I lift the flowers off the bed where I’d dropped them and hand the bouquet to Mel, who bends her head into the yellow petals and sniffs at them. She lifts her head to meet my gaze, sniffles gently, and then crushes herself to me.
The flowers get squashed between us and I don’t fucking care. It’s more than worth it to have her in my arms like this. ‘Do you like it?’
She nods against my chest. ‘I love it.’
‘You’re my sunshine Melissa Sedric. You always remind me why you are every time I make a pretense of forgetting. Like what you have done for the charities.’
She’d made time even with our busy schedules to visit the hospitals the charity was associated with, she’d even made me go with her once, dragging me half the way and sticking by my side the entire time.
She lifts her head off my chest and glares playfully up at me. ‘You bought that ticket didn’t you?’
I plant a small kiss on her lips and she pulled back, laughing when I tuck my hand into her hair and hold her still. ‘I had to. No one was getting that lunch with you.’
She’d suggested auctioning lunch with someone to make more money for the hospital. It had been a bad idea, first because it was unsafe for her to be out there where danger might get to her, second because I didn’t want anyone getting lunch with my woman.
She is mine. If she is having lunch, it would be with me.
‘It would’ve made me a lot more money.’ She quirks her eyes up at me.
I lift my own brows. ‘Do you need more money?’
She slaps her open palm against my chest. ‘It’s not about the money Xander!’ She laughed.
I tip her head up to mine and then press it into my beating chest. ‘The charities are supposed to be secret. I don’t want the rest of the world finding out. I like you running it, I like seeing you with those children, I love how the adults adore you, that you treat it like your baby, that you shine so bright, my sunshine but I’d like to keep it under wraps. It’ll help me feel better knowing you’re safe.’
She drags a deep breath into her lungs and looks away from me, when her eyes meet mine again, there’s tears in them. ‘I understand. But you still overpaid for lunch.’
I shrug carelessly. ‘Whatever’s mine is ours. You overpaid.’
‘She pulls away, a soft smile lingering on her full lips. ‘Do we tell the family I’m pregnant?’
‘Yes. I’ll inform my family tonight. I’m guessing you’ll want to talk to your family too.’
‘Do you think we should? It’s early days yet.’ Melissa asks looking up at me, her forehead creased in question.
I plant a small kiss on her lips and pull her into my arms again. ‘Father’s sick. I think we should. The news won’t make it out of the family. We can depend on them for that.’
She plants a kiss on my lips too. ‘Father will be so glad. We should tell Lucian, too.’
I shake my head. ‘Give me a little more time with him first.’
My phone rings on the bed and I go to take it. She starts dressing while I get on the phone with Ryder, who seems a little hurried as he informs me about the arrival of another shipment of our merchandise.
I nod and reply as I watch Mel sink her head into the flowers again, a tiny smile curling her lips. As we’d both been expecting, the pregnancy test had turned out positive. The relief I’d felt in the moment had been instant.
I end the call with Ryder and decide it’ll be good to spend some time with the family. ‘We should head over to my father’s. I’m sure he’ll love hearing the news from us instead of over the phone.’
It’s been a while since the family has been together. We haven’t had a family gathering since my father’s illness had been outed by Gabriele. I’d been too busy keeping everything afloat with my brother’s help.
She drops the flowers to the bed finally and nods. ‘I’ll ask Father if he’d like to come over.’
I walk over to her, tip her head up and plant a soft kiss on her lips. She kisses me back with no hesitation. It feels as though something is crushing my heart. It’s tight as though filled to the brim. It’s an odd feeling, but it’s good.
I pull away and she moans, a gentle hum that ends with a mewl when I nip at her lips gently. ‘You’ve got to be the best thing that has ever happened to me Melissa.’
She leans forward and spears me with a long look full of meaning. ‘Good. I better be.’
Mother heaps some peas over Father’s plate, and when he grimaces and shoots a look at the rest of the table with her head bent, we all laugh. Father looks as though he’s aged ten more years since the last time I saw him.
He’s weak, so much so Mother is feeding him a part of his meal. It wrenches my heart to see the once strong man so weak. It’s also a reminder of the futility of it all. Some day, we all will slip from the earth like stardust disappearing in the sky.
Sedric shakes his head like he understands and scoops up his own peas, which he heaps on Lucian’s plate. The laugh explodes again.
‘I can see you all are having fun at my expense, but he’s going to eat what the doctor says is good for him.’
We all shut up. Knox is smirking at me. ‘Of course he will, Mother. We all know how much he needs it.’
Mother finds a pea on the platter and in a move that surprises everyone at the table, throws it across at him. It hits right on his forehead and a laugh rings out along with a steady applause which mom accepts with a queenly wave.
Mel flicks her hair back and leans closer to me. ‘Do we tell them now?’ She smiles. ‘I’m sure they’re all thinking why we invited them to dinner at your parents.’
I let my hand drop to her thigh under the table. ‘Let’s let them stew in it a little while longer.’
