"Hey everyone, for those of you who don't know me, I'm James Spencer and I'm honored to be here tonight to help celebrate the marriage of Lawrence and Eileen. The happy couple has asked me to sing a special song just for them, to celebrate the happy occasion and to celebrate their love. And they also asked the father of the bride and his lovely wife to join them on the dance floor and share in their first dance. This one is for the beautiful bride and the lucky groom."
Tonight, when all the stars are shining bright
I look into your eyes and see the one
I've been searching for all my life
You are my dream come true
You are the special one I've been waiting for
You are my one and only
You are the only one I adore
Tonight, you've made me the happiest of my life
I thank God when I look into your eyes
That you are the one by my side
You've made all my dreams come true
You've filled my heart's desire
You've made my life complete
These heights can't get much higher
Tonight
Oh, tonight
My life begins with you tonight
"Thanks, everyone," James called out as the song ended. "Let's hear it for the happy couple."
"You'll have to excuse me," Vanessa said as she wiped her eyes and turned away from the dance floor to look at Logan. "I am total sap when it comes to weddings. They get to me every time."
"Don't worry about it. It's nice that you're a romantic at heart."
"Thank you. Are you having a good time? I know you don't really know anyone here. I hope it's not too boring for you."
"Not at all. I'm enjoying myself and I've been enjoying spending this time with you."
"How sweet. I'm enjoying being with you too. Thank you for coming with me." As the next song started and James invited everyone out to dance, Vanessa asked Logan, "Would you like to dance?"
"In a minute," Logan said. "There's something I want to tell you first."
"What is it? If you're going to tell me you aren't a good dancer, don't worry, I don't mind."
"No, it's not that," he replied with a smile. "I hope I don't come on too strong by saying this, but I think you're a really special lady. We don't know each other very well yet, but for the last few months I haven't been able to get you out of my mind and I really do want to get to know you better. Unfortunately, like I said, I'm going to be away for awhile, for some special training for my work. I just found out they want me to leave next week and I might be gone for awhile. I honestly don't know for how long, but it might be months. When I come back, if you're still available and willing, I'd very much like to see you again. I guess what I'm trying to say is, I'm hoping you would wait for me."
Vanessa smiled. "I'd definitely like to see you again and don't worry, hon, I'm not going anywhere."
"Except to the dance floor, right? I'd like to take you up on your offer."
Reese walked cautiously into the busy room, searching through the crowd of guests. This wedding was a huge event in this small community and she knew the people she was looking for would most likely be in this room. She ran into one of them almost as soon as she walked into the room.
"Andrew, hi, how are you?" she asked timidly, trying to break the ice while she tried to figure out how to approach the topic she wanted to discuss.
"Not bad. Were you at the wedding, Reese? I didn't notice you there."
"No, I didn't make it. I'm just dropping in for a second. I wanted to talk to you about Amanda . . . she came to me a few months ago and had me do some paperwork for an adoption," she started cautiously. "I never got to meet with you about it. I'm sorry it fell through."
"Adoption? What are you talking about?"
"So you didn't know that she was planning to adopt a baby," Reese said, not at all surprised.
"No. Are you sure? How long ago was this? Amanda and I had talked about the possibility of adopting a long time ago, before she got pregnant, but we never got as far as filling out paperwork or finalizing anything."
"She told you she was pregnant? I'm not sure how to tell you this, Andrew, but nothing is adding up. About 4 months ago, Amanda came to me about adopting a baby . . . from a client of mine who was pregnant and didn't want to be. Amanda had me make arrangements and draw up the paperwork for her to adopt that baby. The last time I saw her, a couple of weeks ago, I told her that the baby was born prematurely and she acted really strange about it. When I asked her why she looked pregnant, when she hadn't before, she said she was wearing a pregnancy belly, just to see what it was like. . . Are you absolutely sure she was pregnant?"
Andrew's mind was spinning as he tried to take in everything Reese had said and pondered her final question. Now that she mentioned it, he had noticed some unusual things with Amanda and her pregnancy that he had simply dismissed. Now they were all coming back to him.
Andrew looked up just in time to see Amanda walk into the room. For a moment her expression looked concerned as she saw Reese and Andrew talking together, but she quickly covered her nervousness with a forced smile.
"Hi, honey. I decided to take your advice and come to the party after all. You're probably right, getting out and being around people will probably be good for me."
"We were just talking about you," Andrew said coldly. "Did you hire Reese to help you adopt a baby without telling me?"
"We talked about it," she answered evasively.
"Sounds like you did more than just talk about it from what Reese says," Andrew retorted. "It sounds like it was a done deal and you never said a word about it to me. And why did you tell Reese you were wearing fake padding to make you look like you were pregnant? Tell me what's really going on here. I want to know the truth, Amanda. You lied to someone, who was it? Me or Reese?"
Reese had stepped back when Amanda entered the room, but hovered nearby to hear what was being said. She felt she needed to speak up now. "I still have the adoption papers I prepared at my office. I'll can get them if you need proof."
