by Andre, Bella
Jake’s voice came as a warning to her brother. “She’s mine, Smith. And no one hurts what’s mine.”
Knowing the man she loved had tried his best to let her fight this fight herself, and that she wouldn’t change one single thing about him even if she could, she told her brother, “Jake is right. I am his. I’ve always been his. And I always will be. I want Jake.” She glanced down at her stomach. “I want the babies we made together.” Knowing it was time to finally say what she’d held back from her family for far too long, she said, “And I want you, I want everyone in our family, to accept that I’m more than just your nice little sister who can’t take care of herself.”
The silence between them stretched out for a long while before Smith shook his head and said, with a slightly rueful expression, “I always thought your nickname was all wrong.”
That was all it took for laughter to bubble out of her. “Just as long as no one comes up with any for my kids,” she warned him.
Smith took a deep breath and glanced down at her stomach. “Twins, huh?” He looked amazed and so proud her heart turned over with love. “You’re going to be one heck of a parent, Soph.”
As he leaned forward to kiss her cheek, she whispered, “I had a lot of great teachers.” She held his hand even tighter. “Especially you.”
And then, from out of the blue, Smith held out his hand to Jake. “Welcome to the family.”
Mary Sullivan walked in just as Jake said, “Thanks, Smith. You don’t know how much that means to me.”
Smiling at everyone despite the fact that she was clearly choked up, Sophie’s mother said, “I’m so glad you two finally figured out that you’re meant to be together.”
Sophie gasped in surprise. “Wait a minute, you mean you knew all along that Jake and I would end up in love?”
Mary Sullivan beamed at her. “From day one, honey. Just like Jake did, didn’t you?”
She could see how much her mother’s approval meant to Jake as he squeezed her hand tight. “It was all I ever hoped for, Mrs. Sullivan.”
Mary smiled at the man who had captured her beloved daughter’s heart. “Actually, Jake, I’d much rather you called me Mom.”
***
At long last, Sophie’s mother and brother left, with a promise to be back first thing in the morning with all of her favorite treats. The door hadn’t quite closed behind her brother, but she couldn’t wait another second to turn to Jake and ask, “Did you mean what you said? That you’d been loving me from a distance all this time?”
“I only have eyes for you, Sophie. But I never thought I deserved you.”
“Can’t you see how magnificent you are?” she said softly. “Because I’ve always seen it. I’m just so sorry I didn’t see more, that I wasn’t there for you when you needed me most.”
“You couldn’t have seen it. Not when I’ve spent twenty years honing my ability to hide my problems with reading from everyone. Especially you.”
She watched as his fears surfaced in his eyes, and while she didn’t ever want him to be afraid, it meant so much that he was no longer hiding his true emotions from her.
“What if I’m a horrible father just like mine was? What if all the hard work in the world won’t change that? And what if our kids have the same problems I do?”
“I know you’re nervous about becoming a father, but I’m scared, too. I wasn’t planning to become a mother yet—or to have two at once. All we can do is make a vow to each other to stick through the good times and the bad and figure everything out together.” She stared into his beautiful dark eyes, knowing it was long past time to say, “Ask me again, Jake.”
“Sophie?”
“Ask me.”
He dropped to one knee at the side of her bed. “Sophie Sullivan, I love you. I’ve always loved you. I always will love you. Forever.”
She didn’t even try to keep her tears from falling. “I love you, Jake McCann. Always.” She felt the wonder, the magic, the beauty, of knowing true love had been waiting for them all along. “Forever.”
His mouth captured hers in a kiss so sweet her heart soared.
He reached into his pocket and took out a small blue box she couldn’t believe he’d been carrying with him all this time, just in case she was ready to agree to his proposal.
“Marry me, princess.”
His proposal was still more of a demand than a question, but Sophie wouldn’t have Jake any other way. She loved every bossy, sweet, dominant, comforting, overly protective, loving part of Jake’s soul. Sophie had never felt like an outsider in her own family, but until Jake, she’d never truly felt like she belonged, either.
His love had made her whole.
He opened the box to show her the ring, and she lost what was left of her breath. “Oh, Jake.” The center stone was a bright, beautiful yellow gem surrounded by a ring of diamonds.
Looking up into his eyes, she smiled even as tears slid down her face. She could never change his past. But with her support—and her boundless love—she hoped that one day he would finally put it behind him, where it belonged.
She had to kiss him, had to hold him, giving him her answer—the Yes she’d been longing to say all her life to one man, and one man only—from within the warmth of his arms.
Two months later…
Sophie smiled, happily singing along with one of Nicola’s songs on the radio as she drove from the library to Jake’s house. Even though she’d always been perfectly happy with public transportation, especially in the city, where she could easily get wherever she needed to go, he’d insisted on buying her a car. Life with Jake was sweeter than she could ever have imagined, but given that he was still the dominant man she’d fallen in love with so long ago, she’d quickly learned how to pick her battles. A car wasn’t worth fighting over.
She’d recovered well from the surgery to take out the uterine fibroid, but even though Jake had been loving and just plain wonderful during the past two months, she’d missed the wild part of him. They’d made love, of course, and it was always amazing, but she could tell he was holding back out of fear that he might hurt her or the babies in some way.
