Second Chance (41 page)

“Truce?” she
offered.

He grinned and
opened his eyes. “Truce,” he said. Only his Suzy could say that word the way
she did and make him feel the way he did.

“You could kiss
me,” she said.

And that he did.
In one quick motion, he had her in his arms and was kissing her with all the
longing he had for her. Her body molded perfectly into his as she encircled her
arms around his neck, drawing him closer.

The crowd was
deafening when their lips touched but the two lovers didn’t hear. Jae
reluctantly broke their kiss. “Koo loo kos, my Shorty Suzy Sue,” he whispered
in her ear before burying his face in her hair. He held onto his wife with the
intention of never letting her go.

How did he…?
She’d teach him the correct intonations later. Right now—laughing, Sue slightly
turned to her husband and whispered, “
Saranghae
, my Lefty Khyba Jae.”
She could feel his lips curving into a smile. She leaned in his arms and looked
at her handsome husband smiling at her with that lazy smile of his, that
lopsided curve of his lips that didn’t quite form a full smile but just enough
to take her breath away. Sue could have sworn her heart skipped a beat.

They kissed again
and the audience cheered even louder. And at that moment, anyone of those
screaming fans in that stadium could bear witness that their pop star Khyba was
truly enchanted and besotted by his wife. And Sue didn’t give a damn what
people thought about her shameless public display of affection for her Lefty,
her Khyba, her Jae, especially, more importantly, and finally, her husband.

CHAPTER
58

Sue and Jae
returned to Minnesota for a Hmong wedding. Jae wanted to do it “correctly” this
time. She warned him that he’d get drunk and possibly poisoned by the alcohol.
Jae only laughed and said, “Then you’ll just have to save me.”

Jae wasn’t
laughing after the wedding. Since Jae didn’t have family in Minnesota, her
parents decided to forgo the traditional traveling from the groom’s residents.
Instead, they performed the traditional bargaining and requesting of the dowry,
which the groom was more than happy to pay again. Her parents had requested
nine-thousand, the amount they requested for Mai Yee. Jae had frowned and said
that his Suzy was worth more than that and since no amount in the world could
amount to what she was worth to him, he gave them a generous dowry.

When the drinking
and toasting began, Jae was bombarded with alcohol from her brothers, her male cousins
and their friends. By the time Sue was able to put a stop to the flow of
alcohol, Jae was already so drunk, he was losing consciousness. Ty and Jackie
were able to get him to his limo and back to Sue’s apartment. Jae spent the
rest of the evening vomiting and the next two days recovering from the
hangover. By the third day, he was finally well enough to make love to his
wife.

“Will you listen
to me from now on?” Sue asked. They sat on a bench overlooking the St. Paul
Airport at Indian Mounds Park.

“Absolutely,” Jae
said. He tightened his hold on her, remembering how hellish the last couple of
days had been and was content to have his wife in his arms.

“Good.” She
smiled and snuggled closer to him. “Jae?”

“Yeh?”

“You’re going to
be a father.