I follow Maggie into the living room and say a silent prayer that this will go okay. I don't just want the blessing to marry Ciara from her family I need it. I know that Victor could make my life miserable if he wanted to. Her father is dead, so I'm hoping that by asking Victor's permission, he sees that I respect that he is the head of Ciara's family and that I will do anything to make sure that Ciara is happy, loved, and cared for; including enduring his wrath for even bothering to ask.
Victor is reading a newspaper when Maggie announces, "Victor we have a visitor. Ben Weston wants to speak with you."
Victor folds his newspaper back up and places it on his lap, "Ben Weston, huh? I hear you saved my granddaughter and prevented my great-granddaughter from harming Ciara."
"I did, sir."
"What are you doing here?"
I take a deep breath and begin my opening statement, "I want you to know that I love Ciara and she is the most important thing in the world to me. I know that you are important to her and that is why I want to speak to you. Now that my name has been cleared of setting all these fires, I want to ask for your permission to marry Ciara."
"You are either really brave or really stupid to come here and ask me that."
"I think it's probably a combination of both. I'm aware that you know all about my past and all of the mistakes that I have made, but I'm better now. I've gotten help for my illness, and I have continued to keep up with my treatment. Ciara keeps me motivated to keep up with it because I don't want to do anything to put her in danger or hurt her. I love her, and I'm asking for your blessing to let us get married, please."
"What would you do if I said no?"
"Honestly, I will still ask Ciara. I came here out of respect to you as the head of Ciara's family. Ultimately, it's Ciara's choice, and I believe she would say yes to me."
"It took guts for you to even step foot in my house. It would be even gutsier of you to go against my wishes, but you're smart enough to know that Ciara is headstrong and that I can't control her. You do seem to have changed. Ciara has been in danger I can't count how many times starting with crashing her motorcycle and you have managed to save her each of those times. I will give you my blessing under one condition. Twice a month you and Ciara are to join us for dinner here. I don't get to see my granddaughter enough and this will allow me to get to know you even better and keep an eye on you."
"I can do that."
I walk over to the older man and stretch out my hand to shake it. "Mr. Kiriakis, I promise I'm going to do everything in my power to make Ciara happy. Thank you."
Just as I'm about to pull my hand away, Victor increases his grip on my hand and looks me straight in the eyes, "If you don't keep your promise or you do anything to hurt my girl, Mr. Weston, have no doubt that you will find yourself at the bottom of Lake Michigan sporting a brand new pair of cement shoes. And Ben, know that this is not an idle threat," he chortles, "it's a promise."
He releases the grip he has on my hand and I swallow the fear that has risen up before responding, "Understood, sir, and thank you for giving your permission."
I walk out of the mansion and release the breath I didn't realize I was holding. Victor has given his blessing. Granted it's with conditions but they are easy enough to meet. I want nothing more than to keep Ciara feeling loved, happy, and cared for. And I have no problems with him keeping an eye on me, Ciara is worth having to live my life under a microscope and I have no problem with proving day in and day out that I am a changed man if it means that I get to have her as my wife.
I walk back to my car get in behind the wheel and this time I head over to Hope's. She is Ciara's mother after all, and I want to get her blessing as well. As of last night, she was still unemployed by the Salem PD, but hopefully, after everything that went down last night, she will be reinstated as the police commissioner.
I ring the doorbell and the door is quickly opened. "Ahh…Ben, c-come in," she stammers in surprise. Hope pulls the door further open and I walk in. "Please, have a seat," she points with her hand toward the couch, "I'm actually glad you came here."
I swallow, not expecting to hear those words in reference to me about stopping at her home, "You are?"
"Believe it or not, yes, I am."
"Why?"
"Because I want to ask for your forgiveness."
"My forgiveness for what?"
"For the way I treated you after you were released. I should have trusted what Ciara was saying about you. I was just so worried…"
"That I was taking advantage of her."
"Yes, she has been hurt so much in her life and I didn't want you doing that to her. After she was raped, she was so broken, and it broke me to see her like that. I didn't want you to break her even more. But I can see now that you really are different and that you really do love her."
"I really am, she has made me a better person, and I really do love her. I love her with all of my heart."
"I'm begging you to please forgive me for everything that I put you through, for trying to put you in jail when you had done nothing but try and care for my daughter when she was not ready to come home."
"I forgive you. Now can I ask you a question?"
"Of course."
"Will you please give me your blessing to marry Ciara?"
"You don't need my blessing," she raises her eyebrow at me, "you also know that even if I didn't want you marrying Ciara, I couldn't stop you. I didn't even want her to go on a date with you, and I couldn't stop it," she smiles'
"Hmm…I may have noticed that she can be a bit stubborn if she wants to be."
"Ciara has a mind of her own and as difficult as it may be sometimes, I have to accept that she is an adult and can make her own choices."
"True, but I still would like your permission, please."
"Then you have it, Ben, but the one you should really ask for permission is her grandfather, Victor, he's the one who I think you really have to worry about," she sighs.
I can't stop a small grin from forming on my face, "I already asked him actually, and he gave his blessing with one condition; that we have dinner with him twice a month so he can see Ciara and get to know me and keep an eye on me. He also said that I would be wearing cement shoes at the bottom of Lake Michigan if I hurt Ciara in any way."
"Sounds like Victor."
"It's a good thing I have no intention of doing that."
"That's good because have no doubt, Ben, he would follow through."
"I have no doubt he would."
"So, when do you plan on proposing?"
"If everything goes well, tonight, so I'm going to get going. Thank you for your blessing to ask Ciara if she will marry me," I stand up and begin to walk to the door.
"Ben, thank you again for convincing Ciara to talk to me about the babies and making sure that she is taking care of herself."