Knox’s voice breaks into the conversation. ‘Are we too boring for you, brother?’
I lift my eyes to his to find the rest of the table already staring at us. Mel blushes a furious pink and returns her attention to the half eaten chicken on her plate.
I roll my eyes when Declan snickers. ‘Quite frankly? Maybe you are Knox.’
Alec laughs. ‘Oh, I see how it is then.’
I bare my teeth in a smile, my heart somehow even lighter. This feels familiar. ‘You do? Pray tell.’
Mother taps at the table, and glares at the four of us. ‘You will desist from such behavior at the table, especially not when we have guests.’
Sedric meets Mother’s eyes and chuckles. ‘You don’t count us among guests, do you? We already are family.’
Daniel nods and gives his sister a playful glare. ‘Especially since those two were being very obnoxious with it too.’
Mel winces. But before she can get a word in, Gianna jumps in. ‘And he looked a second away from kissing her right here.’ She giggles and slaps at the table. ‘The insolence!’
That’s Gianna, alright.
Mel grimaces this time and glares at her sister. They stay locked in a stare down until Mel laughs and looks away. She rolls her eyes and mutters ‘asshole’ into her food.
We finish the meal, Mother making sure Father gets as much fiber as he can, Father muttering all the while about controlling women. Daniel and Alec are discussing something I can’t hear, while Knox has a smile on his face as he recounts some story to Mel.
She tips her head back and laughs. A shot of possessiveness attacks and I beat it down, instead, I call on Hailey and distract Lucian with ice cream. He follows her out of the room and I tap my fork against the crystal of my glass.
Everyone’s attention comes to me, and I slip my hand into Mel’s. I press a kiss to her knuckles, and Mother smiles softly. ‘I know dinner tonight was impromptu, but we’ve barely had time to spend with each other, so I thought the news we have to share was a good enough excuse to gather here today.’
‘We don’t need an excuse to gather Xander.’ Mother mumbles.
‘No, we don’t. But we’re all here today.’ I nod at Mel. ‘You tell them.’
She tilts her head to the right and then presses a kiss to the corner of my lips that I feel everywhere. She slides the smile to my father and then to her father. ‘I’m pregnant. We found out just this morning.’
A shocked silence fills the gap her words leave. Mother’s eyes widen even as she comes around the table to hug Mel. ‘Oh, my goodness. Are you certain?’
Mel hugs her back. ‘Yes, I am. The test was pretty positive.’
Gianna comes around the table next, and she glares down at her sister first before squeezing her arms around her. ‘You lied to me.’
Mel loops her arms tight around her. ‘No I didn’t. I said there’s nothing wrong. There isn’t.’
‘Oh Sissy. This is such great news.’ She comes over to me and hugs me just as hard. She bends her head and whispers right into my ears. ‘For the first time, I don’t think I want to be responsible for your murder anymore.’
I chuckle. ‘You never would’ve been.’
She pats at my shoulders. ‘Well, you had to go ruin it, huh?’
Father holds his hand out to me, the other to Mel, and I take her hand as we walk to him. She tips her head to his, and he presses a kiss to her face, his sunken cheeks twitching in a smile. ‘I’m so happy to see the day Mel. You will never know how truly glad this makes me. Maybe we cannot rewrite history, but the future is a blank slate.’
Mel nods and shifts away so I can receive my own kiss. We go over to her father, who stands and hugs her hard, pressing a kiss on her forehead. She hugs her father, sagging into his arms. He pats her back and whispers something to her that makes her laugh.
My brothers are next, and soon, the table is rowdy again, Lucian the only one among us who is utterly focused on his ice cream. Mel watches him eat, and I watch her watch him.
This is a future I’d never once envisioned. Especially after she’d left me. It had been a question of surviving her, of waking up every morning with the singular focus of going an entire day without any thoughts of her. I’d put all of me into the business, into growing it, into making sure that the Amory name deserved the tremble that it evoked.
But to have her here beside me, holding my son, carrying my son or daughter inside her, it is a blessing. I take Lucian from her. He swings his arms around my neck. ‘Do you want some Ice cream, Papa?’
Papa? It’s the same name I’d called my father growing up as a child, and to hear it from my own son, sitting at the same table where I’d grown as a child, it smothers the air from my lungs as though it has been sucked out. ‘No figlio, you enjoy.’
He returns his attention to the ice cream and I huff out a hard breath. He’s a lovely boy. Downright, the best thing to happen to me ever. He along with his mother provide the warmth I need to chase away the cold that clouds my days at work.
Mel shifts closer and swats at something off my shoulder. I hitch my brow at her and quirk my lips. Bending my head towards hers, I whispered right into her ears. ‘Did you just miss getting your hands on me?’
‘Best bet I plan on doing a lot of that when we get home.’ She runs her tongue over her plump lips. ‘And yes. Yes, I just did.’
I groan softly. ‘You’ll be the end of me, Sole.’
