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“What?” he laughs. “You know what I mean. Things were scary back then. Plus, it was your birthday, and you were still high on pain meds. It’s easy to get hitched with Oxy in your blood. Now you’re making that promise again, but you’re sober, your entire family is here, and she’s still a pain in your ass.”
“She was in a fucking meeting with a mass murderer this morning.” I press a hand to my swirling stomach and groan. “She’ll never sit down and be quiet.”
“No.” He glances across to the doors and sighs. Because Mia and Fifi wander through next. The unlikeliest pairing. The sweetest sight for a man who wants only for his baby girl to be happy. “But we don’t want the women who sit down and shut up, do we?” He rolls his bottom lip between his teeth and beams when Mia waves. “We don’t like ‘em meek.”
I drop my head back and stare up at the sky, nerves swarming my blood and leaving my knees damn near knocking with anxiety. But then the music changes and that knocking anxiety turns to a full-blown drumline of sickness.
What if she doesn’t come?
What if she’s changed her mind?
What if she’s taken this time to realize being married to me is simply too much work?
I’m a needy guy. I demand her constant attention and affection. I lie sometimes and manipulate others. Always with her best interests in mind. But still, lying is lying, and manipulation isn’t cool.
What if… what if… what if.
“Dude.” Fletch digs his elbow into my side, bringing my focus down with a snap of my neck. But then my eyes lock on to Minka’s. Her stunning brown stare, waiting for me at the other end of our makeshift aisle.
She stands in a long, stunning gown that steals the oxygen from my lungs and the shake from my knees. Her hair is up, butloose tendrils hang low to tickle her shoulders, her veil creating a halo of golden light at her back.
“Fuckkkkk.” Just laying eyes on her washes the dread from my stomach. It removes the nerves from my blood and the fear from my heart. All thewhat ifsin the world cease to exist because she’s looking at me. And she refuses to walk down the aisle until our eyes meet.
Exhaling, I bring my free hand up and press it to my thundering heart. “Jesus.”
“You could go to her,” Fletch murmurs. “If you want.”
“Go to her?”
“Yeah.” He shrugs. “It’s a non-traditional wedding. You’ve already done it once. No one is giving her away. And besides,” he smirks in my peripherals. “Doesn’t look like she’s moving until you go get her, anyway.”
“Get her?”
“Yeah,” he slaps my shoulder. “I think she’d like that.”
“Going to her.” I stumble forward and fall deeper in love with the woman waiting for me at the other end of the aisle. Because her terrified eyes grow softer as I start in her direction. The death grip she has on her flowers loosens as I approach. The thunder of her pulse in her throat visibly slows. And when I come to a stop in front of her, blocking her view of our waiting crowd and stare down into her eyes, she releases the breath trapped in her lungs and blinks the moisture from her eyes. “You want me to walk you, Minnnnka?”
She nods, her head bobbing nervously and her tongue coming out to wet her perfectly red lips. “Yes, please.” She draws a deep breath as I come around and offer her my arm. “I feel like I might fall over if I had to do it on my own.”
“You’re nervous too?” I breathe a sigh of blissful relief when she wraps her arm in mine and snuggles closer. When she laysher face against the ball of my shoulder and simply leans against me. “You’re shaking, babe.”
“I don’t understand how I could be so nervous,” she murmurs. Yet, when I start walking, she walks too. But now, I get to see our waiting crowd alongside her. Instead of me being part of the gathering of starers, I get to walk toward them.
Toward Tim, who stands beside Aubree. And Felix, who ensures Christabelle is close by. Cato waits beside her because she’s family. In more ways than one. Then Micah, whose silence has always been a comfort. His quiet confidence, a blanket I’ve always luxuriated in, even when I left him behind and fled New York. Finally, Fletch. He’s not my brother, according to biology. But he’s my brother in all the ways that matter. We’re blood in, and that’s more important in my mind.
“I was worried you wouldn’t come,” I admit on a whisper. Peeling my eyes from my family, I look down instead at my wife. “I worried the first time was a fluke. Second time wasn’t happening.”
“Funny.” She sets her bouquet on a tall table as we pass and frees up her hand to wrap it around my arm. “I worried the same about you. I’m neurotic, Archer. And strange. And cranky, often. I don’t always behave in ways that make you happy.”
“And yet,” I reach across and place my fingers beneath her chin, “I’m happy only when you’re a part of my life.”
“Walk faster please!” Cato fans his face with his hand. “I love you both, and I get that this is a special moment, but I’m sweating like a whore in church over here.”
“Cato!” Christabelle smacks the teen who’s already grown taller than her. “That was rude.”
“It’s rude to make us stand in the sun for hours,” Felix grumbles. But when she points her furious gaze his way, he smiles. “You’re pretty, and I love you.”
“Are you ready to get married?” I whisper. Drawing Minka’s focus, I smile and lean down to press a kiss to her glistening lips. “Again?”
