“But this isn’t love. You’re just trying to replace Victoria.”
“No one can replace Victoria. But you aren’t a replacement, Cassidy. You’re you. I want to spend my last days protecting you.”
“If I agree, what happens then?”
“You’ll become Cassidy Thornton. Emma will become Emma Thornton.”
Cassidy agreed on one condition: “No pretending. We are a real family. You live the days you have left as a father, as a husband.”
“I agree,” he whispered. “I’ll truly live for you, for Emma, for this family.”
The wedding took place 2 weeks later in the garden. Cassidy wore an ivory dress. Maxwell looked at her as if she were the sun after a long winter. During the vows, Maxwell said: “Every day I have left belongs to you and Emma. I promise to live, truly live, until I no longer can.”
Cassidy replied: “I promise to be your family. To be the hand you hold when you’re in pain.”
Maxwell lifted Emma into his arms. “Papa’s here. Mama’s here. And now we’re a family. A real family.” That night, they made love for the first time. “I love you, Max.” “I love you, too.”
Three weeks later, Maxwell’s phone vibrated. A German country code. Dr. Weber from the Berlin Hospital was on the line. “Mr. Thornton, there has been a mistake. Your test results were switched with those of another patient. You don’t have a brain tumor. You’re completely healthy.”
The phone slipped from Maxwell’s hand. “I’m not dying.”
Cassidy collapsed into tears of joy. Maxwell laughed, then cried, then laughed again. He crushed her in his arms. “I can stay with you. I can watch Emma grow up. I can live!”
Maxwell sued the hospital to ensure such mistakes never happened again. He began withdrawing from the underworld, turning illegal businesses into legitimate enterprises. “I found two reasons to change,” he told Isaac. Cassidy began her university studies. Maxwell sat beside her while she studied. Life in the mansion was full of laughter. One morning, Cassidy woke with nausea. She took a test. Two clear red lines.
“You’re pregnant,” she whispered. “We’re going to have a baby, Max.” Maxwell broke down and cried. “This time, I’ll be here. I’ll protect them.”
One year later, Emma was nearly two. Maxwell sat on the grass accepting flowers from his daughter. Cassidy sat beside him, four months pregnant. On the table lay the adoption papers: Emma Thornton.
“I still can’t believe our life,” Cassidy whispered.
“I thought I was going to die,” Maxwell replied. “Then you and Emma appeared and everything changed.”
Emma ran back and climbed into Maxwell’s lap. “Papa, Mama, love.” Maxwell wrapped his arms around his wife and daughter. He was no longer the ghost. He was a father, a husband, a man who had finally found the meaning of life. “I love you both. More than anything in this world.”
“We love you, too, forever.” As the sunset bathed the garden in golden light, the three of them remained there, holding one another. Happiness didn’t need to be spoken. It only needed to be lived.
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