No Stranger to Scandal - By Rachel Bailey Page 0,63
attention. Then she swiveled and planted her hands on her hips. “Before you get whatever it is you forgot, there’s something I—”
“You,” he said, voice deep and serious.
She stopped midsentence, mouth still open to form the next word. “Pardon?”
He put Josh on the sofa, where he was immediately joined by Rosie. Then Hayden looked back to Lucy, eyes intense. “I forgot you. As soon as the plane took off, I knew I’d made a stupid mistake. A colossal mistake. When we disembarked in New York, I found a flight straight back again.”
She started to tremble. The hope was so strong, it was painful, but none of this made sense. “You want to continue our fling?” she asked.
“I want more than a damn fling. I want everything, Lucy.” He took her hands and gripped them tightly. “I want to live my life with you.”
The trembling inside grew stronger, until she could feel her lips quivering, and her fingers as Hayden’s gripped them. All that she wanted seemed so close, but she wouldn’t live with regrets. She wouldn’t settle for anything less than the whole package.
“What about Josh?” she asked, looking down at the little boy who was rubbing Rosie’s tummy. “I couldn’t be with you and be excluded from your relationship with him. You said you’d never share him again.”
“I was wrong.” He dropped her hands and speared his fingers through his hair, looking nervous. “One of the things I thought about on that flight was that parenting a child with you would be a world apart from parenting with Brooke. It was fear talking—fear of being edged out of my son’s life again. The best thing for Josh is to have two parents who love him. But I know it’s asking a lot to take on me and Josh together. You should be—”
She placed a finger over his lips. “You’re not about to tell me what I should be doing again, are you?”
His mouth curved under her fingers. “No, ma’am.”
“Good,” she said and grinned. “Because I love Josh. When you flew away, I was missing him almost as much as I was missing you. I want you both as a package deal.”
His Adam’s apple bobbed slowly, then he knelt down on her living room carpet and took her hands. “Lucy Royall, marry me. Marry me and Josh.”
Joy bubbled through her body, filling every cell, every dark corner inside her until it was too big to be contained and seemed to flow out and fill even the air around her. But, aside from a smile, she managed to keep from reacting just yet.
“Before I answer that,” she said sweetly, laying her Southern accent on thick, “I want to set some ground rules.”
His mouth opened. Closed again. “Ground rules? You’re killing me, Lucy.”
She held up a finger. “First rule—no more thinking you know what’s best for me.”
“Agreed,” he said, chuckling. “I failed pretty bad at that anyway.”
“Also, I’ll be flying back to D.C. at least once a week to visit Graham no matter what happens with his sentencing, so I don’t want to live too far away. Though I won’t want to be far away after he gets out, either.” She’d meant it when she’d told Graham earlier that she’d be there for him.
Not letting go of her hands, Hayden stood. “I expected you’d want to be nearby and I’ve had a suggestion. I’m open to setting up an office for my business in D.C. if you want to stay here. Or we could live in both cities—Josh has a few years before he starts school, so we don’t have to be chained anywhere just yet. We’ll work around Boyle’s sentence.”
After tracking Graham’s crimes and being the one responsible for catching him, Hayden was still willing to work around the man’s sentence, to change his business, if needed? For her. Because he knew it was important to her. In that moment, she knew he genuinely loved her. “You’d really be happy with that?”
“I learned a couple of things from my first marriage. This time I want a true partnership, where our lives reflect what we both want, what we both need. Graham is part of your life, so we’ll include him. I’m sure I’ll come to appreciate his virtues,” he said wryly. “One thing I do like about him is he honestly cares for you. I can respect that.”
Emotion clogging her throat, she wrapped her arms around his waist. “I didn’t think I could love you more.” It was almost too much,