His hand’s on my shoulder suddenly.
“I wanted to tell you… I came back to tell you, that I’m sorry for jumping to conclusions. You brought my Faith safely with you, but something tells me that she’s not the little girl I left behind anymore?”
I shake my head. “No, she isn’t, Father. And that’s what I wanted to talk to you about. I need you to marry us, to make it right. Now, don’t make that face. You know as well as I do that we don’t live in the middle ages anymore, but I love Faith and I want her to be my wife. I need your blessing before I even ask her,” I tell him.
“You just announced you wanted a preacher to marry you both,” he scoffs, sounding wounded. “Like a Father, not a preacher.”
“And I do, Father,” I tell him. “I want you to be that Preacher, so whenever I call you Father, it also means Dad…”
We stare at each other for a long time, both our eyes getting misty with emotion and both for very different reasons.
“You swear to look out for her, always?” he asks, sounding more like a Dad by the second.
I don’t need to be coached in how strongly I feel for her though.
“I love Faith, more than anything. And the only thing I want is for her to keep being as happy as she’s been the past few days, so I can know she’s my wife. Forever,” I tell him.
Hearing someone coming up behind us, we both turn around.
“Is that a proposal, Noah?” Faith asks, her eyes turning to her Dad after she’s cocked her brow at mine.
“Oh, please say yes, Daddy. Noah’s the only man for me and I know you’ll get used to us being one and the same, eventually,” she adds.
“You’re right, Faith. I do need to get used to all this!” her Dad exclaims, turning on his heel.
But before he goes he shoots me a wary glance as he twists his mouth into a puckered shape that’s trying not to smile while being angry at the same time.
“Well?” he asks me gruffly before turning away. “Better go ahead and ask her properly, I guess. Nothing I can do about it. Just make sure you love her and protect her as much as I’ve tried to the past twenty-two years, that’s all I can ask,” he says finally, walking away from us as I take both Faith’s hands in mine.
“It’s Richard, by the way,” I tell her. “Richard Noah Templeton, but call me Noah. And I’d be honored Faith if you’d say yes to being my-”
Her lips are so hard on mine, I almost stumble back as she leaps up into my arms.
“…Wife,” I murmur, feeling her lips bunched up against mine as she squeals with delight.
“I knew it!” she cries out. “I knew it was Richard… Or maybe something else, but Richard was way up there, and yes! The answer will always be yes!”
“I love you, Faith,” I tell her, gripping her hard and holding onto her like I’ll never let go because I never will.
“And I love you, Richard, Noah Templeton. Now and forever.”
EPILOGUE
SIX MONTHS LATER
Faith
“It’s just air sickness,” I groan, handing back the paper sack Noah just offered me after filling it.
“I’ll have a word with the pilot, maybe see if we can’t land somewhere sooner, get you to a hospital,” he says gravely. His jaw set hard and worry in his smoldering eyes.
“I’ll be fine,” I try to laugh, but another wave of nausea grips me hard.
Noah holds my hair back as I lurch forward again.
What the heck is wrong with me? I ate what Noah ate, I haven’t been this sick, ever.
Noah buzzes for the stewardess.
Some honeymoon.
We’ve waited all this time, finally just tying the knot after Dad insisted we stay with him until he got used to the idea.
He’s hardly ever home during the day and it turned out to be the only way he’d agree to marry us.
“If you can last six months under my roof with the man, you can last the rest of your lives,” My Dad had preached to us, bringing it up every time he got on our nerves or when we got on his, even though we had a total run of the upper floor of the old house.
I grip Noah’s hand. “I’ll be fine honey. There’s no need to make a fuss. Commercial airlines don’t just make emergency stops for-”
But it’s too late. I can’t finish what I have to say, filling another paper sack.
The stewardess agrees that Noah, a pilot himself should talk to the plane’s pilot. She sits with me while he does so and in a few minutes, he re-appears, looking a little happier.
“We’re diverting to another airport, near a hospital. There’ll be an ambulance waiting, Faith. Just hang on,” he says, his voice quaking with emotion.
I should be mad, but a part of me knows something isn’t right.
I’ve never felt so ill in all my life. My whole body feels like it’s hot and cold, puffed up and about to explode.
“But the bookings, Noah. Our holiday?” I protest. He shakes his head gently, mopping my brow with his hand, and clutching my hand in his.
“Only you matter, Faith. Everything else will just have to wait, we need to get you to a hospital, and quick,” he says in his deep, calming voice but I can see the turmoil in his expression, the helplessness in his eyes.
Everyone else on the plane is so supportive, not complaining at all as we divert to the nearest airport, only just big enough to hold our passenger jet.
Once I’m being stretchered off the plane, the whole plane claps, and cheers, wishing me well as I pass them, making me cry.
It’s a short trip to the nearest country hospital, with everybody waiting for us once the ambulance arrives.
Noah won’t let go of me for a second, and almost gets booted from the hospital once he stands fast against me, not wanting any male doctors to even examine me.
Eventually, he calms down, and for the first time in six months, I’m without him by my side. But only long enough for the doctors to do their work.
