House Of Payne: Twist Part 24

When her father had finally left for home, he did it with Angel's a.s.surance that she would call her mother in the morning to allow Emily a chance to mend that fence. Twist had been in an exceedingly mellow mood after that, and as they'd settled in for the night he'd revealed that her father had been so touched that the growth chart had been saved, he'd almost cried.

That was when it occurred to her that it might be time to mend some fences with her father as well.

"We're almost there, just a little farther."

"Wherever we're going, there had better be balloons," she muttered, mincing her way across what felt like slightly uneven ground. "Birthdays should always have balloons."

"I think you'll be happy with the birthday balloon ratio I've got going on here."

"And where is here, exactly?"

They came to a stop. "Why don't you open your eyes and find out?"

With that, he dropped his hands.

Blinking hard against the harsh glare of the hot August sun, Angel looked up. And promptly felt her mouth drop open.

"SURPRISE!"

"What in the world...?" Stunned, she stared at a wide open corner lot of about an acre with a scattering of mature trees around the edges, but had otherwise been cleared in obvious preparation for construction. A vibrant, life-sized outline of a house's floor plan had been sketched out on the large lot, along with the familiar sign of her father's architectural firm and the construction company he used to build his creations. The floor plan was completely outlined in rainbow hues of balloons at ground level and held in place by rocks, and she could only imagine how long it must have taken to blow up that many balloons.

Then again, considering the size of the crowd that stood in what appeared to be the center of the floor plan, it might not have taken that long at all.

Payne and his very pregnant wife Becks were front and center, along with Scout and her husband Ivar, and Rocket and her old man, Fisch. Joey and Novak were grinning like idiots at her, as were all the Santiagos including the dark-haired and gorgeous Essie. To her surprise, her parents were also there, glowing with golden tans undoubtedly earned on the links in the Arizona sun.

"Well?" Hugging her close from behind, Twist bent so that his mouth was close to her ear. "What do you think? Are there enough balloons?"

She could barely find her voice. "Is... is this...?"

"Our new home? Yeah. Your dad says we can be in it in four months or so."

"Hi, neighbor!" Joey bounded over, all smiles, with Novak close behind. "Do you recognize the neighborhood? Or what will be a neighborhood," he added with a careless shoulder lift. "We're the corner lot right across the street from you."

Realization hit her hard, and as the flood of joy hit her so hard it punched the air out of her lungs, she looked from them to Twist. He'd known. Even though she hadn't told him how much she'd missed them, he'd known, and had done something about it. "Seriously?"

"Seriously." Novak grinned so widely at catching her flat-footed, he looked borderline-crazed. "And since you guys are gonna be blocking our view of Prairie View Forest Preserve, the creek and Lake Forest in the distance, I say all barbecues happen at your place."

Angel laughed. "Just as long as you're not the one a.s.sembling the grill, I'm good with that."

Twist turned her to face him, his dark eyes velvety soft as he smiled down at her. "Does that mean you're okay with this? Because if you're not, unringing this bell is going to be one monumental pain in my a.s.s."

"Baby, I love it!" She launched herself into his arms with a shout of laughter, and that broke the ice. There was a chest full of champagne, along with another full of beer, sodas and water, and soon bottles were popping. Twist had called in an order from their favorite Italian place, Lou And Lulu's, for a delivery of several pizzas. As Ed and Nick set up tables and chairs, and champagne, beers and sodas were all pa.s.sed around, her father and Twist took her on a tour of their "house."

"I made a list of what I thought my girl should have in her very first family home," Jackson said, looking like he was doing all he could not to burst at the seams with excitement as he pantomimed opening the front door for them. "First off, I talked this over with Twist, Joey and Novak. They all agreed that parties have a tendency to just sort of spontaneously erupt around you-"

"That's my girl," her mother piped up happily, trailing behind them. She turned to Essie and confided, "She was always so popular in school."

"So," her father continued, moving through a balloon outline of a circular foyer, "that means you need room for entertaining. This calls for a free-flowing floor plan and no formal s.p.a.ces. The kitchen looks out over a large living-slash-dining area, which also opens to an outdoor living room complete with an outdoor kitchen and fireplace. The interior kitchen was designed to Lynette's specs-"

"In a kitchen like that, you'll be cooking like a pro in no time, sweetie," Lynette a.s.sured her, also tagging along and pulling Ed behind her. Ed, G.o.d love him, was simply doing his best to chow down on a slice of pizza in one hand, while sipping a Goose Island Summer Ale from the other. "There's gonna be room for a conventional oven and a convection oven, can you believe it? Ooooh, wait until Christmas! We're having that over here, by the way. Just so you know."

Her mother, Emily, squealed and turned to hug Lynette. "How exciting! I can't wait!"

"Uh, okay," Angel said, still reeling.

Essie laughed. Her voice was a rich contralto made slightly husky by vocal chords damaged in the long-ago a.s.sault, but Angel thought her new sister-in-law's sultry voice sounded like pure hot s.e.x. "You should see your face, girlfriend. You look like Bugs Bunny after an anvil's been dropped on his head."

