Page 17 of Fighting Happily Ever After

Before Stephanie could put her phone down, it rang in her hand. The sound jarred her from the quiet. But her surprise quickly turned to pleasure when she saw Dax’s face on the screen.

“Hey,” she said as she answered the call. “What time is it? It must be the middle of the night there?”

“It is.” His warm voice reached through the line from the other side of the world. “But I missed hearing your voice, so I set an alarm.”

He did sound a little groggy, but she loved him all the more for thinking of her and making the sacrifice. “I miss you.”

“I miss you too, babe. So much,” he said. “I still wish you would have come with me.”

There’d been more than one occasion when she’d wished she would have gone with him, too. But she knew from experience that it wasn’t a vacation to visit your partner on set. They worked long hours and were often completely consumed by the shoot and had very little time for anything extra. Including spending time with anyone who wasn’t involved in the production.

Dax and Stephanie had made a decision early on not to get involved with each other’s work. It was a decision they’d both had opportunity to regret, but by and large it had been the right choice.

“You’ll be done soon, Dax.”

“I will,” he said. “You know I love you, babe, right?” There was something in his voice.

“Dax? What’s wrong?”

“The article,” he said simply. “You know it’s bullshit, right?”

They’d been here before. Plenty of times. With fame like theirs, almost no week went by without some trashy tabloid site publishing some garbage about one or both of them. “I know,” she said with as much confidence as she could muster. “But it always stings a little to see it.”

“I know, I know.” His voice soothed her. “And it makes it even harder to be apart. But you’re all I think about, babe. Every day, all day.”

She believed him. The same way he believed her every time some garbage was published about her.

“Tell me about this town you’ve found. Your text messages make it sound like a little bit of paradise. Will I like it?”

“You’ll love it. In fact…” The idea came to her while Dax had been speaking, and she probably should have thought about it a bit more, and let it mull over in her brain a bit, but she couldn’t help it. She blurted it out. “I think we should get married here.”

He laughed. “I thought that was the plan all along?”

“I know, I know. But I mean right away. Like a quickie elopement. You’re almost done there, right? You can just come straight here and we can do it, just the two of us before the press finds out.”

He was silent for a moment. “An elopement? I thought you wanted the big wedding with the big white dress and—”

“Not anymore.” She hadn’t even realized it herself, but just by spending time in Glacier Falls and meeting all of Faith and Logan’s friends, who had their own amazing wedding stories, none of which were traditional, her opinion had started to change. “I just think there’s something so magical about this town, I can’t even explain it. And more than that, it’s private. No press.” Her thoughts went back to the photo of Dax and his costar. The tabloids were going to be the death of her. “I’m treated like a normal person here, Dax. No reporters following me around and questioning my every move. It’s nice. And if we could get married without all of that…well, then, I think we should.”

“This will make you happy?”

“Very.”

“Let’s do it then.”

She squealed and clapped her hands as Dax laughed on the other end of the line.

“I’ll talk to Faith about it and we’ll organize all the details, okay? You’ll be here next week?”

“I can be there by Wednesday.”

“That’s in five days!”

“Too soon?”

“No way.”

They spent the next fifteen minutes discussing Glacier Falls and the people she’d met. She told him all about Ever After and the weddings Faith and Logan held, throwing in suggestions for their own super private and quiet nuptials. She talked as long as she could, with Dax agreeing it sounded amazing as his voice got more and more distant.

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