Ryan Ch. 08

Dinner was buffet style with the food set out on the large center island in the kitchen. Everyone filled their plates and sat down in the adjoining dining room. Ryan sat at the head of the table with Dani at his right.

The dining room was large, fully able to accommodate up to twelve people easily.

Dinner was a boisterous affair with everyone contributing to the conversation discussing everything from little Michael to Micah's newest client. It was obvious that no one knew that Ryan and Dani had gotten away for the weekend, except Crystal and Micah, who hadn't said a word.

After they'd finished eating, Ryan, not wanting to wait any longer, decided it was time to get the real party started.

Looking around at everyone, he said, "By the way, Dani and I went down to the beach house this last weekend."

Turning to Dani, Haley asked, "How did you like it. Isn't it just glorious?

"Oh my god, Haley," Dani gushed; "the house was absolutely gorgeous with a picture perfect setting. It was really hard to leave; I hope that wasn't our last trip there."

"I'm sure it won't be," Haley said, purposely looking at Ryan, who only smiled at her.

Continuing, she said, "I know what you mean. Matt and I spent a couple of weeks there last summer. It was so peaceful. Although it's isolated, we didn't feel like anything was missing. We're on the go a lot, especially since we have Michael now, so we're really looking forward to our next trip down there."

Joining in Helen said, "Besides being so peaceful, it's so romantic. I remember when Dan and I first went there. The flowers were in bloom, the weather was beautiful, clear and sunny the entire time. It was like being in paradise."

"Except, we didn't see a lot of the outside," Dan interjected to Helen's embarrassment.

"Dan!" she admonished.

Smiling Dan said, "Uh, we didn't get outside much because we just really enjoyed the interior décor. How's that, honey?"

Shaking her head, Helen smiled and said, "That's just as bad. You're incorrigible."

"Yep, that's me," Dan replied with a twinkle in his eyes.

"Ahem!" Ryan said, "I don't think we'll ever be old enough to hear stuff like that from you Dad. We'd rather be left with the illusion that we all came via the stork."

"Amen," Micah said in agreement while the others chuckled.

Getting to his feet, Ryan said, "Since we're all together, I'd like to say something."

All eyes turned to him, expectantly.

"This has been a great year for us as a family and I'd just like to say something to remind us of our many blessings. First of all, there was the addition to our family of Mallory, Haley and Matt's beautiful baby boy."

Looking at his parents, he said, "I wouldn't count on that being your only grand kid."

Everyone chuckled, naturally assuming Ryan was referring to Haley's love for children.

Continuing, he said, "Then there is Caleb, the guy whose gift for gab was parlayed into a successful career as a writer. His third book was published and damn if it didn't hit the top of the New York Times Bestseller List last week. Congratulations, again, Brother," Ryan said nodding to Caleb.

Nodding back, Caleb smiled proudly.

"Now, we come to Micah, my partner in crime."

Micah chuckled at that.

"He recently sold custom guitars to Eric Clapton and Carlos Santana, in the same week. Seriously Brother, you are an incredible artist," Ryan said.

"Thanks, Ryan, that means a lot coming from you," Micah said with feeling.

Ryan went on to say, "I don't have the patience or imagination for writing and never in a million years would I have the touch Micah has when crafting his art and you can forgot about me carrying a baby."

That comment was met with hoots of laughter that soon reduced everyone to tears.

But, I did have some success of my own," he said when they'd all calm down. "I saved the acquisition of a major property for the corporation earlier this year. However, my proudest achievement was having the good sense to fall in love with a woman who knows I'm not perfect, but still thinks I'm the best thing since sliced bread."

Turning to Dani, Ryan raised his glass and said,

"Danielle Marie Carter, you're everything I ever truly wanted or needed in my life. Thank you for sharing the journey with me and agreeing to become my wife."

Everyone looked stunned for a second, but when the realization of what Ryan said seeped into their brains, they all started talking at the same time.

"What?!" Crystal squeaked.

"Oh, my God!" came from Haley.

"When?!" was all Helen could manage.

Micah looked over at Caleb and they both said at the same time, "Damn."

Dan just sat back in his chair and smiled thinking, "More grand babies."

"I know you all must have questions and we'll answer them all," Ryan said grinning from ear to ear.

Crystal sitting next to Dani, hugged her and said,

"Congratulations, Sis. I'm so happy for you. Mom is just going to flip out."

"Ryan and I will call them tonight," Dani said.

"They're crazy about Ryan. They both will be over the moon," Crystal whispered.

"Ok, people," Ryan said, "let's go to the living room for the Q and A session.