"Packs," Twist muttered under his breath to his little sister. "This family runs in f.u.c.king packs."

Her father continued to grin as he displayed imaginary appliances like a hostess revealing grand prizes on a game show. "Here will be your fridge and beside that a s.p.a.ce for a corner desk that'll be wired for everything imaginable, from cable to the internet and everything else we can think of. You can have your tablet or laptop ready to go here for your event calendar, or recipes, or streaming video, or whatever you want. Oh, and that reminds me-the house will be completely wired to be a smart house, including warming tiles in all the bathrooms that you can digitally program yourself, along with the water temperature for not just the showers, but for the pool and hot tub, which will be situated off of the outdoor living area, obviously. Oh, and did I mention the solar panels? Because there will be solar panels."

"Wow," Angel breathed, rocking just a little before she looked to Twist. "Can we afford this?"

"Considering what we're both pulling down from the House, plus your folks offering up the down payment as a housewarming gift and a free architect building you a custom home, this is coming out less than what I'm selling my house for."

Her eyes filled as she looked to her parents. "Daddy. Mom..."

Emily's eyes were bright with both happy tears and excitement as she squeezed Angel's outreached hand. "Just wait until you see how insanely gorgeous your master bath is going to be. That's the dream room I wanted for you. Honey, show them what you have planned in the master. Oooh, and tell them about the great deal you've found on that closeout of white-veined black marble tiling that's just been sitting in a storage unit for a year. Baby girl, I'm going to be flying in from Scottsdale to take baths in your bathroom."

"Wow, black marble tiling," Kara breathed, clutching her chest and looking past her husband Nick to make googly eyes at Becks. Angel had no idea when they had joined the tour, but there they were. "I wanna get me come of that drama, girl."

"Right? Honey, maybe after the baby comes, we can do a tiny bit of remodeling?" With a hopeful air she turned to Payne, who slung an arm over her shoulders and kissed the top of her head.

"Whatever you want, baby, you got."

Somehow the entire party had decided to come along for the tour, and as Angel turned to watch the huge glut of friends and family funnel and shuffle into a balloon-marked "hallway" without simply stepping over the balloons and going around, she realized that every single person in her life was completely crazy.

And she adored them for it.

"This master bedroom is going to have coffered, twelve-foot-high ceilings with recessed lighting, a separate sitting area with a multi-paned bow window for maximum natural morning light exposure. On the other side of the house will be your official art studio drawn up to Twist's specifications," Jackson added, smiling at her. "But I know my little girl. The first thing you like to do when you wake up is capture whatever fantastic images that have come to you overnight, so you need good morning light for that."

"That's so perfect and so thoughtful, Daddy, thank you." Though what he didn't know was that now her morning routine started with her new husband's hands on her, which led to some pretty spectacular fireworks. But this was something a daughter didn't share with her father, especially in front of half the population of Chicago tagging along.

"Right here will be a spiral staircase leading up to a workout room directly above the master," he began but Angel held up a quick hand, and he looked to her questioningly.

"Does it have to be a workout room?"

He glanced at Twist. "It can be whatever you want, honey, but I know Twist likes to keep in shape."

"True." Heaven knew she was thankful for the body his fitness hobby gave him. "I was just wondering if it would be possible to put a nursery somewhere close to the master, so I can hear the baby when it cries in the middle of the night."

Dead silence greeted this announcement before she was turned by Twist, who looked like he'd stopped breathing. They'd decided to forego using contraceptives less than two months ago shortly after their small wedding held in the church Twist had been baptized in. It had been a little scary, opting to let nature take its course, but her confidence grew when they'd promised each other that they would be happy with whatever outcome would be achieved.

Now, however, with his eyes wide and burning and his face oddly pale, she wasn't as sure of his reaction as she had been a minute ago.

Maybe doing this in front of an audience wasn't the best decision she'd ever made.

Twist bent down to look her right in the eye. "What did you say?"

"It's not confirmed," she said frantically, in the hope of lessening the impact. In her mind she heard that terrible echo of her father yelling that he'd been trapped and hadn't wanted ever wanted a baby... "I mean, in the past couple of days I've peed on seven separate pregnancy test sticks, and they all came back as positive for a pregnancy. But I haven't had it confirmed by a doctor or anything."

"Whoa." Somewhere behind them, Essie whispered, "You peed on seven separate sticks?"

"Holy c.r.a.p, who needs a doctor when you've peed on seven sticks?" Rocket raised her bottle of summer ale and clinked it with her man, Fisch. "In my book, that's confirmation, know what I mean?"

"I made a doctor's appointment for Monday to see if that's what's going on." Tentatively she pressed her hands against Twist's chest. "Are you okay with... uh..." Panic strangled the rest of the words as again she heard the echo of her father. But the ache in that still-tender wound vanished under the dazzling smile that began to dawn in Twist's eyes.

