by Lynn Bulock
“Yep. It’s starting to work, too. And guess what? I have a concussion but no skull fractures, so they’re going to let me out of here tonight, too. Who did Rose get for taxi service?”
“Either Peter or Travis Vance,” Holly told him.
The pressure of Jake’s hand in hers was getting a little more lax. “Great. Tell her to make it Peter. That brand-new car he bought for Emily to tool around in since he came home has better shocks. Besides, there’s something I need to ask him.”
“Oh? What is that, Jake?” It was a little funny, watching Jake, normally intense and edgy, with his senses mellowed by pain medication and a hard day.
“Something personal,” he said, arching one perfect eyebrow. “Before that, I need to ask you something even more personal. I’ve been thinking, Holly. I know I said I’d give you all the time you wanted before we started dating. And I still mean it. But after today, I’d say that dating is highly overrated.”
“Oh?” It seemed to be the only answer she could keep making to Jake—handsome, wonderful Jake—without bursting out in giggles. “What do you mean by that?”
“Dating is so casual. And I have no desire for our relationship to be casual, not after today. Life is too short for casual things. Do you think when you’re ready for something more that we could just skip the dating and go straight for an engagement?” His grip on her hand tightened, and his blue eyes cleared a bit, waiting for her answer.
“Yes. Definitely. I’ve been thinking the same thing, but I was afraid you’d think I’d gone around the bend after what I told you less than forty-eight hours ago.”
Jake gave a dry laugh, and then winced when the movement must have hurt his head. “Yeah, well, life changes. Look how ours both changed in a day. Even before that, you’ve certainly changed mine so much in the last month that I can’t imagine a life without you, Holly.”
“You did the changing, Jake. You and God. I just got out of your way and let you change,” she told him, leaning over to brush the softest of kisses on his uninjured temple. God had changed her, too, as He’d been working changes in Jake. It would take a while for her to come to grips with how much had changed, in such wonderful ways.
“So you’ll marry me?” Jake didn’t seem to believe her answer.
“I’ll marry you. It will take a little while to plan the kind of wedding I suspect our families will want. But I’ll marry you as soon as we can put it all together, Jake.”
“Oh, we’ve got it all together, or at least God has put it together for us,” Jake said with a soft smile. “Now all we have to do is work out the details.” And there, in the unlikeliest of settings on side-by-side hospital gurneys, they began doing just that.
Chapter Fourteen
Two months later
“Dearly beloved,” Reverend Gabriel Dawson began, “we are gathered here together in the sight of God to join these couples in holy matrimony.”
Couples. The thought made Holly’s head spin, but then it had been spinning most of the time for about nine weeks now, and it wasn’t likely to stop soon. Jake’s question for Peter Vance on New Year’s Eve had gained him an unexpected answer; instead of a best man, he’d ended up with a double wedding. Holly could still hear the ricochet conversation that went on in Peter’s car that night. “Well, sure, I’ll be more than happy to stand up for you, Jake, if you’ll provide the same services for me. It will get me out of a jam, because I don’t dare ask either of my brothers without hurting the other guy’s feelings, and I wouldn’t do that for the world,” Peter had said.
“So have you got Good Shepherd booked already? When’s the big day?” Jake asked. Holly could hear the wheels turning in his head.
“Two months from now, to give Emily and my mother time to plan. I was originally pushing for tonight in Las Vegas, but I’m kind of glad that didn’t work out now, seeing as how you needed a ride.”
Before Holly could stop them, the guys were planning a double wedding, oblivious to her suggestion that perhaps the women might want some say in this as well. Instead of backing off, Peter got Emily in on things right away, and the four of them ended up staying up all night in Jake’s parents’ living room, drinking ginger ale to ring in the New Year and plan a wedding. At some point Marilyn Vance and Peter’s parents had joined the impromptu party, making it the strangest New Year’s Eve Holly had ever spent anywhere. They’d even had a baby New Year in the person of Peter and Emily’s soon-to-be adopted son Manuel, who had gotten passed around to everyone that night.
