Skipping Midnight (Desperately Ever After Book 3)

by Laura Kenyon

  “Wait. All of your siblings? You mean including—”

  “Yup.” Belle nodded. “Including Julianne. I actually think having our mother back might change things between all of us.” She shrugged. “I think the idea that she tossed us aside impacted everyone differently. Not that Julianne and I would have been best friends otherwise, but … who knows how things would have turned out if she’d just stayed home?”

  Everyone nodded, not sure what to say. It was one of those impossible “what if” questions for which there would never be an answer.

  After a minute, Cindy cleared her throat and mercifully changed the subject. “And how’s the inn coming along?” she asked.

  Belle glanced at her partner and swirled her cider.

  “It’s coming,” Rapunzel said before explaining that they’d finally finalized the plans last week and would officially break ground on Tuesday. The new layout consisted of a two-story building with ten guest rooms, three separate cottages with private suites, and a single-family house that would be categorically off-limits to all Phoenix guests.

  “That’s great,” said Penny, now Riverfell’s first co-queen and the founder of a private law firm in her southern Riverfell dream house. “So you’re going to live there with Rye? How many bedrooms, if you don’t mind my asking? Logan doesn’t think we need to add on just yet, but I say planning ahead is key.” Her eyes wandered toward the make-your-own s’mores station, where Dawn’s only daughter and Cindy’s oldest son were pouring hot fudge and rainbow sprinkles over melted marshmallows. “After all, if I want to do three in five years—” she smiled and tapped her watch “—the clock’s ticking.”

  “Three in five years?” Dawn cried out. “Penny, take my advice and have one kid before you start making plans for another two. It isn’t a walk in the park, you know. And babies have a way of putting brand new businesses on the back burner.”

  “I know,” Penny said, the light from the fireplace reflecting off the gemstones in her hair. “But I’ll have a five second commute and an overbearing mother-in-law just dying to help out.”

  “You’re kidding.” Dawn shook her head as everyone else’s jaws dropped. “After all the time you spent trying to get Logan away from her … you’re really going to ask Letitia to help bring up your kids?”

  “Not bring up,” Penny corrected. “Just babysit once in a while. But she’s never getting her own key to the house.” She shook her head like a toddler refusing to eat broccoli. “Logan and I had a looooong conversation about this. But Belle, you never answered my question. How many bedrooms? I mean, I have to assume Gray won’t be sleeping in that cabin anymore. And if the two of you want to give Rye a sibling—”

  Penny stopped as Belle choked on her drink and launched into a coughing fit. Rapunzel held her glass while they all waited for it to pass.

  “What makes you think Gray and I are having kids?” she finally blurted, her hand splayed out below her neck. Her eyes were bright red and watery.

  Penny looked around for backup. Her mouth hung open for an embarrassingly long time while she struggled to gather her thoughts. “I … well … you guys are great together and I just assumed … I mean, isn’t that what usually happens when the villain gets defeated and the skies finally clear?” She glanced out the window. It was starting to snow.

  “What usually happens?” Dawn asked, tugging at her lace bolero. “People have babies?”

  “No!” Penny said, shaking her head vigorously. “People get married. That’s how all the fairy tales end.”

  “Yeah,” Belle said, dragging the word out into five syllables. She flicked at her wrist. “That formula didn’t work too well for me last time. Besides, Rye already has a brother.” She paused to wave at Donner, who was here with his new love interest, Kim Epson; his newly discovered son, Cooper; and the ankle bracelet Judge Ford insisted he wear in lieu of serving jail time.

  Penny furrowed her brow and cocked her head. “So Gray won’t be living with you, then?”

  “What, are you kidding?” Belle balked. “Heck yes, he will! I need all the midnight feeding help I can get. That child may be almost normal now, but he eats like a fiend!”

  Everyone laughed as Rapunzel panned the room and excused herself for a little fresh air.