As they all headed off to the living room, Ryan held Dani back.

He opened the drawer to the china cabinet and took out the box with the engagement ring in it. He slipped the ring on her finger and kissed the back of her hand. Smiling, they joined the family on the big sectional sofa.

Crystal was the first to catch sight of the ring since she was sitting closest to Dani on the left.

"Let me see! Let me see!" she gasped grabbing Dani's hand.

"Oh Dani, it's gorgeous."

"Thanks," Dani said, "Ryan has good taste. It was tough taking it off so the announcement would be a surprise for everyone."

Dani was patient as everyone took turns holding her hand to admire the ring. After everyone was seated again, Ryan said, "Mom, I know you're champing at the bit. Is there anything you want to ask us?"

"I'm still a little shocked," she said beaming, "but I do have one question.

"Did you get engaged at the beach house?"

"Yes, we got engaged last Friday," he said.

"That's a week ago," Crystal said, shocked that her sister could keep a secret that long and a little peeved that she didn't tell her first. Then she realized that it wasn't about her. Dani was a grown woman, a woman about to be married. Besides, she didn't know if she could have kept the secret herself had she known. As it was, she so wanted to tell someone, anyone. But most of all she was happy for her sister and she admitted, just a little bit jealous.

"I planned the trip to the beach house a while back solely for the purpose of asking Dani to marry me," Ryan revealed.

"I've known for a long time that I wanted to marry her and couldn't think of a better place to do it. Once we got back, we decided to tell you all at the same time. We're going to call Dani's parents and let them in on the good news tonight and tell our friends in the next few days."

"Two down and two to go; what say you, boys?" Dan asked, his eyes gleaming as he looked at Micah and Caleb.

Everyone laughed at the hounded expression on their faces.

"Now, Dad..." Caleb started and then just clamped his mouth shut, rolling his eyes toward the heavens as if in supplication.

Micah clapped Caleb on the back and said with a now amused look,

"Buck up Bro, all we have to do is stand our ground."

After a hearty round of snickers, Ryan and Dani continued to answer questions regarding their plans.

They were having such a great time together, that it was after eleven o'clock before they all left. But before doing so, they helped clean up, which both Dani and Ryan appreciated.

When the house was quiet again, they put in the call to Dani's parents. It was a little later than Ryan would have wanted to call, but she assured him that they would still be up. So, they'd called and as Crystal predicted her parents were over the moon at the announcement. It was well past midnight when they ended the call and went to bed.

*

Dani decided not to jump into planning the wedding right away. She wanted to wait until after Christmas to have that as her only focus. In the meantime, she was just going to enjoy being engaged. With all the help she was getting the lost of a little time wouldn't matter.

She decided to use a wedding planner after all. The wedding was going to be larger than she initially anticipated, Ryan was right as usual. She didn't want to be tired and stressed out on her big day, nor did she want that for those assisting her. Letting a professional do the grunt work was the best option.

To ease the process along, she asked Haley and Helen to start working on a vendor and guest list. They agreed that once things got underway, they would all meet at Dani's and Ryan's place to arrange everything, along with the planner. In the meantime, Dani would have time to read a couple of wedding books and organize her thoughts. Even though she was using a planner, she still needed to make all of the decisions.

* Dani went back to work on Monday and was overwhelmed as well as pleased by the reaction of her co-workers to her engagement. They congratulated her and complimented her on her beautiful ring. A few even admitted to being a tad jealous.

Charlotte stated emphatically that she wanted to be a bridesmaid. Dani grinned at her and called her pushy, but they both knew as one of Dani's closest friends, she'd be in the wedding party. Dani didn't have long to bask in the glow of her friends' well wishes as there was plenty of work to do. *

There was hardly time for Dani to get back into her routine when Christmas rolled around. Crystal was spending the holiday with their parents and taking Isaac along, he was spending Christmas Eve with his girls. James wouldn't be coming home. He only had Christmas Day off from his job and decided to spend it with a classmate who lived near the campus.

Christmas day Dani and Ryan called her parents. Once again, they told them how happy they were that Ryan was going to be a part of the family and that they loved them both. Her mother didn't mention grand kids and Dani was perversely disappointed. Now that her mother could be expected to talk about grand children she hadn't uttered a word.

Dani put in a call to her friend Trina Willis. Trina and Quincy moved to Canada almost 2 years ago to be near her family. They got engaged shortly afterward, but were not as yet married.

Dani's long time friend was happy and excited for her. She assured Trina that she would send them an invitation and asked her to be in the wedding party. Trina accepted happily. They spent more than an hour catching up and reliving the good old days, realizing just how much they missed each other. Trina was pleased that Dani had found the right man for her. Dani wished them Happy Holidays and ended the call with a promise to keep in touch.

