, he heads over to pull me into a warm Leo James hug.

"Are you okay?" he whispers.

"Yeah. I really think I am," I choke out, and never have words been truer.

Three months later…

"I DO," Sarah says through a mixture of laughter and tears.

"I now pronounce you husband and wife. You may kiss your bride," the minister announces.

I quickly follow his direction, pulling Sarah in for a kiss. She keeps her mouth closed and denies my tongue entry, laughing as I try to force it on her.

She leans away, wiping her mouth on the back of her hand, and asks the minister, "Is it too late to return him?"

"I’m afraid so," he replies.

"You hear that? You are
stuck
." I laugh, dragging her in for another quick kiss.

Liv giggles from beside her.

"Oh you think that’s funny?" I say to Liv, who is all but glowing in a pale-purple dress that’s tied at the waist with a bow. I scoop her up into my arms and blow a raspberry on her cheek. "Now
that’s
funny." I begin to tickle her.

"Daddy, stop!" she calls out.

Even though she’s been calling me Daddy for several weeks now, it still gets me every time.

"Okay. Okay." I put her back on her feet.

"Come on, Sarah. There’s cake inside!" She grabs her hand and drags her down the small makeshift aisle.

Sarah and I got married in the patio garden of a downtown restaurant. One night while walking home from dinner, Liv spotted the small fountain and wanted to go in and check it out. I dug a few pennies out of my pocket and she tossed them in. It was then that she turned to Sarah and told her that she wished for us to get married. Until that point, I hadn’t realized that she even knew we weren’t. And honestly, our lives had been so busy becoming a family of three that I’m not even sure Sarah and I realized that we weren’t either. We felt like a family. No paper was going to change that. But in that moment, nothing had ever been more important. I dropped to my knee and asked Sarah to marry me all over again, this time with Liv laughing and clapping beside me. Of course she said yes, and less than a month later, here we are, in that same little garden, only now the three of us share a last name.

"Oh my God. I can’t believe she actually married you," Erica says, pulling me in for a long hug.

"Babe, are you crying?" I tease.

"Shut up," she mumbles, releasing me.

I glance up to Slate, who is standing behind her holding baby Adam. Sarah is standing just a few feet away with Emma and Caleb, watching Liv try to pick up Collin like a baby and laughing when he wants absolutely no part of it. Liv bonded quickly with Emma. She loves Collin, and surprisingly enough, she actually warmed up to Caleb pretty quickly too. Last week, she spent an hour sitting on the couch beside him, adding more designs to the tattoos on his arms with a Sharpie. I tried to stop her, but Caleb just laughed and continued to point out empty spots for her to fill in. They were kind enough to invite Liv for a sleepover tonight to give Sarah and me some time alone.
God, do I have plans for those twenty-four hours
.

Having a child has been an interesting transition for us, but we are all doing the best we can. Jesse comes over once a week to hang out and talk with Liv. I can’t imagine what we would have done without her. She is absolutely amazing. I pay her every week, but it’s not nearly enough. No check in the world could adequately show my appreciation for how far she has helped Liv come in such a short period of time.

Thankfully, Brett never came back after that first night. He’s not a bad guy, and I have nothing against him. But hanging out with the ex-husband is pretty fucking low on my list of ways I’d want to spend an evening.

We still have our Thursday nights. Sarah thought it was important to keep those, and I can’t say I disagreed with her. However, now, with Liv in the mix, it has turned into more of a family night. We talk about our week while the girls cook. Then we end the night playing board games, which Sarah almost always wins. I think even Liv has learned to not bother trying to beat her. Sarah is not above cheating at Candy Land.

I snake a hand out to the side and tug Sarah into my side. "Hey,
ángel
." I lean forward, kissing her exposed neck. She picked out a simple, white, strapless dress to wear today. But like always, her svelte body transformed it into something that could have come straight off the catwalk at Fashion Week. There isn’t a word in English
or
Spanish that would ever do justice to how beautiful she looks today—or, really, any day.

"I’m hungry," she murmurs, turning her head to the side to allow me access to her neck.

"Well, dinner’s next, then cake, then we have to drop Liv off, but
then
I’ll be happy to give you something to put in your mouth." I graze my teeth across her neck.

"Leo," she moans.

I swear to God, if there were not children present, I would take her right here in the middle of a restaurant. Or at the very least make her come on my hand under the table.

"All right. Save something for the wedding night," Johnson says as he walks up, holding hands with Chris.

