“Commitable,” Kerry muttered, as her gaze locked on her engagement ring. “I still can’t believe he did that.”
“I believe it now,” Joe said quietly. “I believe he loves you. I believed he loved you even before you confirmed my suspicions about the ring, because no man in his right mind would voluntarily place himself in the lion’s den of the Whelan clan in the middle of a desert if he didn’t.”
“That goes for Mac, too,” Kerry said. “She was always supportive of me even when you were being an ass. She came all the way over here to support us both and kept her composure even when I dropped her in it.”
“About that.” Joe scratched his jaw. “I should probably come clean and admit I dragged Mac into this drama to try to talk you out of marrying Aaron.”
Kerry threw back her head and laughed. “Well, duh!” she said when her giggles finally subsided. “Anyone with half a brain could spot that. I’m glad you somehow talked her into it, you know why?”
“Apparently I only have half a brain, so tell me why,” he said.
“Because it gave you the excuse you two needed to find each other and fall in love.” Kerry grinned and made a drop-the-mic motion. “Boom. Now who’s the best matchmaker ever? You’re welcome.”
She uncurled from the armchair and stood. “And now I need to continue making myself gorgeous.”
“You are gorgeous, and Aaron’s a lucky man.” Joe rose and edged around the coffee table to give his sister a hug.
Kerry squeezed him tight and then released him with a pat on the cheek. “Make your own luck, Joe. Take a risk; roll the dice—the payoff’s worth the gamble. This is Vegas, after all.”
Chapter 16
A wedding at The Venetian was nothing like what Mac had imagined. There were no Elvis impersonators, cheesy organ music, or checkout lines of couples waiting to tie the knot outside the door. Instead, the wedding chapel was intimate and, yes, even elegant. On one side of the aisle sat Joe’s family, and on the other, Aaron’s parents and two of his brothers who had flown in yesterday for the ceremony.
Mac sat next to a twitchy Joe and laid a hand on his leg.
“She’s late,” he whispered.
“She’s meant to be late,” Mac whispered back then directed an everything’s going to plan smile at Aaron, who stood by himself at the front of the chapel.
He gave her a thumbs-up, but if the man looked any more relaxed, he’d be asleep on his feet. Unlike Aaron’s future brother-in-law.
“She and dad might’ve got lost walking through the casino,” he muttered. “It happens.”
“I know,” she said. “It took you almost an hour and a half to find your way back to our room earlier. You should come equipped with a GPS; I nearly sent out a search party.”
“Getting lost doesn’t make me any less manly.”
“Did you stop to ask for directions?”
Joe shot her a grin that made her knees wobble. Luckily she was sitting down.
“Don’t be daft, woman.”
He laced his fingers with hers and squeezed her hand as the first haunting notes of Adele’s “Make You Feel My Love” piped through the chapel’s sound system. Their little group stood, turning toward the double doors and the two assistants standing by. The doors opened, and Kerry walked through on her father’s arm. As she usually did, Mac allowed herself a count of two to admire the bride in all her finery then transferred her gaze to the groom’s face.
The groom—big, burly, tough-guy Aaron—had tears leaking from his eyes. So many big guys did when they caught the first glimpse of the woman they loved. It made all the hard work worthwhile.
Kerry glided down the aisle, her dress flowing around her legs in silken waves. The dress suited her perfectly, but it was Kerry’s smile that lit her up from the inside out. She hadn’t once taken her eyes off Aaron, and the two of them could’ve been the only ones in the room they were that enraptured with each other.
Mac glanced at Joe, about to nudge him with a combination look of “awww, so beautiful” and a “told you so” smirk, when the look on his face froze her elbow mid-nudge. Joe wasn’t looking at his sister, and he wasn’t looking at Aaron, he was looking at her. With a heat and intensity that caused her breath to hitch. He was looking at her the same way the groom was looking at his bride. Her heart fluttered on a thousand wings and beat with hopeful recognition.
