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Corey nodded. “I think Mom, Dads, and Phoebe need to come, too.”
“Call everyone.” Ethel was all smiles. “The wedding is in an hour.”
* * * *
Belle hugged Juan and Jake again.
Jake squeezed her leg. “I love you, Mommy. You look so pretty.”
“I love you, too, little man.”
Juan took her hand. “Mom, don’t mess up your makeup again or Aunt Amber is going to be mad at me and Jake.”
“I can’t help it, boys. I’m just so happy.” Ethel’s chamber was packed with their witnesses. Belle grabbed Amber’s hand. “Shane, Corey, and I would like to have another service at the ranch.” She glanced down at Juan and Jake. “We just want to make it legal so we can adopt you boys sooner.”
“I would love that, Sis.”
Ethel took charge. “Everyone please gather around. Belle, you stand between Shane and Corey.”
They took their places.
Ethel began the ceremony. “We are here because the three of you have decided to join your lives. You come here with precious gifts—mature understanding, your love, your hopes and dreams, your trust in one another, and your faith in life’s meaning and purpose, resolved to share life’s experiences in enduring love and loyalty. The decision has been made in your hearts and minds, and we are here to witness the public expression of the commitments you have made privately to each other. Marriage is a relationship not to be entered into lightly or thoughtlessly, but reverently, soberly, with deep purposes and in the spirit of enduring love. Much is required of you three. Knowing this, does each of you wish to proceed with this marriage?”
She and her grooms said “yes” in unison.
“Shane and Corey, will you take Belle as your wife? Will you love her, comfort her, honor and keep her in sickness and in health, in sorrow and in joy, and will you live for her, before all others, as long as you all shall live?”
“We will,” they answered in uniso
n, causing Belle’s heart to swell with joy.
“Belle, will you take Shane and Corey as your husbands? Will you love them, comfort them, honor and keep them in sickness and in health, in sorrow and in joy, and will you live for them, before all others, as long as you all shall live?”
“I will.”
“Please face each other, joining hands as a symbol of your union.”
Shane and Corey each took one of her hands.
“Shane and Corey, will you then repeat after me? I, say your name, take you, Belle…”
As they repeated the rest of the vow, pledging their undying love to her, Belle knew her life had just begun.
“…so long as we shall live.” Shane and Corey squeezed her hands again.
“Belle, will you then repeat after me?”
Every word sealed her to them forever. “I, Belle, take Shane and Corey to be my husbands. To live with you from this day forward. For better, for worse. In plenty and in want. In strength and in weakness. To love and to cherish. So long as we shall live.”
Ethel nodded. “Shane, Corey, and Belle, having declared your vows in the presence of these witnesses and by the joining of hands, now therefore, by virtue of the authority vested in me by the state of Colorado, I do now declare in the presence of these gathered that you are husbands and wife. You may kiss the bride.”
Corey and Shane kissed her. They are my husbands and I am their wife.
Everyone clapped.
“Mommy just got married to our daddies, Juan.”
“Yes, she did, Jake.”
