A/N: Hi everyone! Thanks for checking out another journal entry from Brandon. This one covers the end of Chapters 23 and 24 in TMMM. I hope you enjoy!

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Do I believe in fate?

I believe that's a question I've never been asked before, not even by my sisters with all their fanciful ideas about romance growing up. Probably because not a lot of people would think I'd ever deign to answer that question. It might be my starched-up image or my iron-like grip on logic about everything.

But since meeting Charlotte, I've gotten other ideas. I've definitely gotten the hint that there are forces much bigger and more powerful than myself at work here. After all, if it had only been up to me, I would've never run into Charlotte, much less ever consider someone like her in my life. I don't even want to think about what I would've missed out on.

I flew home half a day early to see Charlotte after the rambling message she'd left me. Francis had made his move. She didn't have to tell me for me to know. I was thinking of a half dozen ways to tear him up from limb to limb on my flight home but I decided I couldn't do murder during a nice family dinner. He was provoking me into it though, his self-control so frayed he was practically foaming on the mouth with threats. Sneaky was usually Francis's style so something's got his panties up in a bunch. If I stepped away from my constantly furious state around him, just for a moment, I could almost see him as a man being shoved in front of a speeding train by an invisible but powerful hand. Which now makes me wonder about his real agenda. I thought I knew what it was all this time but something's changed. Something's got him desperate. Desperate enough that even if all his manipulation goes to hell and takes him with it, he's going to grab anyone he could with him along the way. It's hard to trust that whatever's different is for the better. How could I trust a man so hellbent on ruining me he would hurt his own family to do it?

I know he'd been sniffing around me for years, always looking for an opportunity to hurt me. And I've been careful but somehow he still managed to put a mole right under my nose. I hardly knew Gwen. I barely saw her. But she'd been close enough to get her hands on a very important document—one I should've burned the day I decided that I wanted the farce to be true. I've contemplated ways to hit him back for it but I had to remind myself that while I have something at stake, I'm not the only one who could get hurt here.

In the end, no matter how I feel about it, the decision will have to be Nicole's.

I've decided that maybe it's time to trust the very people I care about to fight their own fight. It will suck, watching them possibly get hurt or fail. But after thinking things through about my own lack of good judgement when I tried to keep Charlotte out of this fray, I realized that maybe the best thing I can do for someone is to trust them to be strong and smart about their decisions. Maybe that'll help them be more confident about their life choices, and hopefully encourage them to make the right ones. My sisters, my baby brother, my wife—I can spend my whole life sheltering them. But sheltering them isn't the same as strengthening them. I only have to look at Charlotte to know that even if the roof over her head blows away, she'll still weather the storm because she's actually strong.

Oh, I don't mean that I'll just bum around by the sidelines. All I'm saying is that they don't have to be put in a box and sealed shut from their own fates. They have to be there, behind the wheel. They might have to endure my less than agreeable navigational advice but at least they'd be driving.

And to start on that new resolution, I told Charlotte everything. And as expected, she refused to save her own neck over Nicole's and Zach's. But maybe she won't have to. If Nicole decides she can face Francis and prepare herself for his inevitable admission to Zach's life, then Francis will have no reason to let the secret out—at least until he finds something else to bargain for with it. It's a fight that probably will never end while he's out for my blood. I'll do my best to prevent the eventual disaster but Charlotte and I will have to be ready. That secret will one day come out—whether by someone's greedy intent or our own decision to come clean.

For now, the priority is to ensure that Nicole and Zach get a chance to reclaim the kind of life they should've been living from the beginning while mitigating the damage of Francis's threat to me and Charlotte.

And as much as I want none of his toxic influence touching my wife, I'm not afraid for her. She's the toughest girl I know, with the gentlest heart.

Quite contrary, this woman I married. Someone so seemingly imperfect to be my wife but couldn't be any more perfect for me.

Only fate can be that ironic so yes, I guess I believe in fate.

Who else would put two people so different from each other in such a splendid mess? My father, sure, but I have a feeling he's just playing henchman here.

