Page 84 of It Must Be Fate

I turn towards the snooty voice of the stranger and find a woman with thin lips and even thinner mental abilities, if the obvious judgment in her tone is anything to go by.

Straightening to my full height, I glare at her.

“Jog on, lady. No one asked you,” I bark crisply.

“She can do whatever she wants,” Hayes adds, ever her baby sister’s defender.

The woman pales, not at my daughter’s words but at recognizing who I am.

“I’m s-sorry,” she mutters before slithering away.

“I can’t change my hair?” Ivy asks with a devastating lip tremble that makes me want to go after the woman and force her to apologize.

“Of course you can, bow.” Crouching, I cup her chubby cheeks and rub my nose against hers, making her giggle. “You’re your mother’s daughter. You were born to have different colored hair,” I add, running my fingers through her messy blonde locks.

“What are we talking about?”

Thisvoice, I welcome with a huge fucking grin. Standing and spinning around, I find my wife looking up at me with a smile tugging at her lips.

I’m reaching for and kissing her in the same breath, indifferent to the dozens of watching eyes I know are on us. A picture of this moment will be in the papers tomorrow, but I don’t care. In fact, I welcome the press acting as my own personal megaphone to broadcast to the nation just how obsessed I am with my wife.

“Hi, Silver,” I say huskily, pulling away but keeping her close to hide my now obvious erection, a terrible thing to be sporting at this particular event.

“Hi, Mackley,” she answers, equally breathless.

I hear the girls call for her from behind me, but I ignore them. A displeased rumble sounds in my chest instead.

“You know how I feel about you calling me that,” I warn.

She laughs, the sound as clear as a bell.

“Even now?”

“Even now,” I confirm. “The only time you should say our name is when you’re introducing yourself or the girls. But I don’t want you calling me that.”

It reminds me of a time when Thayer would refuse to say my name, all in an effort to keep her emotional distance from me.

No such distance is allowed now or ever again.

She strokes the hair away from my face, her eyes softening as she touches me. “Yes, Rhys.”

“Better.” I smack a kiss on her lips. “How was Pilates?’

“Exhausting and fun. How’s the game?”

“We’re down two-nil.”

“Ouch. Hayes must be thrilled.”

“Ding ding ding.”

“And Ivy?”

“Well she hasn’t touched the ball once, but she’s picked quite the special bouquet of flowers.”

Thayer laughs again. The sound slides beneath my skin and goes straight to the organ in my chest. She tilts her head and looks past my arm and over to our daughters.

“Hey, girls,” she calls warmly.

---