I finish getting everything in the trunk. Once we arrive home, I finally ask, “What is the plan?”
She sighs, setting the pup into a crate filled with blankets, “I want to try to save her, but it might be pointless.”
“We’re nothing but persistent,” I remind her. “We’ll do the best we can, okay?”
She nods.
“But first, you’re going to take a nap,” I suggest. “Then, we’ll make a game plan.”
“Can you watch over her while I’m sleeping?” She yawns.
I grab her to me, pressing my mouth onto hers. My tongue slides easily along the seam of her lips, darting inside her. Her fingers thread through my hair. She’s as hungry as I am. I know she’s bone tired and I have to stop now. When I try to break the kiss she doesn’t allow me to do it. She’s devouring me. Fuck if I don’t want her desperately, but I know we have to stop.
“Love you,” I whisper. “Tell me what to do with the little girl and then you’re going to sleep. We can finish this once you’re rested.”
I won’t lie. I need more of her, but I can wait.
“You’re the best person in the world,” she states, giving me a big hug.
I’m not, but for her, I would do just about anything.
There’s a lot about me that she doesn’t know, and I prefer to keep it that way. I like the version of who I am with her. What’s the point of showing that I can be an asshole who doesn’t give two shits about others?
“Only for you.” I wink at her, bend my head down and kiss the fuck out of her because I’ve missed her so much.
“I promise to make it up to you later,” she says after our long, deep kiss. “Let me tell you what she needs.”
As she explains how to care for the pup, I pray that the little thing doesn’t die before Leyla takes charge.
Our little girl doesn’t die. She’s strong, and we spend three weeks watching her around the clock. Today, Leyla decides to wean her off the formula to solid food.
“Is she out of the woods?” I ask as Buster, Leyla, and I stare at the pup who shyly takes one kernel of food and places it on the floor.
“I’m not sure,” she answers.
Buster pushes the plate closer to the puppy. This guy has been concerned about the little girl just as much as us.
“Maybe. I won’t say for sure until she’s eight weeks old. Tomorrow, I’m taking her to the animal hospital so we can run some blood tests. I want to make sure that she’s perfectly healthy.” Leyla looks at me and says, “Thank you for…humoring me.”
“I won’t lie. I thought she wasn’t going to make it, but I wasn’t humoring you. It’s more like having faith in you. I wanted her to live.”
She smiles at the pup and then at me. “I can’t believe the owner had no idea that her dog was pregnant. At least one of them survived.”
“Any ideas of what breed she is?” I ask, because this is too close to what happened to her. Everyone dying and her surviving. She has high functioning depression, which means that when she feels like the world is about to swallow her, she overworks, sometimes running herself ragged.
“The mom was a Golden Retriever. Her fur is soft, but her white and black coloring and those blue eyes make me wonder if she’s a mix with a Husky.”
“Are you calling the mom’s owner to tell her that this girl survived?”
“No, she told me that I should find her a home if she made it through. She didn’t want her,” she answers.
“She needs a name,” I suggest.
“I don’t want to name her yet.”
“She’s going to make it, baby. Look at her. We swore she’d be pushing up daisies soon, but this girl is strong.”
“Daisy,” Leyla says. “I like that name.”
“What do you think, Bust?” I ask because this should be a family decision. “Should we call our girl Daisy and keep her?”
He barks, and Leyla smiles at me. “And now we’re four,” she declares. “I love it.”
“We need a house,” I say what I’ve been thinking for the past couple of months.
Buster is a big boy, and he needs more space to run. This girl might be just as big. Leyla needs to see Poppy daily, and it’d be easier if we have a stable for her. Boarding the horses makes everything too complicated. With the storm, Daisy, and Leyla’s last days in the internship, we haven’t had time to visit the mare. Alistair needs to come to us too.
“What?” Leyla asks.
“These two will outgrow this place soon. I think we should buy a property on the west side of town, closer to the foothills. We can have a barn so you can see Poppy every day.”
Leyla’s face brightens, and she adds, “We could bring Alistair and add chickens to the family. I’m done with the internship. Depending on where we live, I can find another place where I can work.”
“While we’re looking at houses, we should go to the Motor Vehicle office,” I suggest.
“To get a new driver’s license?” She rolls her eyes. “We need a new address before that.”
“No, to get a marriage license,” I say, looking at my phone. “It’s Friday. It sounds like the perfect day to get hitched. Don’t you think?”
“You’re crazy.”
“For you.”
“We just met,” she throws another excuse, and I glare at her. “I can’t… Marriage is?”
“Marriage is the logical thing to do. We’re buying a house to get all the children under one roof.” I shrug. “Who knows, with a bigger house and enough room, we can have a bigger family.”
“You want a family?”
“We’re a family already.”
“Yes, we are,” she confirms, and the happiness she radiates is all I need in my life.
“We’ll fill the place with more children,” I add.
“I love you, Pierce,” she declares.
“Well, then let’s go to the DMV,” I state and head upstairs to change. “I’ll call the realtor to see if we can start looking for a place today.”
