by Sarah Bailey
He smiled at me in that heart-stopping way of his. It made me melt immediately and relax into his touch.
“All they want to do is get to know the man I’m intending to spend the rest of my life with and make you a part of our family.”
He stroked my cheek with such reverence, I couldn’t take it any longer.
“Raphi?”
“Yes, cuore mio?”
“Will you hold me?”
He dropped his hands from my face and pulled me into his arms, kissing my hair and stroking my back. I curled my arms around him, burying my face in his shoulder and breathing him in.
“I don’t know what I’d do without you,” I whispered into his jumper.
“We already know what it’s like to be without each other and I can tell you now, that’s not happening again, okay? I love you.”
I could hear the words ‘I love you’ from his lips forever. They wrapped around my heart and kept me from drowning.
“I love you too.”
He pulled away and smiled at me.
“You always see me at my most vulnerable,” I said with a shrug.
It only made him smile wider.
“I love that about you. Knowing you feel safe with me.”
“I do. You keep me grounded when I’m anxious.”
“I want to make sure you’re comfortable and happy. It’s all I ever want.”
I took his hand and brought it to my lips, placing a kiss on his knuckles.
“I’m your heart.”
Those green eyes behind his glasses softened.
“You are so ridiculously adorable and if you don’t stop it, I might say fuck my parents and kiss you for hours instead.”
“I’d like that.”
He chuckled and shook his head, making me smile wide.
“I know you would, but they wouldn’t be happy with me, so come on, they don’t bite.”
Raphi pulled me towards the door, opening it and walking through into the living room again. None of them said anything about what happened. His dads merely came up one by one and shook my hand, telling me they were happy to have me here. Eric, Raphi’s biological father, was last, and in all honesty, I was most nervous about his opinion of me. Only because Raphi was closest to his dad. Well, technically Duke was the person Raphi was closest to, but I already had his approval. Raphi said Duke’s reaction to us getting back together was “thank fuck for that,” something which did not surprise me in the slightest.
“Raphi said you got all your qualifications and are now working as a psychologist,” Eric said after he shook my hand.
“Yes, I do love my work. As Raphi knows, helping people is something I’ve always wanted to do.”
Eric reached out and squeezed Raphi’s shoulder.
“Then I know my son is in good hands. He speaks very highly of you as it is.”
“Dad!” Raphi groaned.
“Don’t mind this one, we’re apparently always embarrassing him, especially now he’s an adult.”
“Dad, please stop talking, you’re almost as bad as Xav, but at least he didn’t make a crude joke.”
Eric grinned.
“Not yet, monkey, but the night is still young.”
Raphi shook his head, his hand tightening around mine.
“Oh great. You sure Mum didn’t tell you all to be on your best behaviour tonight? I distinctly remember every other time one of us brought a partner around, she threatened you into being good.”
Eric bit his lip in the way Raphi did.
“She did, but you know Xav likes to bend the rules somewhat.”
Raphi rubbed his face.
“Welcome to my version of hell,” he muttered to me.
I kept from commenting but it didn’t stop me smiling. Seeing him all worked up over his parents not behaving in front of me somehow made this less awkward and uncomfortable for me. They were a normal family and they’d accepted me. They approved of me being his boyfriend. It’s all I wanted.
Ash disappeared to get dinner out of the oven, and told the rest of us to sit at the table. I was thankful Raphi sat next to me and laced our fingers together on his knee under the table.
“You okay?” he whispered as his dads all sat down.
“Yeah, I’m good.”
He glanced at me, his green eyes shining.
“Did I tell you how handsome you look this evening?”
I shook my head. Raphi had picked me up from my flat before we made our way over here. It turned out my boyfriend was a perfect gentleman outside of the bedroom and a dominant one inside. I loved that about him. Those two sides of my man excited me in the best way possible.
“Does that mean I scrubbed up well for your parents?”
“Fuck yes, possibly too good. I can’t wait to get my hands on you later.”
My cheeks heated. I didn’t think I’d made a huge effort even though it’d taken me half an hour and pestering Meredith to help me choose an outfit. I’d settled on smart casual. Dark jeans and a navy short-sleeved shirt.
“Your parents are right there,” I hissed, feeling embarrassed about how openly he was admitting to wanting to fuck me later.
He grinned and winked at me. No wonder his parents called him a cheeky monkey.
“Don’t worry, they’re not listening.”
“You are something else.”
“You love that about me.”
I smiled and squeezed his hand. I loved everything about him. Nothing could make me want to leave this man ever again.
Dinner was a rather lively affair amongst the seven of us. His parents asked me all sorts of questions and made every effort to engage me in conversation. The whole time Raphi kept looking at me as if I was everything to him. As if it made him happy I was getting along with his family. It helped me relax and allayed my anxiety.
When dinner was over and we’d had dessert, Raphi leant over to Rory and asked him something I didn’t hear. I gathered by the smiles they shared, it was something good. Raphi then tugged me up out of my chair whilst his parents started to clear the table.
