Page 56 of Just Curious

“Of course,” Willa answered with tears in her eyes as Jackson slid a ring onto her finger.

“Yes, absolutely,” Casey replied as he accepted his ring, and then he added, “Jackson, with you illegally marry me? And you, Willa? We’re perfect together… as three.” That got a smile from them, but none of this felt illegal to anyone, and they both answered yes to Casey’s question.

Willa’s attention went to Casey and she looked between the two men. “I love you both so much, and equally. I can’t imagine being married to one of you without the other. Do you have a band for yourself too, Jackson?” When he produced it, she and Casey slipped it onto his hand together.

Lots of kissing happened for a while, punctuated with plenty of happy laughter and declarations of, “I love you.”

“And now we’re all each other’s. Always,” Jackson said with a catch in his voice. He smiled contentedly, but then regarded Willa with a pensive expression. “Do you feel in any way like you’re missing out on the big white dress experience?”

Willa cocked her head in thought for a moment and then answered, “Not really. If my parents were still around, then maybe I’d feel differently.” Her voice choked up suddenly. “My dad was such a softy, he always cried at weddings, and my mom used to dream about planning for mine.” She shook off the sad face and went on, “But I honestly never had that big princess-for-a-day fantasy going for myself.” She smiled at Jackson and then Casey lovingly and said, “Besides, I feel like that every day I’m with the both of you. I’m absolutely the luckiest woman alive. I’m sure of it. And a fancy white dress and a bunch of flowers won’t add anything to that. We’re us. That’s what’s important. We’ve all just made our promises, and that’s enough.”

Often when they were done making love to each other, the two men would lie on either side of Willa and talk to the baby as they caressed her tummy. It was another one of Casey’s research findings. “Babies can hear in the womb, and it’s good for them to become accustomed to different voices and noises.” Willa’s favorite times were when the two men tried to outdo each other by telling the baby stories about one another. She laughed so hard, she routinely leaked tears.

Casey told the baby, “Your daddy Jackson used to go to school in his flannel pajama pants until the school made a rule against it. A lot of the other kids copied him because he looked so comfortable, but the administrators thought it ‘set a bad example.’”

“I never got in trouble for it, though,” laughed Jackson. Addressing Willa’s womb, he said, “Your daddy Casey used to threaten anyone who tried to tease me. He scared the sh… the stuff out of Billy Waite, the school bully. Billy tried to harass me about my pajamas until the fad caught on. They really were comfortable,” he added with a sigh.

Sometimes the men would strike up a song and sing it to the baby, and Willa thought she could just die on the spot. They both had smooth, deep voices that harmonized perfectly. Their choice of songs ranged from classic rock to country to nursery rhymes they’d probably learned as kids—and one or two Christmas carols—but each one was memorable. She ran her hands through their hair and tried not to cry as they sang. She failed.

Chapter 37

At the same time that Willa’s pregnancy was beginning to show prominently, it was time for Ryker and Deb’s trials.

When the jury saw Willa, an ethereally beautiful pregnant woman, glowing with the promise of a new life, and they heard how Ryker had almost killed her, they didn’t give one single shit that he hadn’t “meant to” do anything other than torment Jackson with his car antics.

He’d sealed his fate when Willa’s lawyer Mckenna had him on the witness stand. She asked politely, “Did you try to kill someone with Mr. Mitchell’s car?”

Looking shifty, Ryker replied, “Hell no! I was just messing around!”

The judge reprimanded him immediately for cursing in the courtroom and told Ryker to watch himself.

Without batting an eyelash, Mckenna continued, “Did you know you were controlling the car that was being driven by Ms. Camden, who was pregnant?”

“No,” Ryker muttered. Then he had the bad sense to say, “Her boyfriend is an asshole and I wanted to pay him back.”

The judge told him any more outbursts like that would result in some stiff fines.

Mckenna then asked Ryker, “Did you send the car over a cliff with the intent of killing Mr. Mitchell?”

“I made a mistake! But that fucker needs to be paid back for messing with me!”

“So,” Mckenna continued, “Because Mr. Mitchell outsmarted you at a hacking competition, which is the entire point of the competition, I might add, you thought it was appropriate to endanger his life, but in doing so, you nearly killed his girlfriend and her unborn child. Is that about the size of it?”

Ryker glared at Mckenna while the judge imposed a fine and had him removed from the courtroom. Ryker hollered obscenities about Jackson the whole way out.

After finding him guilty, the jury recommended the maximum punishment for Ryker. The general consensus was that he was lower than scum.

The FBI had a team of hackers at their disposal. They had uncovered all of the nasty shenanigans he’d been up to over the years, and Ryker was not going to get out of prison for the rest of his life.

The lawyers for Willa did some extremely fine sleuthing and located the original ghost screenwriter Deb Abbey had used when she stole Willa’s first book. Under oath, the woman swore that the manuscript had said the name Willa Camden on it. She explained that when she asked Deb about it, Deb claimed it was one of her pen names. She also said that Deb introduced herself as Delia Abbott. Willa Camden was unpublished at that time, so her name meant nothing to her.

It turned out, as they’d suspected, that Deb Abbey had chosen the name Deborah Abrams because it sounded more professional and literary than the name she’d been given by her parents. They’d saddled her with Debbie Abbey, and she’d never liked it.

All of the proceeds from the more recent book Deb had stolen from Willa were awarded to her, and the unedited copies of the book were ordered to be destroyed. Willa donated the money to a literacy foundation. The jury also awarded Willa a million dollars in damages, but she was informed soon after the trial that she shouldn’t hold her breath for a payout; Deb didn’t have a penny left.

The Baxter Brothers studio that made a movie from her stolen story, however, was also ordered to pay damages, and it nearly bankrupted them. The jury reasoned that it should have looked suspicious to the Baxters when Deb was unfamiliar with the particulars of the story. That money went to the literacy foundation as well because Willa didn’t want a cent of it for herself.

For her complicity in making a video of Willa, Jackson, and Casey, and for using the internet to threaten Willa and her men with harm, Deb was sentenced to spend time in prison as well. She would not be out for many years.

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