Chapter 12
B lue pulled up in front of Anne’s and parked. “Well, little girl,” he told the baby, “let’s go in and tell your mommy what happened.” That made Blue chuckle a little, but he had every intention of having Indigo call her just that.
He opened the door and found Anne lying on the sofa, sobbing.
She was crying so hard that she didn’t even hear him come in, and he stood for a moment and thought about her softness, the heart of gold in her chest, and the light in her eyes when he called her name.
Blue knew he was blessed to know her, to have her, and to call her his.
Before he could speak a word, Indigo yelled, “Ba-ba-ba ya-ya ma!”
Pressing herself up from the sofa, Anne’s eyes lit up as she looked toward the sound and her face split into a huge smile. “Oh my god! She’s here!”
As soon as she was on her feet, Blue handed Indigo to her and Anne wrapped the baby in her arms. “Oh, my sweet baby! You’re here!”
“Brrrr aga!” Indigo said and patted Anne’s face.
“She’s here. And she’s never leaving,” Blue told Anne as his arms encircled two of the three women in his life. “She’s never leaving. She’s ours, babe, all ours.”
“Tell me! Tell me what happened! I was so scared, Brent, and then they started asking me all those questions about us, and I didn’t know―”
He interrupted her with a kiss. When he broke it, he said, “Sit down and I’ll tell you everything.”
It took him over an hour to tell Anne everything that had happened in the courtroom, and he watched as she went from horrified to laughing hysterically.
“I’m telling you, if we hadn’t already won custody, that woman would’ve done it for us!
She was a hoot! And you should’ve seen old Casey―he was livid! ” Blue said, laughing.
“I bet! So are you going to let Cindy’s mom see Indigo?” Anne asked, still grinning.
“Yeah. I gave her my phone number. I hope she calls. I’d love for Indigo to get to know her.
” Blue set the baby on the floor and she crawled a few feet to the play area Anne and the kids had made for her.
“Look at her,” he said, watching Indigo.
“Isn’t she just the most beautiful thing you’ve ever seen? ”
“One of them. I think Polly and Toady are pretty beautiful too,” she said with a gentle smile.
“I do too. They’re just as beautiful as that little one there.” He faced Anne and gave her a little kiss. “I love Polly and Toady.”
Anne looked at her hands instead of at Blue, and he wondered what she was thinking. It took her a minute to say, “Where’s this going?”
“What?”
“This relationship. Where’s it going?”
“Where do you want it to go?”
Anne just sighed. “I want to be with you.”
“I want to be with you too. Forever.” He’d never said that to a woman before. “And I want to do it the right way,” he added.
One of Anne’s eyebrows quirked up. “So what have you got in mind?”
“Well,” Blue said, grabbing her around the waist and hauling her back onto the sofa so she was lying in front of him, “I think we should go look at rings. I mean, if you want to. Do you want to?”
“I want to.”
“Good. That’s what we’ll do. How are we going to combine our households though? I’ve been thinking about it and I don’t know what to do,” Blue said, running a finger up and down Anne’s arm.
Anne snorted. “After what Galloway did today, I think we should sell both houses and buy one together somewhere else.”
“You’d do that?”
“Hell yeah, I’d do that. He tried to take our baby away. That pisses me off, and I’ll be pissed off forever because of that,” Anne said, her face reddening. “He tried to hurt you. I won’t have that.”
“Wow, you’re quite the mama bear when you’re mad!” Blue said, smiling, and kissed her cheek.
“Hell yeah I am! I won’t stand for that. Now, the kids will be home in a couple of hours and I have to go to work. Are we okay?”
“Yeah. We’re okay. Oh, and they read the results of the paternity test,” Blue told her.
“And?”
He laughed aloud. “Look out. You’re going to have a rough time with this one when she gets older. She’s one hundred and fifty percent Wallace!”
It had taken him all of fifteen minutes to find a sitter.
He’d tried the first two names in the little black book he’d been given at the shower, but they’d both been busy, although they told him to make sure to call them next time because they really wanted to get their hands on that baby.
The third person on the list was Shelby, and when they’d dropped Indigo, Polly, and Toady off at Shelby and Glen’s house, the attorney and the nurse had looked positively ecstatic.
Dinner was amazing, and Blue was proud as a peacock. He’d spared no expense and called in a reservation to the nicest place in the little Georgia town, and it had exceeded his expectations in every way. The food was delicious, the décor and ambience spot-on, and the desserts… they were incredible.
