Three years later

Everyone loves a summer wedding, right? The bride's mother, even if she huffs and puffs and says this had better be the last time her oldest daughter gets married, the bride's friends who love any excuse for a piss-up, the groom and his colleagues who are all delighted that today they won't be the ones making and serving up food...

The bride herself? Oh, yes. Yes, yes, yes...

We weren't going to get married. I did not need that commitment, I declared (somewhat loftily). Justin had gone through the cure for me. If that didn't count as pledge to someone, I don't know what did. But three months ago, life surprised me.

I'd popped into Club Sapphire's at the end of a busy day at the Assembly, my feet aching, my jaw too from having to answer so many questions. On my way to the restaurant, I'd walked past the town hall, people gathered outside throwing confetti over a couple who were laughing their heads off.

Justin, service finished for the day, watched as I took off my uncomfortable shoes and groaned as I rested the balls of them on the cool marble floor.

Marty said he was popping out for a cigarette. Justin calling after him that he needed to give up asap. A vampire no longer, Marty was now subject to the same smoking health risks as anyone else. The sooner he packed it in, the better.

"Want to get married?" I asked, studying my fingers. A ring had been missing from the fourth one for three years now, removed the day the quickie divorce came through dissolving me from any legal connection to Kyle.

"What brought this on?" Justin asked, the question puzzled and not, to my intense relief, horrified.

"A lot of things. Seeing a couple getting married today. Wanting to be respectable once more."

He curled his eyebrow at that knowing it was a crock of shit excuse. Respectable! Ever since I'd put out that first vampire makeover video all those years ago, respectability and I managed only a distant relationship.

He gave me a sly smile, indicating where his mind had gone. The sex we had in the first six months after he'd become human once more. Lord, heady stuff! One time, we got caught in my office in the assembly that I'd returned to after two months bumming around doing very little. Justin had met me there, eyed the papers on the desk, and said, "I've always fantasised about fucking you on a desk."

So we did, startling the life out of my fellow MA Marc Andre when he waltzed in without announcing himself, Justin, his trousers around his ankles and my bare feet over his shoulders.

"Anything else?"

"Tiny thing," I flicked my hand. "You don't need to be married to provide a child with a happy or secure upbringing, but I like the idea of it."

Justin folded his arms. The tiny pulse at his temple gave him away. "Yeah? Mirac doesn't seem bothered."

No, my four-year-old was a happy-go-lucky little chap. Kyle and I split his care 50/50. Today, for example, he was with his father and Rosie. Kyle and Rosie had always got on very well and Kyle's love of kids extended to offering to babysit for her whenever he had Mirac. Mirac wasn't much younger than Rosie and regarded her more like a sister than his aunt.

"He isn't. The next one might be, though."

At that, a huge grin split Justin's face. At first, we'd told each other we didn't care about children. When nothing happened, we shrugged, too delighted that life had given us the wonderful gift of humanity. Then, when the months rumbled on, we both got checked out.

"There's nothing obvious," Doctor Ellwood told Justin. "No signs that vampirism has put a permanent hold on your fertility, but these are early days, and I don't know of any similar cases where someone has become pregnant."

"When did you find out?" Justin asked now. He stepped forward, taking both my hands in his and bending his head forward so his forehead touched mine.

"Today. I missed my period a couple of weeks ago but put it down to stress. I popped out to buy a test at lunchtime, and I've had to sit through three hours of blasted Question Time hugging the news to myself. The opposition must have wondered why on earth I was so cheery."

"How do you feel? Are you okay? No sickness or weird cravings?"

The last question sounded wistful—as if my food snob boyfriend wanted me to come out with an outrageous request for peanut butter, Nutella and gherkin sandwiches.

"No, I'm fine. But I've worked out the baby is due in February, which gives us seven and a half months to plan and have a wedding. What do you say?"

The old-fashioned clock in the kitchen tick-tocked, emphasising the sudden silence. Had I read this wrongly? I'd thought that—

Justin dropped to one knee. "I better do this properly. Maya Britney," his lips twitched at that; my second name a source of constant amusement to him, "Dupont, will you marry me?"

