Krystal is practically my shadow.

The boys are oblivious to everything.

I get to spend most of the day with Khloe.

That’s amazing.

I’m with Chrissie fulltime.

That’s beyond amazing.

Yep, other than Kaley, no complaints here.

I take another swallow of coffee and study Chrissie. Yep, I know that expression. Either it’s more nightmarish tabloid press or Kaley’s done something again.

I set down my cup. “Are you going to tell me what’s wrong?”

She reaches for her belt. “I’m supposed to be in the studio all day with Strike at One while they record my new song. But I got a call this morning from Kaley’s school. They want me in there in forty minutes to talk to the Dean and her counselor.”

I shrug. “Maybe it’s nothing.”

She shoves her feet into her shoes and comes to the bed. “No, Alan. It’s not nothing. They don’t call you in on the first day of Spring Break, school administrators don’t work when they are on break, unless it’s something pretty bad.”

Oh fuck. The kids are out of school for two weeks. And shoot, Chrissie’s right, this issue with Kaley is going to be unpleasant.

I make a sympathetic downward curl of my lips. “You don’t know for sure that something is wrong, Chrissie. Don’t get upset until there is a reason to.”

She nods. She lays her forehead against mine.

“Who would have thought you’d work out to be such a good team player?” she whispers. “And you are absolutely terrific with Khloe. She likes you more than she likes me.”

I laugh and pull her into my arms. I lift her hair and start kissing her along the neck, then run my tongue lightly against her ear. When she starts moving into my kisses, I take her hand, guide it beneath the sheets and press it to my erection. “Why don’t you be a team player and come back to bed, Chrissie?”

She laughs, jerks back her hand, and shoves me away. “God, you’re impossible. You’d think I’d learn it’s never safe to get near you when you’re being sweet.”

I fall back on the bed, smiling. “What can I say? I love my wife. I’m horny as hell today. Didn’t get you last night. Didn’t get you this morning. Chrissie, stay.”

Her lush blue eyes soften and fix on me. “I love you, too. I’d like to come back to bed. I’d like to hide under the covers with you today. But I can’t. So I’m leaving.”

I watch her grab her cell phone and her purse. “Call me once you know what’s going on with Kaley?”

A flash of surprise in her eyes—why does it still surprise her that I care and want to be involved? I’ve always cared about these kids. And anything to do with her is everything to me.

Quickly the surprise is tucked behind a smile. “I will.”

She turns the lock and then closes the door behind her. I sigh and stare at the empty room.

I finish my coffee, read the Wall Street Journal online, contemplate having a Kevin Spacey shower, and check my email instead. Tour itinerary. I forward that to Chrissie. PR email. Fuck, not doing any extra press appearances. That’s a no. Kenny. Emailing instead of texting. Interesting. Directions to a new studio location. Wants me there today. No, not hanging out with him. Listening to him ramble about his marriage is less appealing than a day alone in the house with five kids. What the fuck is Brian sending me now? One line message: You need to start responding to some of these. Oh crud, more online tabloid links.

I click on one. Interesting. Just pictures of the wedding. Nothing new. Fuck you, Brian, no comment. How did so many reporters get tipped off about the day we got married? We were so careful. We told no one. Jack called the people we wanted there. Invited them to Santa Barbara for the day. No explanation. If they showed they showed. If they didn’t they didn’t, and Chrissie and I couldn’t have cared less.

It would have been perfect if not for the clusterfuck of paparazzi on all sides of us and even in the air. I was so worried Chrissie would step outside, see the nightmare of press and melt down. But no, my girl rolled with everything that day. Refused to move the ceremony indoors. She wanted to get married on the cliffs above the beach as planned. And how beautiful she was. No. It was a perfect wedding anyway…

*  *  *

“I now pronounce you man and wife,” Jack says.

I stare at Chrissie, the breathtaking smile on her face, and the way her eyes are shimmering for me. What I’m feeling—being married to Chrissie…finally—there are no words for it. I’ve never experienced anything like what’s rushing through my veins today.

“Are you going to kiss the bride?” Jack asks, louder and amused.

I shift my gaze to Jack. “This better be legal.” It’s a mind blower that he performed the ceremony even though it’s perfect symmetry that he did because I would have never met Chrissie if he hadn’t interfered in my life all those years ago. How the hell did he manage to become a licensed justice of the peace in under a week to marry us so there would be no outsiders here?

Jack laughs. “It’s legal once you kiss her.”

I run my thumb along Chrissie’s cheek. “I just want to stare at you for a little while. Let me.”

Her smile grows larger. “No, I want to be kissed. Kiss me fast since we’re not married until you kiss me.”

I laugh, and pull Chrissie into my arms and lower my face to hers.

Applause all around us.

I kiss her slowly. Gently. Tenderly deepening it as she melts into me, then quietly drawing back before we go across the line of loving and appropriately chaste because her kids are watching everything. And the paparazzi overhead in helicopters and the cameras tucked into drones are capturing every minute of this.

Fuck ’em. Who cares? Let them film today.

Chrissie steps back, breathless and laughing. “Holy crap. We did it, Alan.”

Everyone around us laughs and we’re quickly swallowed up in hugs and congratulations. My humor comes, fuller and richer. Shit, I’m so happy today I’m feeling fucking giddy. And my heart swells into something painful as I watched Chrissie embraced and kissed over and over again.

I don’t think anyone outside the two of us knows that Chrissie tucked behind a few silly words to make everyone laugh what it is to both of us to get here, married and still in love and together as we should be. They don’t know the moments we’ve been through together, the bad, the good, and the loving. They think it’s just light banter, one of Chrissie’s cute-cute moments, but what it is for me is in her voice and the look in her eyes as she looks at me.

Holy crap. We did it. My thoughts exactly, baby.

Everyone moves to the wedding party beneath the giant tent Jack had set up on the lawn. He pulled together an amazing party—dance floor, music, buffet tables, serving staff brought here and not told what the function would be—and by the looks of it everyone we care about is here.

Chrissie and Jack thought of everything.

At 11:30 p.m. I stare down at my wife as we dance. Fuck, the only way I can keep her with me and not have someone drag her away is to dance with her. The party is not winding down. All the guests are still here. She told me not to plan anything. Did she plan a wedding night?

I bring her closer to me, kissing her beneath the hair by her ear. “Is it time to go yet?”

She laughs. “Already?”

“I was ready to go when you said ‘I do.’ I am beyond ready to leave here now.”

She smiles, her face flushed, her eyes sparkly and impish. “Don’t look at anyone. Don’t say anything. Follow me. We need to get to the stairs on the cliff if we’ve got any hope of getting out of here.”

She takes my hand, pulling me through the crowd, and I laugh. I’m possessed by a pleasant sensation of déjà vu, a memory of Chrissie at eighteen, dragging me across the lawn at a running pace to the steps built into the cliffs.

We slip out of the tent and then she hurries me to the access to the beach.