  Ethan was leaning against the patio doors a few dozen yards away, talking with Elmina Goodman. She’d just been named temporary prime minister following Angus Kane’s incarceration, and her approval ratings were through the roof so far. Everyone expected her to make the post official in the special election after the holidays. At the top of her campaign platform: a promise to recognize Selladóre as a legitimate sixth kingdom, monarch to be determined.

  Rapunzel gave the fairy a warm smile and apologized for interrupting—even as she grabbed Ethan by the elbow and guided him outside.

  “Hey,” he said as they stepped onto the patio, snowflakes immediately resting atop his springy salt and pepper hair. “Elmina and I were just in the middle of rating people’s outfits. It was really quite riveting.”

  Rapunzel gave a sarcastic laugh and nudged him into a bench.

  “Is Kiarra Kane really wearing a see-through dress?” he continued, flashing that sideways smirk that still made her knees weak. “Oh, if I could only get my sight back for one day.”

  “Stop talking,” she half teased, half ordered. Then she pulled the box from her pocket and slid down beside him. “I have something I need to show you.”

  His smirk flatlined for a second, then forced its way back up. “I assume you mean tell me,” he corrected as Rapunzel shook her head. “What is it? I’m all ears. Those still work.”

  “No, I mean show you,” Rapunzel said, her hand shaking so much that she dropped the box. She cursed as it bounced off her boot and tumbled behind them. “Just one second.”

  Her insides quivered as she hopped to her feet, rounded the bench, and bent down to scoop it up. Her fingers were two inches away when a pair of patent leather shoes seemed to appear out of nowhere.

  “Hi,” squeaked a tiny voice.

  Rapunzel’s heart skipped three beats. “Holy crap!” she yelled, pulling upright and grabbing her chest. Ethan whipped around immediately to make sure she was okay. The helpless look in his eyes was undeniable.

  “Yes, I’m fine,” she said, continuing to stare at the little girl. She looked familiar somehow. Perhaps she was one of Snow’s orphans and she’d seen her in a brochure. “Can I help you?” Rapunzel asked, leaning her hands on both knees.

  “Are you Renpuzzle?” the girl asked. She had strawberry blond pigtails and was holding an envelope, one hand on each side.

  “Rapunzel,” she corrected, having the distinct feeling that she’d had this exchange before. She looked exactly like the little girl who’d delivered Ethan’s letter during the inn’s grand opening party—but that was months ago. “Yes? What can I do for you?”

  “For you,” the girl said, straightening her elbows and presenting the envelope as if it was a serving tray. She scurried off the instant it touched Rapunzel’s hands.

  “Wait,” Rapunzel called after her. “What—”

  “Who was that?” Ethan interrupted, his voice still showing concern—and a little frustration.

  Rapunzel straightened up and looked at the envelope. There was something hard in it, and by the light of the moon she could make out her name scrawled along the front. “No one,” she replied, tearing at the paper. “Just someone’s little gir—”

  She stopped as a folded note and a chunky silver heart slipped into her palm. A locket. A locket dangling from a black leather cord with—

  She gasped as it flew open on its own and revealed two tiny photographs. On the right was a shot of her and Ethan during Letitia’s fortieth anniversary gala way back in the spring. On the left was a picture of her and Grethel decades earlier. Rapunzel was in Grethel’s lap wearing pigtails secured with bright green ribbons, and Grethel was smiling as if it was the happiest day of her life.

&
nbsp; She bit her lip and unfolded the note.

  My dearest Rapunzel, she read, her breath suddenly paper thin against the chill, November air. No one is ever lost who has love, and nothing is impossible when it’s true. Please think of me whenever you wear this locket, and know that you are always in my heart—forever, truly, and undeniably loved. I could never have asked for a better daughter. You deserve even better than a fairy tale. Yours always, Grethel.

  P.S. Congratulations

  P.P.S. Told you I was there for everything

  Rapunzel whipped her head up as a tear dropped onto the letter, smearing the ink. Her mind raced back to their reunion on Blood Island. “I never actually left you,” Grethel had told her. “I was there for everything. You just didn’t recognize me. You weren’t supposed to.”