All in all, the holidays were a fun, albeit tiring time for Dani.

*

A week later with the celebrations behind them, Dani settled in back at work. Mr. McClain went out of town for a conference in Chicago which had been scheduled a month earlier. He would be gone all week long, but he left instructions for Dani that included a courthouse records search.

Digging through old records was tedious, but Dani found that she was more focus on doing it after she'd gotten all or most of her other work done. With that in mind, she scheduled a block of time toward the end of the week to do her research. It she were lucky, it wouldn't take more than an afternoon to complete the task.

The week went by fairly quickly with few problems. Dani had plenty to do, but it was mostly routine work. She did end up getting extra work from McKinney because his secretary had to leave on a family emergency late Thursday morning. She didn't mind, but it put her a little behind with regard to starting her research at the courthouse.

After finishing McKinney's letter, Dani changed her voice mail to reflect that she wouldn't be in the office the rest of the day and headed downtown. She really did hate going downtown with all the one way streets and noisy traffic, but sometimes it couldn't be avoided. Then there was the parking. Street parking was definitely out, so she looked for a space in one of the covered garages.

After parking on the garage's second level, she locked her car and headed for the main courthouse. The research she needed to do was straight forward, it just took time and sifting through old records.

*

It was about four o'clock when Dani completed her research, which took less time than she had anticipated. However, it had been a successful trip. She'd found a couple of case laws which might be useful. Another good thing was she had more than enough time to avoid the dreaded five o'clock rush hour traffic.

Dani opened her car door and was about to get in when she saw a motion in her peripheral vision and her breath caught in her throat. Turning, she recognized Keith as he approached. While breathing a sigh of relief, she still eyed him cautiously and wondered what he was doing there.

Noticing how Dani seemed startled upon seeing him, Keith said,

"Hey, I'm sorry, didn't mean to scare you. I just wanted to talk to you for a minute."

Feeling a sense of Déjà vu, Dani asked, "What are you doing here?"

"Like I said, I'm here to talk to you," he said slightly peeved. "I can never seem to find you alone."

"What?" Dani said, starting to get alarmed. "Have you been following me?"

Without answering the question Keith said,

"You gave me the brush off in the grocery store, don't think I didn't notice. I just wanted to talk. You always seem to be with someone or at the River Lakes Estates. I guess that's where your boyfriend, the white guy, lives. I know you can't afford to live there," he said with his lip curling into a sneer.

"Are you living with him?" he snapped.

Dani was too flabbergasted to even answer. He was following her, just like before.

Not liking her silence, Keith grabbed her right wrist and pulled her toward him and asked in a hard tight voice, "I asked you a question, are you fucking living with that bastard?"

Now, really afraid, Dani squeaked, "Yes."

It was when she put up her left hand to push him back from her, that he saw her engagement ring.

"What the fuck?!" he hissed grabbing her left wrist in a bruising grip.

"You're engaged to him?!" he shouted, not expecting an answer. It was obviously an engagement ring.

Dani was scared, really scared. She opened her mouth to scream when Keith grabbed a fist full of her hair and banged her head against the car door frame several times in quick succession, drawing a moan from her, while blood seeped from a wound at her temple.

With one hand still grasping her hair, Keith held her throat in a choke hold with the other. Pressing his big body against her, he snarled, "If you scream, I'll fucking kill you. Hear that bitch?"

Dani slowly nodded, fighting the nausea.

Keith was getting angrier by the minute; she had to think of a way of getting away from him. He was too close and holding her too tightly for anything she knew to be effective.

"You thought you were too good for me, but you're fucking some white guy. I was crazy about you, but you were so prissy you didn't even want me to touch you. I could tell. Oh, you tried to hide it, but as soon as my dick got hard, you'd push me away, just like a fucking tease. I bet you get down on his dick, don't you bitch?" he barked, increasing the painful pressure on her throat.

Feeling dizzy from the lack of oxygen, Dani fought to stay conscious.

When she heard faint voices approaching, she did the only thing she could think of, she let her entire body go slack. Caught off guard, Keith loosened his hold on her. It was then that he heard the voices too. They were too close for comfort, so he brutally shoved Dani and fled, never looking back as she hit the cold hard concrete garage floor.

A man, seeing Keith running away, called out. "Hey, stop! Stop!"

Dani, already weak from being strangled and having her head banged against the car, was unable to stop herself from falling; hitting her head on the solid surface, she lost consciousness.