“Holidaying from America?” A doctor asks me, trying to relax me while they perform some tests.
I give a nod. “We’re moving here, to the North Island,” I tell him.
“Aww, that’s great!” he says, squeezing my hand. “Welcome to New Zealand!”
I must be imagining it, but the doctor actually looks like he’s smiling a little bit too much under his mask once he orders some more tests.
“We need to do an ultrasound now, Faith. Okay? Just have a little look-see at your tummy… won’t be long now.”
I’m wheeled into another room, darker, but Noah’s there, and I take his hand in mine, kissing it.
“I’m getting scared now, Noah. What’s happening?” I ask him, feeling his concern as well as my own.
“Everything will be fine, Faith. I know it, let’s just wait and see what the doctors say,” he tells me.
A female nurse comes in, cheerful, and setting Noah and me at ease quickly.
“Moving to the North Island, I hear?” she asks politely, making me jump with the cold from the ultrasound gel.
“We’re moving over here from the states,” Noah says proudly.
“Starting a family by any chance?” The nurse asks, grinning to herself as the doctor appears behind her, beaming also as he clutches a folder of test results.
“I don’t know if you know yet, Mr. and Mrs. Templeton,” The doctor says with an air of seriousness.
“But I only hope your new home has room for three… or maybe even four,” he adds, unable to contain his own excitement.
“You mean…” Noah asks, his jaw falling open.
The doctor nods excitedly, but Noah’s eyes are on mine.
I can only gasp, running my hands over my own belly, tracing the lines from the ultrasound.
“Here, Faith. Look here,” the nurse says calmly and firmly, taking one of my hands in hers, the other letting me hold the paddle while she moves it so we can all see what the whole fuss has been about.
It all makes perfect sense in that one moment.
�
��Looking over your other test results, Faith. I’m pleased to tell you that the only thing wrong with you is nothing wrong at all,” The doctor announces.
“You’re both going to be proud parents of… Oh! Do we want to know the sex or even how many?” he asks, stopping himself.
“I think we can have our first family portraits,” Noah murmurs, raising his brow in question.
Me? I can’t wait to know, and once I see them both, up close and how they’re so tiny and delicate but so strong, I feel a new kind of magic.
When two souls join as one, Noah and me. And the souls they bring into the world because of that union.
“They’re just so beautiful!” I whisper, feeling Noah’s hand over mine as he helps me guide the ultrasound probe over my whole belly, almost like he has to chase them already.
“They’re perfectly healthy, maybe just some stress from the move and from flying brought on some delayed illness once they started to wriggle around,” The doctor says, beaming with as much pride as we both have, watching our babies.
“We’d like to keep you in, just overnight, Mrs. Templeton. Then tomorrow, I can refer you to a very good midwife on the North Island, the best,” he adds.
“The best?” Noah asks, not meaning to sound doubtful.
“She should be,” he adds. “She’s my daughter!” he exclaims, stopping in the middle of our shared joy just long enough to glance at his beeper.
“I have to go now, but congratulations you two… err, three, or is it four?” he says with another smile, placing his hands over both of ours before disappearing again.
Noah and I stare in wonder at our babies, and the nurse lets us hear their heartbeats too,
“Strong, and powerful,” is her diagnosis.
“They say babies conceived in moments of pure passion and love are always the strongest,” she adds.
“You didn’t know you were pregnant, all this time?” she asks, dumbfounded.
Noah answers for us both.
For all four of us.
“There’s so much passion in our life, I’m not surprised these two crept in without us even noticing,” he says proudly, kissing me on the lips and pressing his hand over mine firmly.
“Mommy Templeton,” he whispers in my ear, teasing me a little before kissing it.
“Daddy Templeton,” I tease him back, feeling the tear from his cheek running onto mine as the nurse leaves us alone to be together as we celebrate the news of our instant and unexpected family.
EXTENDED EPILOGUE
TWO YEARS LATER
Noah
“Of course I won’t go, honey, not if you don’t want me to,” I tell Faith.
Helping one of the twins from her hip, I kiss them both, telling her I’ll change Zak and then put him down with Zoe if only she’ll just relax.
Faith groans, following me through to the changing table, gnawing her lip like she used to. The surest sign she’s not sure about something.
“I mean, I just don’t want you feeling like you have to go,” she says finally.
I murmur an answer, but with the large diaper pin between my teeth.
“What?” she calls over her shoulder, pretending to fold some baby clothes.
The eternal supply of onesies.
“I said, I haven’t seen you this touchy since-” But I lower my own voice suddenly.
“Could it be?” I ask baby Zak, holding his tiny puckered fist in my fingers as I draw it gently to my lips, moving his whole arm as he gurgles and finally giggles.
A look of complete satisfaction as I know it from him, then smell him filling his entire diaper I just changed. In record time too, or so I thought.
“You wanna see me some more before you go to sleep, don’t you little man?” I ask him, bending down to kiss him as I reach for a fresh diaper.
“What are you feeding Zak, honey?” I ask her, half-joking, half-serious. Totally trying to change the subject.
I know she doesn’t want me to go, we’ve been together, here at home with our babies for two years in July.
