by Treva Harte
Molly opened her mouth, shut it and smiled. She grabbed her sister in a tight embrace.
"It's your show, Jen. I think I look too fat in it but I'll do what you want." She gave in. "I want you to stay happy like you are now."
"I can't remember being this happy, ever," Jennifer agreed. "Wait until you see my dress. Cee Cee—"
"Picked it out. This should be something." Molly looked and whistled when Jen took it out of the closet. "I hope Jack can make it through the ceremony without fainting. Or something else."
"Molly!"
"Oh, it isn't overtly wild or anything, but it is seeexy…" Molly looked at the slit on the side and the simple lines that concealed only to reveal. "Yummy."
"And I'm going to wear Mom's veil—" Jennifer began.
Loud barking interrupted. They could hear Poppy thumping into furniture as the dog ran in circles, yipping happily at the new intruder. Someone was going to have to shut the dog up in Jack's house before too long.
"Hey, is anyone home?" a deep voice called.
Jen almost dropped her dress on the floor in her hurry down the stairs. Molly paused long enough to hang the dress back up. She'd recognized that voice too, and wasn't quite as anxious to meet up with its owner.
"Kevin!" Jen shrieked and launched herself at him.
She didn't stop to think that she would never have expected him to catch her a few years ago. In that split second before she left the ground she saw the same dirty blond hair that was meant to be unruly, but was currently cut in short military style. She looked into the same laughing eyes. She'd realized the differences, too. Daniel Kevin Turner, Jr. had broadened his shoulders and increased his muscles considerably. It looked like the army had made a man out of her baby brother.
He dropped his duffel bag and caught her easily.
"Jen-nifer!" he managed. "How are you, Slugger?"
"Happy." Jennifer giggled.
"I can tell." Kevin carefully placed her down. "Any food around here?"
His habitual question made her laugh and whap him playfully on the head.
"Go find Jack and play some ball," she ordered. "The man seems a little edgy. I can't imagine why. Maybe some basketball will relax him."
"Babe, the honeymoon will relax me. I don't plan to lose my edge until then." Jack came into the kitchen to take a quick nip at her ear. "How're things, Kevin?"
"OK." Kevin and Jack briefly clasped hands. "Glad to see things are under control here."
"As under control as they ever will be," Jennifer called out as she danced up the stairs again.
"I'm damn glad," Kevin said, steadily. "Thanks, Jack. Thanks for helping to take care of it. I can't imagine anyone who deserves my sister more."
"No one is good enough to deserve your sister." Jack smiled. "I'm just damned lucky she's willing to take me on."
"Listen to me." Kevin swallowed. "I'm going to have to say this to my sisters, too, but I thought I should start with you and get it out of the way. I was wrong to leave. I knew it when I did it but I—I couldn't stay. Now I'm back, I'm older and I'm going to try. I never was the smart one, the responsible one, the good one in the family. Any of my sisters could manage those things better than me. They still can. But my tour is up in a few months and when it is, I'll be here. You and Jen—you enjoy being with each other. Forget about the rest of us for a while. I'll handle the rest."
"Kevin, I'm glad you'll be back to keep an eye on things, but you know Jen couldn't stay away if you locked the door," Jack reassured him. "She loves you guys. She worries about you. Hell, I want to stick around myself. But the enjoying each other part—that sounds pretty good to me."
Kevin looked at Jack's grin and groaned. "No, don't tell me! There are things a brother doesn't need to know."
The familiar thump of a basketball could be heard. Jen hesitated. She should be doing other things. A million other things. She ran out anyhow.
She paused to watch the two most important men in her life sweating and laughing as they fought over a basketball.
Somehow that made everything back to normal in her life. She fought the urge to beg to play, too. Instead she waved and ducked back in.
Priorities. A bride had to have priorities. Watching her fiancé with his shirt off wasn't one of them. At least not yet.
As Jen ran back up the stairs for about the hundredth time that day she heard the murmurs outside the window of the landing and paused. Cee Cee and Molly were outside on the porch, watching the game, too.
