“So what I’d like to know is, will you marry us for real this time?” Paris gave him a tearful look and pulled the two girls up close to her.
His wife was a wreck. She had no makeup, and no brush had been near those scarlet locks of hers in a good two days. Her face was tearstained, her eyes were rimmed with red, and he saw freckles for the first time ever, spattering across her nose, which was chapped from blowing. The babies didn’t look too much better—their heads were a little lopsided, one had a blotch on her forehead—from her sister’s foot, most likely.
But really, he had never seen a more beautiful bunch of women, and they were all his.
“Paris, for me, it was for real the first time, and I’d marry you again in a minute.” He came over to her and tipped her chin with his finger, then kissed her with all his heart. This time, for the first time really, she kissed him back with all her heart. He could feel it. Even with her arms full of babies.
“Mmmm.” He brushed her cheek and let his hand rest there. “I know a nice chapel not far from here,” she whispered.
“Very funny.” Turner saw his wife blush for the first time in his life.
“I wanted to ask you yesterday, but things got out of control. Besides, I waited till I had some leverage.” Paris nodded to the sleeping babies.
“You already had leverage, Paris. You just didn’t give yourself enough credit.”
“I know that now.”
Turner kissed her again. He was flooded with happiness knowing that Paris had found her way to him, and to their children.
“I think I’m going to need some therapy, though, and I’m still fairly terrified about what might come up in the next few weeks, but my mother is willing to work things out with me. She said we should go to counseling together.”
“I’m going to be with you through whatever comes up, Paris. I’m in this for the long haul,” Turner said.
“I owe it to them…and you, to get my head on straight. Which is not to say I won’t still be a raving bitch sometimes.”
“Yes, but you are my raving bitch.”
“I love you, Turner. I guess we are going to have the best holidays ever.”
“I love you too, Paris.” He bent to kiss her again. The door to the room opened with a quiet knock. Paris’s mother was there, and behind her was a lovely redheaded girl who looked to be in her twenties.
Paris gasped. Turner figured it out pretty quickly. It must be her sister Bonnie. He gathered the babies up. “I’m going to take the girls for a walk, Paris. We’re going to the nursery for a while, but I’ll bring them back.” He nodded at Bonnie as he passed by.
Bonnie pushed past her mother and flew right into Paris’s arms. He heard a whole lot of crying, and he smiled at Lucille. “Thanks.”
“She caught a hopper flight from Fresno,” Lucille said. “It’s been quite a morning.”
“Is your head okay?”
“Just a bump. But the inside of it is a little overwhelmed.”
“I’m going down the hall. Come and join me after a while,” Turner said.
“I will.”
Turner walked his daughters down to the nursery and had the nurse tuck them into their bassinet. She put them together. She said she had a theory that twins slept better together at first. He sat in the resident rocking chair and watched them sleep.
His whole world had been turned upside down in the blink of an eye. He thought back to April first of this year, when Paris had whooped her way into his life. He thought about the young Paris, howling at the moon with him on a desert night. She was still that girl, and he was glad his daughters would grow up with her free spirit. He thanked God that his prayers had been answered.
“Now you’ve got a handful,” Millie’s voice came from the doorway to the nursery. The nurse checked with Turner, but she asked Millie to wait outside in the hall anyhow. Turner stepped out to join her.
“Redheads up to my eyebrows.” Turner gave Millie a hug. “She asked me to marry her.”
“Did you say yes?” Millie joked.
“I did.”
“I knew she’d crack.”
“I’m sure you helped with that.” He hugged her again. “And Millie, we’re going to need you, so pack up your scrapbooks and come to that big house.”
“I’m already in there. Preacher Pruitt’s house is quite the joint. Are you sure you want an old showgirl like me around?”
“Who else can teach them to high-kick? But no more phone sex, okay?”
“Darn, and I so enjoyed it. Turner, I can’t even begin to thank you. I never thought I’d be a grandmother, since I didn’t have any kids of my own and all, so you’ve given me quite a gift.”
“Don’t worry, you’ll regret it later.”
Millie reached down by the wall to a shopping bag she’d brought with her and pulled out two Raggedy Ann dolls. Turner could see they were handmade, complete with loopy red hair.
“You did these? They are beautiful.”
“Lookit those girls.” She turned and pressed her nose to the glass nursery window. “What are you going to name them?” Millie asked.
“I don’t have a clue. I’m trying to figure out how to tell them apart.”
“You’re going to be a hell of a daddy, Turner. We’ll just call them Thing One and Thing Two for a while.”
“Your children are beautiful, Turner.”
Turner turned to the sound of Sarah’s voice. She was right behind them, wearing her student nurse uniform. “Thank you. They’re doing very well. It was an extraordinarily easy delivery.”
“Easy for you to say,” Millie added.
“I saw her name on the chalkboard. I came over to say congratulations.”
“Thanks, Sarah. It’s been a long haul, and you helped out a great deal.”
“She’s going to stay, isn’t she?”
“Yes.”
“I knew she would.”
Turner saw the sadness in Sarah’s eyes. He reached over and took her hand. “You are always welcome with our family, Sarah, and we’re here if you need anything.”
“Thanks, Turner. As soon as I’m finished with school, I’ve decided to go back to the Islands. They need nurses there, and I actually miss my folks,” Sarah said.
