“There’s one person who won’t be there,” she said softly and looked out the window, avoiding my eyes.
Damn.
I should have seen that one coming.
“Is that why you’ve been a little hesitant to plan anything?” I asked.
She nodded, and I watched her throat work as she swallowed. “How does a girl plan her wedding without her mother?”
What the fuck did a guy say to that?
Sure, my mom was dramatic, all up in our business, and totally controlling, but she was here. Rimmel wouldn’t ever get to say that.
I could tell her that her mom would be there in spirit. I could tell her she was looking down on our wedding from heaven. I could even tell Rimmel that her mom would be proud.
She knew all of that.
She’d heard it likely half her life.
It still didn’t make it suck any less.
“So we won’t plan a wedding,” I said instead.
Rimmel looked at me, surprise in her tearful eyes. “What?”
“I should have taken you to Vegas the night I put that ring on your finger and you said yes. I was trying to be a good guy by giving you a wedding with our family and the shit girls are always going on about. But I forgot you aren’t like most girls. You don’t need dresses and flowers. So fuck this shit. Let’s fly to Vegas tonight.”
She laughed. It was a good sound. “You heard your parents in there. They want to be part of this.”
“But this isn’t about them. It’s about you and me.”
“If there’s one thing I learned in the past couple months, it’s that weddings are definitely not just about the bride and groom. If they were, we wouldn’t need a venue, centerpieces, and favors. And we definitely wouldn’t need to invite every person your mother sits on charitable boards with.”
She was right.
Almost from the moment I proposed, it became about everyone else. We spent one night in a gorgeous hotel and then flew out early to be with our family. We’d been at home and focused on making sure everyone was okay. We’d been careful not to make too many flashy plans in fear we’d draw more media. We didn’t want to celebrate too much or be too excited because it felt wrong to be so happy when B and Ivy were still trying to heal. And my mother, dear Lord, we had to give her an extravagant party just so she’d not kill us with plans and charts.
Somehow, I’d let the one thing I’d taken for myself become about everything else.
“I’m not sharing you,” I growled and threw the car in gear.
“Where are we going?” she asked as I sped out of the drive. When I didn’t answer, she said, “We can’t go to Vegas today, as much as I want to. I have classes in the morning, a dress fitting with Ivy, and Braeden needs you…”
Yeah, everyone else.
But the most important person is you.
“Romeo?”
“I’m not going to Vegas, baby.” I promised.
“Then where are you going?”
“I’m making it about me and you again.”
“How are you going to do that?” She wondered.
I smiled.
Chapter Twenty-Three
Rimmel
He drove us downtown.
Even though it wasn’t quite yet five o’clock, the sun was already beginning to set. Not that it had been very bright to begin with. The winter sky was gray and full of clouds, giving everything an overcast hue.
When he pulled up in front of a large stone building with great wide concrete steps, my brow furrowed. Then he parked at the curb.
How he always managed to find the best parking spot on a street was something I could only chalk up to Romeo magic.
This wasn’t a part of town I was very familiar with. I’d only been downtown once before when Romeo and I had tried some restaurant a few streets over. Mostly, we stuck around campus and in the neighborhood we lived in now.
So it took me a minute to realize where he’d brought us.
Okay, fine. I saw the sign.
“The county courthouse?” I asked.
He didn’t answer, only flung open his door and came around to mine. When he reached his hand into the open doorway, I didn’t hesitate to give him mine. I allowed him to tug me out onto the sidewalk and pull me into his arms.
“Marry me. Marry me right the fuck now.”
My heart skipped a beat and butterflies erupted in my belly. Excitement sizzled along every nerve inside my body because I knew he was being one hundred percent sincere.
“Right now?” I asked.
“Right the fuck now.”
I giggled. “What about the wedding? Your parents?”
His arms shifted when he shrugged. “We’ll have the wedding.”
“You want to get married twice?” I laughed.
He put his forehead against mine and stared into my eyes. “I’d marry you a thousand times if I could.”
“Oh, Romeo,” I whispered.
“But this first time. The official time. This time is for us and only us. No reporters, no waiters with trays of appetizers, no cameras going off, and no speeches to listen to. Just me. Just you.”
“Just us.” My voice was wistful, totally captivated by the picture he painted.
This was the way we were meant to get married.
“You in your yoga pants and Alpha U hoodie, me in my jeans and snotty T-shirt.” I laughed, and he grinned. “Us exactly as we always are together and nothing else. As far as everyone else will know, we got married on the day of our wedding. But we’ll know. And every time I look at you, there will be an unspoken secret between us, a bond of how we really vowed to be together.”
A tear slipped out of the corner of my eye, and he kissed it away. “It’s perfect.”
“Say yes, Rimmel.” He urged.
“Yes.”
After a quick kiss to my lips, he pulled back to take my hand, and we ran up the courthouse steps and into the huge, historic building.
Of course, we had to go through security, and he became impatient. But my lips danced with laughter, and even though I couldn’t see them, I knew my eyes held a note of promise. I didn’t mind the wait.
It just added to the anticipation.
The anticipation of the moment when he would become mine completely.
When we were finally cleared to travel deeper into the building, Romeo tugged me along behind him as he followed the signs toward where we needed to go. When we finally stepped into the small office, it was five minutes until five.
It was almost closing time.
