Marry Me Again (The Second Chance Love Series, Book 1)

by Hill, Teresa

  He'd hoped that before too long he and Rebecca and Sammy would be finding their own house to share.

  He wondered now if they ever would.

  "I've been wondering," she said, "what I would have done if you had given me a choice."

  Him or Brian the wonder boy?

  Tucker had never felt he could give her a choice. What if they had stayed together? They had probably been on the way to making Sammy as miserable as his parents had made him.

  She came a little closer, and he was glad he had his hands in his pockets, because he wanted, so much, to reach out and grab her, to hold her to him and never let her go.

  "I don't really know what I would have decided," she said.

  Tucker pulled on one end of his already-loosened tie until it was free of his collar, then walked to the door of the bedroom and threw it inside on top of the bureau.

  He thought about going into the bedroom, putting some distance between her and him, but—

  The phone rang, and he looked at his watch and wondered if everything at work could have come together this fast.

  "I'm sorry," he said. "I think it's the bottling company thing. I've been working on this all night, and something may have broken."

  He picked up the phone by the bedside table. It was Bill Marshall, his contact in the state Senate. Political leaders were on board.

  He hadn't had time to talk about it even with the commission chairman before the meeting, so he'd had to ask for the delay on the hearing.

  Now he'd spent all evening working on the plan: to levy a fee on any company wanting to use the state's natural resources—and water was definitely a state resource—for private gain. If the water was ever needed for the general public, the bottling company's permit could be suspended.

  He was almost positive the plan would make the water bottler rethink its project.

  "Thanks, Bill," he said into the phone. "I'll call you first thing in the morning, as soon as we can get everybody together."

  He stared at the wall in front of him and wanted to tell her, wanted to share this with her. But he didn't, because no victory would mean anything if he lost her for good. And that was what he was facing tonight.

  "Is everything all right?" She came up behind him, and he froze there, looking at the bed.

  He'd been so hopeful that night he'd spent in her bed. And he'd barely slept since. He'd just relived that night, and thought about all he wanted to share with her in the future.

  "Yeah. Things are good." He gritted his teeth and said, "Tell me about you and Brian."

  She put her hand on his arm, surprising him. "Tucker, it would have been a mistake for me to be with Brian. I know that now."

  He didn't say anything. He couldn't. He wanted so much...

  "Ask me why," she said.

  He turned to face her.

  She surprised him again by putting her palms flat against his chest. One thumb slipped in between the ends of his shirt that no longer met, and rubbed up and down, so slowly.

  "Why?" he asked, his voice as rough as gravel.

  She stood there with one of her palms over his heart, his runaway heart.

  "Because I never loved him the way I loved you."

  Loved, he told himself before he could get too hopeful. She said loved. Not love.

  "I tried to make it work for the longest time, but it just didn't. And I thought for a while it was me—that something was wrong with me, but it wasn't. It was Brian and me—we just weren't right together."

  Tucker couldn't stand it anymore. He took her by the shoulders and held her there, where she was, about six inches from his chest.

  He didn't want her to get any farther away than that, but he was afraid to pull her any closer.

  "What about now, Rebecca? What about us?"

  She hesitated. It seemed to go on forever, and the whole time he eased her closer, and the whole time he was surprised that she didn't protest.

  He let himself kiss her once, softly, then again, like a starving man face-to-face with a king's feast.

  "I still love you, Rebecca," he said against her lips, then kissed her some more.

  He tasted her again and again, wondering how he'd managed to go so long without the taste of her lips on his, wondering how he'd ever manage again.

  "Rebecca. Tell me something."

  She eased away from him, and he stopped her when she would have gotten too far away.

  "I'm not ready for that, Tucker. I can't tell you yet that I love you."

  He looked away at that and wondered if he'd have to literally pry his hands off her upper arms.

  God, he was going to have to let her go.

  "But," she said, tilting his head back toward her so she could look at him, so he had no choice but to look at her, "I think I want to try."

  Tucker almost fell to the floor.

  She smiled at him, and he was surprised he was still standing.

  "What would that look like? If I wanted us to try again?"

  "What do you want it to look like?" he whispered. "It can look like anything you want. Just tell me. Anything."

  "Well, we'd have to be careful, for Sammy. I don't want him to get hurt."

  "He won't be. We'll make sure of it," he said, still in a daze. "We'll... sneak around behind our own kid's back, if you want. I don't want him to get his hopes up and then be hurt again. I don't want anything to ever hurt him. He's... amazing, Rebecca. I missed so much time. I threw it all away, and the way he's been so accepting of that, so ready to let me back into his life. To let me be his father. That's amazing and humbling. How does he do that?"