Marty spoiled the moment by returning to the kitchen. "Sorry! I'll just, um—"

"It's okay," I said, "seeing as I'm about to agree."

I turned my attention back to Justin's face, cradling the side of it in one hand. "Yes. Of course I'll marry you!"

He stood up and flung his arms around me as Marty clapped his hands.

As my first wedding had been old-fashioned and fussy, I insisted the second one be much more casual. Justin was happy to go along with it. We'd invited far fewer people and we were getting married abroad—a remote island in the Mediterranean.

I stood in the small cabin near the beach we had hired, Shayla by my side. In an echo of my first wedding, only two of us were visible in the mirror. Shayla's conversion hadn't worked, something I knew caused her enormous pain and suffering.

But my party, my original raison d'etre had been to make life better for vampires. The mission stuck. I couldn't do anything about Shayla's body's stubborn refusal to embrace humanity, but I could do my utmost to make sure life was much better for her. Ensuring vampires got passports for example, allowing them to travel.

And getting married in the evening, so that the sun didn't bother her.

"I wish Lara was here," I said, and Shayla nodded, tears leaking out. Lara and I had been close, but Shayla and Lara had lived together for so long, the raw gaping hole her absence left still hurt.

"I had this made," I said, holding up my bouquet. Fastened to it was a picture of Lara in a circle frame. It had been taken soon after we met, and I'd given her a makeover. I found the photo on my computer just after she died, catching sight of it unexpectedly. I cried for hours.

Shayla nodded. "Thank you. That is a lovely dress. I prefer it to your first one."

"So do I." Heartfelt. The outfit for wedding number two was a summer dress—sweetheart neckline, sleeveless, the all-important stretch waist and slit to the thigh. We'd arrived here five days ago, and I'd spent most of the time lying in the sun dozing, only opening one eye from time to time to check Mirac hadn't run too far into the sea. As a result, I'd picked up a light brown tan and gold tips to my hair. The heat made make-up impossible, so only lip gloss and mascara completed my look.

The door opened. Rosie, closely followed by Mirac bounded in. "Maya," she screeched at me, "Mirac's just eaten the last ice-cream! The one that was meant for me!"

Mirac grabbed for my dress before anyone could stop him, chocolate-y fingers leaving dirty prints on it.

He drew back, horrified.

"Sorry, Mummy!"

I swept him up in my arms. "Never mind, wee man. Do you want to help your mummy get married?"

He nodded. On occasion, I read his thoughts. Children never actively stopped you from doing so because under the age of five, they weren't self-conscious about anything. Most of the time, I schooled myself not to. Unfair. The teenage Mirac was not going to want a mother who knew what he was thinking, either. I'd make sure he got early enrolment at the academy, so he could learn how to shield his thoughts.

Rosie's dress matched mine minus the side split. I thought at the lofty age of nine, she would turn her nose up at being a flower girl again, but she surprised me by pouncing on the idea. This time, though, she did her own hair—a headdress she'd been working on for the last few days, the shells gathered from the beach.

Safi's girlfriend, our photographer for the day, stuck her head around the door and snapped us. Safi and Shayla headed out with her, promising to see me soon. The ghosts of weddings past beckoned—the thought that crept up on me every so often.

You've done this once. What makes you think you can do it again...

"Because it's Justin," Mirac said, making me smile. Mind-reading—not just one-way. I put him on the ground. He stuck his hand in mine. Rosie took the other.

"You're not supposed to see the bride now, silly-billy!" Rosie exclaimed, making me turn. Mirac's hand gripped mine tightly, the gesture conveying his confusion more than his thoughts did.

Behind us stood a vampire—his appearance startling because it reminded me so much of the first time I'd ever clapped eyes on Justin. Green-tipped hair, wide shoulders and a lanky frame. An ostentatious pair of sunglasses and a far too knowing smile.

"Polite people send an RSVP," I said. "Weeks before the wedding. Rosie, that's not Justin. It's Lewis, his brother."

Used to vampires, as Shayla had hung around her for so long, Rosie merely shrugged. Old instinct made me want to pull her closer to me, protecting her from those who might do her harm, even though the vaccination made her safe.

"Long time no see," I said, as Lewis took his glasses off. "I expect Justin will be pleased."

