Chapter 23
MILES
“He’s perfect,” Chelsea murmured, staring down at the newborn boy in her arms. “Can you believe we made something so perfect?”
Miles couldn’t. And Chelsea was absolutely right.
From the moment they had learned she was pregnant, he’d had thoughts of what this day might be like, but he had never imagined anything as beautiful and powerful as this instant.
He had never dreamed of what it might really be like to see his baby — his son.
There was nothing better in all the world.
Chelsea looked up at him. “Do you want to hold him?”
Miles nodded reverently, hardly able to believe that he was allowed to do such a thing.
He was not a man who had ever shied away from responsibilities, and yet this one seemed as though it might be too much for him.
He accepted the baby carefully as Chelsea held him out, supporting his tiny head the way the nurse had instructed.
His heart swelled with more love than he had ever felt in his life.
My father was right. I’m so grateful I did this. I’m so grateful he pushed me to carry on the family legacy. It’s about so much more than that, and if I hadn’t tried to have an heir to please him, I never would have discovered the gift of fatherhood.
The baby yawned and stretched in his arms, eyelids fluttering. His lips pursed and his head tipped to the side.
“He’s a whole little person,” Miles said wonderingly. He shifted the baby’s weight to one arm and stroked a fingertip down the soft fuzz of his tiny cheek. “I never knew I could feel this way about anything. Anyone.”
Chelsea reclined in the hospital bed, looking positively radiant. Her skin glowed and her eyes shone bright, and as Miles looked at her, he couldn’t remember ever thinking anyone was more beautiful. It brought his mind, all at once, back to the letter he still hadn’t read.
Her name was on it. Her name and his. And he had fully intended to read it without her, to make sure whatever was inside was something he wanted to share. But now, seeing her like this and holding their baby in his arms, he didn’t want to do anything without her.
“Here.” He rose to his feet and gently transferred the baby back into her arms.
She frowned. “Are you going somewhere?”
“No, no,” he assured her. “Nothing like that. It’s just that I have something for you.”
“For me?”
“I think so. Well… it’s for both of us.” He produced the letter, which he had been carrying around in his jacket pocket since the day he’d found it, trying to work up the courage to rip it open.
She took it from him, looked down at the envelope, then back up at him. “Miles… what is this?”
“I found it weeks ago in my father’s house,” he said quietly. “I haven’t been able to bring myself to open it. Now I think maybe that’s for the best. I never should have considered reading it without you anyway.”
“You can, you know,” she said quietly. “Even if it does have my name on it. He was your father. If you want to read it first, I understand. I wouldn’t be angry at that.”
“I know you wouldn’t,” he assured her. “It means everything to me that you feel that way. But I want to share this with you. Dad wrote it to both of us. It says so right there. We should read it together. That’s what he would have told us to do — in fact, that is what he’s telling us to do.”
Chelsea hesitated. “If that’s what you want.”
“More than anything,” he assured her.
She nodded. “But you should be the one to do the honors,” she passed the envelope back.
Miles hesitated. Even now, he was fearful.
Even now, he found it hard to open this envelope, to face whatever was inside.
These would be, as he had realized before, his father’s very last words to him.
The last message he would ever receive from the man who had raised him.
It suddenly seemed more important, more significant, than anything that had ever passed between the two of them before now.
He took a deep breath and ripped open the envelope, pulling out the folded piece of paper inside. He opened it carefully, feeling at once as if his father had stepped into the room and was standing there beside him.
“Dear Miles and Chelsea,” he read aloud, “I don’t know when the right time will come for me to give you this letter.
These are things I’ve wanted to say to the two of you for a long time now.
I couldn’t tell you exactly when I knew you had something special, but I certainly know it now, and I feel it’s my duty to tell you exactly what I see when I look at you. ”
Chelsea’s eyes welled with tears. “We never told him the truth,” she whispered. “He never knew — he never knew that we had been lying to him. I just feel awful.”
Miles lowered the letter. “It doesn’t matter now,” he murmured, taking her hand. “The lie is the truth now. I do love you. I do want you to stay with me.”
“I want that too,” she said softly.
“Then it wasn’t a lie,” Miles told her, his voice firm. “It was the truth. We just didn’t know it yet. But… it sounds like Dad did. I would rather he left us knowing that we loved one another than thinking everything between us was false, even if it means he knew before we did.”
She smiled at him. “I think that’s a good way of looking at it,” she said. “Go on. What else does he say?”