“That sounds wonderful. Until then, you’ve got the apartment, and I guess we’ve moved. I think the only things left in the house are my leftovers.”
“We’re leaving most of the furniture. The princess went shopping,” Millie said.
“Hey, it’s her specialty. She’s good at it,” Sarah smiled.
Turner refocused on his babies and enjoyed watching them sleep. From everything he’d heard, this was a rare moment. Millie danced a Raggedy Ann in the window and made faces.
“Oh, you’re going to be great. You’ll get them all excited, then hand them back to the weary parents,” Turner said.
“Heh-heh. Now you’re getting the picture.”
Turner was glad Sarah had come to make peace. He felt, at this moment, completely blessed.
Epilogue
A Big Hunk o’ Love
Three years later
“And waltz, and turn, and very nice ladies! Emma, pull your tights up. Little ladies can’t have saggy tights.” Paris tried not to laugh as her two three-year-old terrors danced together behind the much older preteen girls who had signed up for Paris Pruitt’s School of Girl Power. Millicent and Emmaline Pruitt weren’t ready for manners yet, that was for sure. Paris was lucky to get them dressed in the morning, and without Granny Millie’s help, she doubted anything would ever get done.
The girls turned and headed down to the other end of the long mirrored studio space, her daughters doing the toddler two-step behind the older girls. The bright music put more wiggle in them than grace.
And they never listened to her, only their daddy. Of course those two were wise women already, because if she’d just learned to listen to Turner sooner, she wouldn’t have wasted a minute resisting his charms.
After meeting his parents, it was easy to see where Turner got his patient and loving spirit. Not to mention his good looks. His dad was an equally handsome older version of Turner, and the nurses in the hospital had flirted with him shamelessly.
Mr. and Mrs. Pruitt were so gratful to Paris for making them grandparents that they instantly accepted her into their fold. She didn’t even want to think about what Turner had told them, but once, as they’d been washing a giant load of baby things together, his mother had said she and her husband had prayed together every day and night that all would be well for Turner and Paris.
Even in the weeks following the birth, when she’d felt the edge of darkness fold over her and a very mild depression start, they’d all been there beside her. Her doctor, Millie, her mother, and her in-laws all helping out. She’d survived it. She’d done no harm to anyone, and she’d learned an amazing lesson about love.
But Turner had been the best. Her husband had made sure she took all the treatments on time, and had made her round-the-clock snacks to keep her blood sugar even. He’d made sure she’d gotten enough rest, and he’d shouldered more than his share of baby care, along with his parents and Millie. She was one lucky woman to have Turner in her life.
She’d come to see that although her mother’s problems had had many facets, not all were passed down to her.
She’d never been so grateful to a man in her life for standing by her through good times and bad. No man but Turner ever had.
She had quite a family now, including Millie. Something she’d never even dreamed of. And it was a good thing, because it was going to take a village to raise these two rascals. Her own mother and sister had pitched in when they’d been able to, and it was so wonderful to think that the girls had an Aunt Bonnie now. Paris and Bonnie never let a day pass without talking to each other on the phone. Hopefully Bonnie could swing a move to Vegas as soon as her husband found a new job.
Her mom’s suggestion to open this school had been brillant. Paris had loved the idea. She could teach these girls a thing or two, like it was great to be pretty, and makeup was extremely cool, but a girl has to tap into her inner warrior princess once in a while, because life can kick you in the butt unexpectedly.
She’d drifted off into her own thoughts, and she hardly noticed when the music changed from Strauss to Elvis. The familiar opening guitar riff to “Jailhouse Rock” came blasting out of her stereo system.
And there was her husband, the hottest Elvis that ever lived, in his white studded Elvis duds, playing air guitar and singing, “Let’s rock, everybody let’s rock…” The girls went wild, including his own two. They ran smack into him and he lifted them like airplanes, one under each arm, while he twisted like Elvis. Paris thought they’d yak from squealing so much.
The older girls were doing their own squealing, and it was just all too funny for words. That’s what she got for buying the building behind the chapel and opening her studio where Turner could come and bust up her classes anytime he wanted. Although it had been a long time since she’d seen him in the Elvis.
Paris walked over to Turner, who put down his redheaded daughters and grabbed her. She’d figured out long ago that she better know how to jitterbug with this Elvis, and at least now he could lift her in the air after three years of low carbs, aerobics, and Pilates torture.
He spun her out and all her girls started rocking around the room, the waltz abandoned, the beat of fifties rock and roll fully embraced.
As he dipped Paris backward and she saw the smiles on the faces of her daughters—upside down—Paris knew she was completely blessed. Fools like her that rushed into crazy love must truly be looked after by the angels in charge of Las Vegas wedding chapels.
Acknowledgments
I’d like to thank the best Elvis impersonator ever, Danny Vernon, for providing inspiration and research data. Thank-yous to Reverend Dee Eisenhauer, for her amazing grace; Susan Sanderford, for her amazing insight; and Dan Brown, for writing The Da Vinci Code just when I was ready to read it.
By Suzanne Macpherson
SHE WOKE UP MARRIED
IN THE MOOD
TALK OF THE TOWN
RISKY BUSINESS
Copyright
This book is a work of fiction. The characters, incidents, and dialogue are drawn from the author’s imagination and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
SHE WOKE UP MARRIED. Copyright © 2005 by Suzanne Macpherson. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.
ePub edition February 2007 ISBN 9780061751776
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