Total pages in book: 24
Estimated words: 22950 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 115(@200wpm)___ 92(@250wpm)___ 77(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 22950 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 115(@200wpm)___ 92(@250wpm)___ 77(@300wpm)
“I changed my mind,” Ophelia says, facing her father with her cheek flattened over my heart. “But he wasn’t going to take no for an answer. Ezra showed up and kicked the door down.” She kisses my chest through my shirt. Once, twice. “He protected me.”
I drag my attention off Ophelia to find her father pale and lowering himself into his chair. “I can’t believe this. I told Wagner about the bribe in confidence and he…he uses the information to try and get his sleazy hands on my daughter?” His troubled eyes land on Ophelia. “You should have come to me.”
She shakes her head sadly. “Look at everything I’ve been given. Every advantage. Tutors. The best schools.” Her eyes shine with unshed tears. “Everything is given to me without question. I wanted to stand on my own two feet. I didn’t want to be a burden.”
The man appears dumbstruck. “All these things I give you, daughter…they’re because I love you. You’ll never be a burden.”
“Thank you.” She slides her hand into mine, squaring her shoulders and I’ve never been prouder of anyone in my life. “But I still want to stand on my own. For a long time, I’ve wanted that. I don’t need the fancy trappings and money and Princeton. I want to make my own decisions and tackle the world as I am. Not what I’ve been built up to be. Father, I need to make my own decisions. And my first decision is choosing love. Choosing Ezra.”
There’s no way to keep the happiness off my face. Not when she looks up at me with love shining in her eyes. “Ophelia,” I breathe, brushing her hair back. “My princess.”
“I love Ezra,” she murmurs. “And I’ll leave this all behind in a heartbeat to be with him.”
“You don’t have to do that,” her father says, sighing. “Not entirely.”
I glance over at him in puzzlement.
He stands once more. “I owe you a great debt, Ezra. It’s bad enough that my business partner stooped so low. If he’d actually been able to carry through on his threats…” He closes his eyes and shivers. “We’ll put Princeton on hold for now. You’re young, daughter. If you’re still happy in four years’ time and Ezra has followed through on his promise to provide for you, then we’ll celebrate. If not…” He eyeballs me carefully. “Your trust fund will be waiting.”
In other words, I have four years to prove myself.
Little does he know, I have enough motivation—and startup capital—to do it in half that time. And I will. There’s no mountain I wouldn’t climb for the girl standing beside me. She might have fallen in love with an ex-con, but I’m going to do her proud.
Starting now.
I heft my princess up into my arms and carry her from the office, whispering in her ear how much I love her, how I would die for her, that I’m going to marry her as soon as possible.
And I do.
EPILOGUE
Ophelia
Five Years Later
I climb into my Bentley and let out a long breath, leaning my head back against the leather headrest. A smile curves my mouth. The reasons for my happy exhaustion—my twin daughters—wave at me from the upstairs window of the house, Leeza standing behind them with her hands on her granddaughters’ shoulders. I signal my mother-in-law, who lives in the guest house half a mile away on our property, to let her know I’ll be back soon. Then I start the car, pulling around the twinkling stone fountain that sits in our driveway and starting the journey down the tree-lined path to the main road.
Memories reach out to me from all sides. The first time Ezra brought me here two years ago, carrying me over the threshold like a bride, even though we’d already been married three years by then. I can see him chasing our daughters through the orchard, pretending to be a monster, sunlight flickering around their shadows. In a few months, Christmas lights will hang from these trees, making our home look like a winter wonderland.
Life is beautiful.
I’m married to the most hard-working, loving, passionate man on earth and I’m headed to see him right now. My thighs tingle with anticipation as I make a turn onto the road that will take me to the manufacturing plant. The one Ezra built from the ground up and turned into a multi-million-dollar operation in just five years.
Really, he accomplished what he set out to do much sooner than that. In those early days when we moved to Michigan, Ezra found us a small one-bedroom apartment. It was filled with sunshine and it had a small fireplace. Most importantly, it had a bed. Ezra made love to me so many times in that tiny, happy apartment, I lost count. And nothing has changed since we moved to the fourteen-bedroom mansion on Lake Erie.