Epilogue One
Penelope
I lean back on my elbows, laid out in a neon pink and orange bikini on a towel along the grassy shore of Lake Tyler, watching my husband swim with our two-year-old daughter, Kennedy, in her toddler-sized life jacket. Christopher and David went back to Dallas shortly after our picnic lunch, still in newlywed bliss five months after getting married. Our parents left about an hour ago, but we’ve decided to stay until dusk, just the three of us.
It won’t be much longer until our family of three turns into four, though. I place my hand on my belly when the baby kicks, smiling and soaking in the warmth of the leisurely summer day spent with the people I hold deepest in my heart.
“Penelope?” A shadow falls over me, and my attention darts to the voice I haven’t heard in nearly a decade. It’s a shock to lay eyes on Daniel in his red and white rash guard and boardshorts when I was hoping to never see him again.
Holy shit , this is the guy I sacrificed my happiness for? He’s aged like cheese in the years since we’ve been divorced, his receding hairline so pronounced that it’s a wonder he hasn’t just shaved off the remaining artificially dyed brown strands clinging to his pink scalp. I can guess why when a bouncy little brunette walks up behind him, further along in her pregnancy than I am, and links her fingers with his.
A flash of anger charges through me, hotter than the relentless sun. It’s quickly snuffed when I spot Jacob helping Kennedy onto the end of the dock, catching her when she bravely jumps into his outstretched arms in the water. I’m so thankful I’ve carried Jacob’s babies and not my sleazy ex’s.
“Hi, Daniel. Long time no see,” I say without enthusiasm.
Daniel’s eyes dip to my full breasts when I roll over onto my knees and gain my feet without his help. His gaze is lusty, which is surprising considering how unattractive he found me when I was too old at thirty and, funnily enough, forty-five pounds lighter. Go figure.
“You two know each other?” asks the young woman from his side, her eyes shifting between Daniel’s face to mine, down to my belly, and then up at Daniel again.
I snort. “You could say that.”
Daniel sighs. “Kayla, meet Penelope, my second ex-wife.”
“Oh my god, hi! It’s nice to meet you!” She waves and beams a blinding white smile, surprisingly friendly instead of hostile.
I cock my head to the side. “You’re Daniel’s…”
“Wife!” She holds up her left hand, a small diamond and plain silver wedding band sparkling in the sun.
“Interesting.” To Daniel, I ask, “What happened to Trisha? Things didn’t work out between you two? Shame.”
Daniel clears his throat, then coughs. I love watching him squirm. “We’ve been, uh, divorced for a year now.”
I turn to Kayla, and damn if the bouncy little thing’s smile isn’t strained. With a sneaking suspicion, I ask, “You don’t play pickleball by chance, do you?”
“I do! Best game ever. Sebastian introduced me to it, and we play all the time,” she stresses. “He’s, like, my best friend. That’s how I met his dad.” She tips her head against his arm, and Daniel looks like he wants to shake her off. Another shame.
I gesture to her stomach. “So, I see congratulations are in order.” She’s all belly, no boobs, wearing the tiniest white bikini.
“Thank you! We’re having a boy, and we couldn’t be more excited,” she practically shouts.
“Oh yeah?” I turn to my ex, who looks positively miserable. This just gets better and better. In an offhanded manner, I ask, “Hey, what are the chances of a vasectomy failing after twenty years? What was it, what was it? I think I’ve googled this before.” I snap my fingers. “Oh, that’s right. Something like one percent. Or is it lower than that? Like, less than half of one percent?” I tilt my head, battling back the smirk tugging at the corners of my lips.
Kayla shifts on her feet and rubs her rounded belly protectively. “Oh, vasectomies fail all the time. Like, it’s so common. My friend’s boyfriend’s failed, and now they’re finally married. Happily ever after, just like us!” Her particular choice of words makes it sound like her friend’s boyfriend only married her after she miraculously got pregnant.
She must realize her mistake when Daniel eyes her as if it’s just occurred to him that maybe after fucking me without protection throughout our entire relationship when I’m clearly able to get pregnant means that there’s a rather large chance that his vasectomy has not, in fact, failed. That maybe she might have had a little help from the best friend she plays pickleball with all the time.
“Your friend’s husband,” Daniel grumbles. “Doesn’t he own a talent agency in Dallas?
“Uh huh. Super successful.” She leans forward and says in a faux whisper as if her words are meant for just the two of us, “Huge mansion.” Her face falls again, realizing she’s made another mistake. Daniel drops her hand.
And wouldn’t you know it? Her best friend strides up to our sides at just that moment, dragging a cooler on wheels stacked with wet towels. His attention lands on Kayla’s stomach, then his dad’s pinched expression, and finally on my smirk. His bourbon eyes ringed with gold widen, and he sets his hands on his hips, his tanned, bare torso carved with abs.
“Wow, Penelope. I haven’t seen you in years. How have you been?”
My heart pings. I spent so many years caring about Sebastian’s well-being, making sure he completed his homework on time and turned it in, cooking his breakfasts and dinners on his weekends with us, and doing his laundry, yet I don’t get so much as a hug.