Chapter Nine
Pierce
Probably acquiring a marriage certificate and asking Nyx, one of my friends and colleagues, to meet us at the parking lot to marry us isn’t romantic. It’s definitely unorthodox. We aren’t the only couple who decided to marry on a whim. It’s almost like eloping, but without going to another state or country.
How many people do it daily in Vegas?
A shitload.
This isn’t the most romantic way to get married, but I think it fits us. I still owe Leyla an engagement ring—or some solitaire diamond that she can wear even when she’s taking care of her patients. At least we have wedding bands. That might be as traditional as we get.
We skip our honeymoon. Daisy is too young to be left with a puppy sitter. I don’t feel bad. We travel often. One of those trips could pass as our honeymoon. Just before the blizzard, we went to Hawaii. Another tradition we didn’t skip was having sex all weekend long. Then again, that’s the way we like to spend most Sundays when we’re in town.
On Monday, when I arrive at work, Mom is waiting for me in my office. I sigh because she only does that when someone is in trouble.
“What did I do?”
“The workweek is from Monday to Friday. You have to be at the office every day. We don’t have new dog-owner leave in this company. That’s not even a thing,” she says furiously. “The past month, you’ve been working mostly from home. Your excuse is the new dog you got back in May. That’s completely unacceptable. You have a responsibility with this firm and your clients.”
There are so many things I should tell her, starting with the fact that my clients are happy. I haven’t lost any cases, and my work hasn’t suffered just because I’m not in my office every fucking day of the week. The company should be more lenient about working hours, trusting our lawyers, taking cases worth winning, and not just grabbing everything that comes to our door because we can make more money.
“We should assess the pros and c
ons of creating a new pet-owner leave,” I suggest, half joking. Last week I convinced the senior partners that my team and I will only handle the corporate cases. I know which battles to fight with her, and this one isn’t worth my time or the aggravation.
To distract her, I pull out my phone and show her a picture of my girl. “Isn’t she precious? Her name is Daisy.”
She glares at me, and then her gaze focuses on my hand. “Is that a wedding ring?”
I look at my finger and grin. “By the way, I got married last Friday. You should be thankful that I’m here. Technically, I have a week off.”
“Please, tell me you are joking.” I’m sure her voice can be heard all the way to Colorado Springs. “You married that woman.”
“Leyla,” I correct her. “My wife.”
“Pierce, you just met her,” she snaps at me like she did when I was a child who couldn’t understand why his father will never come back or why it’s wrong to want to meet his new brothers.
She stares at me coldly, and a sneer distorts her upper lip. Okay, I pissed her off. Honestly, when I thought about marrying Leyla, it never crossed my mind that there would be an issue with my mother. I did it because it felt right, like the natural progression of our relationship.
“Where is the prenuptial agreement? I need to make sure she won’t touch the ten billion dollars your father gave you.”
Who the fuck cares about that money? I don’t plan on using it because it’s tainted. William Aldridge doesn’t give a shit about me. If he cared, he could’ve fought for custody or to see me more often. When I started visiting him once a year in Baker’s Creek, he barely paid attention to me. Now that I’m an adult, he could reach out and say, “Hey, bastard number two, are you doing fine?”
“I’ve been dating her since last year,” I remind her. “This makes sense to us. You should be happy for me.”
“Happy? You’ve been neglecting the firm since you met her. I was going to propose making you a partner, but now”—she makes an exasperated sound and taps my desk with her well-manicured finger— “I want to see that prenuptial agreement. And if she didn’t sign one, have her sign a document where your assets are protected when you divorce.”
This could go two ways. One is with me telling her that there won’t be a prenup and I’m never leaving my wife. The second is to agree. Then there’s the matter of having to sweet-talk her back into promoting me to partner. I’ve been working hard for it.
Being on my mother’s wrong side is a nightmare, which is why I listen to her and have Nyx draft something. I ask her to include our kids because even when I want to be with Leyla forever, I want them to be covered in case we divorce. When I show it to Leyla so she can sign it, she frowns.
“I don’t understand.”
“It’s just in case…something happens.”
“So, if either one of us cheats, the other gets Daisy, Buster, Poppy, Alistair, and any other animal we acquire during our marriage,” she says out loud. “If you cheat, I get your trust too. What if I cheat?”
I look at her and smile. “I’ll be heartbroken.”
“You don’t care about my assets?” she asks, and it takes a lot of self-restraint to contain the laugh.
“I’m sure your car is safe,” I answer. “You can keep it.”
She has a piece of junk that should be going to a museum. I bought her a new, top of the line SUV, but she doesn’t care about it. She refuses to use it.
“You haven't googled my family, have you?” she asks.
“No, why?”
“You should in case you want to know who you are married to,” she states. “Search Leyla Gibbs or Justin Gibbs. Bristol, Maine could narrow the search.”
I roll my eyes. What can I possibly find out that she hasn’t told me? She’s the one who pulls out the phone, taps it furiously, and shows it to me.