She tilted the rearview mirror down to take one last look at herself before she got out of the car. During her lunch break she’d been inspired to go out and buy a soft pink, long-sleeved dress. Sure, she knew she wouldn’t fit into it in a few weeks, but she loved the way the soft fabric slipped and slid against her skin. It reminded her of the way Jake touched her, so gently, so sweetly…so wickedly.
She’d seduced Jake McCann before, and she was beyond excited about seducing her fiancé again. Especially after he’d showed her his new tattoo last night, a Celtic knot that symbolized the never-ending path of life, faith…and love. He’d had the artist thread her name through the design, worn right over his heart.
Taking a deep breath, she rang the doorbell instead of using her key.
Jake opened the door a few seconds later, a dumbfounded yet lustful expression on his face. “Sophie?”
She’d never forget that night in Napa when she’d stood on a different doorstep and begged to come inside. “I know you think you need to be careful with me, but the doctor said I’m fully healed now.” Her voice grew husky. “I need you, Jake. Badly.”
He pulled her inside, and she was immediately enveloped in his delicious heat, but despite the fact that he clearly wanted her just as much as she wanted him, she could tell from the hard set of his mouth—and the fact that he was keeping a bit of distance between their bodies—that he was going to be a hard sell.
Well, she’d just picked her battle. And there was no way he was going to win this one, thank you very much. One day he’d finally accept that his self-control was no match for the intensity of their connection. In the meantime, she thought as the heat from his skin and muscles warmed her all over, she’d just have to prove it to him one night at a time, making her case over and over until he finally gave in.
“Stop trying to deny it, Jake,�
� she said in a husky voice. “You need this just as much as I do.”
He didn’t argue with her, just simply said, “I’ll make you come, princess, as many times as you need.” He looked like he was about to burst with the need to do just that. “But I can’t be rough with you. Not if it means hurting you again.”
“I know what you’re trying to do,” she told him in a soft voice. “You’re trying to make all the decisions for both of us again. But it’s not going to work.” Heat jumped into his eyes, along with the emotion he no longer tried to hide from her. “I want you exactly the way you are. Rough around the edges. Commanding. Exciting.” She licked her lips. “And I’m willing to do anything to prove it to you.”
She worked to control the laughter that threatened to spill out at how adorable he was as he tried to fight the inevitable.
“You’ll do anything to prove it to me?” His expression had finally changed back to the wicked lover she’d begun to miss lately.
“Anything,” she repeated as she reached for the buttons on the front of her dress and began to undo them. Jake’s eyes held hope, desire and so much love in them that it took her breath away as she pulled open the front of her dress.
She loved the way her name fell as a ragged plea from his lips, loved the way his eyes ate up the fullness of her much-larger-than-usual breasts, the swell of her stomach. She pushed the dress from her shoulders and let it fall to the floor.
“I’m yours, Jake.”
***
Sophie was everything to Jake. Despite all the ways he’d been longing to take her in the past two months, he’d known going slow, easy and gentle, was what she needed as she healed from her surgery. They had forever to make their way through everything else he wanted to do with her.
Tonight, however, he could see she needed—and was finally ready for—more.
Thank God.
The air was already heavy with desire, and the promise of incredible pleasure. He loved the way her body felt against his as he pulled her into his arms. The softness of her skin, the gorgeous swell of her breasts against his chest, her rounded stomach pressing against him. She was his perfect fit in every way, the only woman he could have ever dared to be completely honest and open with.
And the only one he ever wanted in his bed again.
He scooped her up into his arms, and she wound her arms around his neck, laughing as he carried her into the bedroom. “You’re going to have to start lifting weights soon if you want to keep doing this.”
He pressed a kiss to her stomach as he laid her down on the bed, almost knocking over the pile of colorful children’s books on the side table. He and Sophie had a standing date at the bookstore once a week to select books for their children. He could hardly believe it, but he actually enjoyed reading when Sophie was in his arms, and he couldn’t wait for their children to be there, too. The fact that his little girl and his little boy were growing inside of Sophie still blew his mind.
Jake ripped his clothes off in record time, then moved into her outstretched arms. She offered him her mouth, and she tasted so sweet he had to take and take and take, even though he’d been planning to do nothing but give. He cupped her breast with one hand, her hips with the other. God, how he loved filling his hands with her, could spend hours running his fingertips over every inch of her skin. Even better was the way she begged for him to do more than touch.
His thumb caressed her breast and when she begged, “Jake, please,” against his lips, he was too close to the edge himself to make her plead any more than that.
Every time they made love, Jake gave silent thanks for the way she opened not just her body but her heart to him. Later, he’d use his hands, his mouth, to slowly bring her to the edge—then over—again and again. He finally believed in forever.
But he needed her now.
Cupping her face in his hands, he crushed her mouth beneath his as their bodies became one. Their limbs were wrapped tightly around each other as they moved together in the perfect rhythm they’d always had, until he was swallowing her gasp of pleasure in a wild kiss as he fell with her over the edge.
