Page 68 of SEAL'S Baby Surprise
Austin pauses for a minute. “Are you married?” he asks.
“No,” I say. “Didn’t you hear me? I couldn’t. I just could not go through with it, no matter how many terrible things he said.”
“What kind of terrible things?” Richard starts to ask, but I’m not paying any attention to my brother, because Austin takes a knee right in front of the gate.
“Lee,” he begs. “Come talk to me. Don’t make me shout it out to the whole neighborhood.”
I start to walk forward. But Artie looks at me, and says, “Don’t you dare, Missy.” Her voice snaps like a whip, and I stop. She sounds like my mother on her very worst days, and she has that big gun. I don’t want to argue with her.
Austin puts his hands in the air, holding them away from his body. “I guess I don’t mind. I just . . . this is going to be real embarrassing if you say, no, Lee.”
“Keep talkin’, bub,” Artie says. She’s still got the gun pointed at the ground, and I can see she doesn’t have her finger on the trigger. But she hasn’t put that hand cannon away, either.
“Lee,” he says, “You are the most amazing person I know. You are kind and caring. You’ve tried your hardest to learn practical things like cooking and cleaning house. I guess I know now why it was hard for you. And why you know some of the weirdest and most unexpected things. My daughter loves you, and so do the Turners, Mrs. Hubbard, and even Pops McKinney, and he’s a hard person to please.”
He stops and breathes hard, swallows like his throat is dry.
Then he goes on. “Most importantly, I love you. I swore I’d never fall in love again.” In the back of my head I can hear the song he’s been playing over and over for weeks now. It’s a 1962 hit by Lonnie Donnegan. “But you washed up on my beach, and I fell right into those big blue eyes of yours. I’ve been drowning in them ever since. I can’t say no to anything you want, won’t say no unless it would hurt Julia. And I know you won’t ever do that.”
I feel my lips begin to tremble. I’m going to cry some more. Gosh, I’ve never cried so much in all my life as I have today. It must be the pregnancy hormones, or maybe being so scared for hours and hours.
Or maybe it’s the fact that I’m hearing the man of my dreams confess his love to me.
“Lee . . .” he says.
“Rylie,” I correct him, ready to start this thing together on the right foot. “My name is Rylie Arianrhod Lane. That’s my brother, Richard Lane standing behind you. He can vouch for the ownership of my gems, and I can pay you back for everything.”
His eyes flash with anger, and for a moment I think he is going to shout at me. “You don’t owe me anything,” he growls. Then he softens his voice. “I owe you. I owe you for a wonderful summer, for remembering how to laugh. For the time you spent with my daughter, helping her to see people as good most of the time.”
“But I want to help,” I say. “I want Julia to learn anything she wants to learn. I want her to grow up strong and independent. How can she learn any of that if I saddle you with another mouth to feed? You work all the time. You take care of all of us. All I can do is burn my hand, fall off my bike, and bring attention from people no one wants to have around. And get pregnant. I can’t even do something as simple as remember to get my birth control implant renewed before it runs out. I’m a mess, Austin, and I don’t want to have my mess gum up the great life that you and Julia have.”
Austin goes down on both knees then, clutches at the wires of the gate, and starts making strangling noises. I can’t tell if he’s crying or laughing or both.
“Lee,” he says, making a caress out of the short, simple name I’d given myself when we met, “You are a master artist. You’re a little scattered when it comes to practical stuff . . .”
“A little?” my brother scoffs.
“ . . . but your sketch books put da Vinci to shame. Your color sense rivals that of Van Goh, and your impressionist sketches would impress Matisse. I know it’s your body, but I would be so happy, so absolutely joyous if you would marry me and let that little life inside you grow to be whatever it will be.”
Sometime during this speech, Artie has put the safety on her gun and holstered it. I don’t have any idea where she put it on that skinny frame of hers, but it went out of sight.
“Do you trust him?” she asks me.
“With my life,” I say. “I’m not sure I trust him to know what is best for him, though. I’m just one disaster after another.”
“Please say yes,” Austin begs. “Because I need my Lady Mermaid far more than I need her selkie pelt. You can give all those pearls and zircons to your brother to take home with him. We don’t need them.”
“We don’t?” I ask, surprised.
“Not even one,” he says. “I do work a lot. But for me, trading stocks and such is kind of like playing Tetris. I started doing it with my pay while I was deployed in some pretty rough places. I don’t like getting drunk, and I was being true to my wife, so I needed something to do with my time. Besides, it brought in extra cash when she wanted a new car or bigger apartment.”
“Are you sure we don’t even need one or two?” I ask.
“Not even,” he says. “Lee, I own Freedom Beach and about half the village. I’ve even got a regular house. But Julia and I like the beach, and we enjoy the van. Besides, all our friends are there.”
“I did wonder how you sold Family Services on living in a van,” I say slowly.
“Freedom Beach?” Artie says. “You’re that Austin?”
