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I stand straighter, speak firmer. “This is how it has to be. I’m no longer yours to control. You thought you were protecting me but all you did was drive me into the enemy’s arms, Father.” I take his hand and speak softer. “I know you meant well, but now I’m my own woman and this is what I want. You will not try to seek revenge. From this day forward the Kingstons and the Bellamys are united. By my blood and this baby.”
Today is so fucked up but I believe the words I’m saying and I silently plea for my father to understand.
“Is this what you truly want?”
“Yes.”
“Then you no longer belong to the Kingston bloodline. You are no longer welcome under my roof, little girl. You’ve made a grave mistake and I hope you are happy because there’s no going back from this.” Pure rage burns his words and leaves scars over my heart. But I take them knowing we will all walk away from this alive.
I watch my father tuck his gun into a holster and signal for his men to gather. A few of them are in rough shape and I can see a third man leaning against a tree, his hand to his abdomen. Lucas is a formidable enemy and these men knew what they were coming up against by storming this island. I have zero regrets but one.
Tears burn my eyes and I launch myself from Lucas’ arms into my father’s. Pressing a kiss to his cheek I hold him tight and just breathe in his scent one last time. “I love you. Just so you know. I love you, dad.”
His arms are around me and I take comfort in the one last hug. “I know, baby girl. I know.”
And then he left me on an island with my mafia pirate. What started as a desire for a one-night stand turned into kidnapping and now love. Or at least I hope it’s love I see staring back at me when my father hands me back to Lucas.
Epilogue
Serenity, five years later
In the end, I guess good beat out all the bad from my life. I mean, my father and Lucas are mafia men to the core. There’s no changing that. They will never be paper-pushers and I knew that from the start with Lucas. He never hid who he was beyond that first night.
My father has held his ground to date. Which breaks my heart but I don’t want any part of his life touching our children’s lives. The drugs. The prostitution. That has no place in our lives and I’m grateful Lucas has no stomach for either.
In the last five years of our lives, Lucas spends less time in Chicago in a suit and tie and more time here on Serenity Island with our growing family.
Warm seawater splashes against my toes and I look on as our four-year-old daughter teaches her three-year-old brother how to form a tower for their sandcastle.
It’s been a little tricky going back and forth from the mainland to our paradise but so worth the extra effort of keeping two homes. And my protective husband says it’s easier to keep guard against the growing enemies trying to take over his part of Chicago.
But I can’t focus on that right now. Not when so much new life depends on me right here, right now.
In the distance I see my love descend the stairs to the beach, his shirt wide open and linen pants rolled up.
“You guys ready to eat?”
He plants a warm kiss on my lips and joins me in the sand. He settles his hands over my growing belly and I lean back letting him take all my weight and the extra I’ve been carrying for the last six and a half months.
“I’m starving!”
“Well, dinner is ready and I can’t wait for you to try tonight’s sea bass. I have a new sauce I want you to try.”
Since the night my father left me on this island, the only time I've stepped foot in the kitchen is when Lucas has asked me to try one platter or other. Not that I’m complaining but my husband loves cooking and now that he has a family to enjoy it, he pampers us all.
Even today, five years later, I’m still in awe at how much my life has changed. If I had to plan my life around what others always wanted me to do, I would be in law school back in Chicago living a life of school, home, and nothing more. My father was so intent on protecting me from the ugly world he saw day in and day out that he forgot to show me the world beyond his small box, to show me the world full of color and love.
Not Lucas. He’s shown me endless amounts of love and what life can be when there are no towers to be hidden away in.
He helps me to my feet and we link our arms as the kids run ahead. “How’s school going?”
“If you could stop putting babies in me, maybe I would be able to put my ‘almost’ degree to work.”
I’m a year away from getting my degree as an oceanographer and I plan on using it to teach our children about the water and world around them.
“Stop spreading your legs.”
We share a laugh knowing neither is ever an option. A large family in our paradise in the middle of the beautiful ocean is a dream I never knew I had and one I could never live without now. And that pesky idea that we’re supposed to be enemies only makes my nights with my mafia pirate all the more fun. Trust me.
