Or was it? “Sure, the way it happened wasn’t ideal, but does a wedding ceremony really make the marriage?” Whether she wanted to admit it or not, they were good together.
As soon as he said the words, he knew he shouldn’t have said them. The ceremony did matter to some women.
Maybe it wasn’t the marriage that she objected to, but the way that it happened. Of course, he would have proposed to her. Sooner or later.
There had been a lot going on in both of their lives.
Two of her sisters and her grandmother had gotten engaged and married. Elle and Daniel had a baby.
Aidan had simply wanted to put some space between the happy family events and their own. He had been doing it for Kate. He had wanted her to have the engagement and wedding spotlight all to herself.
Maybe he hadn’t realized that until now, but that was his reason for waiting to propose. Now it was crystal clear. He knew what he needed to do. He was going to give her the proper down-on-one-knee proposal with the traditional engagement ring and they could have another wedding.
If they weren’t already married, he would ask her family for her hand, but that seemed like a moot point now. But she would get a more traditional wedding if that was what she wanted. The Vegas elopement would just be a precursor that could remain their secret if that was the way she preferred it. Or a funny story they could laugh about with their kids in the years to come.
“If we got the annulment, couldn’t we just go on as before?” Kate said, jarring him from his thoughts. “Really, why does this have to change anything?”
Aidan looked at her like she had two heads. “Because an annulment would change everything, Kate. If we get this marriage annulled, what’s the point in going on like before? I guess it is my turn to issue an ultimatum. We are married. As far as I’m concerned, we either need to live like we’re married or we need to end things now. Permanently.”
Kate flinched. Her reaction was visible and soul crushing. Aidan knew his words must’ve hit her like a slap in the face.
He didn’t like being in this situation any more than she did. It wasn’t the marriage he minded, because he wanted to make it work. It was her reaction to being married to him. Seemingly not even wanting to try to make things work. That cut.
As far as he was concerned, if she wanted to annul their union, then they had reached the end of the line.
She couldn’t have it both ways. They had been drifting in and out of each other’s lives in this limbo for far too long. Maybe a dose of cold, hard reality would wake her up.
He suppressed a string of colorful words. He didn’t want things to be like this between them. He wanted to bring home his bride, carry her over the threshold and start the rest of their lives together. Why did the simplest things have to be so damn complicated?
“I did some research about annulments,” she said. “It is a little iffy, but a legal website I went to said that since we haven’t cohabited, as they put it, we might be eligible to have the marriage dissolved.”
He had fixated on the qualifier, might, because even though they hadn’t formally lived together, they had made love. They had been discreet about their relationship, for the sake of his daughter. And good thing, too, since things seemed to be crashing and burning.
Even though his love for Kate was soul deep, his love for Chloe was in his bones, in his DNA. If Kate didn’t want them to be a traditional family, Chloe had to be his first priority. His little girl had never known her mother. Veronica had chosen to not be a part of her daughter’s life. How anybody could walk away from their own child was beyond comprehension to him. Veronica had her demons and her own issues, but at least the relationship had produced a sweet little girl.
For that, Aidan was eternally grateful.
It was also a mystery to him how a woman like Kate could walk away from the man she claimed to love. He’d thought he knew her. Was he really that bad a judge of character? Or maybe he was just a glutton for punishment. Two marriages and both of them down the crapper. One after a child was born. The other before they could even get out of Las Vegas.
So he had no idea if their physical relationship would prevent an annulment. But if Kate considered the marriage a mistake, he certainly wasn’t going to force her to stay.
“Kate? Is that what you want? Do you want to start annulment proceedings?”
She kept her head bowed but looked up at him through thick, dark lashes.
“I don’t know what I want, Aidan. From what I understand, the longer we wait the more difficult it could be.”
“I don’t know much about this since I’ve never been in this situation, but we might have a better chance if you filed and said that you were not in a sound state of mind to make such an important decision.”
She shot him a dirty look and it brought up pinpricks of irritation. He stood up and walked back to his chair.
“What do you want, Kate?”
“It sounds so irresponsible,” she said. “Not of sound state of mind to make such an important decision? That’s not who I am. Aidan, you know that.”
“I know it is not who you are, but according to you it is the truth about what happened. You’re the one who doesn’t remember. You’re the one who wants the annulment. So you’re the one who is going to have
