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A heavy knock at the door ended their moment. “Hey!” Duncan called through the wood. “Mom is thirty seconds from starting a game of charades to keep people entertained, and Dex is gettin’ antsy under that flower arch thing. We doin’ this or what?”
Her daddy kissed her head again. “Okay, beautiful. Let’s get you hitched before this baby comes.” As he drew her to turn, he brushed a hand lightly over her belly.
Her mom had been right. Once he’d understood that Kelsey was happy to be pregnant and that Dex was stepping up to take care of her and the baby, her dad had jumped with both boots into the idea of being a grandpa. Their half-formed child already had a full wardrobe of Harley-themed onesies and sleepers, and blankets, and stuffed bears, because this grandpa-to-be could not pass the Harley store without going in to see if they had anything new in yet.
Everything was working out exactly as it should.
~oOo~
Kelsey, her mom, and Maisie had toured several wedding venues. She’d wanted this one the very second she’d seen the bridge over the stream, at which she could start her aisle walk. Of course, getting a wedding venue three months before the date was not exactly the way things were done, and everything had been booked solid for almost a year. But her father said he’d handle it, and she’d wanted it badly enough to let him handle it and not get too curious about how.
Now, the two of them strolled from the bridal prep suite to that beautiful bridge, its railing wrapped with an abundance of ribbons and flowers in mint green and white. He drew them to a stop right at the point the bridge began to arch upward.
“You ready?” he asked.
“Very.”
He lifted her hand and kissed it. “Life is a real ride, Kelsey. Sometimes the road is smooth, the weather’s fine, and the countryside is beautiful. Sometimes it’s so hard you’ll think you can’t make it another mile. Sometimes you’ll break down and really won’t be able to carry on without help. I know Dex will be there for you, but I want it clear: I will always be there, too. I’ll be there to enjoy your good days and to put you on the saddle behind me on the bad days. You hear me? Not one day that I draw breath will you be on your own, no matter what.”
“Don’t make me cry again, Daddy.”
His chuckle was soft with his own emotion. “Sorry. I just want it said. Feels like putting a foot on this bridge is crossing over to something new, and I gotta say, it’s bittersweet. And a little scary.”
She leaned on his shoulder and squeezed his hand. “Don’t be scared. I’ll always be there for you, too.”
“Then let’s cross over.”
When they reached the middle, highest part of the bridge, Marcella, Eight Ball’s wife, began to sing, and their guests all stood and turned. The song she’d suggested, and Kelsey had enthusiastically agreed, was ‘Here and Now,’ but Kelsey was barely aware of it at the moment.
Dex stood under a white arch draped with flowers. Like all the Bulls, he wore jeans, a pressed white shirt, and his kutte, cleaned and polished to a soft sheen. He’d gotten a fresh haircut and had his summer beard, shorn to tidy stubble. Uncle Eight stood at his side, his best man.
Maisie stood at the arch as well, her maid of honor.
And six dogs, freshly groomed, sat at perfect attention in a line before the arch. Charlie, Ripper, Lennie, George, and Mr. Darcy all wore mint-green bow ties. Lizzie had a flower crown.
Kelsey was having a wedding beyond her dreams.
Dex’s smile as he watched her come to him was so huge and happy she thought she could see his glorious dimples from the bridge.
She never took her eyes from him for the whole long walk across the bridge and down the aisle. Her father lifted her hand and set it in Dex’s. He kissed her cheek, dropped a hand on Dex’s shoulder, and then backed away. Making room.
“I’ve never seen anything as beautiful as you walking toward me today,” Dex murmured as he led her to the arch, where Caleb’s brother, Levi, stood, ready to marry them.
Dex had been uncomfortable with the idea of writing their own vows, so after Levi said a few words tinged with wedding traditions of his Osage tribe, they did traditional vows. When it was Dex’s turn, Levi prompted, “I, Seth Michael ‘Dexter’ Denson …”
They’d talked about that, and Dex had decided he wanted the name that was most comfortable to him, his road name, in his vows. Kelsey had agreed it was right.
Once, she’d wanted to call him Seth, because she’d thought Dex was the wrong name for him. She’d thought calling him by his given name would remind him that he was more than a man named for a TV serial killer, would keep the dark parts of who he was away from who they were together.
But she’d been wrong. Dex was the man she knew, the man who’d been forged in the life he’d lived. It was the dark parts of him that made the rest of him shine so brightly. Everything he did, everything he’d lived, all that he was, made him Dex.
She’d begun to fall in love with him when she’d seen how selfless he was, how quick to jump in and save anyone who needed saving, from an abused, doomed animal, to a stranger in trouble, to a woman being attacked by an abusive ex.
But she’d truly landed in that love when she saw how much he needed saving himself. It took a special kind of person, a truly good soul, to set aside one’s own troubles and use the strength one had for others instead. It took a hero.
She would spend the rest of her life making sure he always knew that he was loved, that he was worthy. That he wasn’t alone. They would stand together and keep each other strong. They would make a beautiful, happy family. And when his burdens got too heavy, she’d be there to share their weight.
Sometimes heroes need to be rescued, too.
THE END