"Yeah, yeah, yeah." I turn to face him. "Glad you could make it," I joke because I saw him sneak into the back during the ceremony.

"Gee, sorry. My asshole of a boss scheduled me to work today, so I was trying to keep Slate from being mauled out front." He rolls his eyes.

"Hey. It was cost effective. You were both coming to the same place anyway. No sense in paying another man when I can make you work for free." I smile and he shakes his head.

The week after Liv moved in, I decided to move the Guardian Protection office out of our apartment. When it was just me living there, it was convenient and really saved me on overhead. However, now that Sarah and Liv live there too, it was time to make that apartment a home. So Guardian Protection officially moved to the top floor of a building a few blocks away. Sarah has been instrumental in the success of the business. She’s extremely good at the social side, and the clients love her. I kept my office in the security room, so she works from home most days after she drops Liv off at school.

"I want some cake," Liv says, pulling on my hand.

"You have to eat first, baby." I glance at Sarah, who is laughing with Chris. "
Si nos vamos ahora podrianos en secreto cojer un poquito de la guinda del pastel.
" (
If we go now, I bet we can sneak a little icing off the back
.) Her big, brown eyes grow wide and a smile lights her face. "But only if you tell me you love me first."

She begins laughing. "I love you, Daddy."

Yeah. That will never get old.

It’s funny how life works sometimes. The day I met Sarah Erickson James, I was living an existence that couldn’t even be considered a life. I was at absolute rock bottom. But I guess that’s as good a place as any for your life to begin again.

Every day is a struggle. That will never change. I still have moments when I forget to breathe, but it’s damn near impossible to focus on the darkness when your life is filled with lights as bright as Sarah and Liv James. Life is hard. That’s a fact. But looking over my shoulder at my wife, while being dragged away by the hand of a little girl I love more than anything in the world, I can’t help but feel like today might be the exception.

Easy.

12 years later…

"WHY DO I have to go?" I groan, rolling up the sleeves on the black button-down I just pulled on.

"Because I said so. Because Caleb is going. Because I’m really freaking happy and I want you and the kids to be there with me."

"Okay, okay, gorgeous. No need to get crazy and pull out dirty words like freaking." I laugh.

She levels me with a glare. "Come on, Brett. You told me you’d come with me. Slate and Erica will be there too. You know Madeline has a crush on Adam."

"Yet another reason why I should stay at home. Adam’s a nice kid, but I don’t want him anywhere near my daughter. Do you even know what thirteen-year-old boys think about?" I ask as she giggles from inside the closet.

We have been together for almost sixteen years now and that sound still silences the whole crazy world.

"He’s thirteen, Brett. Worst case is he might try to hold her hand."

"She’s eleven!" I yell, but it only makes her laugh louder.

"Hey, dad!" John calls, walking into our bedroom. "Wait! You’re wearing jeans."

"Excellent observation, son," I say sarcastically, giving him a quirked eyebrow in response.

"Can I wear jeans to this thing? Mom gave me some khaki pants, but they make me look like a dork."

I try to stifle a laugh and fail miserably. Poor kid might be eight years old, but he’s the baby. Jesse is having a hard time letting him grow up.

Jesse and I had a good bit of trouble getting pregnant. When we first got married, we decided to start trying for kids immediately. However, three years later, we were still chasing that dream. It should have been a time in our relationship that brought us closer together, but we both struggled with our desire to start a family in different ways. She did a lot of crying back in those days, and it damn near broke me when I felt so helpless.

Finally, we took a chance. We emptied the contents of our savings account and gave the miracle of In Vitro Fertilization a shot. It was hands down the best gamble I’ve ever taken. That one cycle of IVF gave us Madeline. Then, two years later, we thawed one of our frozen embryos and hit the jackpot again with John.

"No! You are wearing those pants. Don’t even try it." Jesse says, walking out of the closet.

"Sorry, bud." I tousle his shaggy, brown hair, and he walks out with a groan.

"Now, can you hurry up? I want to stop and pick up some flowers on the way."

"So what am I getting out of this?" I ask with a smile.

"Um, I won’t poison your food?" She offers me a sugary smile on her way to the mirror that makes me bark out a laugh.

"Well, I was thinking something a little more…um, stimulating." I walk up behind her and roll my hips into her ass.

"We don’t have time for that, so stop." She rejects my advance, but with one glance in the mirror, I can see her cheeks flash to pink.