But that’s ok. I have Jacob, who suddenly appears next to me. He pulls me into his side, the water dripping down his skin, cooling me off. Kennedy, free of her life jacket, reaches for me. I prop my mini-me over my belly, and she gives me the world’s best hug, resting her head on my shoulder, reminding me that I have the beautiful family I’ve always dreamed of to love and care for now.
I don’t need to make introductions because Sebastian echoes his dad’s expression, their brows shooting up with shock. “Jacob? You and Penelope…?”
Jacob smiles so wide it lights me up inside. Silently confirming Sebastian’s unfinished question, he puffs out his broad chest and splays his massive palm over my belly with his thick gold wedding band proudly on display.
Sebastian’s mouth drops open for a moment. “Well, I’ll be damned. You’re even younger than me, aren’t you? And you’re married ?”
“Yup. Best years of my life spent with my Penelope.”
Daniel shoots me a glare.
“Oh please, don’t look at me like that. We’re closer in age than you and I are. Certainly closer than you and Kayla, here.”
Sebastian laughs. “I didn’t know you had a thing for younger men, Penelope,” he says with a slow look up and down my form. “If I had known…”
Jacob drapes his arm over my shoulders, pulling me in closer, continuing to hold my belly. “Just one younger man,” Jacob growls.
My ex-stepson’s sudden interest in me makes me nauseous, no matter how handsome he grew up to be with his mother’s Mediterranean features instead of taking after his dad, who has to slather himself in sunscreen to avoid turning as red as a lobster after twenty minutes in the sun. Jacob and I might enjoy our seriously hot and heavy role-playing, but the idea of being with Sebastian has me swallowing back bile.
I blurt, “Are you only friendly with the women you want to F-U-C-K?” I spell it out since I don’t want to curse in front of Kennedy. “Because you sure weren’t when I was married to your dad.” I mumble under my breath, “Like father, like son.” The two of them at least have the good grace to look ashamed when I finish. As they should.
It’s not that I want to hurt Kayla’s feelings, but with the topic of conversation having veered toward our age gaps and the men shifting on their feet like they want to leave, I can’t ignore the compulsion to warn her with a soft voice that I hope she takes to heart, “You won’t be young forever. You’ve got maybe another five to ten years left before Daniel finds himself another pickleball partner .” My eyes shoot to the man in question. “Then again, he won’t be young forever, either, so maybe the fourth time’s the charm, and you’ve got a good shot at the long haul.”
Kayla looks like I’ve struck her, and I wonder if I’ve hurt Daniel’s feelings as much as he hurt mine when he would criticize my weight and apparent waning attraction. I hope so. Daniel grips Kayla’s arm like he’s trying to hold onto the last hot young woman who’ll ever give him the time of day.
Kayla takes it for what it is—her cue to end the bristling exchange. “It was really nice meeting you,” she says with a strangled voice, like it pains her to say the words. “We should get going now so we don’t miss our dinner reservation.” Without a glance back or saying goodbye, their group continues their original path past us toward the parking lot.
I watch from the distance as the group starts bickering by the time they reach the first line of cars. Waving his hands back and forth between Kayla and Sebastian, Daniel raises his voice in a way that doesn’t bode well for their futures. Maybe Kayla won’t have to wait for her age to extinguish any interest Daniel still has for her after all.
With a hearty chuckle, Jacob grabs the sunscreen from our beach bag once the group is out of sight, squirts a healthy amount in his hands, and starts lathering up our daughter. Once done, he does the same to me, making sure to cover every nook and cranny of my body while Kennedy lies oblivious on the towel with her juice box and quartered grapes, allowing her sunscreen to soak in.
“That was fun,” he says sarcastically.
“Serves him right. I wish I could be a fly on the wall when they get the paternity test results I’m sure Daniel is about to hit them with.”
“Me, too, Mama.” Squeezing my hips, he says with a low growl, “I saw the way Sebastian was looking at you.”
“Ew, don’t remind me.”
“So I’ve got nothing to be jealous of then?”
I smack his shoulder. “No! Why on earth would you think that?”
“Well…I just thought…” An insecurity I’ve never seen from him creeps to the surface. “With the way we like to play, maybe seeing your actual stepson would make you—”
“You stop that right now.” I cup his cheeks and pull him down to meet my lips. “You know you’re the only man for me. I’d have run screaming if Sebastian tried anything with me.” Lowering my voice for his ears alone, I whisper, “Mama loves you. Only you, baby.”
If we didn’t have a toddler currently tugging on Jacob’s black swim trunks, impatient to get back in the water, I’m sure I’d be flat on back in the trunk of the huge Jeep Wagoneer we traded Jacob’s Audi in for with him deep inside me within a minute. My pussy clenches, and I rub my sunscreen-slicked thighs together at the mental image.
“Tonight,” Jacob whispers against my lips. “Your stepson is going to catch you in the shower while Dad is playing pickleball and show you just how much he loves you, too, Mama.”
“Looking forward to it, baby.”