Miles returned to the letter in his hand. “Chelsea — I want you to know that you are a rare woman. The way you treat my son is all I could have ever hoped he would find, and I’m so grateful that you’re in his life.”
“What does he mean?” Chelsea asked.
“He liked that you didn’t think of me as a rich man,” Miles explained. “He told me once that you didn’t seem like you were after me for my money, and he appreciated what a rare thing that was.”
“That’s giving me a lot of credit,” Chelsea chuckled. “I got into this with you because I knew you could pay for the fertility treatments I wanted.”
“That’s why you agreed to get into this with me in the first place,” Miles agreed.
“But that’s not the answer to everything that happened afterward, is it?
” He didn’t need her to answer this question, but he wanted her to see what he saw, and what Silas had seen.
“You don’t need me to be a rich man. If I lost everything tomorrow… ”
She nodded. “I would still be here,” she agreed. “Of course I would. Of course I’d stay.”
“That’s what he meant,” Miles said. “He could tell that about you just by meeting you. He knew the kind of woman you are. He knew before I did — I’ll probably always be ashamed of that.”
“You don’t need to be,” Chelsea said with a smile. “It seems like he knew before I did, too. Your dad knew a lot of things.”
“We were lucky to have him for as long as we did,” Miles agreed.
He turned back to the letter — there was more.
“And Miles — I’m grateful that you have Chelsea and glad the two of you are on this journey together.
You know how I hope it ends. But whatever you decide, whatever you do, know that I’m so grateful for the fact that you’re going to have a family.
I’m so glad you’re going to have love in your life.
I hope you’ve realized by now that all I ever wanted for you was to experience the joy of fatherhood — the same joy that has made my life so rich and rewarding.
I know you think I wanted you to have a child so you could carry on our family legacy, but truly, that’s the least of it.
I want your life to be as full as mine has been because I had you. I want you to be a father.”
He had to put the letter down again. He was overwhelmed, too moved to speak.
He had done all this — contracted with Chelsea, arranged to have a baby — because he had believed from the bottom of his heart that his father had wanted nothing more than an heir. Someone to carry on the legacy of the family. But it hadn’t been about that. It had never been about that.
Over and over, he’d told himself that this was just business. That it was just about providing what his father wanted. It had never been just business.
No wonder his father had grown so attached to Chelsea, allowing her to get close so quickly. No wonder he had given Miles his mother’s ring and encouraged him to propose. Maybe he’d wanted an heir, but what he had really wanted was so much more.
It’s because he loved me.
Miles wouldn’t have been able to fully comprehend his father’s motivations yesterday. But today he was looking down at the face of his son, and it was all as clear as glass.
He loved me. I changed his life. And of course he wanted me to feel it. I’ll want that for our baby someday too.
He reached into his pocket.
The ring was still there, right where it had been since the day his father had given it to him.
He had been carrying it around with him all this time, unable to piece together exactly why he had wanted to have it nearby.
He had told himself it was because it was his father’s final gift to him — that keeping it close was similar to the way he had kept Bear close after his rediscovery. Now he knew that wasn’t true.
He had been keeping it for this moment, not quite knowing when this moment would come — but understanding that it would. That they were, and always had been, on a path to this.
Pulling the ring out, he opened the little box. Chelsea registered no signs of surprise. She watched him steadily, the first of the tears starting to spill from her eyes.
He should have said something far more romantic. Instead, he said, “Did you know?”
“No,” she whispered. “But if I’ve learned one thing today, it’s not to assume I know anything. I don’t think anything could surprise me right now.”
“I didn’t know either,” he confessed. “I knew I was coming here to tell you I wanted to be with you, but I had no idea… no idea that today would be the day I would ask you for this.”
He was choked up, unsure if he would be able to get through what he needed to say. But Chelsea was crying outright now. The baby in her arms was still and quiet, as if he could sense the significance of the moment.
Someday we’ll tell him about the way his family sealed around him the moment he was born.
Miles cleared his throat. “Chelsea, you’ve shown me so many things I didn’t know I always wanted.
My life will forever be changed because of you.
Not only because of our son, but because of the way you’ve opened my heart.
And I’m begging you now. Stay with me. Be my wife.
Let us be a family together — all three of us.
This was my father’s dream for us… but it’s mine, too.
And I’m hoping it will make you as happy as it would make me. ”
Chelsea was beyond speech. She simply nodded.
He slipped the ring onto her finger and leaned over to kiss her tenderly, one hand resting on his son’s head.
Love and family. Everything they needed.