Her Dad hasn’t come to visit since we left the states and I’ve volunteered to fly him over myself, picking him up from Hawaii, the beach house we bought there.
He stays there more and more, always asking us to come up and we always mean to.
But with these little ones, the days have turned into years and they’re growing so darned fast.
“It’s only to pick him up from the South Island,” I protest. “Not like I’m flying across the Pacific to go get him.”
Silence.
I don’t need to turn around to know the look she’s broadcasting, I can feel it.
“Y’know, honey? If I didn’t know better I’d think you never wanted me to fly again,” I suggest.
And once I turn around, I have my answer.
And Faith has hers.
“Oh, baby… I’m sorry,” I tell her, grabbing her and wiping her silent tears away. “I won’t go, that settles it, and I’ll have Joel go get your Dad, it’s not too far out of his way.”
The one business I know, flying. I’ve set up here on our new home turf as well as keeping things going back in the States.
Putting my arm around her, I guide her back to the changing table, lifting little Zak into her arms as I hold them both tight.
“I didn’t think it was such a big deal,” I confess, kissing her forehead and then her tears. Relieved when I see her smile.
“It shouldn’t be,” she admits. “But I just don’t know what I’d do if anything happened, Noah… Our babies,” she whispers.
I nod quietly. Wondering if living so remote was such a good idea after all.
But she does have a point.
When it was just me, I’d fly like a devil. Planes, helicopters, anything that got me high and fast. I loved it.
But it’s nothing compared with the love I feel at home.
The calm, still love of being grounded with my one true love.
With our babies, who won’t be babies for long.
“You feeling okay, honey?” I ask her, pressing my palm to her head and taking some instant husband diagnostics of my own.
Internally doing the math. Realizing she could be-
“I’m not pregnant, Noah,” she growls. “And don’t change the subject. I don’t want you flying this weekend, not because I don’t want you to, but because of the weather coming in. You know that…” she reminds me.
She’s right.
She’s always right.
“Or is it because your Dad’s coming to stay for a month?” I ask her, sensing maybe the issue runs deeper than the pair of us and our own family.
Poking her tongue out she makes a face and passes me Zak so I can lay him in his crib next to his sister’s.
These two, they could sleep through an earthquake.
And they both have, too.
“Do you think we’ve been up here too long?” I ask her, remembering the caution we had from the locals and her father about moving into the highlands so soon, practically self-sufficient.
“No,” Faith chimes automatically. “I just think I love you too much to even bear the thought of anything happening to you or my Dad,” she admits.
The kids are settled, and Faith’s arms around my middle. It’s my favorite part of the day.
Nothing but us and the tranquil sounds of our babies asleep.
“How ‘bout I rub your back?” I suggest, feeling her fingers curl over mine as I lead her to our bedroom, right next to the twins.
“How ‘bout you rub my front?” she asks, defiantly.
And I’m only happy to oblige.
Hearing her moan as she pulls me down onto our bed, yanking her own bathrobe to one side so I have full access, it feels like the first night I had her under me.
The first night I even tasted her on my lips.
“How will you cope?” I ask her, gasping and grunting, setting to work as I ease her legs wide open, hearing her sigh as I plant my face between
her sweet, creamy thighs.
“Cope with… uh..! What?” she gasps.
“Your Dad being here for a whole month?” I ask, forgetting the question entirely as I feel her warmth running freely over my tongue.
We don’t discuss this any further, not until she’s shuddered hard against my tongue first, and my hard cock second.
The only way I ever send my wife to sleep after we’ve put the twins down for the evening.
Holding her close, later on, she asks me if I mind.
“Mind what?” I murmur, kissing her neck, craning my neck as I check to shear if it’s Zak or Zoe shifting in their sleep.
“About you not going to collect my Dad… flying,” she says finally.
I breathe heavily against her neck, moving my hands over her under the covers and letting my renewed hardness press up against the small of her back.
“Does this feel like I mind?” I ask her.
Of course, I don’t.
“Just stay here with me, Noah Templeton,” My wife orders me, pressing herself back up against me and making us both sigh with contentment.
An order I can’t resist, and one I’m glad I haven’t backed away from since the day we met.
“I love you, Faith,” I remind her, hearing her purr.
“And it’s exactly why I need you here with me, soldier,” she reminds me and I feel suddenly at full attention again, ready to prove her point all over again.
EXTENDED EPILOGUE
TEN YEARS LATER
Faith
“Alex! Peter! Just what the heck do you think you’re doing? Zak and Zoe, y’all should know better!”
I’m trying to stay mad, but hearing their Dad thumping up the hall behind me, out onto the patio, I just can’t help but smile and eventually laugh as I feel his arms around my waist.
“They’ve got too much of their mother in ‘em, that’s the problem!” he reminds me, gnawing at my neck before picking me up, making me squeal, and hurling me ass first into the pool, followed closely by his own huge frame doing a cannonball which seems to drain half the pool in a moment.
The kids, all four of them have been dare-devilling, building a fort in the trees above the pool and diving straight out from it into the deepest end.
Preacher's Daughter: An Instalove Possessive Age Gap Romance Page 12
