Back to Me (Book Three ✓)

forty-seven

BEAU

"I don't know what else to say. I mean, nothing has ever made me feel this..." My attention shifts from the laptop screen, the pale face of Dr. Williams staring at me through the screen, glasses on the tip of his nose, to the closed door of our office space.

Maggie's cry pierces the air in her nursery across the hall. Not a moment later, Parker's voice carries up the stairs.

"No, I'll get her. You should go to bed, get some beauty sleep." A pause. "You have a big day tomorrow."

Heavy footsteps, heavier than Emma's light skip, ascend the stairs and I hear Maggie's door creak open, Parker murmuring to her already.

Then Emma's steps, light and springy, but slower and tired, until she closes the door to our bedroom.

"Happy?" Dex supplies the word for me and brings me back to my session.

"Right, yeah." I blink at the screen, the reflection of my teeth indicating a smile I hadn't realized had formed. "So fucking stupidly happy. Can you believe it? Me, the same guy who ran from home and lived on the streets of LA, chugging whiskey like water, is getting married tomorrow? I have a kid, Dex. A real life one year old." I shake my head in disbelief. "And she's fucking awesome."

And she really is. Sometimes I forget she's just a little baby, I get carried away with conversations she doesn't understand or ask her opinion on lyrics she doesn't care about.

We're just ... on the same wavelength. I swear she looks at me and it's like we're thinking the same thing. Whether it's fed up with Parker, amused by Zeus chasing his own tail, adoring her momma... we're in tune. I play my guitar and the way she stares at me, it's like she's understanding in a way I don't think babies do.

Then her little body bounces to the beat and it's all I can do not to stop playing, scoop her up, and hide her away so she can stay just like this forever.

"So..." Dex speaks in that voice that always tells me our session is coming to an end. "Let's recap, shall we?"

I nod and he continues.

"Zoey is in a facility receiving treatment and the stalking has not resumed, you haven't heard from your father in months, Emma is perfectly safe and your baby, born perfectly healthy and happy is growing into a content toddler, your career has taken off, albeit in a direction you never thought you'd go, you've reconnected with your biological brother and your nephew, and it seems, in Parker, you got the brother you always wanted from the beginning."

He taps his pen to his notepad as he raises his brows,  a grin on his lips.

"Tell me. Am I missing anything?"

"Nope." I smile hugely, like a goddamn fool in love, like a mad man, and shake my head. "Fucking crazy, isn't it?"

He lets me sit for a moment, the silence bringing back so many feelings from over the years: anger, betrayal, guilt, shame, but also bliss, acceptance, and love, and again, I can only shake my head.

Tomorrow, I marry the girl of my dreams.

Tonight, our child sleeps soundly in her crib, waiting for us to spoil her rotten in the morning.

How the actual hell did I, Beau Lewis and major asshole, get this goddamn lucky?

"I don't think it's so crazy." Dex challenges, watching me intently.

After a moment of quiet, I cock my head to the side. "I'm listening."

"We come back to this every time, Beau." He leans forward, closer to the screen. "Your family's failure to accept and love you was not a reflection of what you deserved. You deserve this happiness."