"Have you ever wondered how she does it, Molly?" Cecilia asked.
"She doesn't do anything. She just—is," Molly said.
"But she manages to pick the two handsomest guys in high school, snares them from the time she is old enough to wear a training bra and—get this—holds on to them both. Jack nearly fell over the basketball when she showed up just now. Even when she had Victor, she could make Jack sweat. And if Victor was alive today ol' Vic would probably jump his best friend to get her back. She doesn't even have to try. That's the amazing thing."
"Jack and Victor both know a good thing when they see it." Molly was loyal.
"Oh, Jen is a good thing, all right. She must be great in bed, too. You wouldn't think it, since she is such a good little mother to everyone, but you can see the look in Jack's eyes when she goes by. Victor used to look like that sometimes, too. You could feel the sizzle. I don't think they were thinking about her capacity for mothering."
"I think that is a compliment." Molly wasn't completely sure. "You don't look too happy about it, though."
"Hell, I'm jealous of her," Cee Cee admitted. "I have been all my life. If I didn't love her so much myself, I'd probably claw her eyes out. Why don't any of my men sizzle for me?"
"Of course they sizzle. But Cee Cee, I never had the impression that you gave a damn about any of your men," Molly told her. "Jen does."
"No, I don't suppose I have." Cee Cee sounded a little sad. "But Jennifer gets the men you could care about. Then she hangs on to them. We never get a chance. What a selfish little pig she is!"
Jen smiled. It wasn't the usual compliment a bride got on her wedding day, but she would take it just the same.
And, finally, she was ready. She smoothed the ivory gown. As a concession to Jack, she wore her hair long and unbound. She touched her mother's veil. If only Mother could have been here to see this.
She took a deep breath and walked into the living room.
Jack was there. Of course he looked wonderful in his suit. He always looked good in his suits. But his blue eyes looked particularly bright today, his smile had a special curve to it when he saw her. He reached out his hand, wordlessly, and gathered her close.
He looked perfect. How had she managed to get this incredibly physically perfect male to marry her? He made her mouth water. He made her heart hurt, he looked so good.
"My God, you look great in that dress. Did Cee Cee—"
"Pick it out? Yes, of course. You know, I'm starting to feel bad that no one thinks I could find something this sexy on my own."
"You have your talents," Jack told her. "But remind me to kiss Cecilia's feet after the ceremony."
"I will not." They laughed together.
The room looked perfect. The old photographs on the mantel smiled at her. The flowers throughout the room were all her favorites. She had arranged all of them by herself. She and Jack had agreed there would be no procession. They would be there together to greet their guests as they came in. Jen could almost feel herself dancing with joy and impatience. She wanted to get on with it. She was tired of waiting.
"I wish we had made the wedding earlier in the morning," Jen almost sulked. "I'm ready to go now…well, almost. I've gotta put on the makeup."
She blew Jack a quick kiss and dashed up the stairs again and into her bedroom.
She glanced over at the bed where Vicky was sleeping hard. Things were working out perfectly. If Vicky had her nap before the ceremony there would be less likelihood of baby ta
ntrums and hysterics.
Jen began to carefully apply makeup. Cecilia might laugh at her efforts, but she could make an effort for her wedding. Her tongue stuck out just a little in concentration as she worked on the eyeliner.
She heard the door crash open and wondered if Kevin had charged in. He hadn't changed that much, apparently.
"Hello, Jen. Darling."
The brush dropped as Jen stared in the mirror. He still wasn't real. He was a reflection. He was—
She turned.
He looked faintly disreputable, even in his suit. Although he stood almost as straight and almost as gracefully as ever, he held a cane in one hand and his dark eyes pierced into her with more intensity than she remembered him ever having.
Jen felt herself swaying. It felt almost like a dream again, even though she knew it wasn't. Somehow she was sure that this was real. Still, time seemed to move unnaturally as she stared at him.
