She was bewildered. “What do you mean, everybody else has listened? Who is everybody else?”
“All my friends. The other people I love.” He looked into her eyes, willing her to see the truth. “I just left Louise’s house. Spence and I are good. He understands now.” Mason’s eyes never left hers. If she still refused him, he didn’t know what he was going to do. He couldn’t very well tie her up and make her sit there and hear what he had to say.
She shook her head. “There is nothing that will make me understand why you humiliated me by letting me think we were…that you are…like me. That you have to work to earn a living.”
“I do work to earn a living,” he insisted. “Please just hear me out, and then if you still want to leave, I’ll take you home myself.” He drew a deep breath. “I won’t bother you again, except to see my children.”
“You’re not giving me much of a choice here, are you?” She couldn’t even set out on foot. It would take her the better part of an hour to walk home, and she didn’t want to be out after dark. She finally took off her coat and dropped it onto the table that took up one side of the room. “Talk.”
“Will you sit down with me?” He knew it didn’t really matter. She could walk away from a sitting position just as freely as standing, but it felt like she was already on her way out the door before he even started.
She sighed and walked over to sit down on one of the metal folding chairs. He pulled one around and sat down to face her.
“I want to tell you about my childhood first,” he began. “You described your parents as strict and upright. My parents were never really parents at all. They treated me like a possession—something they owned. They could just pick me up and place me wherever it suited them, with no thought to how it affected me. Can you imagine what it’s like to be sent off to boarding school when you’re nine years old, just because your parents have some upper crust friends who think it’s the best place to send children? Well, I do.”
She sat in silence, unsure of what to say.
“Before you, there has been one person—only one person—who loved me. My grandmother. She treated me like a human being, and because she controlled the purse strings, my parents had to go along with her.” It still cut like a knife after all these years. “Then, she died when I was nine, and it was all them from then on. My life was a living nightmare. They rid themselves of me under the guise of wanting what was best for their only son. Every school or camp their friends thought were good—I’d be sent there. Until the next ‘best thing’ came along. I wasn’t ever in one place long enough to call it home.”
“I’m sorry, Mason, but that doesn’t change anything between us.”
“Please, I’m not finished.”
Claire slowly nodded. She would at least hear him out.
“When I turned eighteen, I got out of there. You know the kind of lifestyle I had.” He looked over her left shoulder for a moment before he shifted his gaze back to her. “I’m not proud of how I lived before I discovered what I truly value. I can’t go back and undo what I did. Believe me, I would in a heartbeat if I could. Except I still can’t tell you I’d go back and erase our night together. We wouldn’t have Zoey, and I wouldn’t have found you.”
“I don’t think you can fully comprehend how much I love you, and how much you’ve changed my life for the better,” he stated fervently. “And I’m proud of you, no matter what you think. You could wrap yourself in burlap, and I probably wouldn’t notice because I see you, who you are, not what you have. That’s what I’m asking of you. Please see me, and not what I have.”
“If you’re not embarrassed by how I dress, then why did you set up the whole thing at Rivets?” She was holding onto anger as her last defense. She had to keep her self-respect.
“I didn’t set anything up,” he insisted. “That was all Joni’s idea. She asked me about it because she thought you’d enjoy having some new clothes. I told her it would be up to you—that she’d have to ask you. She was just trying to be your friend and help you have something you wanted, not just something you needed.”
“You still let me think you had to work for a living,” she reminded him.
“My grandma left me some money—a lot of money. Even though I went through a sizable amount of it when I was younger, there is plenty left. But I don’t use it unless I have to. I live off what I make at Taylor’s.” He thought he saw some acceptance in her eyes and prayed he was right. “When I had my accident, I had to fall back on the savings account to pay my bills, but think, Claire. Do I live like a man who spends a lot of money? I have a one-bedroom apartment.”
“You bought a brand new van.” Seeing it had just made her realize even more, what a fool she was.
“I did,” Mason admitted. “But I bought it for my family. My car insurance check took care of a lot of it, but I did take money out of the savings account to cover the rest. That van is the safest one on the market, and after what happened to me, I want to be sure I’m doing everything I can to keep all of you safe.”
“So you just spend it when you feel like it?” She didn’t see the difference in doing that and living off of it.
“From now on, we’ll decide if we need to spend it, and what we need to spend it on—you and me. If something happens and Spence’s scholarship doesn’t come through, we can afford to send him to college. I want us to make those decisions together.” He searched her eyes but still couldn’t find the love that had flowed so freely from them before.
“That’s your money. I shouldn’t have any say in how you spend it.”
“Claire, everything I have is ours—yours and mine. That’s what marriage means to me. I want you to know everything, too. No more secrets.” He told her how much money was in the savings account, and she nearly fell out of her chair. “There is one thing I’d like for us to consider doing with part of that money. I’d like to build a house for our family. Taylor’s will do it, so it won’t cost near what it normally would, and it would give us a brand new start. Will you think about that?”