Right now baby Manuel was spending the wedding ceremony happily ensconced in his grandmother Lidia’s arms, smiling and seeming to cheerfully wait his turn for the moment that Peter and Emily had built into their vows to have the baby blessed along with their renewed union. He was such an adorable little guy, and looked so cute in the little white suit his parents had dressed him in.
The church was filled with flowers, Vances and Montgomerys. Holly felt a little sorry for Emily’s out-of-town family coming into this profusion of the two mixed families. There were less than a dozen of the Armstrong clan, and while everyone else was perfectly welcoming, Emily’s relatives probably felt overwhelmed in the face of all the boisterous mayhem of the rest of this crew. The friends and cousins of Holly’s age group had all grown up together in such a tight bunch that she suspected it would take days to explain all the private jokes and shared experiences to anyone from outside their circle.
Seeing so many of them here today brought such a special feeling to her wedding day. Before she walked up the aisle with Mike, Holly had been afraid she would be teary, but it didn’t happen. There were so many warm, friendly faces between the back of the church and Jake waiting for her in front, all she could do was smile.
Gabriel Dawson was a wonderful preacher, and he used his skills to perfection on the talk to the two couples that became a sermon for the whole congregation on love and new beginnings and how we are new in Christ every day. In what seemed like a flash Holly was walking down the aisle again with Jake, both of them laughing as they looked behind them to see Manuel steal the spotlight from his parents, waving from his mother’s arm as the three of them followed Holly and Jake.
Holly was sure that today might be the only time she’d see a white limousine fitted out with wedding flowers and a car seat at the same time. Still, it was so much fun to pile all five of them in for the trip to the Broadmoor. On the way over they had their own private celebration between the happy confusion of the receiving line at Good Shepherd and the upcoming reception. “I think Manuel has got the right idea,” Peter said ruefully to Jake, watching his son sleep. “Do you think we’ve got time for a nap?”
“Not a chance. That photographer is going to be on us again the moment these car doors open. I think Emily’s going to come at you with a comb again,” Jake teased him.
At that Holly and Emily were both getting the giggles, trying to keep things quiet enough not to wake the baby. It was a struggle. Jake decided to help by kissing her to stifle the giggles. The trip to the Broadmoor had never gone so fast.
Jake looked around at the ballroom of the Broadmoor, filled with about two hundred of his closest friends and relations. It had started out with them wanting a small, simple wedding. So much for the plans he and Peter had tried to cook up weeks ago. Of course, once all the mothers got involved, things got out of hand quickly. At least the guys had gotten their way for half of the day’s events. The ceremony had stayed as small as possible, and simple. Jake knew he would remember that forever, and treasure the glow on Holly’s beautiful face as she came up the aisle toward him on her brother Mike’s arm.
The reception had gotten larger and more festive every time his mother and Lidia Vance had gotten together, however. Everyone else involved had finally let these two old hands at social direction have their way with the party, once Holly and Emily set a few ground rules. The four women got along so well that planning the reception was never a problem.
He and Peter had du
cked out of that planning as quickly as possible. “Our job for this part, my friend, is just to say ‘yes, dear’ and ‘sounds great, Mom’ once in a while to the right woman, and then head for the hills,” Peter had said somewhere about the first week of January, and Jake found he had to agree with him. Since there was so much family overlap, and so many social commitments among their parents, all four members of the bridal couples had let the grooms’ families host the reception. It wasn’t traditional, but Jake had lost count of how many nontraditional things had happened in this courtship and wedding.
First there was the engagement before ever really dating. Some of their friends were aghast at that, but it suited him and Holly just fine. As if she knew he was thinking about her, his beautiful wife turned from where she was talking to Lucia two tables away in the ballroom and beamed at him.
He joined her at Lucia’s side, giving his bride a soft kiss on the cheek. “I missed you. You’ve been gone a whole five minutes.”
“Well, you looked like you were busy talking to Travis and Tricia. What did they have to say to you?” Holly asked, eyes sparkling.