Jake was certain nothing could be more amazing than lying with Sophie after they’d made love, with her nestled into the crook of his shoulder, her hand laid over his heart, his on her stomach. But then, he felt it, a ripple of movement under his palm.
“Did you just feel that? Did they just kick for the first time?”
Sophie’s smile was radiant, and so full of love it stunned him every time.
“Yes,” she said as she lifted her face to his and kissed him, “they did.”
Epilogue
As Sophie Sullivan stood at the entry to her mother’s backyard in a lacy white wedding gown that proudly showed off her baby bump, she knew she’d never been happier in her entire life. Everyone she loved—her brothers and sisters and cousins and friends—was here to celebrate with her and Jake.
Considering what pregnancy hormones had been doing to her lately, she was pretty darn proud of the fact that she hadn’t cried yet and ruined her makeup. Yes, she knew it was going to happen, probably the second she started walking down the aisle that her mother and sister and niece-to-be Summer had strewn with rose petals of every color and saw Jake standing beneath the shade of the big oak tree waiting for her to pledge herself to him. Lori swore she’d used completely waterproof liner and mascara when they were getting ready earlier, but Sophie still rarely wore makeup and wasn’t sure she trusted it to hold up and keep her from looking like a raccoon during her vows.
Vows. She and Jake were about to make wedding vows to each other.
Her heart swelled so big she thought it might actually leap out of her chest and run up the flower-strewn aisle to the man who had stolen it when she was just a little girl. She’d had so many dreams for a future with him, and now she knew how good it felt when they all came true.
When the breath she took shook, Smith, who would be walking her down the aisle, gently rubbed his hand on the small of her back and she leaned into him. He’d always been there for her, the big strong boy, and then man, who would never let anyone hurt her. He might have been one of the biggest movie stars in the world, but when Sophie looked at him, she only ever saw her beloved big brother, never the celebrity he had become.
As they waited for the Wedding March to begin, the sun momentarily moved behind a cloud. When it emerged again, it lit up the tree fort that she and her siblings had had so much fun in as kids. Jake had almost always been there with them…and she’d never forget that he was the reason she’d mustered up the courage to climb it as a five-year-old girl who was far more interested in reading stories than getting skinned knees.
Darn it, she thought as she sniffled, that was all it took. Just thinking about that day, the challenge in Jake’s eyes that had had her climbing up so high into the huge oak tree to discover a completely new perspective on the world, and she couldn’t stop herself from tearing up.
It figured she wouldn’t have any time to compose herself, because that was right when the Wedding March started up.
Smith tucked her hand into the crook of his arm and looked down at her, love and warmth shining down on her from his deep blue eyes. “Sophie—”
Great, his voice was breaking on just her name. If he said anything more, she’d be a complete blubbering mess by the time she got to Jake.
Smiling at him through the tears that she was only just barely keeping at bay, she squeezed his arm. “Take me to Jake, Smith. I’m ready.”
She’d been ready forever, and now—finally—she would be Jake’s wife.
Smith pressed a kiss to her forehead and then the two of them started the slow procession through the crowd of friends and family who were standing and smiling at her.
She didn’t hear another note of the Wedding March, couldn’t hear anything but her heart pounding in her ears, couldn’t see anything but Jake waiting for her by the base of the old oak tree looking as happy, and as madly in love, as she�
�d ever seen him.
He was standing close enough to the tree fort that what had once seemed so big, so high, to her as little girl, now looked small by comparison to his six-feet-plus and incredibly broad shoulders.
As soon as their kids were big enough, they would be building a tree fort in their own backyard. And she and Jake would play pirates again, just as they had so many years before.
At the end of the aisle Smith pressed a soft kiss to her cheek, and then he was putting her hand in Jake’s.
Sophie looked down at their linked hands, Jake’s so big and tanned, hers smaller, yet just as capable. They made a great pair.
A perfect pair.
Just as she’d always known they would.
She looked up at Jake and when he whispered, “I love you,” to her so softly that only she could hear it, she went up onto her tippy toes and whispered it right back, before kissing him.
Everyone laughed at the way they were doing everything out of order by kissing even before they’d made their vows, but Sophie knew out of order was what worked for the two of them.
A one-night stand…and then seven days and nights together that turned into forever love.
Getting pregnant with twins…and then getting married.
And as Sophie took her place beside Jake to say their vows, she knew she wouldn’t change one single thing.
***
Zach Sullivan yanked at his tie. Damn, he hated wearing ties, but he figured he could suck it up for an afternoon, considering it wasn’t every day one of his little sisters got married.
The past year had churned out a seemingly endless supply of Sullivan weddings and pregnancies. First, Chase had gotten married and had a kid on the way in a matter of weeks, then Sophie pulled the same thing from out of the blue. Even Gabe and Megan were now engaged. Only Marcus and Nicola were still slightly sane, but Zach wouldn’t be surprised if Nicola showed up sporting a huge diamond ring one of these days. Marcus had just officiated Sophie and Jake’s wedding, mere months after he’d done Chase and Chloe’s. If things kept up like this, he was going to need someone to cover for him at his winery.