  “Hey!” she suddenly called out, hustling to the edge of the patio and peering into the darkness. “Little girl?” she called again, pulling the locket into a tight fist. Then, in a much smaller voice, “Grethel?”

  She felt a tiny shock in her palm, then heard a confused voice answer. Only it wasn’t Grethel. It was Ethan, staring at everything and nothing back on the bench. She opened her mouth to tell him she’d be right there, but as soon as she did, the taste of salty tears covered her tongue. She wiped her face, pulled the locket over her head, and clasped it between her fingers.

  “I’m right here,” she answered, reaching the bench in six quick steps and scooping up her velvet box. She stood behind Ethan for one more minute, struggling to process what had just happened. Then she took a few slow breaths and tried to plug the flow of tears trickling down her cheeks and dropping onto Ethan’s forehead as he leaned back against her hand.

  “This snow melts fast,” he said, wiping her fallen tears from his eyes. “Too bad. I was looking forward to beating you in a good snowball fight.”

  Rapunzel laughed and slid back onto the bench. She placed the jewelry box in her lap. To anyone else, it contained a strange-looking blob of wood carved to show one large oval supporting a smaller, jagged circle. To her, it was a three-dimensional rendering of her and Ethan’s nine-week-old baby.

  She’d taken the test a few weeks after her return from Blood Island, when her motion sickness refused to go away. By then, he’d already lost his sight and she had no idea how to tell him. A month earlier, he would have been elated. He would have flown his entire family in from Stularia to celebrate, while she tried to hide a full-blown panic attack every other hour.

  But now, Rapunzel feared she would have to carry the hope and joy for both of them. She worried he’d hear the news and mourn the father he’d intended to be but no longer could—the kind who played catch with his son or raced alongside his daughter while she learned to ride a bike.

  “Ethan,” she whispered as his fists began to rub his eyes harder. Too hard. “Ethan, are you okay?” He removed his hands and blinked a few dozen times, staring first into the sky and then down at Rapunzel. “I’m sorry, I think you might have gotten tears in your eyes, not snow. Maybe the salt’s bothering you. It’ll probably pass in just a few—”

  “Indigo, huh?” he asked, reaching awkwardly towards her face and running her chest-length waves through his fingers. “And …” he bent forward, getting a closer look and almost nuzzling into her shoulder. “And powder blue on the ends? I like it.”

  Rapunzel’s jaw dropped as her hand jerked up and pressed off his chest. Someone at the party must have told him what her hair looked like tonight, and he thought pretending he could see it might be a fun joke. “Not funny,” she said, turning away. “Don’t tease me about that. It’s not—”

  Suddenly, he cupped three fingers beneath her chin and rotated her face back towards his. With perfect aim, his lips fell against hers and pressed, pulling what felt like all of her insides up to her chest and out into the atmosphere somewhere far above them.

  “Rapunzel,” he said a few moments later as their lips fell apart. “I don’t need eyes to see how beautiful you are.” He caressed her cheek with the back of his thumb. “But damn, have I missed them.”

  “What?” Her words tumbled together. “Are you saying you— Can you really see?”

  The floodgates opened again as Ethan nodded and pulled her into his arms. They sat this way for what seemed like an eternity, nuzzled into each other, breathing, struggling to process the enormity of what had just happened. Then Ethan’s gaze fell to the locket around her neck. It was glowing, a thousand times brighter than she’d seen it glow in Grethel’s tower, and pulsing from solid blue to solid green without a hitch. Perhaps some of Jacara’s magic had survived the Pulse after all. Perhaps they’d saved Grethel or cured her cancer or given her enough power to enchant that charm with something that would protect Ethan’s sight. Or perhaps she’d never know for sure. Perhaps she’d just have to take each day as it came, reveling in the good times while she had them because there was no telling when they might end.

  “You know,” Ethan said, as his eyes migrated a little further and settled on the box in her lap. “Blind or not, I’m the one who’s supposed to pop the question. Not you.”

