Total pages in book: 141
Estimated words: 134531 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 673(@200wpm)___ 538(@250wpm)___ 448(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 134531 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 673(@200wpm)___ 538(@250wpm)___ 448(@300wpm)
It hadn’t felt like that to me.I wasn’t one of those girls who dreamed of her wedding day. Who imagined the dress, the flowers, the groom.
I’d had enough weddings, grooms and marriages to last me a lifetime. My mother had ensured that. In fact, my dream had been to never get married. To never define my identity based on a man. Never have a man responsible for my security, for my happiness.
And look how that turned out.
“I don’t mind what the wedding is,” I answered honestly. “I want you there. The club. Violet, hopefully…” I trailed off, struck with worry about what my daughter would say to the news that I was not only divorced from her father but marrying an outlaw biker she’d never met.
My first instinct was to protect her from that at all costs. And in order to do that, I would either have to lie to her about the wedding, about Swiss, or I would have to delay it indefinitely.
Neither of those options were plausible. Neither were options I could live with.
I’d protected my daughter from enough, lied to her enough. I was no longer willing to sacrifice my happiness in order to do that. That was not a decision she would respect. That’s not the woman I wanted to be.
I hoped, prayed, that my wonderful little girl would be understanding. Would forgive me. I had to trust in that.
I blinked at Swiss who was watching me carefully, as if he were witnessing the wheels turning in my mind.
“The marriage,” I whispered. “That’s what’s most important to me.”
Swiss smiled then lifted himself up in order to lay a soft kiss on my lips. His eyes turned serious. “What about kids? Do you want more?”
I hadn’t been expecting that question nor the grave tone in which it was spoken. Neither of those things should’ve surprised me, though. It was a completely rational and necessary thing to talk about before committing to someone.
But I didn’t think of Swiss as a particularly rational person, or someone to tick off all of the necessary boxes needed before marrying someone.
Though it made sense.
He’d lost his wife and daughter.
He’d lost his child. Something I could not fathom. Something that you never recovered from.
That pain had stayed with him, so it made sense that he might not ever want another child. Might never want to know that pain again.
Beyond that, neither of us were particularly young. A child was hard work. Was years of hard work. All-encompassing but rewarding hard work. Swiss lived a particular lifestyle. He liked freedom, liked partying, staying up late, doing what he wanted.
I liked that too. I’d just discovered that. And for the first time in my life, I could make choices for myself.
My daughter was grown and out of the house. Of course I never stopped being her mother, but I’d entered a different season of motherhood. Did I want to start all over again?
With Swiss.
With a baby with his eyes, with his smile, seeing him hold that baby in his arms. Seeing him as a father.
“I don’t know,” I said honestly after processing for a while. “Maybe. I want everything life has to offer with you. And I know that a child deserves to have you as a father.”
Swiss’s expression was carefully blank. He didn’t speak for a long time. “I don’t know if I can do it,” he confessed hoarsely. “If I can face that fear.”
There was incredible, heartbreaking vulnerability in his voice.
I reached up to stroke his face. “Well, if you can’t, if you don’t want to, you don’t have to. I want you. That’s all I want. Everything else is just gravy.”
A ghost of a smile twitched the corner of his lip. “Just gravy, huh?”
I smiled, nodding. “You’re all I’ll ever need.”
His smile flattened. “You too, Countess.”
Eventually, we found our way back to bed. But even in Swiss’s arms, I didn’t find sleep for a long time. We had had sex unprotected. Not something new for us. When he learned I was on birth control, Swiss had been adamant about taking me ‘raw.’ I wasn’t one to protest that.
But I’d been in the hospital in intensive care. Then I’d been recovering from those wounds in a new home. Then I’d been pissed at Swiss. I hadn’t exactly prioritized getting my birth control prescription filled.
And we’d just had sex. A lot of it. In what could be described as my ‘fertile window.’
In the wake of everything we had just gone through, the choice very well could’ve been taken away from us.
That thought kept me awake for a long time.
Chapter Twenty-One
Kate
“So I guess I’m kind of… engaged?” I announced as we sat down. It was a statement of fact but also kind of a question.
We were at my house.
I was hosting girls’ night for the first time ever.