Would he? We hadn't seen Lewis in... three years. Stories surfaced from time to time. Vampires running loose. Attacks on far off compounds. Argist Agents and even the depleted Vampire Security force went after them. They never caught him.

"I'm duty bound to report you."

He shot me a sly smile. "You won't, though, will you? Not when we're about to be related. Imagine being responsible for the destruction of your kid's uncle."

He eyed my belly. I cradled it. A vampire had tried to rip into me the last time I was pregnant. All those freshly multiplying cells were like caviar to them, apparently.

"What have you been doing?" I asked, doubtful he would tell me the truth.

"This and that. Big ol' world out there. Room for all of us, I'd say. Humans and vampires. Someone's gotta take care of your kids once you and my brother are pushing up the daisies, right?"

God. Echoes of my past wedding kept coming at me. Hadn't I said that very same sentiment to Sharon the time I married Kyle, promising her that Shayla would be there to cast a protective net over Mirac once Sharon and I were dead?

"But..."

His gaze held mine—those dark glittering eyes compelling me to believe him. Once upon a time there had been humans and vampires. Bitter enemies. When vampire numbers increased, the state licensing programme became the only practical solution. It also became apparent that many vampires disliked what they had become and accepted the restrictions of state regulation in exchange for the chance to live side by side with humans.

Then, we discovered the cure and while most vampires chose conversion, enough of them didn't. They hid away and lived in the shadows, doing heaven knew what and turning up out of the blue like this to spook people. Like now.

"Awful lot of the baddies are dead and gone, Maya," Lewis said, plopping the glasses back on. For a few seconds, I found myself in forests in the dead of night, the sound of footsteps charging through undergrowth, shrieks as someone (who?) pounced, and then screams. Clouds of black dust erupted into the air.

Rosie and Mirac huddled around me. I laid my hand lightly on top of Mirac's head, blocking the thoughts from reaching him.

"I like being top dog," Lewis said, shrugging. "There's only room for one vampire at the top."

He'd destroyed them, then. Cordelia, the Galens—the few even older than them who'd emerged from the rocks they'd crawled under, hissing and spitting.

I nodded. Message received and understood. Lewis was on our side. He just preferred life in the darkness with its unpredictability and thrills. His turning up today was a reassurance for the future. Yes, vampires might be around for centuries still. But one or two of them, like Lewis, would keep the others in check.

And protect my babies—Mirac and whoever it was who developed in my womb.

"Justin will want to see you," I said. "You could come to the wedding. Make a speech if you like. The best man's supposed to take the mickey out of the groom. I'm sure you'd have plenty of tales to tell."

"Too right," Lewis said, grinning once more. "But duty calls. I need to get back. And your Argist mates might pounce on me. Nothing like a staking to ruin a party, eh?"

He reached for me—the arms once again familiar and yet not. I'd forgotten the strength of vampires. If he squeezed any tighter, he would run the risk of crushing me. And yet as we stood there, something began to flow between us—a rush of energy that sparked up every cell in my body.

"Tell him," he whispered in my ear, "that I love him. More than anything. That I miss him every single minute of every single day. And that I'll do anything and everything to keep him, you and your family safe."

He bent his head, lips touching mine briefly, one hand dotting first Rosie's head and then Mirac's. Their eyes glazed over for a few seconds. By the time their vision cleared, Lewis had gone.

"Mummy!" Mirac exclaimed, "I went to sleep for a few seconds standing up!"

"So did I!" Rosie said. Lewis must have wiped their minds. Neither of them would remember anything of their encounter with the vampire.

"Well," I said, opening the cabin door, "that's just as well, as you'll need plenty of energy for the party, won't you?"

We stepped out onto sand, the path from the cabin to the small gazebo just before the sea studded with tealights in jam jars. A small cheer went up as the guests spotted us.

"We thought you'd bolted," some wag shouted, making me laugh.

Justin turned, his smile so wide and bright it almost brought tears to my eyes. He held out a hand. Rosie, Mirac and I walked forward.

Time to cement our relationship at long last.

AUTHOR'S NOTE - thanks for reading! All votes and comments much appreciated. The last (and final) update will be on Sunday 27 September. Have a nice weekend everyone.