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So here we were, four weeks later, stood in front of my parents house in typical rainy England. Brady squeezed my hand and gave me a reassuring kiss.
“Come on, cowgirl, let’s get this over with.”
We’d arranged to come over for two reasons—one to finalise the split of all the assets with Ben, and two so my parents could meet Brady—although they didn’t know this yet. Walking through the front door, the one thing I hadn’t been expecting to see was my sister’s Jimmy Choo’s in the hallway.
As if I’d been smacked in the face with a shovel, I froze. Brady’s bulky mass bumped into me from behind. Bile rose in the back of my throat as a furious mix of nerves and anger boiled in my stomach. My parents knew what time I was arriving, why did they allow her here?
“You ok?” Brady asked, his hands stroking up and down my arms.
I took just a couple of seconds to regain my composure and nodded. She was not going to get the better of me.
He planted a lingering kiss on the back of my head and for just a moment, I closed my eyes and revelled in it. Then came the familiar creak of the living room door being opened. I blinked my eyes open to see Alyssa stood staring at me.
Her perfect, curvy, bikini body had now dissolved into a thin skeleton. Her porcelain skin was dotted with angry red spots, and her usual vibrant green eyes were flat and sunken into their sockets. She looked dreadful. I smiled.
“Hi,” she said, her eyes flickering to Brady behind me.
“Hands off, bitch,” I said. If I could have spat venom, she would have had a face full of it.
“I’m sorry, Soph,” she said, taking a step towards me. “I never meant for it to go that far.”
“Oh, but you meant for it to happen?”
“No, of course not. I just...it just—”
“Save it,” I said, striding forwards. “You did me a favour anyway—as I’m sure you can see.”
I walked past her, knocking into her shoulder on purpose as I made my way through to greet my parents. After having seen her here, I wasn’t surprised to see Ben sat on Mum’s pristine cream leather sofa, smirking like the cat who’d got the cream.
“Howdy,” he said, easing back into the soft leather like he owned the place. “Knew you’d come back.”
“Like you know everything of course.”
His gaze fell on Brady and he clenched his jaw. “What’s he doing here?”
“I don’t see how that’s any of your business,” I said.
“Enough,” Mum said, standing up from her beloved chair. The leather had more creases and wrinkles in it than a century old person but it was incredibly comfy. “We want this aired, dried, and put away once and for all. This isn’t just about you two. There are other people this affects too.”
“You know what?” I said, fixing a steely glare on her. “I actually couldn’t give two shits.”
“Sophie Louise—”
“Save it,” I said, putting my hands up in the air. “How many of you bothered to come out and see me after I nearly got eaten alive by a mountain lion, hmmm? And you,” I said, glaring at Ben. “Left me in the hospital to come back for her.”
“Sophie,” Mum said, walking towards me. “We had both daughters in hospital at the same time. We could only be in one place at once. John assured us you were in the best of care and kept us updated every day.”
I snorted. “Oh, well that’s alright then.”
Mum frowned. “Where’s this attitude come from? Stop it now.”
“I don’t have an attitude, Mum. I just grew a backbone, that’s all.”
“You’re being rude, Sophie. You’ve not even introduced us to your friend yet.”
“Quite frankly, with how you’ve all acted towards me, I’m not sure I want to.”
An awkward silence settled into the room. Nobody moved, nobody spoke. The ticking of the grandfather clock in the hallway signalled my life passing by with valuable seconds.
“If you’re hoping for some big show of forgiveness,” I said. “Then you can forget it—it’s not happening. End of. I’m here to take the rest of my things, introduce you to my future husband, and settle debts with Ben.”
Small gasps resounded around the room. “Future husband?” Ben said, his triumphant smirk suddenly gone and his face paling.
“Yes.”
“But—”
“But what, Ben? Did you think I’d come back to declare my undying love for you? Tell you I can’t live without you?”
He opened his mouth to speak but nothing came out. His silence gave me the answer I knew anyway.
“So you’ve jumped from fiancé to another? In the space of two months? Sophie, I’m worried for you.”
I rolled my eyes. “We’re not engaged, Mum. I’m just telling you this is the man I plan to spend the rest of my life with.”
Brady squeezed my hand and slipped an arm around my middle.
Mum pursed her lips and sighed. “I feel like I don’t even know you anymore, Sophie. You’ve been away for eight weeks and you’re just a completely different person. I don’t understand what’s changed. Where’s my sweet, polite, wouldn’t say boo to a goose little girl gone?”
“That’s just it, Mum. I’m not a girl—I’m a woman.”
At that, Brady lifted my hand to his lips and pressed several kisses onto the back of it. All eyes fell on that simple yet tender gesture but not a word was uttered.
“Shall we go?” Brady said, not even acknowledging anyone else in the room.
“Sounds like a good idea to me,” I said.
“Excuse me, young man,” Mum said, addressing Brady. “It would be nice to at least hold a conversation with the man who is keeping my daughter on the other side of the world.”
“With all due respect, Ma’am, I am not ‘keeping’ your daughter. She is free to do as she pleases, when she pleases.”
Mum’s face contorted in horror but I couldn’t work out whether it was her title of ‘Ma’am’ or the fact that Brady put her in her place. Either way, it made me smirk.
“Well,” Dad said, his lips turning up at the edges. “I think it’s safe to say that our daughter has finally found herself a man. Well done, Sophie, and thank you—”
“Brady,” he said.
“Thank you, Brady, for being the first person in over two decades to stun my wife into silence. I hope we get a chance to meet under better circumstances someday.”
I stifled a laugh at my father’s direct approach. He was a man of few words but those he did say were always carefully thought out.
“We’re flying home next Thursday,” I said, walking us towards the front door. “If you want to see us before then, we’ll be staying at mine.”
“Where am I supposed to stay exactly?” Ben said, the tremble in his voice more than evident.
“Couldn’t care less. Since you’ve been gracing her bed for months, why don’t you try there?”
“That house is just as much mine as it is yours, Sophie. I have every right—”
“You have every right to shut the hell up and quit whinging like a little girl,” Dad said, not even looking up from his newspaper.
“Roger—”
“Enough, Sheila. I’ve never liked the boy. There’s no reason for him to think otherwise now.”
An eerie silence crept over the room and I gratefully used that as an excuse to run out of there as fast as possible. Dad rarely challenged Mum but when he did, it usually resulted in a sulking mother for days. She knew if he said something he meant, there was no budging him.
We sat back in the car and burst into laughter. After a couple of minutes, Brady took my left hand and stroked his thumb over my ring finger.
“You were very forceful in there, I’m proud of you.”
I blushed. “Yeah, well, I’m not being walked all over anymore.”
“Are you going to show me that forceful side later?” He gave me a cheeky wink.
“Well, I do still have some riding whips and some knee-high leather boots...”
He grinned before turning all serious on me again. “Hearing you call me your future husband, it did funny things to me. It made me realise how proud I would be to call you my wife. I want everyone to know that I’m yours and you’re mine.”
My heart began thudding. Heat trickled through my veins at the sincere edge to his voice and the determined look on his handsome face.
“I’m going to push the divorce through with Anna as quickly as I can,” he said, inching his way towards my lips. “Because I want you to be Mrs Lancaster—no one else.” He graced me with a dizzying kiss. “Marry me, Sophie. Please?”