Victor was back. After all this time, his dark eyes were fixed on her. He was older, tougher-looking, thinned down even more, and he limped his way toward her. But he was alive. Alive.
"Victor!"
"Sweet—?" Victor said, in a low voice.
Oh my God. Someone said it aloud. Jen knew it must have been her. She could have sworn nothing could come out of her throat.
She dragged air into her lungs.
"Victor, how? What—" She couldn't form a sentence, couldn't feel anything. She took a step toward Victor. Her movements felt awkward, unreal—just like in the old dream, the one she had hoped was gone forever.
"Jen, I'm sorry. After the last assignment, when the helicopter went down, we landed in some wild country. Some people took me in—the pilot was dead, I never found out about the others. I couldn't remember anything. I had hit my head in the crash—" His hand briefly touched a scar over his eyebrow.
She reached her hand out to touch, snatched it back.
"I dreamed of you, you know," he told her next, very calmly. "I dreamed myself back into remembering your name and mine. You speaking my name in a dream reminded me who I was. I kept seeing you and it was all so real—I could see you as I got out of the jungle. I dreamed of you in my hospital. You were there. And I dreamed you were thinking of me. All this time I felt so close to you. I felt like you were waiting for me."
She couldn't tell him. She couldn't. He would think it meant—that it meant—She didn't know what it meant.
"It took almost two years?" The voice came from behind her, from the man who had just arrived at her bedroom door. It was Jack speaking although she did not quite recognize it as his voice. "You couldn't remember anything for two damn years?"
"Not for a while." Victor was grimmer by the second. "Not for a long while. It came back slowly. But then I found myself near the Amazon. The people who took care of me were brave, but not brave enough to try to smuggle me out. They didn't know who I was anyhow. And my leg wouldn't—it wouldn't carry me far."
Jen's eyes glanced down to the cane he held. He looked like he was in pain, both physical and mental, but Victor held himself steady and his voice was pitched calmly, although there was an edge behind it.
"I managed to get out and get back a few weeks ago."
"Why didn't you tell me then?" Jen wailed.
A few weeks ago. Was it about the time she had first seen Jack as a man and they had gone to bed? When he had fought Jamieson over her? When she had proposed? What would have happened had Victor shown up at any of those times? What would it have meant if she had known her dreams were real? And would she have wanted it to be any different than it was? It was hard to think, talk, breathe.
"I didn't know how my leg would make it—whether I was going to be crippled up. Useless. After I got into a hospital I wanted to wait to be sure." Victor's voice grew harsher. "Then I read the wedding announcement in the paper. I realized I was almost too late. I came because I heard my best friend was getting married to my woman."
"She isn't yours." Jack kept talking in that same even, flat, unnatural voice. "Not any more."
"You bastard!"
Vic limped rapidly toward him and gripped his collar.
"No! Bad!"
Vicky had woken up from her nap and she screamed the words.
She ran to clutch Jack's leg. Victor went absolutely still and loosened his hold on the other man.
A little girl with his eyes and coloring looked back at him, sobbing. Jen saw his hand grip his cane this time until it went white.
His other hand reached out, touched his daughter's hair.
"Who—" Victor looked up at Jennifer.
"She's mine now, too," Jack answered him. "You didn't think about that before you went off, leaving Jen to take care of everything from her parents' death to your baby. Didn't even occur to you there might be some problems for her without you, did it, old buddy?"
"Da, Da!" Vicky screamed and Jack knelt down to scoop her up, his set face a contrast to the soft words he used to soothe her.
Goddamnit. He'd spent the last few months fighting what just hit him as he buried his face in Vicky's baby neck. He couldn't lie any more. Love overwhelmed him as he held the little girl, refusing to look at his almost-wife. He'd been so close—so close—
His woman and his little girl were leaving. Somewhere, deep down, he'd believed Jen would never be his. Was that why he had lied to himself that he couldn't love Jen? He'd gone without a family or love before. It hadn't killed him. Stupidly, he'd believed that if he didn't admit he cared this time, it wouldn't hurt if things fell apart.