  "Children are amazingly forgiving. He wants you in his life. He needs you. I guess wanting you and needing you the way he does is more important to him than anything else. Like being angry or not trusting you or... "

  She went silent, staring at him as tears filled her eyes and a single one rolled down her cheek.

  "I guess, that's where I am, too," she said, nodding. "I wanted to hate you. I wanted to stay angry. I wanted to keep reminding myself about what you did and what I saw, how horrible it felt when you gave up on us—"

  "I know, Rebecca. I know." He tried to catch her tears as they fell faster, tried to wipe them all away. "I just threw it all away, and I'm so sorry."

  "But as much as I tried to remember all of that, I just kept thinking of how much I missed you. How much I wanted you. Not just for Sammy, but for me. I'm still scared, but it doesn't seem to matter that much anymore. I just... I still feel like I belong to you, like we belong together."

  "We do."

  Tears kept falling down her cheek, and he wiped them away, thinking he never wanted to make this woman cry again.

  "I've missed you, Tucker."

  He groaned and settled her body intimately against his. "I thought I was going to die without you."

  She pulled his mouth down to hers and kissed him the way she had that night when they'd spent all night loving each other.

  When she pulled away, she said, "And you can't keep making decisions about what you think is best for me or Sammy on your own. If we're going to do this, if we're going to try to put our marriage back together, we make decisions together."

  "You're right. I know that."

  "If we're scared, we're scared together—"

  "I'm too happy to be scared right now," he said, because he was, and she was entitled to honesty from him in all things. "Too hopeful. Too surprised. God, I didn't know if this day would ever come."

  He kissed her again, deep and slow, savoring the taste of her, the feel of Rebecca in his arms.

  "I was so wrong," he said. "So wrong about everything. I'm so sorry. I don't ever want to hurt you again. We'll be different this time. We're different people, and we know now what we lost for so long. We can be happy together. I know it. I just need the chance to prove it to you."

  "Okay," she said.

  He could hardly believe it. It had been so long. So many dark, lonely years. "Okay?"

/>   "Yes." She nodded.

  "I love you. I love you so much. We're going to be so happy together. I promise."

  Epilogue

  It was almost Christmas, and Sammy was excited.

  He ran ahead of his mom and dad into the store to look at all the pretty lights on all the trees.

  "Hey, look at that one! Look how big it is!"

  Sammy looked way up at the tall tree, and when his parents didn't answer, he turned around to see what was going on.

  They were kissing again, doing all that mushy stuff.

  Sammy started to yell at them again, but didn't.

  He just didn't understand. Jimmy Horton said kissing was gross.

  But then, Jimmy didn't believe in birthday wishes coming true or in Santa Claus, either. Sammy wasn't worried about that, 'cause his dad said Jimmy Horton didn't know everything, 'cause he was only seven years old.

  B'sides, Sammy knew birthday wishes came true, because he'd wished his dad back.

  Sammy turned around again. He was tired of waiting.

  "Come on, you guys. We have to find Santa."

  They'd almost caught up with him when Sammy ran on ahead. He had to talk to Santa, 'cause he had an extra-special wish he had to make, and it was almost Christmas.

  They finally found Santa in the store, 'n' they had to wait in a big, long line till it was Sammy's turn.

  Sammy finally climbed up on Santa's lap, and he wasn't scared. Not a bit.

  Santa made him laugh and let him pull his whiskers to show that they really were real, 'n' then he asked what Sammy wanted for Christmas.

  Sammy tugged on the whiskers again until Santa leaned down so that Sammy could whisper it to him, 'cause everybody knew wishes had to be secrets if they were going to come true.

  He told Santa that he wanted his dad to come home and live with him and his mom, forever and ever.

  Santa looked down at the serious-minded little boy, then turned to look at his parents, standing close together, at ease that way, the handsome, smiling man with his arm around the pretty woman.

  Santa always got a lot of Christmas wishes that he knew he couldn't make come true all on his own, and this was always the hardest one.

  He didn't like to make promises he couldn't keep, but Santa believed in miracles, especially Christmas miracles. And he liked to make little children happy.

  "Can you do it, Santa?" Sammy asked.

  Santa looked at the man and the woman again, looked deep into their hearts—Santa could do that—and figured it was a pretty safe promise to make to a good little boy like Sammy.

