Mr One-Night Stand

He stopped by the hospital on his way home. The beeping machines were thankfully long gone, and his grandmother’s new private room was cosy, with splashes of yellow, and the flowers he’d brought her lit up the window ledge.

‘You’re stubborn, my boy—remember that.’ She positively beamed up at him. ‘Don’t you be taking no for an answer.’

He chuckled and bent to press a kiss to her brow. ‘I’ll try not to. But she can be rather stubborn too.’

‘Good—I like a girl with a bit of backbone.’

‘Oh, I have no doubt you’ll like her.’

‘Well, make sure you bring her home soon, so we can see for ourselves.’ Sadness swept across her features. ‘I often worried that you would never settle...that somehow your past had seen to that.’

‘Hey, easy, Gran.’ He placed a hand over hers. ‘It just took me a while, that’s all.’

/> She nodded, her eyes glittering with a smile, and his throat tightened.

‘We understood why you didn’t come home much. We knew how hard it was for you to keep coming back here.’

‘Don’t make excuses for me.’ He squeezed her palm. ‘I should’ve come back more. I was being selfish—foolish, even.’

‘It’s not foolish to want to avoid those memories.’ She took a shaky breath. ‘Nonetheless, the past is the past, darling. You can’t change it, but you shouldn’t let it taint your future either.’

‘I know,’ he said softly. ‘I get that now.’

‘Aren’t you done lecturing the boy yet, Angie?’

His grandfather’s booming Welsh lilt invaded the room as he joined them, a fresh bouquet in his arms.

‘I don’t lecture,’ his grandmother bristled.

‘Whatever you say, dear.’ He smiled and bowed down to plant a kiss upon her forehead, adding with a wink, ‘The important thing is, did it work?’

She returned his smile, happiness filling her cheeks with colour. ‘How could you ever doubt me?’

His grandfather chuckled and looked to Marcus, his gaze warm and hopeful. ‘You finally ready to stop running and start living?’

Marcus grinned, loving their interchange, and loving the whole promise life suddenly held. ‘You’d better believe it, Pops.’

‘Diolch i’r Arglwydd.’

His grandfather pounded him jovially on the back, back to his best now that Gran was on the mend.

‘So what are you waiting for? Be off with you and bring us back a granddaughter-in-law.’

‘I’ll do my damnedest.’

‘Language!’ came his grandmother’s warning.

He exchanged a look with his grandfather and they both erupted with laughter.

‘He has you to thank for that, Angie.’

She gave an exaggerated huff. ‘I have no idea what you’re talking about.’

‘Whatever, Gran,’ he teased. ‘I’ll see you both soon—very soon.’

And he would. He could say it and mean it now.

* * *