"About Seth and Julian? No. But about Seth's continued desire to marry me? Enough to call this whole thing off." But her stomach burned and her windpipe started to close at the idea.
"Forget it. He's got normal anxiety because being without you was hard. Probably harder than getting clean. I'm sure he's afraid being with you will be even harder. But once you get through today, there won't be anything concrete for him to hang that anxiety on, and you'll be fine. Or as fine as any married couple is, anyway."
Cassie hardly felt soothed, but the string quartet outside had begun playing, and there was no more time to worry and wonder. Either she was doing this or she wasn't. She took the bouquet Georgie handed her and exited the tent, watching her friend start up the aisle between two rows of chairs on the high part of the beach. Cassie could only see her for a few steps before she was hidden past the tent, and relied on the change in music to signal her.
There it was. She took a deep breath, stepped out, and paused. Seth stood under the ivory canopy, his dark hair rippling in the wind, one hand gripping the other so hard that even at this distance she knew his fingers were white. Next to him stood Julian, solemn for once, staring at her as if daring her to turn and run.
Sudden calm descended over her, born of the conviction that everyone else was right, and she and Seth were wrong. They belonged together, and fuck the groupies and the inquiring press and temptation and distance and even Julian's fifteen-year-old blow job.
She was going to marry Seth Graham.
* * * *
She's about to run.
Seth's heart stopped when Cassie did at the end of the white runner leading to the canopy, where a female minister waited patiently behind him. She looked gorgeous in her simply wrapped dress and bare feet, her hair looking like she'd tossed it up to take a shower. It was perfect, right down to the white flowers in her hands. White, for new beginnings.
It was the sappiest, most ridiculous thing he'd ever thought, Seth realized, but it didn't matter. He and Cassie had had a lot of new beginnings, and would continue to. That was the nature of their relationship.
A knot inside him that had formed after the first dream and tightened with every thought and fear since undid itself, and that freed him to concentrate on the reason he was here.
Cassie strolled down the aisle, her eyes intent on him, and he knew her fear was gone, too. Maybe temporarily, but who ever said they could live fear-free? At least they were together.
When she'd reached midpoint, the music stopped. Julian shifted beside him and raised a wireless microphone to his mouth. Off to the side, Robert started playing an acoustic guitar. The breeze, which had been carrying the recorded wedding march out to sea, died, and Julian's voice rose above the small crowd.
"Long ago you left my life..."
Cassie's eyes widened, and Seth knew she recognized the tune he'd been humming the night before. He held out his hand, and she started walking again.
"Left me broken, weak and empty..."
When she reached him he took her hand and placed it on the crook of his elbow. Their eyes locked, Cassie's fingers tightening as Julian sang the song Seth had written.
"I had to build myself again, before you would return."
Cassie's bouquet vibrated, and Seth couldn't tell if it was because she was shaking, or he was. Her eyes glistened, and moisture dotted his own lashes.
Everyone sat or stood motionless, not a sound marring the purity of Julian's singing or the mellowness of Robert's guitar.
"Here we are, with hope restored, our future open wide. Rebuilding forever, for the rest of our lives."
Georgie sniffed into the silence after the last notes faded. Echoes from their friends and family were accompanied by rustles and coughs. But Seth couldn't take his eyes off Cassie.
The minister cleared her throat and said, "Are we ready to begin?"
Cassie and Seth turned toward her, and faced their forever.
Natalie J. Damschroder
Natalie J. Damschroder became a writer the hard way--by avoiding it. Though she wrote her first book at age five (appropriately titled, My Very First Book) and received accolades for her academic writing (Ruth Davies Award for Excellence in Writing for a paper on deforestation her senior year in college), she hated doing it. Colonial food and the habits of the European Starling just weren't her thing.
Shortly after graduating from college, however, she found her niche--romantic fiction. After an internship with the National Geographic Society, customer service for a phone company just wasn't that exciting. So she began learning how to write the books she'd loved to read all her life. Four books and six years later, she finally sold. Now she struggles to balance her frenetic writing life (how else can she get all the stories in her head on paper?) with her family, the most supportive husband in the world and two beautiful, intelligent, stubborn, independent daughters (one of whom has already declared her desire to be a writer, too). She somehow also fits in a day job and various volunteer positions in and out of the writing industry.
More can be found at: www.nataliedamschroder.com
* * * *
Don't miss Blue Silver: Lost Our Forever, by Natalie J. Damschroder,
available at AmberHeat.com!
Cassie Bryant didn't let a flat tire deter her twenty years ago. As soon as she hit eighteen and graduation, she took off after pop band Blue Silver, determined to make lead singer Seth Graham her future. It worked, until pressure, drugs, and a tanking final album tore apart not only their marriage, but the entire band.
Now Blue Silver is making a comeback, and Cassie's friends want her to use her connections to bring the band to their hometown so they can live their aborted dream. Against her better judgment, she agrees. But will the concert and after-party create the magical night they'd all always wanted? Or will her friends face the same disillusionment she did? Worse, when Seth wants to reconcile, she finds it difficult to resist...despite the same pressures and temptations that ruined them last time.
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