“I’ll let her tell you herself,” Jake said, unwilling to tell a secret.
“I knew it!” Holly crowed, taking his hand and going over to the table where her aunt and uncle and her Vance cousins sat. She let go of him long enough to hug Tricia as she stood up. “Congratulations! When are you due?”
“The end of September,” Tricia said, smiling. “I thought you said you weren’t going to tell her,” she chided Jake.
“He didn’t,” Holly said, laughing. “I wondered earlier because you looked so happy. When he said he’d let you tell me what you three were talking about over here, that clinched it. I’m so happy for you.” She hugged her again, and Jake wondered how long it would be before people were telling him the same thing.
Travis looked as thrilled as Tricia with upcoming parenthood. “Mom’s going to be in her element.” Lidia was nodding to agree with him, having overheard the conversation. “For years she’s been nagging all of us about grandbabies, and in the course of six months she’s gone from none to four, if you count present and future.”
“And I love it,” Lidia crowed. “With the other changes we’re talking about, I’m trying to convince Max that I need to cut back at the restaurant and have fun with the grandbabies instead. Amy already loves helping me bake cookies. She’s going to be such a great big sister.” Lidia patted the hand of her oldest granddaughter, who smiled back at her, unwilling to say anything in front of this many grownups looking at her.
Amy ducked her head shyly and turned to her mother, whispering something in her ear. “Of course. Don’t go far,” Jessica answered back, and Amy slid out of her seat and went over to the next table. There her friends Hannah and Sarah greeted her and the three children started a game of some kind.
Jake could hear the children playing together, and Susan’s twin daughters were telling Amy something about “when we get our new baby brother,” making Jake wonder if he should add Gabriel Dawson to the fraternity of expectant fathers around here. His wife Susan, the twins’ mother, looked stunning as she watched her own girls and Amy, who all got down from the table now to play nearby.
It was so great to see the changes in Amy, Jake thought. The little girl had blossomed since Jessica had married Sam last year, and Sam’s family had all surrounded the child with acceptance and love.
They were surrounding him the same way, Jake realized, coming to grips once again that his marriage today made all the Vances his family as well. Holly’s aunt and uncle and cousins were his now, which made it clear just why the size of the dining room had mattered so much in the houses Holly and he had looked at for the last two months.
As if reading his mind on the subject, Holly leaned over and said, “Sam and Jessica are having Easter brunch. She wanted to do a holiday dinner before she got too far along to worry Sam. That’s three weeks from tomorrow, so we’ll be back from Hawaii by then. I figured we could do dinner with your folks later in the day.”
“This married life is complicated,” Jake told her, still grinning. “I’m glad I have such a competent person to walk me through it.”
“It makes all the difference,” Sam piped up, his arm around Jessica. She smiled at him and rolled her eyes, and Jake marveled again at how lovely she looked in the flowing silk pantsuit, her expanding waistline announcing her advancing pregnancy. He knew there had been this many expectant mothers around him in times past, but until now, when it was his friends and family he’d never paid attention.
“You’ll be that beautiful when you’re carrying our baby,” he whispered to Holly as they made their way to the head table a few minutes later. She blushed all the way to the roots of her hair, which she’d left loose in heady waves. “You’re so beautiful now, and every change in our life will only enhance that beauty.”
She looked at him, brown eyes glowing with happiness. “That’s the most wonderful thing you could have said, Jake. I think all women worry some if their husbands will still think they’re attractive then, but seeing Jessica and Tricia today, I’ll worry a whole lot less. They’re both so gorgeous and so happy.”
“That they are. We just seem to be surrounded by happy people,” Jake said, catching his brother Adam’s eye at that moment and exchanging a smile. Adam and Kate sat with his parents, probably discussing their upcoming return to Venezuela as part of a group starting a new clinic in a rural area. It wasn’t the life he’d choose, but they reveled in it, and Jake couldn’t be happier for them.