“Come with me.”
I was unceremoniously dragged out of the room, which didn’t seem to faze his parents. We were their guests tonight after all.
“Where are we going?”
“I have something to show you.”
I kept quiet as he took me down a hallway. He stopped outside some patio doors and opened them. The two of us stepped into what looked like a conservatory, but it was nothing like any normal conservatory I’d ever seen in my life. Raphi closed the door behind us and swept his hand out.
“Welcome to what my parents like to call Rory’s sanctuary.”
I looked around. There were a variety of plants everywhere, some of them as tall as the glass ceiling. It was like we’d stepped into a mini version of Kew Gardens.
“This is… amazing.”
He smiled and pulled me further in. There was a seating area amongst the plants. The lighting in here was low and made it almost seem magical.
“Are we allowed to be in here?”
“Yeah, I asked Rory if I could show you. He doesn’t like too many people being in here, but you’re special to me.”
“Well, I’ll have to thank him.”
Raphi pulled me closer and cupped my face with his free hand.
“I have to admit, I also have an ulterior motive for bringing you in here.”
I raised an eyebrow.
“And what would that be?”
He placed a gentle kiss to my mouth, making my heart go haywire in my chest.
“I want to ask you some things. I want to be on the same page about the future or at least, I would like to know what you want.”
I swallowed. It had crossed my mind many times what our future would look like. I knew what I wanted with him. And here I’d told Meredith not to mention anything to Raphi, but he’d been thinking about it himself.
&nb
sp; “Okay… you sure it’s not too soon to discuss this?”
“No, J, it’s not. I don’t want to waste time second-guessing your feelings about it.”
I gave him a nod. If he wanted to do this now, then we could. Raphi dropped his hand from my face.
“It didn’t escape my notice when I told you about Aurora’s wedding, or more like I complained about it, you questioned if I wanted to get married.”
I bit my lip. He’d deliberately avoided the question at the time. Was he waiting until now to talk to me about it?
“I want to get married in the future… to you, obviously.”
I tried not to smile. My heart was doing all sorts of crazy shit in my chest at the knowledge that’s what he planned for us.
“Obviously.”
“And I want to know if it’s what you want.”
“That’s easy. Yes, in the future.”
He let out a breath.
“And a family… is that something you’d want too?”
I had to make a conscious effort not to let my mouth drop open.
“I’ve thought about it.”
“And?”
Honesty. You and Raphi have to have honesty between you even if it’s scary.
“I’ve always envisioned I’d adopt with whoever I ended up with.”
It took a second before he smiled at me. Then his hand came up and cupped the back of my neck, drawing me closer to him.
“We can talk about specifics when the time comes, but know I want that with you.”
I didn’t get a chance to respond. He kissed me again and my body reacted to his like it belonged to him. I curled my arm around his back and held him close. Many times in this life I’d wondered if I could ever be truly happy. Right there at that moment, knowing Raphi was mine and we wanted the same things in the future made my heart swell.
When he pulled away, he raised our joined hands and started to sway slightly. I raised an eyebrow.
“What are you doing?”
He started to hum in answer to my question. I let him rock us from side to side, shaking my head and smiling at him.
“Really, Raphi, what are you doing?”
“I’m celebrating the moment.”
He made me twirl around like we were dancing whilst continuing to hum a tune. I started laughing at the ridiculousness of this man. He never ceased to amaze me.
“You say I’m adorable, but I think you are.”
“I’ll take that.”
I allowed Raphi to spin me around and dance with me in Rory’s conservatory because apparently, this is how he wanted to mark the moment. It felt like we’d taken a giant leap of faith with each other tonight. I leant my head on his shoulder, feeling content, happy and in love.
“You’re not going to run away from me again?” I whispered.
“Never, cuore mio, you’re stuck with me for life so you better get used to it.”
“I’ll try.”
He laughed. We both knew there was no trying involved. Raphi was the one I wanted to be beside forever.
“Haven’t I shown you how much I love you yet?”
I raised my head from his shoulder and smiled at him.
“You have, but later, I think I’m going to need you to show me all over again.”
The way his eyes darkened made me shiver.
“Make no mistake, I fully intend to show you as many times as you ask for it.”
“I can’t wait.”
He squeezed my hand and I knew we were going to be okay. Raphi wasn’t going anywhere. And I’d been welcomed into a family I knew would treat me like one of their own just as they did with my sister. Who could ask for more from this life?
All I really needed was Raphi and me together. The rest… well, that was a bonus.
Chapter Fifty Three
I looked up at the man I’d married as he stood, smoothing out the paper in his hand. Raphi had kept a lot of his speech a secret from me because he wanted me to hear it on our wedding day. I had no clue why it was this important to him, but I didn’t question it.
