tender mother who can teach them about potatoes and flowers and seashells and love.”
Oh. She closed her eyes, full of a sensation she’d never, ever known before. Now this…this was the way she always imagined she’d feel the day she found out she was going to have a baby. Utterly at peace and in love.
“They need to love you the way I do,” he whispered. “The way I will for the rest of my life.” He tightened his grip. “That’s why we’re here,” he said. “To get you.”
Oh, God. “And go…somewhere?”
“A few places, but no more hiding,” he assured her. “First, we’re going to find that white-haired mayor.”
“Lennox?”
He nodded. “We have a—no, sorry, I have a piece of paper to sign.”
The marriage certificate. “You still need that?”
“I still want that. Don’t you?”
More than anything. She nodded.
“Then we’re going to fly by Ottawa to finalize some custody paperwork which will ensure that Emma and Eddie are ours.”
Ours. Her heart squeezed. “And then?”
“A trip to London, I think.”
“London?”
“My parents want to meet you and, of course, see the kids. I have a few other things I’d like to do there, but mostly see the people I left behind.”
“And then…where?” New Zealand? Timbuktu? What did it matter if they were—
“Right here, of course. A resort in paradise, which happens to be the closest thing to heaven on earth I can imagine.”
“Here?” She put her hands to her mouth, the earthen smell on the glove invading her head, making her dizzy with joy. “You’ll live here in Barefoot Bay?”
“We’ll live here.” He lifted her gloved hand and very slowly pulled it off, one finger at a time. She thought he would kiss her knuckles as he had the first time they stood in this garden together, but he reached into his pocket instead.
“To beginnings, pretty Tessa.”
She laughed. “I’ve heard this the last time you stripped my glove off and started courting me.”
“Not this.” In his other hand, he held a blindingly bright diamond ring, the stone catching the sun and stealing her breath. “You haven’t heard this.”
“No,” she managed to say. “I don’t think I have.”
He slipped the ring on her finger and closed his hand around hers. “This is real, Tessa. Real life. Real love. Marry me and let’s be a real family of four.”
“Actually…” She looked at the ring, then him, everything blurred by joy and hope and a sense of completion as palpable as the budding life around her. Stepping back, she took his hand and placed it on her stomach. “There are five of us now.”
He drew back, his eyes wide, his lower lip quivering in disbelief. “Tessa.” He barely whispered her name. “Are you sure?”
She reached up and touched his cheek, the diamond on her hand as lovely as the tears in his eyes. “I’ve never been so sure of anything in my whole life.”
“Well…how are you? Is everything good? Are you okay…I mean, is everything…”
“I’m fine.” She laughed at the stuttering of a stunned new father. “I’m perfect.”
He folded her into his arms, lifting her off the ground for a kiss. “You sure are, pretty Tessa. You are perfect.”
And so, it seemed, was her life.
The Vixen of Vacation Vows
Blog Post—August 12
The maid of honor was a dead woman.
The bouquet was a squirming baby.
And the place was so littered with eye-candy, a girl could get whiplash from checking out the groomsmen.
But I’m getting ahead of myself. Let me back up, loyal followers, and explain why I chose to blog about the wedding I just attended in the most dreamy spot called Barefoot Bay.
Do you remember almost a year ago when I visited a Moroccan-inspired resort on the Gulf Coast of Florida? I had been invited for what was, admittedly, a “soft” opening, as they say. Soft? This was more like the squishy underbelly of a fat cow. Gooey like the dozen eggs I dropped in the grocery store parking lot. Limp like that guy I…never mind, you get the idea. They made some beginner’s blunders and I let them have it, V3- style. (Slice and dice with a dash of vitriol and sarcasm.) I left the Casa Blanca resort quite underwhelmed, despite the lovely ladies who run the place and their high, high hopes.
Well, what a difference a little time makes!
It wasn’t easy to get me to go back (there are thirteen thousand destination-wedding resorts in the world and only one Vixen to critique them for you, kittehs!) but some quite influential friends plied me with…er, twisted my arm. The lovely folks at AABC (that’s the American Association of Bridal Consultants, not the a- alphabet) convinced me to attend a wedding as a VIP guest and what an affair it was! I must share all I experienced that day for it was a wedding like no other. Well, it was like many others. Two people got married. They seemed frightfully in love. The sandy stage was draped with pearls and lace and all manner of white stuff.
But it wasn’t the wedding setting that did me in…it was the people who peppered that place that I can’t forget.
Casa Blanca is one of the few mom and pop resorts left on this earth…and let me warn you, I don’t mean Ma and Pa Kettle. Owner Lacey is a gorgeous ginger who not only handles a teenager and a toddler, she has a smokin’ hot “pop” who was the architect for the place. Yikes. Can you say Matthew McConaughey with a wicked drafting pencil? And the Moroccan design was a result of their mutual love of the movie Casablanca. Awww. I know, gives me a cavity, this sweetness. These two are a powerhouse couple and I see great success in their future. (The teenager’s a handful, though. Good luck with that one.)
The owner has an executive staff made up of her BFFs who—get this—have all been gal pals since college. Do you love it, ladies? Jocelyn is the spa manager and former life coach (and Olympic-quality list maker) who is all spit and polish and perfection. She’s married to a carpenter who, I must say, could nail me anytime. (Oh, I crack myself up.) When they’re not organizing and laying, um, carpet, then they are taking care of her doddering ol’ dad who offered to knit me a scarf. A scarf? In Florida? He knit me two. Forgot about the first one, dear thing.
And here’s something they have that I don’t recall seeing at any other destination wedding resort—a hot air balloon so the bride and groom can literally fly off into the sunset. This pristine beach is stunning from any view, but from three thousand feet in the air with the one you just “I do’d”…best photo op ever.
Coincidentally, the wedding I attended was for the woman who owns and flies the balloon, Zoe, who could give any airhead a good name. Can you spell eccentric? Neither can I, so I’ll describe. Our blonde bride carried her newborn baby in place of a bouquet (I told you this one never met a tradition she couldn’t trample) but thankfully did not toss little Maya to any eligible bachelorettes.
While her three besties were bridesmaids, natch, the place of the maid-of-honor was held by a
