What was a wedding day without at least one crazy, last-minute escapade? This was Jackson’s and mine. I idly wondered what drama Daniel, his brother, Henry, and Rose had found themselves in.
To no one’s surprise, Daniel had asked Henry to be his best man, and we’d both asked Rose to be our flower girl, but when we’d asked, she’d turned her nose up and asked if she could be our ring bearer instead.
Considering that we’d been tossing around the idea of having Bucky as our ring bearer, having Rose do it instead seemed more responsible. Maybe just as chaotic, but more responsible.
We hoped.
Time would tell if we’d be kicking ourselves for the decision.
The biggest surprise to everyone would be who we’d asked to be our officiant. No one except our wedding party knew, and every one of us was looking forward to the reaction.
I had no doubt that our wedding was going to be one event in Rockdale that would be talked about for years.
I couldn’t wait.
“All right, fuckers. Shut up and find your fucking seats. We’re going to start soon.”
Even through the closed door of the manager’s office where Jackson and I were waiting, I heard the moment of stunned silence at Kajir’s gruff words before Rose’s pealing laughter broke out.
I was sure at this point everyone would be assuming Kajir was only a helper and not the officiant we’d asked him to be. I was looking forward to seeing the reactions when they realized.
Daniel and I had wanted the child-free ceremony itself to be filled with fun and humor, so we could think of no better person to be our officiant than Kajir. Much like Jackson had been, Kajir had been a great support to us during the immediate aftermath of the second twister. The fifth wheeler Daniel had bought off him had been far more luxurious than we’d been anticipating and had become a treasured home for us and Rose over the past few months.
Rose had decided to split her time between our fifth wheeler and Jackson’s house now that Brett was out of the picture. Eventually, we’d settled into trading one week on, one week off with Jackson, and Rose was thriving. Both households got together at Malone’s on changeover night for a catch-up dinner, so everyone was on the same page for any upcoming appointments or important dates, and we hadn’t missed anything yet.
Bucky traveled with Rose, but once we’d settled into the fifth wheeler, we’d decided that Lucy was better off staying with us. She seemed to tolerate Bucky well whenever he was with us but appeared much calmer on the weeks when he was at Jackson’s. Rose had initially been sad about not having Lucy with her and Bucky, but when it became clear that Lucy preferred to snuggle in Daniel’s lap every night, she’d relented.
“Daniel and Marshall want everyone to put their fucking phones away during the ceremony so they can see your ugly mugs instead of your fucking phones. Fuck knows why.”
Jackson and I looked at each other and started laughing. I was so happy that Malone’s had offered to record all this for us to watch back later.
The gentle strains of the wedding march started getting louder through the speaker in the ceiling, giving us the cue we were waiting on.
Once I put on the pewter-colored suit jacket that was long enough to trail behind me as I walked up the aisle—the one expensive concession I’d made to see if I could wow Daniel today—Jackson stepped in front of me to straighten the white bow tie that we’d fought over for far too long trying to get it to sit right. “Are you ready?”
Absorbing the sensation of my wedding present to Daniel, I fidgeted with his pewter-colored tie for something to do as I took a deep, steadying breath, and as I released it, a sense of peace greater than anything I’d ever felt came over me. “Yeah. Yeah, I am.”
A warm smile spread over his face as he finished fiddling with my bow tie and placed his hands on my shoulders and gently squeezed. “Good. Let’s get this show on the road, then.”
He turned around to look for the bouquet of flowers we’d picked up earlier. Once he’d found it, he handed it over, thenopened the office door, gave me one last soft smile and a quick nod, and began his walk.
As I’d been instructed, I slowly counted to five, took one more deep breath, and followed him.
The moment I laid eyes on Daniel, I felt my lips spread into the widest smile I could physically create.
Both he and Henry wore three-piece gunmetal-gray suits; however, where Henry wore a tie of the same color, Daniel’s was white.
Apart from agreeing to a monochromatic color scheme, neither of us had seen the other’s outfits until that very moment. I hadn’t even seen Rose’s steel-gray and black suit, as Daniel had worked with Rose on finding the right one for her when he and Henry had ordered their own suits, but it matched us both beautifully.
Daniel must have loved how I looked, too, because a look of stunned awe swept over his face as I trailed Jackson up the aisle before his bottom lip trembled slightly, and with one thumb, he wiped a tear away.
Henry leaned into his brother to say something to him, but Daniel never took his eyes off me. He responded with something that made Henry chuckle and focus on an impeccably dressed as always Blue, who was sitting in the front row with their parents.
Far too quickly, I found myself at the end of the aisle and staring into Daniel’s shimmering eyes.
“My God. You’re gorgeous,” he whispered before he ducked in, cupped my jaw, and stole a kiss.
A kiss that quickly turned filthy.