Around the room, the servers were circulating with bottles of sparkling apple juice, pouring glasses for the wedding toasts. Jake got the notes out of his pocket to praise Peter and Emily, and saw that Peter seemed to be doing the same, handing Manuel back to his wife so that he could manage an index card and a glass at the same time.
Peter spoke first and of course was far wittier than Jake ever expected to be himself. “I’d like to thank everyone for joining us today to welcome my wife Emily and my buddy Jake into the Vance family, and my cousin Holly into the Montgomery clan. Why do I feel like this is like Romeo and Juliet, without all the gory parts and the feuding families?” Laughter rippled around the room.
“Seriously, though, I couldn’t think of a nicer couple to share the happiest day of my life with. Here’s wishing many future blessings to my cousins and dear friends, Jake and Holly Montgomery.” The applause only quieted when Jake rose to return the favor.
“Thank you, Peter. I have to give the credit and the glory to God for bringing me to where I am today, and I am so honored that Peter and Emily and Manuel let us share this special day with them. It is so wonderful to call the man I’ve always thought of as my best friend part of the family now, thanks to Holly’s generosity in sharing her relatives. On that note I’d like to toast my new cousins, Peter and Emily Vance and wish them all the happiness in the world.”
The toasts went on for a few moments, and then Jake, still standing, quieted the room. “I promised my father, and Peter’s, that they could have a few words before we went on to cut the cake and do a few other things. So I’d appreciate you giving your attention to our illustrious mayor and his best friend. Guess this Montgomery and Vance tradition of friendship goes back a ways, huh, Dad?”
“That it does,” Frank Montgomery said, standing in the middle of the room where Maxwell Vance was now beside him. “I want to thank the kids for letting us share their day so that our families and friends will be the first to know what the rest of the city will find out tomorrow.”
“As you know, my focus as mayor during the last half of this term has been rooting out the source of the crime and drug problems that have plagued Colorado Springs. With the collapse of the Diablo crime syndicate, and prosecution of those involved in bringing drugs into our city via La Mano Oscura, I feel that part of my work is done. After two terms as the city’s mayor, I won’t be seeking reelection in May.”
There
was a murmur around the room, as some present started to speculate at what Jake already knew. “It’s time for me to spend some quality time with Liza and our growing family, and maybe even improve my golf game, if that can be done. In our fight against crime and drugs in the city, one name came up again and again, and that was the Vance family. Folks around here say ‘a Vance never forgets’ and I’m sure that once I announce that I’m endorsing my friend Max Vance as Colorado Springs’s next mayor, you also won’t forget all the things he’s already done to make this a great city.”
There was a cheer that went up, and in the aftermath when people were surrounding the two men, Holly turned to Jake. “So that’s what Aunt Lidia meant when she was talking about the other changes they were making. Maybe she and your mom can give each other some tips.”
Jake smiled. “Right. Mom can tell her all about the perils of being the mayor’s wife and all the public commitments, and your aunt can tell her how to deal with having a retired husband around to drive her crazy.”
“They’ll all be happy.” Holly inclined her head to where the two couples were surrounded by their friends, all talking at once. “Look at them—they’re all in their element. Do you think we’ll be that way in forty years?”
“I hope so. If that’s what God has in store for us, I’ll treasure every day,” Jake told her, kissing her soundly to prove the point. He treasured this day already, and planned to cherish every one God gave him with Holly from this moment on. The best is yet to be, Jake thought.
He could hardly wait.
Special thanks and acknowledgment
are given to Lynn Bulock for her contribution
to the FAITH ON THE LINE series.
ISBN: 978-1-4592-0477-5
PROTECTING HOLLY
Copyright © 2004 by Steeple Hill Books, Fribourg, Switzerland
All rights reserved. Except for use in any review, the reproduction or utilization of this work in whole or in part in any form by any electronic, mechanical or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including xerography, photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, is forbidden without the written permission of the editorial office, Steeple Hill Books, 233 Broadway, New York, NY 10279 U.S.A.