“This is too much.” She put her face in her hands. Then she looked up at him. “What about your inheritance? That man told me you won’t get it if you marry me, and if you do get it, you’re going to be even richer.”
“He lied to you.” But nobody ever would again, if Mason had anything to say about it. “The money he was talking about is a trust set up by my grandfather right after I was born. I’ll receive it when I turn thirty, no matter what. And as for me being richer, I have something to show you.”
Mason stood up and walked to the table to retrieve his paperwork. This was it. If this didn’t convince Claire, he was finished.
He scooted a chair closer to her and pulled the top sheet off the stack and put it on her lap. “Brody did this for me, so it’s legal and binding.” He tapped the paper. “This is my will leaving everything I have to you—or the kids if you’re gone, too.” Before she could respond, he placed another paper on top of it. “This is what I’m doing with my trust fund.”
Claire looked at the paper. The total amount at the bottom was staggering, but she looked back up at the list. He was setting up trust funds for both Spencer and Zoey that they would receive when they turned twenty-one. The amount he was giving them wasn’t enough they would be able to live off of it, but they would each have a comfortable nest egg. An amount equal to three times each of the kids’ trust funds was designated for “future dependents.”
The next line was an amount to invest in Taylor’s Construction. The third line was a hefty sum of money, and it was being donated to the church they were in—the one that sponsored the program that brought Mason and Spencer together. The final line, which accounted for the remainder of the funds, and was an unimaginable amount of money to her, was being divided among an impressive list of charities.
“You’re not keeping a penny for yourself,” she murmured, still looking at the paper in amazement.
“That’s not exactly true,” he
told her. “I’m going into business with Logan, and forming a new company—T & W Construction—because it’s something I really want to do, and I think it will give me a more solid financial foundation to take care of my family.”
“Mason…I can’t believe this.”
“That’s not all I have to show you.” He placed yet another paper on her lap. “This legally severs me from the people who call themselves my parents.”
“Not because of me?” The prospect horrified her.
“No,” he spoke firmly and without hesitation. “What they tried to pull with you was the block that toppled the tower, but the fact of the matter is they have done nothing but make me miserable since I was nine years old, Claire. After I had given Vincent Wright a copy of this paper, I felt free, like a whole new person. I would have even changed my name if we hadn’t already started the process of changing Zoey’s to Wright.”
“This doesn’t matter, though.” Claire was still frightened of the power these people must weld. “They’ll never leave you alone until you do what they want.”
“I told him if either of them even comes near my family or me we would sue them for harassment, and I will damage the one thing that truly matters to them. I will drag their names through the mud.” He smiled grimly. “They’ll leave us alone.”
Claire was overwhelmed. “I don’t know what to say.”
“Say you love me, and you’ll still marry me tomorrow,” he implored. “Say you won’t hold it against me that my grandmother left me money we can fall back on if we want or need to. Say it’s going to be okay if I want you to have new clothes and jewelry and all that kind of stuff because you deserve them, not because I’m embarrassed or ashamed of what you already have. I love you more than anything else in the world, Claire. Say you believe me. Please. Believe me.”
“I believe you.”
She wasn’t sure which of them moved first, but the next thing she knew, she was up and in his arms, being kissed like there was no tomorrow. It was a good thing she remembered they were in a church because she was tempted to lie down on that table and let him make love to her.
“Wait a minute.” She pulled away, dismay on her face. “We can’t get married tomorrow. I canceled everything.”
He grinned. “I called right after you canceled and told them it was a mistake. Everything is still on schedule. Our rehearsal is at seven o’clock this evening.”
“I suppose I should be aggravated at you for assuming we were going to work things out,” she told him, “but I’m just too happy to be angry.”
“That’s what I really want. I want to love you and make you happy.” He kissed her again, nearly taking her legs out from under her with the force of his feelings.
“I love you, Mason,” she murmured as he pulled her into a warm embrace.
She felt laughter rumble through his chest. “You’d better. In case you didn’t notice, I set up some extra trust fund money. I want to make more babies with you before Zoey gets too old to play with her brothers and sisters.”
Claire pulled back and looked into his sparkling eyes. “I don’t think that’ll be a problem. As far as I’m concerned, we can start making babies tomorrow night.”
“Oh, I plan on at least practicing several times.” He gave her a quick kiss. “Believe me.”
“I do.”
EPILOGUE
“I don’t understand why we have to wear suits,” Spencer complained for the umpteenth time. “We’re just going to be in the judge’s chambers, aren’t we?”
“We’re wearing suits because this is very important to your mother, and we’re having a family portrait done right after we leave the courthouse,” Mason explained—for the umpteenth time.
“Daddy…Momomom!” Zoey hollered at them from her high chair.
Spencer walked over and picked her up. Mason couldn’t get over how cute she looked in the brand new pink, polka dotted dress they bought just for this occasion. Claire even managed to find a new pair of pink shoes and a bow which was fastened in the middle of Zoey’s head full of black curls. Her big brown eyes were glued to Spencer.
