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Axton placed Shaw’s hand in mine, and the world disappeared except for the officiant. I didn’t remember a single word he said, or even if my voice wobbled when I repeated my vows. All I saw was Shaw’s eyes, the tears glazing those baby blues, and her wobbly chin. But the smile on her face, the sight of those damned dimples that always affected me, told me she was fighting happy tears.
She’d said the day was already perfect before she even walked down the aisle, and a weight had been lifted off my shoulders.
The instant our wedding bands were on, it really did become the perfect day. And then the officiant announced us as husband and wife right as the sun seemed to fall into the ocean behind us. Ma had truly made sure to plan everything down to the exact detail that Shaw had foreseen our ceremony.
Grasping my wife around her waist, I pulled her into me before taking her chin between my thumb and index finger. Tipping her head up, I drank in the moment—the fading natural light, the glow of the torches that had been lit around us flickering in her eyes, those dimples when she grinned up at me.
“Kiss your wife, husband,” she commanded.
“Shh,” I murmured. “Give me a second. I have to memorize how you look right now. When I’m in a nursing home and can’t remember my own name, I want to have this memory pop into my head.”
“I’ll be right there beside you then too, dummy.”
“And you’ll still be just as beautiful then as you are right now.” She rolled her eyes, and I caught her mouth in our first kiss as husband and wife, keeping her from snapping something sassy back at me.
Cannon hooting behind me pulled me back to reality sometime later. Lifting my head, I blinked, and all of our guests came back into focus, but I ignored everyone but Shaw as I brushed another kiss over her lips. This one was softer and over within seconds, but I tried to tell her with each sweep of my mouth over hers how much this day meant to me, how much I loved her, and how happy I was to get to spend the rest of my life as her husband.
When I lifted my head, a tear finally slipped free from her right eye, and she gave me a nod, as if she understood exactly what I’d promised without words.
Linking our fingers together, I turned to face everyone. They were all standing, clapping, most of them openly crying. Luca stood behind Cannon, Love Bug asleep on his shoulder. I didn’t understand how she could sleep through the loud volume of everyone cheering, especially when Ian and Isaac were whining from having been seated on Uncle Jesse’s and Uncle Shane’s laps for so long.
Vi, Piper, and Mila moved in behind Shaw. Violet nudged us, urging us to walk down the aisle together. I swung Shaw up into my arms and carried her down the aisle, garnering even louder cheering from everyone. From there, it was time for pictures, while everyone else moved on to where the tents were set up for the reception.
Like the ceremony, everything passed in a blur, and all I saw was Shaw. Picture after picture was taken until everyone else was complaining that they were hungry and tired. At some point, Love Bug woke up, but she didn’t whine once as we took a few photos with our goddaughter.
Seeing Shaw holding the baby stirred something inside me.
I wanted this.
A little replica of her momma in my wife’s arms, gazing up at me like I hung the stars in the sky, like Love Bug stared at Luca.
When Shaw looked up at me over that tiny blond head, I knew she was thinking the same thing. I felt a predatory smile tilting my lips and lifted the baby from her arms. Giving Love Bug a kiss on the cheek, I handed her over to a hovering Luca.
“Ma, Shaw and I need a minute to rest before we join the reception,” I called out, knowing she was close by. She hadn’t been far from my side all day, making sure that nothing went wrong, working her magic to fulfill the promise of giving Shaw the perfect day.
“You can take a breather where you waited before the ceremony earlier. I’ll have the DJ entertain the guests until you’re ready.” She stepped into my peripheral, and I finally shifted my hungry gaze from my bride. “But I’m warning you, baby boy. Whatever damage you do to her appearance better be fixed before you show up at the reception. Or whatever perfection you were hoping for will be mussed up in the extra pictures and the video.”
“Ma!” I groaned, embarrassed that she knew exactly what I was going to be doing.
“What?” she grumbled. “I gave birth to you, Jagger. If anyone knows what you’re thinking at any given moment, it’s me. And I’ve seen you look at Shaw like that way too many times not to understand what you’re about to do to her.” She patted me on the arm. “Have fun, but put yourselves back together once you’re done.”
The urge to devour my wife diminished somewhat. “Um, I think we’ll just go into the reception as we planned.”
Giggling, Shaw grasped my elbow. That beautiful sound and her firm touch were enough to cause all that hunger to come roaring back to life. But I couldn’t bring myself to act on it with my mom standing right in front of us, those big green eyes staring unblinkingly at me in that knowing way that had always urged me to be good.
“I think we’re ready for the first dance,” Shaw announced. “Maybe a few bites of dinner, and then we can cut the cake. After I’ve gotten a few tastes of that delicious dessert, then we can go to the honeymoon suite.”
Liking the new plan, I looked down at Ma, but the glimmer of amusement in her eyes had heat filling my face. Fuck, she made me feel like I was fifteen again and she’d just caught me with a girl in my room. “Er… What Dimples said.”
“I always thought Mia and I understood each other better,” she said after a silent, thoughtful moment. “But I’ve realized that I just have to hear your voice to know what you’re thinking. Never change, baby boy.”
Epilogue
Emmie
It was easy to let life speed past. Between all the chaos of work, sometimes it was hard to hit pause and take a breath so I could appreciate the small but most precious things in my world. If it weren’t for the phone that always seemed to be attached to my hand—to the point that I felt as if I were missing a limb without it—I probably wouldn’t know what day of the week it was more often than not.
Waking up to all three of my grandbabies bouncing on my bed, singing “Happy Birthday,” was the only reminder I had that it was, in fact, my birthday.