Our love affair had been tumultuous at times, but when we came back together as adults who’d gone through hell and back just over a year ago, it was for good. We both knew what it felt like to be apart and it had only made us appreciate what we had in each other.
I remembered the day Raphi asked me to marry him six months ago. It’d been two days after I’d moved into his place. A normal day in our lives, yet it took a turn when I went upstairs to get ready for bed and found a note sitting on our bed which said turn around. Somehow the damn man had managed to sneak up behind me and get down on one knee. What followed was me crying buckets and just about managing to say yes to his proposal. Raphi had spent the rest of the night calming me the fuck down and telling me how he couldn’t wait to be my husband. Then he’d made love to me, which stopped me crying because how the hell could I cry when he’d been giving me so much pleasure.
Neither of us had wanted a big affair. It was just family and a few close friends. I’d loved every moment of saying I do to him. Raphi had spent the entire ceremony staring at me as if I was the only person in the room. I don’t think I could have asked for more.
Raphi knocked a knife against his wine glass, bringing the attention of the room to us. He cleared his throat and looked around.
“Okay, so I’m not very good at talking in public, but here it goes.”
I smiled and reached out, linking his fingers with mine. He looked down at me and gave me a subtle nod.
“Jonah and I would firstly like to thank everyone for being here on our special day. And it has been truly special. I got to marry this one, so nothing really beats that.” He indicated me with his head which garnered some chuckles from our guests. “Some of you will know we’ve not had the easiest time together, but the journey has been worth every moment. There is no one else in this world I would want to spend my life with but Jonah.”
My heart started to race and my fingers tightened in his. I had a feeling Raphi might end up making me cry, but I was going to try hold back on those tears.
“Now, we didn’t want to do traditional speeches hence why I’m not letting this guy over here talk even though he’s my best man.” Raphi waved a hand at Duke who winked at him. “Mostly because his stories about me would be inappropriate and quite frankly, I don’t trust him not to embarrass me.”
“Aw, Raphi, I would never,” Duke said, putting a hand to his chest.
“You say that, but no one in this room believes you.”
That brought more laughter from our guests, especially their parents.
“Anyway,” Raphi continued when everyone had settled down a bit. “I did want to say a few things to mark the occasion because, for me, there was a point when I didn’t know if I would have a day like this. For Jonah to agree to marry me after everything we’ve been through, well, that’s pretty big for me. Words cannot express how much I appreciate having him in my life.”
I bit the inside of my cheek as tears threatened.
No. No crying!
“I thought I’d tell you about the first time Jonah and I actually had a real conversation.” He smiled down at me. “You remember that, right?”
I nodded, relatively sure of the day he was referring to.
“I was fifteen at the time… crazy to think it was over ten years ago now, but anyway… I didn’t always have the best time at school, though what kid would when they have a family like ours.”
He glanced at his parents, giving them a smile to let them know he wasn’t giving them any shit for it.
“I’d just had a bunch of kids giving me a hard time and I ended up in the toilets, bawling my eyes out. If that wasn’t bad enough, I heard someone come in and tried to be as quiet as possible, but it clearly didn’t work because here they were asking me if I was okay. I’m there like, shit, why did someone have to come in here, but there was also something very f
amiliar about the person’s voice which made me not want them to leave.”
I remembered that day vividly as Raphi clearly did. It was the very first time I noticed how attractive he was. I hadn’t looked before because he was Meredith’s friend.
“So imagine my surprise when I walk out of the cubicle and find my friend’s older brother standing there. Now, Jonah doesn’t know this because I’ve never actually told him, but I’d always felt a little awkward around him. We’d only ever shared hellos and small talk before, but every time he was around me, I’d get this weird feeling in my chest.”
Raphi rubbed his chest as if he was still feeling it now.
“I did eventually work out why later on, but at the time, I had no clue why Meredith’s older brother made me feel so odd.”
“You going to tell me what it was?” I asked, interrupting him.
He smiled and let go of my hand, only to ruffle my hair.
“Yeah, silly, I had a crush on you.”
“What?”
“Well, you know when you’re a kid and you look up to and admire someone, that’s a crush, J.”
I gave him a look.
“You’re so not funny.”
“I like to think you find me hilarious, but are you going to let me get on with the story?”
I rolled my eyes then felt a little sheepish since we had an audience. It was hard sometimes to remember other people were around us when he was next to me. Just as I took up all of Raphi’s vision when I was with him, he took up mine.
“Go ahead.”
“Thank you.” He turned his attention back to the room. “Anyway, Jonah offered to lend me an ear, I think out of the kindness of his heart, but he can tell you why. I agreed because I mean, I trusted him to an extent, like he was my friend’s brother. Jonah takes me off to this café and buys me tea and a slice of Victoria sponge. Here’s me thinking, doesn’t he know my parents are loaded and he really doesn’t need to do this. But… we ended up having this deep conversation. I remember feeling like I’d found a connection with someone who actually understood me, but I felt incredibly guilty about it too.”