The music faded away, and they sat, Joe’s arm draped around her shoulders. She was aware more of his warmth and the brush of his fingers on her bare arm than the ceremony taking place in front of her. It was lovely—sweet and emotional and lovely—but Mac’s heart continued to pound as if she were running a desert marathon the whole time.
The rest of the afternoon flew by with glasses of bubbles, a meal at an award-winning, Italian steakhouse, and to much teasing and laughter, Kerry and her new husband retired early to their suite as they and Joe’s parents were flying back to New Zealand the next morning. After hugging the newlyweds good night, Joe and Mac wandered out hand in hand onto the Strip.
“Where are we going?” she asked.
They strolled past summer crowds moving in and out of the casinos’ huge entrances, clogging up the sidewalks and generally partying on.
“You’ll see.”
Fifteen minutes later, and what felt like many, many miles trekked in high heels through a flashing-light maze of casino floors, Joe came to a halt in the middle of a bank of slot machines. His mouth twisted into a grimace as he stood gazing around, his brow set in stubborn lines.
“Admit it,” she said. “We’re lost.”
“We’re not lost; we’ve misplaced our destination.”
“Which is?” Hopefully not far since Mac was pretty sure she was developing a blister.
“A surprise,” he said mulishly. “And don’t roll your eyes; it shouldn’t be so hard to find.”
Mac pressed her mouth shut to smother a grin as lights flashed and machines tinkled and beeped around them.
“You think you can do better?” he grumbled. “Fine. I was planning a romantic ride on that feckin’ giant Ferris wheel that’s visible from almost every direction in Vegas, except when you try to take a shortcut through a bloody casino to get to it.”
“Wait here.” Mac patted his cheek and spun around, weaving back through the slot machines until she saw a staff member. Less than a minute later, she was on her way back to Joe with directions to the fecking giant Ferris wheel.
“You’re such a stereotype,” she said, leading him through the slot machines.
He allowed himself to be towed along in her wake. “I did try, you know, to get directions before we left dinner. There were communication issues. Evidently, I have quite an accent, and the server had no clue what a Ferris wheel was. So I thought, how hard can it be to find something so big?”
“A question many women have asked.”
Joe stopped dead and threw back his head, laughing from deep down in his gut. The sight, the sound, the fuzzy warmth that swept through her at seeing him so relaxed, so happy—even though things hadn’t gone to plan—filled her with pure joy and caused her to join him. So she stood there, in the middle of God-knew-where in God-knew-what casino and laughed until tears popped into her eyes and her stomach ached.
“C’mon, big boy,” she managed to gasp. “We’re almost there.”
They strolled through another set of sliding glass doors, and the cool air-conditioning gave way to warm night air once again. The huge, High Roller wheel in front of them stood with only a lane of shops and restaurants between them. Shortly after getting their tickets, they stepped into one of the large glass-sided booths with two other couples.
The booth rose smoothly, slowly upward. The two other couples found a spot away from them to admire the expanding view of Vegas’s lights. The higher they rose, the more dazzling the lights grew as the whole city spread beneath them. Foot by foot, the booth lifted them above the spectacular display of the Bellagio’s fountains, the golden light
s of the fake Eiffel Tower, the huge buildings that formed the Strip’s many casinos. In the distance, the beam of light from the apex of the Luxor’s pyramid speared through the inky night sky.
They sat together on one of the bench seats built at either end of the oval-shaped booth and facing the curved glass windows. Joe’s arm slipped around her waist, keeping her close against him.
“If you’re scared of heights,” he said, “feel free to hang on to me for the rest of the ride.”
“I’ll pretend I’m scared, shall I?” Mac leaned her head against his shoulder, breathing in his unique, new-leather-and-male smell and trying desperately to stamp every detail of this moment into her long-term memory.
“Grand idea.”
