by Kate Meader
I mentally grimace at the notion I take effort, but he’s right. I’m not easy.
He goes on. “But no one deserves another person as their right. People aren’t prizes for being princes. I can’t save you, Bean, but I still think we can save us.”
A sob escapes me. A heartfelt, ugly sound.
“Grant, I don’t want to do this alone.”
“Then don’t.” He cups my hips and lifts me against him and all his solidity and strength. The ballast I need. I fall into his kiss, filled with fire and forever, just as I fell into him all those years ago.
Falling doesn’t have to be a bad thing, not when I have the greatest catcher of them all. Life can be joyous, cruel, messy, and terrifying. Love even more so. Rarely is it perfect, and realizing this at long last is the greatest gift I could ever receive.
Epilogue
Grant
THE NOT TOO DISTANT FUTURE…
Max nudges me with his elbow. “Look at our boy, all grown up.”
We both regard Lucas with indulgence, our junior in so many ways. He’s standing on the veranda at Max’s house on Chicago’s North Shore, telling some long-ass tale about Trinity having a cold that could be cured only with Cadbury Creme Eggs. Or something. Other people’s love stories are so boring.
“If the fact Trinity thought stopping birth control and still letting Lucas have sex with her denotes maturity, then I’ll give you that one.”
That’s right, friends, Lucas Wright is now a daddy. In his arms lies a gorgeous girl named Lizzie with a crop of dark hair and gorgeous brown eyes like her mom’s. Our friend and partner in crime is the last one of us to fall to fatherhood.
“So, as Lucas’s brain is currently baby mush,” Max observes, “it’s up to me to do the honors with the quarterly beg. You know there’s more than enough work to take on a fourth partner, so whenever you’re ready, Lincoln. Time to hang up your Minion slippers and dust off your tie collection. We need you back in the office.”
My gaze seeks out my wife, who’s standing with Trinity while they both shake their heads at Lucas. She turns and grins, her happiness a tangible thing that hugs my heart.
“I like being a stay-at-home dad.”
“Can’t think why. Every day I can’t wait to get away from the little monsters.”
“Daddy! I heard that!” Jessica, Max’s five-year-old, cuts in. “Billy’s the monster, not me.” Shaking her blond curls, she pouts and hugs his leg.
Max scoops her up. “Yeah, you’re a monster just like your baby brother. I’ve no problem telling you that. Daddy lies for a living and tells the truth at home.”
“Parent of the year award right there,” Charlie mutters on a drive-by to pick up empty beer bottles.
“I want to play with Milly and Ben now,” Jess announces imperiously. “Put me down, Daddy!”
“Sure thing, fearless monster, I mean, leader.”
She heads off to impose her iron rule over the sandbox Max has built in his backyard, which is about the size of six football fields. I watch her progress until she joins my four-year-old twins. Soon instructions are dispensed for a game that makes no sense to adults, but my little ones take it in stride.
Milly is the strong and silent type, kind of like me. Ben is fidgety and highly strung, more like his mother. They look after each other, which is all I can hope for as they make their way in this crazy world.
Aubrey catches my eye, and we have another perfect moment filled with love. I’m careful not to use that word “perfect” around her, though. It comes with too much baggage, but in my heart it’s what I feel and know we have. My gaze dips to her swollen belly, six months in the making, conceived in the light of a Christmas tree holding a blessed message of hope from the daughter we lost.
My wife, my children, my love, my everything.
I abandon Max and join Aubrey. “You tired, Bean?”
“Not at all. I think Lucas’s energy is rubbing off on me.”
The mention of the word “rubbing” gives me ideas, not that it takes much to send me there. I splay my hand over her stomach, loving how her breath catches at my touch, loving how my heart thumps excitedly about our future. Our past and present, too, because it’s a continuum. No beginnings or ends, only middles. Through good days and bad, each is a tapestry that weaves into the fabric of the life I’ve always wanted.
“Max trying to get you to come back to work?”
“Yup. You’d think one Lincoln would be enough for him. If we were both there, he’d lose his mind.”
“I think you’d lose yours if you had to work with me every day.”
Aubrey took over my partnership in the firm, a move that made sense for us both from a personal and professional standpoint. We could do the nanny/daycare solution like everyone else we know, but this works for us. I missed out on a dad when I was younger, and in a way, so did Aubrey. Having one of us at home fills a gap for us, and it’s surprisingly fun hanging with four-year-olds.
Not that much different from Max and Lucas, in fact.
“I love my time with them,” I say. “Just like I’m going to love my time with this one.” Besides, Cat Damon is in his twilight years and does better with company during the day. At least, that’s what I tell myself when he cusses me out for looking at him crooked.
After the miracle of our twins, we had a hard time getting pregnant again, but now we’re here, blessed once more. Every day Aubrey comes home from work, and I hold her close, ensuring she need never doubt how much I adore her.
I pull my hand away, worried for a moment at the emotional pressure I’m putting on her. She takes it back and covers it with her smaller one.
“Stay,” she whispers, one word that encompasses everything.
