Free Father With the Naughty Bride by Valerie J Aurora

Father, with the bride
    “Well, thank you very much, Mr. Jamison,” Angela said. “We’re really happy that you approve of our engagement.”
    “Approve? I’m beyond approval,” I said, beaming at how lucky my twenty-two-year-old son was to put an engagement ring on Angela’s finger. “I’m humbled that you’ve agreed to join our family.”
    Twenty-year-old Angela beamed shyly, and my son, Eric, grinned from ear to ear. Angela, for about the twentieth time, stared at her left ring finger and see how the diamond glistened in the dim light. She had worn the ring for a week now, yet it still seemed like so new to her.
    “By the way, Angela, we’ve known each other for several years by now, so you really should call me John,” I said to my former babysitter. I first knew Angela when she was fourteen and did some babysitting for my two youngest kids when I was a newly divorced single dad.
    “OK, John ,” Angela said sarcastically. “I really do appreciate all the support you’ve given Eric and I during our relationship, and I assure you I will do everything I can to make him happy, which I hope will make you happy.”
    “Oh, Angela, it’s not about me, it’s about your betrothed here,” I said, nodding toward my son. “As long as he’s happy, I will be happy no matter what.”
    Eric piped up for the first time in a few minutes. “And Dad, she makes me very happy. She’s beautiful, smart, sexy, and funny. She is the complete package. I’m so blessed to have known her, and I’m so humbled that she’s agreed to marry me.”
    “So, you say this will be a long engagement?” I asked.
    “Yes,” Angela said, looking lovingly at her fiancé. “I still have a couple years of college, and I really have insisted that we wait to be married until after I graduate. I know Eric wants to get married this summer, though.”
    “I want to take her off the market as quickly as possible,” Eric said with a laugh. “I know a lot of guys have wanted to be with her, and I don’t want to take any chances on losing her.”
    They both giggled, and Angela immediately turned and gave a sultry little glance my way. I smiled at the two of them and acted like I didn’t see it.
    “You won’t lose me, honey,” she said, kissing Eric softly on the lips. He smiled at her and Angela rested her head on his shoulder.
    After a few more minutes of small talk, I paid the bill, left a generous tip and followed Eric and Angela out of our booth. Eric, standing six-foot-two, put his arm around five-foot-four Angela’s shoulders and Angela walked out with her arm around Eric’s waist, wearing a skin-tight gold dress that stopped in the middle of her thigh and showed off a twenty-four-inch waist and thirty-two-inch hips framing a round, firm butt. I watched them leave and I smiled a bit to myself. My babysitter was all grown up! I felt more proud about that than about my son.
    I went home in my car, and the happy couple went to a movie before Eric would drop Angela off at her apartment . While I drove home, I could not help but reminisce about Angela. She has been a part of my family for several years, even if she’s not officially a daughter-in –law. I remembered the times we’ve spent talking while I drove her to and from our house, she hearing my stories about life as a single dad, and I’m hearing her stories about my kids behaved and the work she has at school. In some ways she already was a daughter to me; but there were other ways in which she was different than a daughter – and more like a friend. She knew things about me that only my ex-wife knew, and I know things about her that my son doesn’t know.
    I was so caught up in my daydreaming that I was surprised I made the fifteen-minute drive back to my house without incident. While I was happy for the kids, I was also feeling a bit melancholy – it was if a part of my life was ending, somehow. It seemed and felt selfish, but in one sense I wasn’t just losing my son,