“I’ll take Kia away from you,” Vonetta said bitterly.
“You can try, but I think once a judge hears that you haven’t seen your daughter in almost a year, deciding who’ll get custody will be easy. Now I want you to leave. Take my advice and return to California. If you want to see Kia before you leave, call me on my cell phone tomorrow, and I’ll make the arrangements.”
Vonetta threw her head back and laughed. “Hell, do you really think I care about the kid? I just wanted to see you, and if I have to use her to hurt you, then I will.”
“And just how far will you go, Vonetta?”
A gloat came into her features. “As far as I have to go. I never wanted a baby anyway. Getting pregnant was my guarantee you weren’t going anyplace. So don’t get too cozy with your wife. No matter what you say, I can pull your strings as long as Kia is in the picture.”
“And you would use our daughter?”
“A woman has to do what a woman has to do. She’s my guarantee of keeping you in the picture, whether you want to be there or not. So get with the program. Either give me one hundred thousand dollars to be out of your and Kia’s lives, or dump your wife and take me back. Do one or the other, or I’ll take you to court for Kia, and I will win.”
Jamison smiled. “No, you won’t.” He then pulled his cell phone out of his back pocket. “I recorded every single thing you just said. Once a judge listens to you, he will see you are the unfit parent. You are not welcome at my grandmother’s house, so leave and do not come back.”
Vonetta lifted her chin. “You’re making a big mistake. Whatever your wife can do, I can do better.” She eased up to him and as if she needed to see whether she could still flame his desire. She reached up and pulled his mouth down to hers.
Jamison let her kiss him. You might have thought she had something to prove, but he had something to prove as well. Whatever feelings he once had for her were dead. When he’d had enough, he pulled back and took her arms from around his neck. “As you can see from that kiss, I have no feelings for you anymore.”
A smirk appeared on her face. “I bet you that your wife won’t think so. She was coming back into the kitchen when we kissed.” Her smile widened. “When there’s trouble in paradise, give me a call. I’ll make things nice for you like old times.”
A frown darkened Jamison’s face. “There won’t be any trouble in paradise.” He wished he could add Because I love my wife very much and she knows it. But he knew he couldn’t say that, because he hadn’t told Kendal how he felt yet. He hoped his actions over the last month had shown her she meant everything to him and that he would not wrong her like her last boyfriend had.
“I disagree there will be trouble,” Vonetta broke into his thoughts to say. “You didn’t see her face. I did.”
“And you think you have reason to gloat.”
“Yes, I do.”
He hoped and prayed she was wrong. “Goodbye, Vonetta. And since you’re so stuck on size, then hear this. Your size only proves you’re even less than half the woman my wife is. She has so many other things on you it isn’t funny.”
When she turned and stormed out of the house, Jamison drew in a deep breath, relieved that Vonetta was gone. He glanced out of the kitchen window and saw Kendal playing with the girls and some of his other younger cousins. He tried reading her expression but couldn’t do so. As far as he was concerned, she was everything Vonetta was not. She had cleansed his soul of bitterness and was showing him just how a marriage could be when two people respected each other.
And loved each other.
He wanted to believe she loved him as much as he loved her and that she wanted a real marriage just like he did. And he wanted to believe she trusted him enough to know he could never go back to a woman like Vonetta.
After walking to the living room to make sure Vonetta had left and locking the door behind her, Jamison headed out back, needing to talk to his wife. As soon as he came down the back porch steps, he moved straight to Kendal and took her hand in his. “Come with me for a minute.”
He didn’t stop walking until he was back inside the house and in his grandmother’s basement, the only place where he knew he could have a private conversation with his wife.
“You okay?” he asked her, still holding firmly to her hand.
“Yes, I’m okay,” she said, looking beyond him to something on the other side of the room.
He took his finger and lifted her chin so their eyes could meet. “I did not kiss her. She deliberately made it look that way and I apologize for—”
“No, don’t apologize. I know what she was doing and why she was doing it. Your ex-wife has issues, and I mean real issues. She doesn’t believe in showing respect to anyone.”
“I know.”
“And she doesn’t—”
Jamison reached out, pulled Kendal into his arms, and kissed her deeply, putting everything in this kiss that he hadn’t in the one with Vonetta. Moments later, when he released her mouth, he murmured, “Forget about her. Let’s talk about us.”
“Us?”
“Vonetta made me realize something today,” he said softly.
“What?”
“How much you mean to me. And I mean to me and not just Kia and Carr. “I love you, Kendal, because you are the one thing I know is real in my life. No pretenses, and you’re loyal. I can trust you, and it makes me feel so damn good knowing you trust me as well. Trust and love are great components to strengthen a marriage and make it last.”
Kendal tried to fight back the tears. “I love you, too. And what she said earlier about my weight and what she did with that kiss didn’t hurt me because over the past month you’ve convinced me that I’m all the woman you desire.”
“You are all the woman I desire, sweetheart, and there won’t be any time limit on our marriage. I want forever, not twenty-four months. What about you?”
Kendal wrapped her arms around his neck. “Yes, I want that as well.” She leaned in for the kiss she knew was coming. And just to think her happiness had started with that ad she’d placed in the paper.
What had started out as a simply crazy idea had ended up being something simply wonderful.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
BRENDA JACKSON is a die “heart” romantic who married her childhood sweetheart and still proudly wears the "going steady" ring he gave her when she was fifteen. Because she’s always believed in the power of love, Brenda’s stories always have happy endings. In her real-life love story, Brenda and her husband, Gerald, of forty years live in Jacksonville, Florida and have two sons, Gerald Jr., and Brandon.
A New York Times Bestselling author of over ninety romance titles, Brenda is a retiree who worked thirty-seven years for a major insurance company. She divides her time between, family, writing, being CEO of her own publishing company and traveling with Gerald. In 2011 Brenda, along with her movie director son, Gerald Jackson Jr, brought one of her love stories to film – Truly Everlasting. You may write Brenda at P.O Box 28267, Jacksonville, Florida 32226; her e-mail address at [email protected], or visit her website at www.brendajackson.net.
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