Things hadn't just fallen apart, they'd smashed into bits. Victor, his now ex-best friend, was about to claim his own. What a fucking stupid time to realize Jennifer was his heart and without her and Vicky, he was lost. Why the hell did he have to realize how much he'd had only when he had lost everything?
Vicky stopped sobbing as she relaxed against him, comforted by his presence. He could feel Jen staring at him.
Oh God, Jen. Jen, in that delectable wedding dress that he was dying to peel off. Jen, with her worried face, trying to take on the world's problems. Jen, with her eyes glazed with lust, reaching for him. Jen.
He'd fight for her. He had to fight for her. He might even be able to win against Victor. Jack tried to loosen the knot in his stomach.
There was one big problem.
He couldn't fight against Jen.
Jen could feel her brain hazing over and fought it off. She wouldn't do this in front of the men and definitely not in front of Vicky, who was frightened enough. No fainting.
"Victor—Jack," she whispered. "Let's go to another room. I'll go find someone to take Vicky. Now. We'll settle this in private. I don't need anyone else coming in."
She ran downstairs and thrust Vicky into a startled Molly's arms without saying anything. Then she stumbled into the dining room and heard the two men behind her. She slammed the door and leaned against it once they were inside.
What could she say? The two men were staring at each other like wolves ready to go for the throat at the first opportunity. Jack looked like he had after fighting with Jamieson, drawn and white. Victor was holding Jack's gaze like an angry dog.
Although one was dark and the other fair, one smooth looking in his suit and the other rough, the two of them were almost frighteningly similar in height and build and icy temper. She knew the two of them were ready to kill each other. They probably would do something—unforgivable—to each other unless she did something to stop them. And she didn't know what to do.
In the distance she could hear Cee Cee and Molly greeting their guests at the door and leading them in. Kevin was upstairs, late as always, getting a shave before he came down. She could imagine Molly having dressed Vicky. She could envision Vicky, dressed in her first velvet and lace gown, trying to touch the flowers and babbling at the guests as they came in and sat down. People would be there, smiling, expecting a wedding ceremony.
She thought she could hear the magistrate, who had been a friend of
their father's and willing to perform the ceremony at home, speaking to her sister.
Everyone would be gathering in the living room soon. It wasn't as if they were having a large crowd for the wedding. Jack's family had declined to come when his mother and father heard there was the chance both could be there. There was Laura and some neighbors like Mrs. Jessup, Mrs. Beale and her considerable family, one or two of Jack's law school friends and Jen's family. Jack had firmly declined to invite any of the other more noteworthy people his mother had suggested.
Jen hadn't wanted anyone else.
Jen took a deep breath and finally made herself face what was there in the dining room. The two men stood in front of her, almost equidistant from the other, both looking at her.
She almost asked the question she had in her mind but stopped. She couldn't be that cruel to all of three of them. She took another deep breath.
Besides, she already knew the answer.
And because she knew, then it was simple. She knew exactly what she was supposed to do at last. She turned and looked at them both.
"Don't," she said. "You love each other. I love you both. Victor—" She turned to him and felt Jack stiffen beside her as she stepped toward Victor and put her hands in his. "Victor, I loved you so much. But now I love Jack more. I'm going to marry him today. We'll work out something with Vicky, if you want. I wouldn't keep her away from you. But we're over."
"Why? You promised me once you would love me forever. Was it his money? Did he seduce you?" The words sounded tortured. Then Victor turned his back on them both and hid his face.
"No, Victor. I did love you. But when I fell in love with you I fell in love with danger and excitement," Jen said. "You were supposed to protect me while we had adventures. It wasn't your fault you couldn't. It wasn't your fault I had to stay behind while you had an almost fatal adventure. But while I waited, I grew up and I realized I wanted my life with someone who will always put me first. I was willing to follow you anywhere when I was young. But Jack loves me more than his family, more than his work, more than himself. He's willing to be there for me. I need that. I need him. I love him more."