“Man kills wife, youngest daughter, and commits suicide. The oldest child of the couple is in intensive care fighting for her life. Billionaire Justin Gibbs owned the famous department stores and supermarket chain, killed two before turning the gun on himself.”
When I look at the date, it’s the same night when I met Leyla.
“Then why do you have that old rusty truck?”
“It was Mom’s,” she answers. “Well, similar to what Mom drove before she died.”
“So, you are the heir of Gibbs?”
“In theory. My grandparents sold everything and set up two trusts under my name so that I wouldn’t misuse the money.”
I cross my arms and stare at her. This doesn’t make sense. Yes, I remember her telling me about the department stores. I just thought it was a coincidence that she shared a last name with the stores. It happens. Last names aren’t exclusive.
“Wait, you can’t be an heiress. You told me you grew up in the foster system, didn’t you?”
She leans back in the chair, wearing a confused and weary expression. “It’s a long story.”
“Which will be nice to learn,” I push her, and I feel like an asshole because I’ve barely told her about myself.
“My grandparents from my father’s side were dead. He was an only child,” she explains. “Mom’s parents didn’t want me. It was my aunt who offered to take care of me.”
She sighs. I grab her hand and kiss it. “Hey, you don’t have to continue. We can talk about this later.”
“We’re married. I think we should be more open,” she explains, and I’m definitely a fucking asshole because nothing will make me tell her about the Aldridges.
“Once I was out of the hospital, she brought me to Colorado. But I wasn’t an easy child,” she confesses. “Nobody in the family wanted me—I was the daughter of a mass murderer. She surrendered me to the state.”
She twists her wedding ring and says, “I’m sure you’re regretting many things.”
“Not at all.” I shake my head. “I’m upset with your family. Isn’t there some kind of law that prevents them from…?”
I scratch my head, trying to think if there is. I am a fucking lawyer. “But if no one in the family is capable of taking care of you, they can turn you over to the state.”
“They did,” she mumbles.
“They just abandoned you,” I state, furious because they should’ve done more.
“My grandfather died when I was seventeen,” she explains. “His lawyer found me, took me out of foster care, and handed me the fortune. I don’t use much of what they gave me because I don’t need it—and it’s tainted.”
A lot of things about her make more sense. Not even her family wanted her after what happened to her.
“We’ll find a good place to donate some of your money. I might start doing the same with mine,” I say.
“Your money?”
“My trust,” I announce.
“What kind of trust is that?”
“My father’s. Guilt money or… I don’t know why he gave it to me.”
“What’s the deal with him?”
“Things didn’t work out between my parents, and he left,” I give her the short version hoping she doesn’t ask for the long one, because it’s not worth talking about William or the fucking mess he made so many years ago.
Is this okay? That I keep so many things from her? It’s not like any of that matters. Everything that happened to me before her, along with the choices I made when I was young, are in the past. Nothing is worth leaving me, is it?
My stomach drops because what if she realizes that this is all I can give her, and she wants more? I don’t think I can live without her.
Chapter Ten
Leyla
I thought that being married would feel somehow different. So far, nothing has changed between Pierce and me. That’s not true. I’m now Leyla Aldridge. We’re still as happy as we have been since we appeared in each other’s lives. I don’t feel as if anything has changed between us or with me.
Maybe the shift will come once we move into our new house. We found a gorgeous p
roperty in Evergreen. It’s a forty-minute drive from downtown Denver, but it’s worth the commute. Five acres of land, and there’s a big barn on the property for our kids. The land is big enough that we won’t have to go to the dog park with Daisy and Buster every day so they can run. We’re building an indoor and outdoor arena for the horses.
We’re finally getting our family together.
Alistair and Poppy won’t have to be away from us anymore. I will work at the shelter down in Lakewood three times a week and at the one downtown on Tuesdays and Saturday mornings. Now that I graduated, I’m donating enough money so they can build a clinic within the shelter. We will be charging according to income and treating every animal that comes by.
Pierce thought I would set up a practice once I had my degree. That would be a smart move if I could deal with people. I’d rather be taking care of the animals than having to look into expenses, payroll, and administrative details that aren’t for me.
Plus, if things continue evolving so fast between us, we might be expecting a baby in a couple of years, and I want to have some flexibility. I still can’t believe it. He wants everything that I ever wanted—our family, a house full of kids. I need to keep going to the therapist because I want to be ready for that step.
My only problem with him is…well, not him, but his family. They hate me. Friday is my day off, and today, I plan on using it to pack most of our clothes. The moving company is coming next Monday. They’ll be packing everything else. Around noon, there’s a knock on the door. I hate when the concierge knocks instead of ringing the doorbell—or just leaving us alone. We don’t care if the neighbors next door feel like having two dogs is excessive.
We’re leaving soon.
When I open the door, I’m not surprised to see Sarah Bryant’s cold, expressionless face on the other side. Anyone would think this is her business face. It’s her passive-aggressive I-won’t-show-any-emotion-but-I’m-so-mad-I’ll-try-to-kill-you look.
Defying Our Forever (The Baker’s Creek Billionaire Brothers Book 3) Page 6