A few years ago, when I found Nicole in that cramped, squalid shelter practically in shambles, I saw from a magnified perspective, its rather urgent need for some intervention. I'm not naive about the realities of this world. Far from it. The Maxfield family has always been generous in helping out, and my father never once failed to remind us of our incredible fortune, but reality never quite sinks in until you're living in it. I realized that if I hadn't known, Nicole, and my nephew, would've probably found themselves a nearly permanent home in a shelter just like Embers. And promptly after that, I realized that the rest of the people there wouldn't have someone like me in their lives. So I did something, hoping that while it wasn't everything, it could still make a difference to someone. I met with the board who ran it, put one of my best project coordinators on it, and did our best to change that place from being a hellhole to a home where you could rest your head down before you start your life over the next day.

I was happy with how it turned around.

You know, you do something good, you feel a little better about yourself, you sleep a little bit better at night.

I did a small good deed, having absolutely no clue that for a night or two since I changed Embers into St. Martin House, a young girl would return to escape the nightmares of her home. The same girl who'd dreamed about me as her prince, no matter how her own life was a far cry from a fairy tale. That she would patiently wait in the line, fill herself a bowl of warm, hearty soup, prop open a book to think of happier thoughts, and sleep comfortably to recharge for what she hoped was a better day in the morning. That she would get through all of that, as she had since she was a kid, only to be made tougher by her father's last act of violence. That after another attempt at escaping to the city of lights and love, she'll be dragged right back home and practically into the dirt of her father's grave.

Months later, she would storm up my table at Marlow's, and irrevocably change my life.

Had I decided that I had better things to do than worry about a homeless shelter falling apart, Charlotte may have not found reprieve in those nights she ran away from home. Anything could've happened to her, whether she stayed at home in the mercy of her father or roamed the streets alone at night. She may have never lived to steal my heart years later, and teach me the kind of happiness I suspect I would've never found with anyone else.

So yes, it's goddamn fated, alright.

It hurt to listen to her tell me, because I've seen what that place used to be like, and the people who used to be there. They went there when there was no other place left to go. To imagine Charlotte that desperate, and that alone, makes me go a little crazy. I don't think that I can take anything for granted after this. How could I when even the smallest decisions could change the future?

My heart hasn't stopped hurting yet but in a way, it feels better than it has for days. Because I believe, now more than ever, that this thing was Charlotte was written in the stars centuries ago, and neither of our useless initial resistance, nor my cousin's persistence, could change that.

Which means, no matter what we go through together, it's going to work out in some way or another.

At least that's how I want to look at it—and it looks damn good.

- B

***

So, what do you think?

There were a few developments in these two chapters but I decided to focus Brandon's journal entry on one of my favorite scenes in the entire book. It's such a small section but something hurts in my heart every time I read the scene where Charlotte tells Brandon of her stay in St. Martin House. It was never written down in my original plot but as I wrote the part where Nicole was telling Charlotte about how Brandon found her in the shelter, the idea just came to me. And how Brandon felt when he realized what his actions meant—the emotions I felt were so stark I was literally crying as I wrote that scene out. And I think I'm not alone in that reaction. LOL!

Anyway, I hope you enjoyed it. Till the next post!

Enjoy your weekend!

XOXO!

-Ninya

P.S. I love this song. I actually love the entire More Than This Album by Trading Yesterday. So much emotion.

♪♪♪ Chapter Soundtrack: May I by Trading Yesterday ♪♪♪

There you stand, opened heart, opened doors

Full of life with a world that's wanting more

But I can see when the lights start to fade

The day is done and your smile has gone away

Let me raise you up

Let me be your love

May I hold you as you fall to sleep

When the world is closing in

And you can't breathe here

May I love you, may I be your shield

When no one can be found

May I lay you down

All I want is to keep you safe from the cold

To give you all that your heart needs the most

Let me raise you up

Let me be your love

May I hold you as you fall to sleep

When the world is closing in

And you can't breathe here

May I love you, may I be your shield

When no one can be found

May I lay you down