"A baby." That smile bloomed with such beauty and awestruck force, it swept away all doubt. "We're having a baby."

"THEY'RE HAVING A BABY!" Lynette let out a whoop that made Angel start and Emily squeal before the two mothers were hugging and crying and trying to figure out who should be Nana and who should be Gramma.

If anyone wanted to be called Meemaw, she'd freaking die.

Before she could voice that aloud, strong arms swept her up and spun her around, and though Twist's hold was tight, there was a new and careful gentleness that made her heart sigh.

Already her beautiful man was protecting his baby.

"I love you so much," he whispered against her ear before his mouth came to hers. "I was supposed to be giving you a dream house for your birthday, but instead you're giving me my greatest dream-the start of our family."

She smiled against his lips. "Like I said, it's not confirmed."

"It's confirmed, baby. Seven peed-on sticks don't lie." Oblivious that they had a smiling, happy audience, he gently put her down and rested his forehead against hers. "I guess all that grdmwla-ing worked."

She laughed, loving that they still enjoyed using their code word. Heaven knew they certainly enjoyed what the code word stood for. "I know that we'd just decided to try-"

"Little girl, this is the best news of my life, making this the best day of my life, and I've already had some truly amazing ones with you." He touched his mouth to hers, then smiled as he looked a little dazedly at the crowd around them. "d.a.m.n, we'd better get this house built fast."

"Not a problem," Jackson announced while everyone laughed. When Angel looked over to her father, she had to bite her lip to keep from blubbering like an idiot when she saw his eyes were wet. "I want to revise the plans just a bit to add in a nursery-"

"Daddy, don't go to any extra trouble, please. We can scrunch a crib into the weight room or something, no worries."

He looked as offended as if she'd told him they were going to sell their unborn child to the circus. "I'm building a house for my first grandbaby, hopefully the first of many. There will be no scrunching."

"Absolutely, and not another word about it, young lady," her mother admonished, then gasped and grabbed Lynette's hand. "You know what we have to do? We have to go shopping. We have a grandchild on the way!"

They squealed like teenagers.

Angel tried again. "It's not confirmed-"

"Seven peed-on sticks." This time it was a chorus from just about everyone.

She sighed. Perhaps it was time to change the subject.

"The nursery could probably go where I had the separate dressing area outside the His-and-Hers closets," her father was muttering to himself, staring hard at a gathering of balloons off to the side of the master bath. "And if I b.u.mp out the walk-in shower area, I can get a nice window into the nursery with a view of the pear tree and part of the edible garden outside...Yeah, I think I've already got this figured out."

"I have just one final request, Jackson," Twist said, and he was smiling as he tucked her to his side. Clearly distracted by thoughts of creating the perfect nursery for his first grandchild, her father glanced back at him. "We need extra-wide doorframes for all the bedrooms. I have a feeling that with all the artists in this growing family, we're going to need a lot of doodling s.p.a.ce."

Her father's eyes lit up at that, as did her heart, because in that moment her world was perfect. And as she rested her cheek against Twist's chest, she knew that this perfect moment was merely one of many to come.

Note From The Author.

Hi there! So, here we are at the end of Twist's story, a 90K-word book that fairly gushed out in a little less than four months. Up next at the plate will be Sa.s.s, as promised, and it's a story that is so alive in my head I've already got the first couple of pages done, when I should have been finalizing Twist. Needless to say, it starts off with a bang! *bounces*

I LOVE hearing from readers, just as much as I love interacting with them. Please feel free to drop me a line at , or follow me on Twitter or Facebook. If you mention that you've read House Of Payne, I promise to follow back and say hi! :) For updates on my latest releases, cover art and publis.h.i.+ng news, sign up for my newsletter-I swear I won't spam your inbox.

There's more l.u.s.t, lies and love to be had in the House that Payne built. Look for Sa.s.s's story this Fall: House Of Payne: Rude.

About the Author.

A compet.i.tive figure skater from the age of eight, Stacy Gail began writing stories in between events to pa.s.s the time. By the age of fourteen, she told her parents she was either going to be a figure skating coach who was also a published romance writer, or a romance writer who was also a skating pro. Now with a day job of playing on the ice with her students, and writing everything from steampunk to cyberpunk, contemporary to paranormal at night, both dreams have come true.

Discover Other t.i.tles by Stacy Gail:.

Bitterthorn, Texas Series:.

Ugly Ducklings Finish First Starting From Scratch (novella).

One Hot Second.

Where There's A Will.

Earth Angels Series: n.o.body's Angel (novella) Savage Angel.

Wounded Angel Dangerous Angel House Of Payne Series:.

House of Payne: Payne House of Payne: Scout.

House of Payne: Twist.

Novellas:.

Crime Wave In A Corset (Part of the steampunk holiday anthology, A Clockwork Christmas).

How The Glitch Saved Christmas (Part of the sci-fi holiday anthology, A Galactic Holiday) Zero Factor (Part of the cyberpunk anthology, Cybershock).

Best Man, Worst Man.