But the most incredible thing was Anne’s face. Her smile was as wide as the sky and her eyes were lit up like sparklers. She looked every bit as happy as he felt, and he was happy―over-the-moon happy. He was pretty sure he’d be happier in a couple of hours.
He wasn’t wrong. As soon as they’d finished dinner, he drove straight to the mall, but instead of going inside, he pulled into the parking lot of the big jewelry store out front. Once the car was parked, he turned to the woman beside him. “Sure about this?”
“Are you?”
He nodded. “Sure enough that if you don’t want to, I think I’ll buy one anyway and wear it myself.”
“That’s pretty sure,” she said with a grin.
“Yeah. Let’s do this thing.” In seconds, he’d rounded the front end of the van and opened the door for her.
He’d seen somebody do that on TV for their girlfriend and he’d decided to try it with Anne.
Oddly enough, she seemed to like it and told him how “gallant” he was.
Blue wasn’t too sure about that, but it was easy enough to do and it made her happy, so he figured he’d keep doing it.
The array of rings inside was mind-blowing.
It got to the point that Blue wasn’t sure which ones they’d looked at and which they hadn’t.
There were only two cases left that they hadn’t gone through when they rounded a corner and Anne whispered, “Oh my god, that’s it right there. That’s what I want.”
Blue motioned a salesclerk over to open the case and when he slipped it on Anne’s finger, there was no doubt.
It was definitely the ring for her―it almost looked as though he’d had it custom-made for her.
“Oh my god, it’s so beautiful,” she whispered to him, then took it off and showed him the tag.
She just shook her head and murmured, “No. It’s too much. ”
The salesclerk smiled. “Do you like it?”
Anne held the ring out to the young woman. “Yes, very much. Do you have anything like it that’s a little, um, maybe slightly…”
“We offer financing,” the young woman offered.
“Do you offer a cash discount?” Blue asked, and in his peripheral vision he could see Anne’s mouth fall open.
“Oh, yes, sir. Fifteen percent, and we pay the sales tax for you. That’s only for pieces over twenty-five hundred dollars,” she added.
“Then write it up.”
Anne shook her head and leaned in to whisper in his ear. “No, babe. That’s too much.”
“It’s not too much, not for the woman I love. We’re getting it, end of discussion. Oh, and do you have the band that matches it?” he asked the clerk.
“Yes, sir.” The woman reached into the case and pulled it out to show to them.
“Go pick out what you want to give me and we’ll put the bands in layaway. I assume you can do that?” he asked.
“Yes, sir. Ma’am, the men’s wedding bands are over here,” she said as she walked away, motioning for Anne to follow. Anne shot Blue a look that made him chuckle under his breath.
An hour later, they were on their way home, the tiny box in Blue’s inside jacket pocket.
Man, these jackets are pretty handy , he told himself as he thought about how he’d looked in the mirror earlier.
The sport coat he’d bought went with a lot of things, even jeans, and he felt dressed up and mature when he put it on.
“So am I getting it tonight?” Anne asked, jarring him out of his own thoughts.
“No. I pick the time and place where I formally ask you,” he announced.
She sighed and he looked over just in time to see her smile. “Okay. Sounds good to me.”
As Anne collected the kids at Glen and Shelby’s house with Shelby’s help, Blue showed the ring to Glen. “Wow. That’s beautiful,” Glen said with a huge smile.
“Yeah. It was what she wanted and I had enough to get it. I wanted to do something special for her, you know?” Blue said.
“She’s a special person. I hope you guys will be very happy,” Glen told him and slapped him on the shoulder.
“Thanks,” he told the attorney. For once, he didn’t feel intimidated by Glen’s money or education.
He almost felt like an equal. Glen had certainly always treated him that way, and he realized it wasn’t Glen’s treatment of him.
It was the way he’d come to see himself, and it was a relief to feel like he fit into society.
The rest of the week flew by, and the weekend stared him in the face.
Friday night’s set at the bar had been brutal, but he’d done it and still managed to get up at eight o’clock on Saturday morning.
Anne was herding the kids through the house to clean their rooms as she watched Indigo playing in her play yard. “Hey, you’re up!”
“Yeah, barely.” Blue headed for the coffee pot and poured himself a tall mug full. “So whaddya think about going fishing this afternoon?”
Anne wheeled and stared at him. “Fishing? Are you serious?”
“Yeah! I like to fish. Have Polly and Toady ever gone?”
She shook her head. “No. I don’t think so, unless my dad took them sometime when we were there.”