"Ok, it's true," Amanda confessed. "I wanted for us to adopt a baby and had Reese draw up the papers. I was going to talk to you about it and discuss whether or not we should do it, but then . . . I found out I was pregnant and . . ."
Amanda paused, trying to choose her words carefully. She had to come up with a plausible explanation, one that would match with what Reese knew and with what Andrew thought. She looked back and forth between the two of them, her mind racing as they looked at her skeptically. She could tell neither of them totally believed what she was saying and she was running out of lies.
"And what? You kept pursuing the adoption and didn't tell me? This isn't making any sense . . . unless, what Reese says is true . . . you weren't really pregnant, but told me you were? Is that why you really kept pushing me away, so I wouldn't find out?"
"I-I'm sorry," Amanda sputtered. She looked at Andrew, her eyes pleading for him to accept and forgive her, but she could see his bewilderment was slowly turning into anger. Afraid to hear what he might say next, she quickly turned and ran from the room, sobbing.
"Amanda!" Andrew called out sharply, but she didn't turn back.
The commotion had caught the attention of the other party guests and everyone nearby turned to see what was going on. Reese, who had slinked back towards the corner as Andrew confronted his wife, caught the eyes of the other person she had been hoping to find here tonight. She wasn't exactly pleased to see that Blaine was at the reception with Cassandra and she could tell that Cassandra was even less happy to see her, but she still made her way over to the pair.
"Hi, Blaine. I was hoping you'd be here. Can we talk for a minute . . . privately?"
"Yeah, I guess so," Blaine said, before turning towards a nervous looking Cassandra and touching her arm reassuringly. "Do you mind? It will only be a minute, I promise."
Cassie just nodded and gave Reese a pointed look before walking to the other side of the room.
"Where have you been, Reese?" Blaine asked. "I've tried to get a hold of you a million times, but you've never returned any of my calls."
"I know. I'm sorry. I've been going through some things and I needed my space."
"I guess so. Is everything alright?"
"Yeah, it's fine and I'm fine."
"I was kind of worried about you when I never heard from you and didn't see you around. I'd hoped we could still be friends. If you ever need anyone to talk to, to help with anything, you can still call on me, even though we aren't together anymore."
"I know. Thank you," Reese said. Feeling eyes on her, she turned and saw Cassie stealing glances their way, obviously wondering what they were talking about, but trying to act casual. "So are you and Cassandra together now? Are you dating?"
"Yeah, we just started seeing each other."
"Do you think it will become serious?"
"I hope so, but then whenever I start dating someone, I'm hoping it will become something serious," he replied. "Look, I know I didn't want to break up when you did. I wanted to stay together and work it out when you didn't. But I've accepted that it didn't work out between us and I've moved on, so if you wanted to talk to me about getting back together, I'm sorry, but it's too late."
"No, I don't want to get back together," Reese said. "I still think breaking up was the right thing to do."
"Oh," Blaine said, embarrassed. "I must sound like I'm full of myself. It's just that you started asking about me and Cassie, so I thought . . ."
"It's understandable. Don't worry about it. I actually just came here to tell you something important," Reese began. She hesitated, suddenly having second thoughts about what she'd really come here to say. She knew it wasn't going to be easy to tell Blaine that he had a daughter from a pregnancy that she hadn't told him about, but she knew it would be the right thing to do for him and especially for the baby. After seeing Blaine with Cassandra, however, she was starting to have doubts. She didn't trust Cassandra and didn't want her in her daughter's life, but she knew she didn't have a right to tell Blaine who not to date, especially after telling him she didn't want to be with him.
"What is it?" Blaine asked.
"I'm moving. I've decided to transfer to another firm and move out of Bay Pointe. I just wanted to say goodbye."
After saying goodbye to Reese and wishing her well, Blaine walked across the room to join Cassandra.
"So, what did Reese want?" Cassie asked timidly.
"Just to talk," Blaine answered casually. "and say goodbye. She's moving."
"Really?" Cassie asked, her tone and demeanor perked up as she felt instantly relieved. "I was afraid she was asking you to take her back."
"No, not at all," Blaine shook his head. "And you don't have anything to be afraid of. It's over between me and Reese."
"Are you sure? Because you seemed pretty upset that you weren't able to get a hold of her after she broke up with you."
"I was, at first. But I promise you, I'm over her and I've moved on," Blaine said. "Besides, once I'm with someone, I'm with them all the way. It's like there's no one else in the world."
"Are you saying you're with me?" Cassie asked hopefully.
"If you want me to be," he hinted.
"More than anything."
As Blaine leaned forward to kiss her, Cassandra she felt the flutter of butterflies in her stomach. When their lips touched for the first time she melted, feeling a moment of pure bliss. This was all she had ever wanted and she meant every word when she'd said she wanted to be with him more than anything.
Her moment of euphoria was broken and she pulled back as she remembered her mother's words about getting pregnant as soon as possible. She wondered why she would say something like that to her and if she should follow her mother's advice. She wanted to do everything right when it came to a relationship with Blaine. She didn't want to mess this up. And she wasn't going to mess it up by worrying about that now. She put it out of her mind for the moment and let herself enjoy this first kiss.
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