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EPILOGUE
three months later
Kelsey’s mother fiddled with her loose curls again, arranging them just so over her shoulders.
“The breeze is going to undo that, Mom,” Kelsey said, smiling at their reflection. Behind them and off to the side a flash went off; another ‘getting ready’ photo from the wedding photographer
“I know. I just can’t stop touching you.” Mom’s voice broke, and she cleared her throat, but Kelsey saw that her eyes were welling again. “I can’t believe my baby is gettingmarried.”
“And making you a grandma already,” Hannah snarked from the chair she was slouched in.
Kelsey smiled and smoothed a hand over the teensy bump beneath the white satin of her gown.
Despite the fact that she’d gotten pregnant at the very beginning of their relationship, and was getting married more quickly than they probably would have because of it, Kelsey had always wanted an outdoor wedding. Winter in Oklahoma was not conducive to outdoor weddings, so they waited until April. She was now about four months pregnant and beginning to show, but a dress with an empire waist handled that nicely. Besides, it wasn’t like they were hiding the pregnancy from anyone.
Waiting until April had also given Dex and Kelsey some time to do all the talking they hadn’t yet done when the test came back positive, and to settle into a truly solid, happy relationship. They discovered what they’d intuitively sensed: they had similar ideas about what a happy life looked like, where they wanted to be in the future, what they enjoyed in the present. About children, they hadn’t decided beyond the one they were already making. Dex wanted to wait until this nugget was born before he could form an opinion about the size of their family. Kelsey was fine with that.
He was in therapy, regular appointments with a psychologist twice a month and check-ins with a psychiatrist every six months. He was taking his meds. He hadn’t had an episode since January; as far as Kelsey knew he hadn’t even been in a noticeably bad mood since then.
That might had been mainly due to the fact that things with the Bulls were quiet. Things were normal. The trouble that had been brewing in the club back at the beginning of the year never really materialized—or if it had, the club had handled it swiftly and decisively, so that it never affected their family at all.
With the exception of some very annoying ‘morning ‘sickness that hadn’t cared at all about the time of day, the first months of this year made up the best time of Kelsey’s adult life. So far.
She’d given up her lease and officially moved into Dex’s house. It was a temporary situation, for a couple years or so, until they were ready to build their dream house in the country, but in the meanwhile, she was working on making it her house as well, adding fresh paint and decorative touches that warmed the place from the chill of Dex’s spartan indifference.
He wasn’t indifferent at all about making her happy, so he dived into every project idea she had. In fact, she’d learned to be careful, because if she even mused aloud about a vague idea she had, he’d start planning for it right away, before she’d decided she really wanted it.
Once, she’d been in the kitchen, and she’d said something about seeing a TikTok where the person had taken the doors off their kitchen cupboards and painted the insides bright red, and how she’d thought that was cute. Just that, that it had been cute. She hadn’t said shewantedcupboards without doors—and in fact, on further consideration, she thought that wasn’t the cleanest way to store dishes—but she’d come home from the clinic the following evening and, yep, doors off the cupboards.
She’d turned his make-Kelsey-happy energy toward the tiny bedroom that would be the nursery. They didn’t know whether this baby was a boy or a girl, and Kelsey wasn’t yet sure she wanted to know before the birth, but she did know she wouldn’t want to do traditional pink or blue anyway. She’d suggested mint green, which had been her favorite color as a little girl, and was still in her top four (with lilac, baby-chick yellow, and blush pink—she was a pastel girl at heart). So they were doing mint green, yellow, and pearl grey.
The focus on mint green for the baby had brought back her nostalgic love of that color with a vengeance, and it was the theme for the wedding as well.
Honestly, pretty much all of Kelsey’s dreams were coming true. She had the job she’d always wanted, the perfect love of and for the perfect man for her, a home, a child, and the perfect wedding.
She’d attended a lot of Bulls weddings in her life, and for the most part, they were casual affairs. They were held in the clubhouse, or somebody’s back yard, or the courthouse, with little fanfare in the ceremony and all the focus on a really boisterous party afterward.
Kelsey had always wanted awedding. A princess wedding. She didn’t need a huge line of bridesmaids—Maisie was the only one she needed at her side—but she wanted the fancy dress and the long aisle, lots of flowers and ribbons everywhere. Her perfect wedding wasn’t some hundred-thousand-dollar cinematic extravaganza, but she really did want to feel like a princess.
And she did. Her dress was perfect: strapless white satin, with the aforementioned empire waist, unadorned except for a simple white chiffon one-shoulder overlay. She’d carry a beautiful bouquet Maisie, a floral designer, had made for her, with baby-chick yellow and creamy white roses mixed with soft green and pink succulents—assuming Hannah, who was in charge of keeping it safe until Kelsey was ready to take it, didn’t destroy it first.
To complete the princess package, she had a beautiful crystal tiara rather than a veil.
Maisie, her maid of honor, stepped up behind her on her other side, so the reflections of her mother and best friend framed hers.
“Girl, you arebeautiful,” Maisie said with quiet awe.
“You really are,” Mom agreed. “You look so happy.”
“So happy you shine,” Maisie added.
Kelsey nodded. She felt happy enough to light up the world.
“Okay, I think it’s time,” Mom said. “I’ll go get your dad.” She pressed her cheek to Kelsey’s and kissed the air—so as not to smudge their makeup. “Let’s go, girls.”
Hannah leaned Kelsey’s bridal bouquet in the corner of the chair she’d just vacated. She gave Kelsey a dramatic once-over and nodded, said, “Yeah, you look pretty good.” Then she flounced the skirt of her pinup-style dress—black and covered with skulls, because Hannah was always looking for ways to be as annoying as possible—and followed Mom from the room.
Maisie waited until they were gone. Then she picked up Kelsey’s hands, and they stood facing each other as if they were about to start ‘Miss Mary Mack’ or ‘Say, Say Oh Playmate,’ like when they were little girls.