"They are my whole world. I would do anything in my power to keep them all safe and healthy."
She walks over to me and does something I never saw coming. She gives me a hug, "Good. It makes me feel better hearing you say that."
I return the hug, "I can't believe I'm hearing this, but thank you."
She releases me from the hug and steps back from me, "Thanks for stopping by, Ben."
"Thank you for giving me a chance."
I open the door and turn around and wave to the woman who will with any luck be my mother-in-law, and then shut the door behind me. I breathe in the fresh air and slowly let it out, "I did it. I can't believe I did it. I have permission to marry Ciara Alice Brady and make her my wife."
I get in my car and head back to the mansion. I check in with Marty, who has quickly become my right-hand man. The guy is such an asset to have on the security team and he informs me that everything is going smoothly.
I go to see Harold to make my requests for dinner at the new lake property as well as how I want things set up over there. He quickly begins gathering the needed items for dinner and sends June, the housekeeper, to take care of the set-up for the evening. I don't know what to do with everything running so well. For the last month I've been so used to running around and having to worry about Ciara and sneaking around to see her I don't know what to do with all the extra time I have.
I go back to the security office and sit down and exhale. I look at my watch; only two hours until Ciara is done with her shift and then we can head over to the lake property.
Marty is still watching the feeds and making notes on the log we keep, "Ben what is up with you? Since you got back here from whatever you were doing, you've been looking at your watch every twenty seconds."
"Have I?"
"Yeah, so dish, dude. What's going on?"
"If everything goes right, I'm going to propose to Ciara tonight."
"Ahh…that explains it."
"Yeah."
"She loves you right?"
"I know she does."
"Then you have nothing to worry about. She'll say yes."
"It's not the saying yes part that I'm worried about. I just want it to be perfect."
"I'm sure it will, don't stress about it."
"I think I'm going to go for a walk around the grounds just to check things out and to maybe get rid of some of these nerves. Call me if you see anything suspicious on the monitors, man."
"You got it."
I get out from my chair and proceed outside to distract myself. It's been a while since I have checked the security of the perimeter of the property, so I start with that. It takes me 45 minutes to walk the entire perimeter, but the good news is there are no weaknesses that I can see. I walk over to the gatehouse because I am so hungry right now and I realize I didn't grab anything for lunch. It's so close to dinner with Ciara though that I think I'll just grab a snack to tide me over.
I open the gatehouse door and I'm stunned to see Ciara pulling down the skirt on the black dress I had requested she wear for tonight. She's absolutely glowing and is literally taking my breath away.
"Wow, you're stunning, Ci."
"Are you sure, babe. This dress is clinging to me like a second skin. Look at this," she says pointing to her abdomen, "I totally look pregnant in this dress. I can't wear this."
I walk up behind her and wrap her in my arms placing my hands on her abdomen. "Honey, you are pregnant, and right now you are taking my breath away, just like you do every time I set eyes on you," I kiss her neck and turn her around in my arms, then grab her hand and place it over my heart. "Do you feel my heart racing?"
She nods her head.
"That's what you do to me. Don't doubt for a second that I love you and that I love how you look being pregnant. Do you know what I was thinking when I first walked in the door?"
She looks down at her feet, "No."
I place my finger under her chin so she will look me in the eyes, "I thought you were absolutely glowing."
"You really think I look beautiful?"
"No, I said I think that you are stunning and glowing and that you take my breath away, but yes, you're beautiful too."
She bites her lip and a small smile spreads on her face, "Thank you," she says as she starts blushing.
"You're home early. I wasn't expecting you for at least another hour."
"It was slow at the pub, so, Uncle Roman let me go home early."
"Well, I still have another hour before we can head out. I just came here to grab and snack."
"That's okay, I'm not finished getting ready anyway."
I place a quick kiss on her lips, "Okay, I'll be back in an hour," and I grab an apple on my way out the door.
I call Marty to tell him to look at the camera feeds that are closest to the house and to watch for me disappearing from the screens for an extended amount of time. I walk around the outside of the house so that Marty can check all of the cameras and look to see if there are any gaps in the camera coverage.
We find one camera that needs only a slight adjustment, and when we finish with that task it is time for me to get ready for my dinner with Ciara.
When I get back to the gatehouse Ciara is snuggled up on our bed and looks to be asleep. As quickly and quietly as I can I grab the suit and dress shirt I plan to wear and get ready. I grab the ring from the hiding place I had chosen; hidden in one of the pans under the stove that had other pots and pans on top of it. My girl is many things but adventurous in the kitchen is not one of them. That and the fact that we have been sneaking to see each other as it was, I knew it would be safe there. I open the box to take a look at the ring. I hope she likes. I take a deep breath and let it out. I close the box and put it in my suit jacket.
I walk over to the bed and see that she has done her hair in some sort of twist and ended it in a ponytail off to the side of her neck and has let some of her bangs go free which are wisps that frame her face. She's has put on a pair of earrings and has put on her make-up. She reminds me of Sleeping Beauty just lying there, and I place a kiss on her lips to gently rouse her, "Are you ready to go?"
Her eyes open immediately, and she smiles up at me, "So, ready."
She sits up so that her legs are dangling off of the bed and I offer my hand to help her up. She accepts it and once she is standing, I place a kiss on the back of her hand, "I love you, Ciara Alice."
"And I love you, Oliver Benjamin."
I motion with my head towards the door, "Come on, let's go," and begin pulling her in that direction.
We walk out to my car hand in hand and I open the door for her to get inside. I walk around to my side and get in behind the wheel. I close the door, put on my seatbelt, and turn on the ignition.
"Ben babe, where are we going?"
I grab her hand and squeeze it as we begin our drive, "You'll see," I grin.