“You’ll tell me if I’m too much.”
Her lips curve. “Your too much is all I’ve ever wanted.”
I drag my eyes away from my wife and check in on the twins. Milly is ignoring the latest order from Jessica, instead forging her own path with a wonkily built sandcastle. Ben is running around in circles chasing Cujo, Max’s dog. The future’s so bright that if my life were to be freeze-framed in this instant, I’d fall to my knees and thank anyone who’d listen for my good fortune.
“Thanks for holding on,” Aubrey whispers. “For never giving up.”
My smile takes in all my blessings, the woman of my dreams and the family of my heart. Lawyers usually have no shortage of words, but in this perfect moment I don’t need them.
I don’t need a damn thing.
If you or someone you know has suffered an early pregnancy loss, please know that there are resources to help. One such resource is Share, http://nationalshare.org/
To Laurie Oh
For your unfailing support
Acknowledgments
This was a tough book to write and required a lot of nurturing from my editor. Thanks to Sue Grimshaw for her great notes and to Madeleine, Gina, and the entire Loveswept team for all they’ve done to support the Laws of Attraction series!
Thanks also to everyone who gave feedback and advice to ensure accuracy and authenticity throughout the series, including: Andie J. Christopher, Robin Covington, Regina Kyle, Pamala Knight Duffy, and Kelly Jamieson. All mistakes, of course, are mine.
Finally, to Jimmie Meader and Nicole Resciniti, thanks for always being in my corner!
PHOTO: ZOE MCKENZIE PHOTOGRAPHY
Originally from Ireland, USA Today bestselling author KATE MEADER cut her romance reader teeth on Maeve Binchy and Jilly Cooper novels, with some Harlequins thrown in for variety. Give her tales about brooding mill owners, oversexed equestrians, and men who can rock an apron or a fire hose, and she’s there. Now based in Chicago, she writes sexy contemporary romance with alpha heroes and strong heroines
who can match their men quip for quip.
katemeader.com
Twitter: @kittymeader
Facebook: authorkatemeader
Instagram: @katemeader
Newsletter: http://katemeader.com/newsletter/
BY KATE MEADER
Laws of Attraction
Down with Love
Illegally Yours
Then Came You
Other Books
In Skates Trouble
Irresistible You
So Over You
Undone by You
Hooked on You
Read on for an excerpt from
Illegally Yours
by Kate Meader
Available from Loveswept
Chapter 1
Lucas
Remember that song by Queen with the banging bass riff? Dindin-din-din-din, another one bites the dust…This is my life right now. I’m at the Library, a tasty little spot in the basement of the Gilt Bar, giving one of the crew a righteous send-off. James Henderson is a friend, and the brother of Max, a partner in our family law firm, Wright, Lincoln, and Henderson. He’s getting married in a couple of weeks, and to say it’s been a whirlwind is an understatement. I suspect his fiancée’s knocked up, but Jimbo’s keeping mum.
Max has set up a whiskey tasting for the stag party. I’m more of an ale drinker, but I like to know all there is to know about everything, so I’m up for learning how to tell the difference between this glass of yellow shit and that glass of yellow shit.
“So, what time do the strippers get here, mate?” I ask with my cheekiest grin.
Max flashes his perfect American teeth. “Get a couple of drinks in you and the stage is yours, Wright.”
Up on my feet, I shake my most excellent arse. “I’ll fucking do it, too!”
This makes the rest of them laugh, but turning to sit, I find a black woman staring at me like I’m an idiot. More important, this woman is wearing a bloody catsuit.
It clings to every curve—and she’s got a lot of ’em—and covers up all the body parts I’d usually be assessing. This cover-up is sexier than if she were naked.
The only parts I can see are:
Feet in strappy sandals that show a tease of skin and purple painted toes. This bodes well because purple denotes royalty (think the late, great Prince) as well as wisdom, dignity, independence, creativity, mystery, and magic.
Arms that look toned and strong, one with a tattoo of some Asian symbol.
Her face. Duh. Did you think she was wearing a mask like Catwoman?
The suit is zipped up to her chin, but above her jawline is the best part: a face that launched a thousand ships.
Or hard-ons.
Okay, my hard-on.
It’s more striking than pretty, this face. Regal, even. Big eyes with melted chocolate drops for irises. Cheekbones that almost rival mine. Warm, brown skin with golden undertones. A sparkling stud in her nose that tells me she likes to go against the grain. And her hair…there’s tons of it, a mahogany wave ribboned with copper and red. I could go on, but she’s quickly recovered from the sight of my booty shake and is now passing out sheets of paper.
“Hi, guys, I’m Trinity. Welcome to the Library and to your whiskey tasting.”
Everyone returns her greeting and I hate them all for daring to talk to her. Her voice has a natural rasp, sexy as fuck. I try to catch her attention with one of my dazzling smiles, but she’s already slinked off, gliding on ball bearings, to get the first round of drinks in.
