“Then marry me.”
I froze.
“What?”
“Marry me. If you’re my wife, she can’t touch you. She can’t claim you’re destabilizing the boys. She can’t take you away from us.”
“Adrian, that’s insane—”
“I don’t care.” He cupped my face. “I love you. I’ve loved you since the day you caught that dinosaur and didn’t run. Marry me. Stay. Fight with me.”
I stared at him.
And then I said yes.
We got married three days later in a courthouse with the boys as witnesses.
Luke held the rings.
Evan smiled for the first time in weeks.
Caleb cried happy tears.
Noah hugged me so hard I couldn’t breathe.
And when the judge pronounced us married, Adrian kissed me like I was the only solid thing left in his world.
Vanessa’s lawyer tried to block it.
Tried to claim it was a sham.
But the marriage was legal.
And the next custody hearing went very differently.
Because I wasn’t the nanny anymore.
I was their stepmother.
And when Vanessa’s lawyer tried to tear me apart, Adrian’s lawyer stood up and said, “Miss Carter—Mrs. Vale—has been more of a mother to these boys in six months than Vanessa was in nine years.”
The social worker’s report backed it up.
The boys’ therapist backed it up.
And when the judge asked Evan, Caleb, Noah, and Luke who they felt safest with, all four of them said my name.
Vanessa’s face crumpled.
The judge ruled in our favor.
Vanessa’s custody was reduced to supervised visitation once a month.
And Adrian was granted full legal and physical custody.
We won.
But it didn’t feel like winning.
