to believe, I looked up.
Edward stood outside the open garage door. Bright California sunshine burnished his dark hair. His face was in shadow, his posture uncertain. He’d changed from his tuxedo to a T-shirt and jeans, and his hands were in his pockets.
On the airstrip behind him, I saw his jet, with the propellers still slowing down. The engine was loud, a blast of white noise. Was he a miracle? A dream? I wiped my eyes, but he was still there.
“You came back....” I gasped. Rising to my feet, I stumbled across the hangar.
“I saw you,” he breathed, his eyes hungry on mine. “And I was crazy enough to hope....”
Hiccupping a sob, I threw my arms around his shoulders. “You came back!”
“Of course I did.” He held me close, caressing my back. I felt the warmth and strength of his body, smelled the woodsy scent of his cologne. He touched my cheek with a fingertip and said in a voice so tender and raw it twisted my heart, “But you’re crying.”
Taking his hand in my own, I pressed it against my cheek, looking up at him with eyes swimming in tears. “I thought I’d lost you.”
I could feel him tremble. Then he exhaled.
“It’s all right, Diana,” he said quietly. “You can tell me the truth. If you’re trying to be loyal to me for our baby’s sake...”
“No!”
“I need you to be happy.” He looked away, dropping his hand to his side. “I told myself I could marry you even if you didn’t love me. That I could earn you back, and make you love and trust me again, over time.”
“Edward...”
“But I can’t be the man who takes away the light that’s inside you. I can’t. I can’t condemn you to being my wife when you don’t love me. When you might love someone else.” Looking away, his jaw tightened as he said, in a voice almost too low for me to hear, “I love you too much for that.”
“You love me,” I breathed.
Edward gave a low, choked laugh. “And for the first time in my life I know what that means.” He looked down at me. “I would do anything for you, Diana. Anything.”
“Even sell your shares of St. Cyr Global to your cousin.”
He looked started. “How did you know?”
“I called Victoria.”
“Why?— How?”
“I saw her going into your house last night.”
“You did?”
I hung my head. “You were acting so weird and secretive. I went back to ask you what was going on. Then I saw her going into your house so late, wearing that dress, and I thought the two of you...”
“What!” He blinked in astonishment. “You thought me and Victoria...”
“I was so scared of getting hurt again,” I whispered, feeling ashamed, “I took the first excuse to run. I’m sorry.”
His expression darkened. “When I think of how I treated you in London, I don’t blame you.” He stroked my cheek. “I didn’t want you to feel guilty, or feel like you were under obligation, because I’d made some kind of sacrifice.... Because you were right. I hated that job. I hated the man it made me. Now I’m free.” He gave me a sudden grin. “In fact, there’s nothing to stop me from coming with you to Romania, as I’m currently unemployed....”
Reaching up, I put my hands over his. “I don’t want to go.”
He frowned. “What?”
“I thought being an actress was my big dream. But I never wanted to audition.” The corners of my mouth quirked. “There was a reason. Whatever my brain tried to tell me I wanted, my heart stubbornly knew it wanted something else entirely.”
He pulled me closer, running his hands over my face, my hair, my back. “What?”
I thought of my mother, and the life she’d lived. Hannah Maywood Lowe had never been famous or celebrated. People who didn’t know her would have thought her quite ordinary, in fact, not special at all. But she’d had a talent for loving people. Her whole life had been about taking care of her friends, her home, her community, and most of all, her family.
“You’re my dream,” I whispered. “You and our baby. I want to go home with you. Be with you. Raise our family.” I lifted my gaze to his. “I love you, Edward.”
He breathed in wonder, “You do?”
“I have just one question left to ask you,” I said, smiling through my tears. I took a deep breath. “Will you marry me?”
Edward staggered back. Then he gave a low shout.
“Will I?”
As he took me in his arms, his handsome face no longer looked thuggish or brooding or dark. Joy made him look like the boy he’d once been, like the man I’d always known he could be.
“I love you, Diana Maywood,” he whispered, cradling my cheek. “I’m going to love you for the rest of my life. Starting now....”
Pulling me against his body, he kissed me hard, until I was gasping with joy and need, clutching him to me.
“Um,” I heard the mechanic’s awkward mumble across the hangar, “you guys still know I’m here, right?”
* * *
We were married two weeks later in my mother’s rose garden. All the people we loved were there, Mrs. MacWhirter and the rest of our closest family and friends. Our wedding was nothing fancy, just a white cake, a simple dress and a minister. No twenty-carat diamond ring this time, either. Seriously, I was afraid I’d put my eye out with that thing. Instead, we gave each other plain gold bands in the double ring ceremony.
It helps to have friends in the entertainment business. A musician friend of mine played the guitar, and a photographer friend took pictures. Madison was my bridesmaid, and Howard walked me down the aisle. As I held a simple bouquet of my mother’s favorite roses, in her garden on that beautiful, bright California morning, it was almost as if she were there, too.
It was all perfect. The only guests were people we really loved. Rupert and Victoria sent their congratulations and a very nice blender.
After the ceremony, when we were officially husband and wife, we held an outdoor dinner reception beneath fairy lights. Howard and Madison openly wept, throwing rose petals as Edward and I roared off in a vintage car, before jetting off to Las Vegas for our honeymoon. We spent two lovely nights at the Hermitage, a luxurious casino resort owned by Nikos Stavrakis, a friend of Edward’s, happily married himself with six children.
Our luxurious, glamorous hotel suite overlooked all the lights of the Strip, which we mostly ignored because we were too busy discovering the joys of married sex. Holy cow. I had no idea how different it would be. How it feels to possess someone’s body when you also possess