I track her moves, jealous of every interaction she has with other members of the rotten human race. I consider myself an excellent judge of character and I’m especially conscious of the vibes we put out into the world. People respond well to Trinity’s energy. A quick smile and pat on the arm for a customer in her path, a wave at someone who has just walked in, a familiar shoulder nudge to one of her (male) coworkers behind the bar.
“Other people first”—that’s the vibe I’m getting from Trinity. What impression did I make on her, I wonder? According to Chicago magazine, I’m a “Chi-Town Hottie on the Rise”—it wasn’t called that, but it may as well have been—aka, one of the city’s best and brightest divorce attorneys. (And still single, ladies!) I tend to get pegged on sight as the cheeky upstart. The good-time Brit. I find it useful to let people make a call and then, boom! I crush those assumptions with a quote from Rilke or the like. No flies on me.
Back in our orbit, Trinity places a tray of glasses with a finger of whiskey in each on the table.
“The first thing you want to do is check the color,” she says. “Turn your tasting chart over to the blank side and hold the whiskey against it. You could be looking at pale gold, straw, amber—”
“Piss,” I interject, because apparently I have verbal diarrhea. Everyone glares at me, so I class it up with its scientific term, “Sorry, your-ine.”
Trinity’s lovely dark eyes narrow ever so slightly, and she announces, “That’s not a standardized color.”
“Sorry, we can’t take him anywhere.” So says James, the groom-to-be, though he’s barely containing his laughter.
“How’d you get to be a whiskey expert, Trinity?” I ask her, needing to establish a connection.
“Years of training. Next, you’ll want to assess its clarity and viscosity…”
Summarily dismissed, I follow the instructions. Of course, I have an opinion on everything. My so-called friends should tell me to shut up, but it’s like a fire hydrant of inanity has been wrenched open and I’m incapable of closing it.
Here’s how I fill out the sheet, accompanying commentary for free.
Appearance: Still going with urine, because I started off so well.
Nose: Engine oil with hints of vanilla and cabbage. Sure, why not?
Palate: Umami. I don’t know if this is correct, but I like saying the word. Say it with me, kids. Umami.
I suspect this is all rubbish, because one of the flavor profiles is “Band-Aids.” I mean, that can’t be right.
“What the hell are we doing drinking booze that tastes like Band-Aids?” Not that this particular whiskey does—I think—but now that I try again, I’m getting a medicinal flavor I didn’t notice before. “How is that supposed to be appealing? No one says wine tastes like sticking plasters—”
“Sticking plasters?” Max interjects with a raised eyebrow.
“Sticking plasters, Elastoplast…” I wave my glass, sloshing the remaining spoonful. “What we call Band-Aids in the old country, Maxie. Try to keep up. If someone said, ‘Sip on this twenty-seven-year-old aged malt, it’s got a lovely Band-Aid flavor,’ any normal bloke would be backing out the door tout de suite. And don’t get me started on ‘forest fucking floor.’ ”
My tirade against the tyranny of whiskey-tasting profiles has silenced the entire group. I peek up to find Trinity glaring at me in a way that makes my dick go schwing!
“Tell the truth, love, it’s all a load of cobblers, innit?”
She weighs me for a moment and clearly finds me wanting in every way. “Actually, no, it’s science. Scotch, you know, from Scotland, is made with malted barley, which is barley soaked in water and dried with peat fires. Peat has a chemical compound called cresols, which are a subcategory of phenols, or carbolic acid, which is found in products like Lysol and Sharpies and—”
“Band-Aids,” I say, because I actually know this.
“Band-Aids,” she affirms, clearly not pleased with how I needed to get the last word in there. I’m being an arsehole, but I can’t help it. I’m a sucker for competence porn, and this, along with her self-assured beauty, makes me nervous. Rather ridiculous, because nothing makes me nervous.
“I’ll get the next ro
und in, gentlemen,” she says, with emphasis on gentlemen to indicate I’m most definitely excluded. “Drink plenty of water.”
With Trinity out of earshot, Max turns to me with palms up.
“If you’re trying to impress her, you are fucking up royally.”
“You think?” My gaze follows her to the bar. She’s doing a fine impression of ignoring me, the little minx. “Thought I was winning her over.”
“Tell her the color of your last dump,” Grant mutters. “I’m sure she’d love it.”
That cracks the crowd up, especially coming from the usually taciturn Grant Lincoln. He’s my other partner in the firm, though he and Max are closer because they went to law school together. Grant’s from Georgia, looks like a Bratva enforcer, and is of a slow and methodical bent, the perfect foil to my hyper personality.
I glance over at Trinity, who’s still not paying me any heed, and consider my options. I’ve never met a woman I can’t crack with my inordinate charm, razor-sharp wit, and all-around smarty-smarts.
Trinity, love, prepare to be conquered.
Trinity
Rich, overgrown frat boys in slick, overpriced suits. Come the zombie apocalypse, these guys will be the first to get bitten.
“Come the zombie apocalypse, we’ll have no one to charge exorbitant prices for fancy whiskey tastings.” So sayeth Gideon, my coworker and closest pal. Apparently I had muttered that observation out loud.
“You don’t think zombies can appreciate the finer things?”