“Pin,” she said, grabbing her brother’s nose. Spencer pulled his nose out of her hands and pushed it against her neck to tickle her. She burst into a fit of giggles until he pulled away. “Pin,” Zoey said again, looking at Spencer expectantly. She wanted “Pin” to keep tickling her.
“Is everybody ready?” Claire asked as she walked into the room.
Mason’s heart sped up at the sight of his beautiful wife. She wore the new, blue dress she’d brought home the night before, and her eyes sparkled so much they appeared to be lit by electricity.
“You look increidble.” He walked over to her.
“Thank you.” It had taken a while for Claire to get used to being able to afford new clothes without feeling like they should be spending the money on something else. After over six months of marriage, she was getting the hang of it.
“You have the evening off, don’t you?” Mason asked.
“Yes, and Joni gave me tomorrow off so we can celebrate,” she told him, smiling. “You’ve got me for the whole weekend, free and clear.” Mason wanted her to quit work altogether, but Claire had been pulling her own weight for too long. Instead, she lucked out when Joni needed a new assistant manager and hired Claire on the spot. After a couple months of training, Claire had a job she loved. She made nearly as much as she had at Butlers, and with the discount she received on clothing, she was able to outfit her family for a fraction of the cost it would normally be. Joni even gave her Sundays off so they could have their “Family Sundays,” a tradition that meant a great deal to Mason. It was all working out nicely.
“Can we take my car?” Spencer asked.
Mason chuckled. “I can’t see your mom getting in and out of the back seat of that two-door in her dress, and you know my legs are too long.” He and Claire had used funds from their inheritance savings account to loan Spencer the money to buy his own car. He worked ten or fifteen hours a week at a pizza place in Ransom and was paying them back a little at a time. They were going to let him keep his job once school started as long as he maintained his grade point average. Mason had no doubt Spencer would be able to do it.
“Are we stopping to get my driver’s license changed before or after our picture, Mom?” Spencer asked, as his sister commenced to giving him big, slobbery, open-mouthed “mwah” kisses on his cheek. He turned his attention to Zoey. “Just rubbing them in,” he told her, as he used his hand to wipe his wet face.
“I think we can go before.” Claire knew how excited Spence was about getting that done. If this had come through just one month earlier, he wouldn’t have had to change it.
“Come on, Zoey.” Spencer looked knowingly from Mason to his mom. “We’ll go ahead and get you buckled into your seat.”
She was jabbering at him as he carried her out the door.
“Come here,” Mason growled as he pulled Claire into his arms. “You look good enough to eat.”
She leaned against him and raised her mouth for him to kiss. If she lived to be one hundred, she didn’t think she’d ever get tired of his kisses. He was working his magic on her at that moment and making her want to forget all this and go back to bed with her husband. That made her think. “Did Logan change our floor plans so our bedroom is on the opposite end of the house from the kids’ rooms?”
He chuckled. “Yeah. I’ll take you over and show them to you tomorrow.”
She felt herself blush. “He didn’t ask why we wanted it changed, did he?”
“He didn’t have to.” Mason ran his thumb over her satin bottom lip. “I just told him my wife goes a little crazy and tends to make a lot of noise when we make love.”
She swatted his chest. “You did not.”
“It’s true, though.” He teased her mercilessly when he increased his health insurance. While he was practically ecstatic to discover his wife did indeed become a ball of fire in the bedroom, the real rea
son was so he’d be better covered in case of another emergency. He had his family to take care of now.
He pulled her in for another deep kiss. Yep. Going back to bed would be just fine as far as Claire was concerned. This occasion was too important, though, so she didn’t protest when he finally pulled his lips away from hers.
“We’d better get out to the car,” she told him, smiling.
“Yeah,” he said. “I’m ready to go get my son’s name changed to Wright.”
“It’s been a long time coming, hasn’t it?” she asked.
He looked at her and thought of all the love she brought to his life. “It’s been worth every second, believe me.”
She always did.
And in January…
It’s You! Book 4 of Hearts for Ransom
Jake Landon doesn’t know what’s happening to his teammates, but he wants no part of it. First, Logan married Emily, and then Bo and Jan made a trip down the aisle. But, what really blows him away, is the one man with more of a revolving door at the foot of his bed than Jake is now a happily married father of two.
He’s always had two rules when it came to women:
Never…and he means, never, spend more than one night with the same woman.
No promises or emotions will be involved—on either side.
Lexie Michaels is excited about her new home in Shadow, Indiana, and the prospect of working for her cousin’s husband and his partner. She needs a fresh start after her fiancé dumped her. From now on, she has a new outlook on the opposite sex. And she has a new rule when it comes to men:
Never…and she means, never, date a man she works with—not after the last one cost her a job.
They unknowingly break two rules on the night they meet. But, how was Jake supposed to know he was seducing the new attorney his partner hired? He hadn’t met her; he hadn’t even seen her. What he does know is one night is not enough with this gorgeous, blonde stick of dynamite. There goes his rule number one.
Believe Me (Hearts for Ransom Book 3) Page 23