  Santa patted Sammy on the back and winked at him with a twinkle in his eye and gave him a big "Ho, ho, ho!"

  "I think I can, Sammy."

  The End

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  HIS WEDDING DATE

  Second Chance Love

  Book Two

  Excerpt from

  His Wedding Date

  Second Chance Love

  Book Two

  by

  Teresa Hill

  USA Today Bestselling Author

  Special Author's Cut Edition

  "So what are you doing this weekend?" Brian asked.

  A perfectly casual question between two people who worked together, Shelly knew, and thought nothing of responding. "I don't know. What's the weather supposed to be like?"

  "Rain, Saturday and Sunday."

  She made a face.

  Brian laughed. "Why don't you let me take you away from all this? Let's get out of town for the weekend."

  Shelly stared at him, her mouth hanging open, until she finally remembered to close it. She had to be so careful around him, because she had trouble hiding her reaction to him. She wondered what it would take to drive him out of her heart forever and hoped marriage would do it—his marriage to someone else, that is.

  Judging from the unread invitation she'd received in February, she couldn't have long to wait for that to happen. And she looked forward to that day, thinking it would prove to her that it was hopeless to go on loving him.

  She laughed, the sound tinged with desperation. "I'm not sure how your fiancée would feel about you going away for the weekend with another woman so close to your wedding."

  It had to be nearly time, she thought. For weeks, she'd so carefully avoided any information about it, cutting herself off from all social media sites, personal e-mail and even phone calls from anyone she knew from Tallahassee.

  Shelly finally noticed that at some point, he'd gone unnaturally still and silent beside her. Shelly made herself look at him. There was a bleakness to his expression, a guarded look to his dark brown eyes, a smile that wasn't really a smile on his lips.

  "Brian?"

  He just blurted it out then. "Rebecca and I aren't getting married."

  "What?"

  He loved Rebecca. He'd always loved her, and Shelly believed Rebecca loved him, as well. It was simply the way of the world. He loved Rebecca. She loved him back. In the end, they would be together.

  Brian leaned back against the office doorway.

  "Actually," he added, "what I said wasn't entirely correct. I'm not getting married. Rebecca is."

  Shelly wondered if her mouth was hanging open again. Twice in the space of two minutes, he'd left her speechless.

  This man was going to be the death of her yet. Because she wanted to hope, damn him. She wanted to believe she was going to get another chance with him, and she could not put herself through that yet again. She knew better.

  "I'm sorry—about you and Rebecca."

  He shrugged. "The wedding's this weekend in Tallahassee. I'm surprised you didn't get an invitation."

  Shelly didn't want to tell him she had, though it obviously wasn't an invitation to the wedding she'd expected.

  "Anyway," Brian continued, "you haven't been home in ages, and I thought...."

  "Wait." Shelly's brain was finally starting to process the news. "What are you doing, even thinking of going to this wedding? You're not going to try to cause trouble? Or stop the ceremony, are you?"

  "No. Absolutely not."

  "Then what?"

  "I have to, Shel. I have to watch her do it," he finally admitted. "I think I'm going to hate every minute of that damned ceremony. But when it's done... Well, it's done. I'll have no choice but to believe it, accept it."

  She nodded, understanding all too well. She'd always thought when Brian married Rebecca, she'd be there to see it, until the invitation actually arrived. Then she'd found she didn't have the courage.

  "So I asked myself," he said, "where could I find a wonderful woman who'd be interested in spending a weekend in beautiful, exciting Tallahassee, Florida, with me? And naturally I thought of you."

  "Naturally." She tried to make light of it, but still felt her cheeks burn.

  He had no idea what he was doing to her, how difficult this was. If she went, she'd spin impossible dreams in her head about him forgetting Rebecca and finally turning to her.

  One weekend, she thought, to either convince him to see her as someone other than a friend or convince herself to finally forget him and move on.

  She was going to do it, going to take this one last chance with him.

  His Wedding Date

  Second Chance Love

  Book Two

  by

  Teresa Hill

  ~

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  His Wedding Date

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  Teresa Hill lives in South Carolina, within sight of the beautiful Blue Ridge Mountains, with her husband, children, three beautiful, spoiled dogs and two really stubborn cats.

  She is happy and proud to be doing work she loves—writing books.

 
; Teresa enjoys hearing from her readers. You can contact Teresa through her website: www.teresahill.net

  Table of Contents

  Cover

  Dedication

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Epilogue

  Excerpt from HIS WEDDING DATE – Second Chance Love, Book 2

  Meet Teresa Hill