Fight For You (21 page)

“We are.” I hug her closer. “And I’m going to be even more grateful after we have cake.”

Caitlin rolls her eyes. “You and Juliet. She’s been trying to get her little arms elbows deep in that cake since she laid eyes on it.” She turns, scanning the crowd for her daughter, laughing when she sees the two-year-old dashing across the grass toward the cake with her daddy not far behind. “I’d better go give Gabe a break before she runs him ragged.”

“Tell her we’ll be right over to cut her a big piece,” Sam says. “We don’t want to keep our favorite tyrant waiting.”

“She is a tyrant,” Caitlin agrees affectionately. “Good thing she’s cute.”

“Crazy cute,” Sam agrees, smiling as Caitlin runs across the grass to scoop Juliet up in her arms, blowing kisses against her daughter’s cheek until Juliet giggles.

Sam has grown closer to all my family in the past year, but she and Juliet have a special bond. They are kindred spirits, strong girls who know what they want and aren’t afraid to let the world know about it. Though Sam has more patience. Most of the time.

“You didn’t tell her did you?” she asks, tilting her head to look up at me, the setting sun making her eyes sparkle, taking my breath away.

“You look like a movie star right now. I swear you do.”

Her smile shifts to the right. “That means you didn’t tell her.”

“I figured it could wait,” I say, kissing her forehead. “I don’t want to ruin the day for her. She’s going to be sad to see us leave, even if it is only for four months.”

“I know.” Sam lifts her chin, bringing her lips closer to mine. “But if we don’t have our adventure now, we’ll have to put it off for another twenty years.”

“Not true,” I say, kissing her, loving that she tastes like sunshine and happiness, exactly the way a bride should taste on her wedding day. “When they’re teenagers, we could leave the kids with Caitlin and Gabe for a few months and sneak off. Teenagers suck anyway.”

Sam smiles. “That’s why they need parents around, to keep them from sucking. And I’m sure Caitlin and Gabe will be busy enough with their own obnoxious kids.”

I bring my hand to her flat stomach, still finding it hard to believe our baby is in there, growing bigger every day. “I can’t wait until I can feel her kick.”

“Or him,” Sam says. “It might be a boy, a boy as gorgeous and wonderful as his daddy.”

I shake my head. “Trying to butter me up so you’ll get laid tonight?”

“Oh,
I’m getting laid tonight,” she says, eyes narrowing as she grins. “I have a letter from the doctor saying it is completely fine for us to have sex. I went to her office this morning and made her write it out, even though she thought you were crazy for worrying.”

“I’m not crazy,” I say though I’m secretly relieved. It’s been hell keeping my hands to myself the past week since we found out. Unexpectedly, knowing Sam is pregnant with our baby has given me a hard-on that won’t quit.

“You are crazy,” she says, hand drifting down to pat my ass. “But also very, very sweet.”

“Are you fondling my ass in public?”

“Yes,” she says, still grinning. “I’m allowed to do that now that everyone knows we’re married. It’s one of the perks. At least for the first year. Public butt fondling is forgiven if you’re a newlywed.”

I slide my hand around from her belly to her bottom, fighting to keep my body from responding too obviously to her closeness. “I didn’t know that. I like that perk.”

“I thought you might, but I—”

Sam doesn’t get to finish her sentence before Juliet collides with our knees, wraps her chubby arms around our calves, and howls, “Cake, pease cake, pease cake!” in such a pitiful way you would think the kid hadn’t been fed in a month.

“Yes, Jules, I’m so sorry,” Sam says, scooping Juliet into her arms with a laugh. “It is past time for cake. Let’s go get some. Right now.”

“Yay! Cake!” Juliet’s tears vanish, replaced by a big grin that makes her blue eyes sparkle just like Sam’s.

I stay where I am for a minute, watching my wife carry my niece across the grass to the small tent where our wedding cake sits waiting to be cut. The way Sam holds Juliet so naturally, slung low on her hip with a hand cradling Jules’ diaper-clad bottom, she looks like she was made to be an aunt, a mama.

She looks soft and sweet, but I know she is also a fighter and a survivor. I know she is as strong as she is tender and that I don’t have to be afraid that life will break her again, not as long as we’re together. And there is nothing I need in the world aside from that.

Aside from the one I love.

Halfway across the lawn overlooking the ocean, where the sun is setting slow, as if it hates to miss a moment of this perfect day, Sam stops and turns back to look at me and mouths, “I love you, too,” like she knows what I was thinking.

And I’m sure she does.

The End

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AUTHOR’S NOTE

One Beautiful Revenge
is by far the hardest book I’ve ever written. Not only because I care about these fictional characters so much, but because attacks like what happened to Sam are all too common.

According to the National Sexual Violence Research Center, young women have a 20-25% chance of being raped (or of someone attempting to rape them) over the course of a four-year college career. Many of these will be multiple counts of rape, committed by several men at the same time, and an alarming number of these attacks will happen at fraternity houses.

In real life, I would never advocate the kind of vigilante justice perpetrated by the characters in this book, but it’s past time for us to take a stand against the epidemic of sexual violence in our learning institutions, our military, and the world at large. By building awareness of the problem, supporting victims, educating ourselves on how to intervene in dangerous situations, and speaking out against rape culture, hopefully we can begin to bring about a real change in our world.

I’ve been talking about consent with my sons since they were toddlers. Even children too young to discuss sexual issues can understand that it is never okay to touch someone without their permission and that “no means no” and if someone says no, you immediately sever physical contact. As they grow older, we’ve talked about what to do if their friends make rape jokes, if they see a girl passed out at party, or if they witness someone initiating physical contact with another person that clearly isn’t welcomed.

As hard as these conversations can be, they’re necessary. At least twice a year, my children are taught by their schools to say no to drugs, but sexual education and sexual violence prevention are treated as taboo subjects. It’s time to bring these subjects out of the darkness. I believe that’s the only way to have hope of raising a generation of young men who would never think of violating another person and of young women who don’t have to head off to college with such nightmarish statistics hanging over their heads.

Knowing my readers the way I do, I’m sure I’m preaching to the choir, but I hope you’ll join me in making a pledge to speak out in favor of sexual education and sexual violence prevention in your local schools. Research has proven prevention education—especially in how to speak up as a bystander—works. And if we can save even one girl, any level of discomfort associated with speaking out is worth it.

Thank you for your time and your readership,

J.C.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

J.C. Evans writes dark, emotional love stories featuring smart, sexy women and the hot alpha males who love them. Her heroes rage against the machine and her heroines color outside the lines and her readers know to expect the unexpected. J.C. likes big questions, underdog-comes-out-on-top stories, wine, cheese, and hot yoga and has found her own happily ever after on an island in the Pacific with her retired Air Force husband and two sons.

J.C. Evans is the wild child alter ego of Jessie Caroline Evans, who writes sexy contemporary and small town romance under another pen name.

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