  Rapunzel responded with a snide, sideward glance and a quick censure about perpetuating outdated gender rules. “But this isn’t an engagement ring,” she clarified. “It’s better. Close your eyes.”

  “Really? I was kind of planning on never closing my eyes again, but—”

  “Just do it,” she ordered, bending back the velvet top and pulling out his hand. “I took you out here to show you something.” She dropped the tiny figure into his palm, closed his fingers around it one by one, and then leaned back to watch. He bobbled it in his fist for a few seconds, tilted his head, and rubbed it with his other hand. Then he froze.

  “No!” he shouted, his eyes flying wider than she’d ever seen them open before. “Are you trying to tell me that you’re … that we’re…”

  He stopped and cupped her face so that their eyes were inches apart, connected by the magnitude of everything that ever was and the promise of everything that could yet be.

  She nodded profusely as a smile blew up across her face.

  “Yes,” she said, tears starting to flow again. “Yes. We’re going to have a baby. There’s an ultrasound picture in my purse, too. And plane tickets so we can go tell your sister in person. But Ethan?”

  He opened his mouth a few times before nodding at her, as if even a three-letter word was impossible to find in a moment as wonderful as this.

  Rapunzel took a moment to make sure she was certain about what she was about to do—what she was about to ask. It was completely unplanned, but nothing had ever felt so right.

  She didn’t even remember hearing the words as they tumbled out of her mouth. She wasn’t even sure they were comprehensible. But maybe Penny was right. Maybe this story was supposed to end with a wedding. Maybe, after everything Rapunzel had spent her entire adult life railing against, she did deserve the kind of happy ending they recorded in the history books. Or, even better, the kind of happy beginning.

  “So he wandered for a whole year in misery, till at last he came upon the desert place where Rapunzel had been banished and lived in her sorrow. As he drew near he heard a voice which he seemed to recognize, and advancing towards the sound came within sight of Rapunzel, who recognized him at once with tears. Two of her tears fell on his eyes, and so healed and cleared them of the injury done by the thorns that he could soon see as well as ever. Then he travelled with her to his kingdom, and she became his wife, and the remainder of their days were spent in happiness and content."

  — The Complete Brothers Grimm Fairy Tales, edited by Lily Owens

  Note to Readers

  Wait! Does this mean the series is over?

  Keep in touch with your favorite Desperately Ever After characters (as well as some new ones) at laurakenyon.com. Here, you'll find playlists, dream casts, character interviews, links to the centuries-old tales that inspired this series, and news about future endeavors—inc
luding Desperately Ever After novellas and short stories!

  Also, if you enjoyed any of these books, please consider posting a short review on Amazon or Goodreads to help spread the word. They are invaluable to new authors and very much appreciated.

  About the Author

  LAURA KENYON is an award-winning journalist and the author of three novels, Desperately Ever After, Damsels in Distress, and Skipping Midnight. Her stories and articles have appeared in numerous newspapers, magazines, and online publications. The Boston College graduate does not live in a castle, but has been blessed with a heroic prince charming, two beautiful princesses, and a noble steed.

  To learn more about Laura, visit her website at www.LauraKenyon.com and sign up for exclusive updates. She also loves connecting with readers on her blog, Twitter, and Facebook.

  And for a peek at how she envisions Marestam, check out her Desperately Ever After board on Pinterest.

  Acknowledgments

  Above all else, I want to thank everyone who read the first two Desperately Ever After books and waited so patiently for the third. The past two years were fraught with unexpected obstacles and blessings, but neither you nor the women of Marestam were ever far from my mind. Thank you for keeping me going and for giving meaning to what some might call complete madness.

  In addition to the many friends, family members, and colleagues who have lifted me up over the years (I hope you all know who you are), there are a few individuals I would like to thank specifically:

  Andrew Brown, for once again taking the jumble of ideas in my head and showing me what I really want. (In other words, creating a kick-ass cover!)

  Annie Hwang at Folio Literary Management, for handling my email freak-outs with grace, and for picking up where Michelle Brower and Jita Fumich left off.

  Marlene Engel, for her last-stop proofreading expertise.