A bittersweet pull tugged her heart as they neared the wheel’s apex. They had three more nights together in the city, including this one, before they drove back to LA and their flight home. But without Joe at her side, she’d never again see the gaudy beauty of Vegas’s lights. She wouldn’t want to, couldn’t bear it. That was the bitter. The sweet? She lifted her gaze from the endless sea of neon and refocused on the strong line of Joe’s jaw. The sweet was that Vegas could be their city, the one they went back to in ten or fifteen years’ time, maybe with their eye-rolling teenagers who thought it hashtag cool-not-cool to see where their olds fell in love.
“Joe?”
He glanced across at her, and something in her face must’ve alerted him that she wanted—no, needed—him to kiss her. Right here, right now, until the sounds of the other couples’ conversations and the running commentary of facts and figures from the built-in sound system faded away, and it was just their space.
Joe lowered his head and took her mouth, took her very breath as his lips slanted warmly against hers. She melted into him, her eyes drifting shut as the invisible connection between them bound them together. His fingers caressed her cheek, traced the line of her jaw, then cupped the back of her neck. The spark grew to a flame as his tongue flicked into her mouth, stroking, stoking the fire hotter, promising wicked temptations to come.
He gave a soft tug on her lower lip as he pulled away, his hooded gaze on hers. “Still scared, Mac?” He squeezed her hip then spider-walked his fingers up to her waist, making her shiver.
“A little.” Her fingers remained dug into his biceps, and she had to make a concentrated effort to remove them, praying she wouldn’t dissolve into a sizzling puddle at Joe’s feet. “But since you paid a lot of money for us to enjoy the view, maybe we should look at it.”
Once the wheel had completed the circuit, they stepped off with the two other couples who moved ahead of them toward the stairs.
“Honeymooners,” Mac overheard the elderly woman who’d ridden with them say to her husband in a stage whisper. “Can’t keep their hands off each other. I remember being like that on our honeymoon.”
“Not me,” her husband replied deadpan. “I was drunk the whole time.”
“George! You were not!”
The woman giggled like a teenager and her husband’s face lit up.
He turned and winked at Mac and Joe. “Enjoy the rest of your night, folks.”
Then with great care he took his wife’s elbow and helped her down the stairs.
Would that be her and Joe in forty years’ time? The heart fluttering returned with a vengeance because part of her really, really hoped so.
They let the two other couples get a head start before they descended the stairs and made their way back along the open mall. Joe stopped to buy them an ice cream, and after demolishing his in record time, eyeballed hers. She made sure to torture him with long, slow swipes of her tongue over the creamy goodness before she caved and gave it to him while they continued to stroll back the way they’d come.
“You’re limping,” he said once they’d successfully navigated through the casino to reach the Strip again.
He crouched at her feet, the sidewalk crowd flowing around them as he examined her left heel.
“Diagnosis, Doctor?” she asked.
“The beginning of a blister,” he said and stood. “An unacceptable injury for tomorrow’s plans.”
A whole day out with him that didn’t involve casinos or credit cards was the only clue she’d wheedled out of Joe about their second-to-last full day in the US. To say she was curious as hell and excited was an understatement. But before she could open her mouth to bug him again about the next day’s itinerary, Joe scooped her up into his arms.
“Put me down!” she squeaked.
“Not a chance.”
Joe ignored the punch on his shoulder and continued walking toward The Venetian. Traffic rumbled and honked past, signs glowed, music blared, a hundred different smells filled the air. Mac relaxed against him, her fingers smoothing over the spot she’d just hit.
“What will people think?”
He grinned down at her. “That we’re honeymooners. And you’re drunk.”
She mock glared at him, and he laughed, dipping his head to kiss her forehead. “What happens in Vegas, stays in Vegas. Isn’t that what they say?”
“I really, really don’t like you,” she said and punched his shoulder again. But lightly.
“I know,” he said, and continued to carry her through the desert night.
Early the next morning, after they’d said their goodbyes to the newlyweds and the rest of the Whelans and Paratas, Joe rifled through Mac’s suitcases. Yep, he had a death wish, but he didn’t want her dressing for the day in heels and a cocktail dress.
