Raging Heart On (Lucas Brothers #2)(85)

“You’re having our baby.”

“I am,” she says softly, tears and happiness mixing in her eyes. In that moment, it hits me how beautiful she is, how blessed I am.

“I love you, Kayla Lucas.”

“I’m not a Lucas.”

“You are in every way that counts and… f*ck it. Let’s get married today.”

“What? Are you insane?”

“No. I want you to have my name. I want to be able to shout it to the world that you’re my wife.”

“White, you’re being crazy. We can’t.”

“Why can’t we?”

“Well, for one, Ida Sue will kill us.”

“She’ll get over it. Come on, sweetheart. Go crazy with me. Let’s get married.”

“You’re serious? You really want to get married today?”

“More than anything in the world,” I tell her honestly. Kayla stares at my face for a few more minutes as if she’s really deciding on just how serious I am.

“Okay.”

“Okay?”

“Yeah. Let’s get married!” she cries out, nodding her head in agreement. I might have just screamed “Yes!” at the top of my lungs. I’m not sure. I do know that I jump off the bed, taking Kayla with me, and I hold onto her as I spin her around. When we’re finished, I stare into her eyes, into the eyes of the one woman who owns me—body and soul—and I give her the words that I’ve never given another woman and never will.

“I love you, Kayla. With all of my heart, I love you.”

“I love you too, sweetheart.”

“There’s that softness again.”

“I have my moments.”

“I’ll be looking for them.”

“Sounds like a plan. You better let me down unless you’re planning on us getting married in the nude,” she says, and I let her slide to the floor.

“As great as that sounds, I’d have to kill the preacher for looking at your body, so that might not be a great start to our married life.”

“Yeah, I’m all for conjugal visits, but I rather little Keurig get to know her daddy without the bars.”

“Kayla, you are not naming our child Keurig. I forbid it.”

“We’ll talk about it. We have about seven months to decide.”

“It’s already…?? Holy shit.”

“What?” Kayla asks, confused.

“We’re going to be parents in seven months?”

“That’s what they tell me.”

“We have to buy a house! We have to have a nursery and a big front yard. We’ve got so much to do.”

“Then I guess we better get busy.”

“Well, what are you waiting for, woman? Go get dressed!”

“Yes sir,” she laughs, heading off into the bathroom.

“Repeat those words to me tonight, Kayla Lucas, and I’ll make sure to reward you.”

She stops and turns to look at me, shakes her head, and gives me a full smile… a smile a man would fight a war to see every night.

I’m a very blessed man.





EPILOGUE


KAYLA



Two Years Later.



“There you are! We were getting worried. You’re late,” says White when I walk through the door. I stop for a minute, frozen by what I see. White’s lying on the floor with little Max pulling at his hair. She has her daddy wrapped around her fingers. This never gets old. No matter how many times I see it, it’s more precious, more beautiful every time.

“Mommy!” Max squeals and I laugh, bending down to pick her up as her chubby legs take off running towards me.

“How’s my pretty baby?” I coo, giving her wet kisses and making her giggle.

Ida Maxine Lucas is the light of her parents’ lives. She came into the world kicking and screaming, instantly demanding attention, and nothing has been the same since. I knew from the day we found out she was going to be a girl that I was going to name her after Ida Sue. The Maxine I demanded, just because White was convinced if we had a boy I was going to name him Maxwell. I had to show him it didn’t matter if it was a girl or a boy; I could still surprise him. He caved after a little bit of convincing—a job that I loved doing and was almost disappointed when he caved.

A lot of things have changed in the past two years. We’ve moved close to Ida Sue and the rest of the family. In fact, we’re just a few minutes away from Gray and CC’s. We have a big house with five bedrooms because White says we’re going to make sure we have the big family I always wanted, and we’ve both been working towards that. I smile as Calder walks in from the kitchen.

The adoption of Calder Lucas just became final last month. He was a boy who went to the school that I teach at now. He’s been living with us for a year, but it’s been a long and hard process to make him ours. He’s twelve and he’s been through hell and back, thanks to his drug-addicted parents who abandoned him. He’s slowly learning to open up and trust us though and his hero worship of White is growing every day. But then how can he keep from viewing White as a hero? He’s mine and that just becomes clearer the more time we have together.

“Hey, you’re just in time for dinner. Dad and I cooked together tonight,” Calder says and my heart stops and then beats erratically. My eyes flash to White and he’s grinning from ear to ear. I know we’ll talk about it more tonight, but right now, I have to act like nothing has changed, even though it all has: Calder just called White “Dad” for the first time!