“These.” He pulled out a pair of red shorts and a blue-striped cotton shirt, which looked as if it’d provide some sun protection. “And these’ll have to do.” Her gym shoes—though, heh, Mac had only worked out twice since they’d arrived as they’d been breaking a sweat between the sheets at every opportunity.
Mac lifted an eyebrow. “You think I’m going anywhere with you in that shirt with those shorts?”
She dug through the mountain of clothes jumbled up inside the bag and came up with a short denim skirt, waving it under his nose. “This goes with the shirt. It’s cute.”
He shrugged. “Don’t blame me if a snake bites your cute arse.”
“There are arse-biting snakes where we’re going?”
She hugged the skirt to her breasts but didn’t let go of it. After a few seconds she rolled her eyes.
“Eh,” she said. “I’ll risk the pervy snakes.”
She stripped down to a dick-hardening pair of tiny black panties and a matching black bra. Pervy snakes were the least of his worries. He turned away before he caused their departure time to shift back an hour and dug out his own suitable clothes.
Thirty minutes later they were in the Lincoln with a greasy but amazing takeout breakfast and coffee, heading out of the city. The sun had risen an hour earlier, the sky a hazy blue arc above their heads with only a scattering of small, streaky clouds. He didn’t need to be a meteorologist to predict a scorcher of a day ahead. Mac stretched out in the passenger seat, licking butter from her bagel off her fingers while the warm slipstream flicked her ponytail around her face. She turned her head, meeting his gaze and making a provocative motion with her tongue over her fingertip.
“Later,’” he said. “When we make use of that big back seat.”
“To sleep in when you get us lost?”
He laughed. “Darlin,’ I know exactly where we’re going, and there’ll be no sleep involved.”
They cruised along the I-40, bantering, laughing, talking about everything under the sun, except perhaps the most important thing there was to talk about—them, and their future. But that topic of conversation wasn’t one you had with a gorgeous woman, driving through an eerily empty but beautiful desert landscape.
If Mac guessed where they were headed by the time the Lincoln crossed into Arizona, she kept it to herself. She whooped like a schoolgirl when he took a short detour off the interstate to cruise along part of the old Route 66 highway, insisting on a short souvenir e
xcursion in the dusty but quaint town of Seligman. Two hours after they hit the road again, they reached their final destination: Grand Canyon National Park.
The expression on Mac’s face when they approached the first lookout point—squeezing in among the other tourists to get to the guardrail—was priceless. She stared out at the stunning vista, her gaze skipping over the rugged terrain, like him, he imagined, trying to comprehend the sheer vastness of the landscape. Tears welled up in her eyes and spilled down her cheeks. She turned her head into his chest, slipping her arms around his waist, and holding on tight.
“Thank you, Joe,” she said simply.
Then she scrubbed the tears off her face and tilted her head. “If I’m not too gross and red-eyed, I’d like you to kiss me now. Just to make this amazing memory even better.”
He happily obliged, kissing her until the wolf whistles and applause from the other tourists had them laughing and pulling apart.
They spent the rest of the day wandering along the rim trails hand in hand. They took numerous photos, watched in delight at the antics of the cheeky crows that reminded Joe of the kakas back on Stewart Island, and hopped on and off the shuttle bus to catch the changing mood of the canyon from different vantage points.
“I thought we’d find a spot to sit and watch the sun set,” he said as the day wore on. “Grand Canyon sunsets are rumored to be stunning.”
And romantic—they had that going for them, too. Joe figured he needed all the help he could get. His heart thudded just that little bit faster as he led Mac onto an outcropping near the rim that was away from the other tourists but far enough from the sheer drop into the canyon not to be reckless.
His gaze swept across the rocky, pebble-strewn ground and latched onto a thin, brownish-gray length twisted around a medium-sized rock. “Watch out for the snake!” was out of his mouth before his brain had registered only a stick, gobshite.
Saying I Do (Stewart Island Series Book 8) Page 21