There was an older woman sitting behind a very long counter on the far side of the room. Her hair was graying and styled. She smiled when Romeo approached the counter.
“We need a marriage license, please.”
My heart burst with joy, and my fingers tightened around his. I suddenly wanted to scream that this beautiful man was going to marry me.
But I didn’t. I somehow managed to contain my joy.
The woman chuckled like his impatience was evident to more than just me and pulled out a clipboard with an application on it. “Fill this out. Pay the fee. In Maryland, there is a standard two-day waiting period. Once it’s up, you can come back in and we’ll marry you.”
“Two days,” I intoned. Suddenly, two days seemed unbearable. It seemed like a lifetime. I was ready now.
Romeo untangled our hands and leaned on the counter to deliver a devastating smile. “Here’s the thing, Kathy,” he said, reading her name off the badge pinned to her shirt. “We’re having a big wedding, for our family and a million of my mother’s closest friends.”
As he spoke, he drew the attention of the other two women in the room. Like gravity, he pulled them all in with his deep, smooth voice, charming smile, and movie star good looks.
“But I don’t care about any of that stuff. I only care about her.” He leaned back to wrap an arm around me and draw me into the conversation. “We don’t want to wait two days. Hell, I’ve been waiting sinc
e the minute she shoved a wrinkled piece of paper in my face and forced me to study with her.”
“I did not force you,” I demanded.
He kissed my forehead like he was humoring me, and the woman off to my left sighed.
“Well, I guess I could see if the justice of the peace has left for the day,” Kathy said.
“I’ll go get him!” one of the other women yelled and raced off.
“It’s closing time,” Kathy said, her gaze bouncing between us. “A secret wedding, huh?”
“You good at keeping secrets, Kathy?” Romeo asked and then winked.
She blushed. Good Lord, she was blushing.
Seconds later, the woman who ran off returned with a man in a suit and a scowl on his face. “Here they are,” she said, pointing at us.
The man looked up, and the bothered look fell away, replaced by recognition. “Roman Anderson?”
Romeo smiled. “How you doing?” He pushed his arm across the counter and held his hand out to the justice of the peace.
“I’m good,” he said, shaking Romeo’s hand and then glancing at me. “You want to get married?”
“Right now if we can,” he replied, nodding.
“Coming in at the end of the day was pretty smart,” the man said. “No one would suspect you’d be here.”
“That’s the idea,” he said.
“I take it you don’t want the media to know about this?”
“No. It’s a secret,” I said, thrilled at the idea of Romeo and me having a secret no one else knew.
“Do it, Abe.” The woman who ran off to find him encouraged him.
“I can waive the two-day waiting period as long as you both can attest to the fact that no one is forcing you to be here. This is not a union under duress.”
“The only duress I feel right now is the possibility that you’re going to say no,” I said.
Romeo laughed. “What she said.”
“All right, then. It’d be my pleasure to marry you and your lady, Mr. Anderson.”
“Romeo,” he said and grinned. “And thank you.”
“You can thank me by signing your autograph after you’re married.”
“Sure thing.”
The justice of the peace turned to the three women standing there taking it all in. “I’m going to need a witness.”
All three of them raised their hands and then scowled at each other for daring to take the position.
“Three witnesses should make it extra official, don’t you think, Romeo?” I asked.
“I like extra official.” He agreed.
The women all looked at Abe with hope in their eyes. He chuckled. “Everybody in my office.”
Kathy, the woman standing just behind the counter, pointed to the papers. “Fill these out and then we’ll get you two lovebirds married.”
Romeo picked up a pen and started writing furiously.
Married.
Romeo and I were getting married.
Chapter Twenty-Four
Romeo
We filled out the papers.
We signed our names.
And now here Rim and I stood in a tiny office in the back of the courthouse with Abe, the justice of the peace, Kathy, and her two friends, about to be married.
Ever since I met her, I’d been finding ways to get my name on her. After today, she’d wear it forever.
“Shall I begin?” Abe asked.
“Please,” Rimmel answered, her eyes never leaving mine.
She was standing right here before me, her head barely reaching my shoulder, my dark-blue sweatshirt hanging past her thighs, and the hem of her black yoga pants dragging the floor. Her hair was pulled up in a messy knot on her head, and the black-framed glasses she’d been wearing since the first moment I laid eyes on her were perched on her face.
She was exactly who I wanted and nothing less.
Her hands felt small and slightly cold in mine as I held them between us. Automatically, I folded mine around them, giving her the warmth my skin was offering.
“We are gathered here today, in secret…” Abe began, and I flashed him a smile. “To join this man and this woman in marriage.”
Rimmel smiled brightly, so bright I saw it in her eyes.
“No one in this room has any objections.” Abe went on. “So we can move right on.”
I barely heard what Abe was saying. I got lost so deep in her eyes. I don’t know how I ever got here, but my God, I was grateful.
“Do you Roman William Anderson take Rimmel Anne Hudson to be your lawfully wedded wife, for—”
“Hells yeah,” I said, cutting him off. I didn’t need to hear everything he was going to list. It didn’t matter. I’d agree to anything to make her mine.
One of the women standing as witness giggled, but I didn’t dare tear my eyes away from my love.
“Alrighty then,” Abe said and turned to Rimmel.
“Do you Rimmel Anne Hudson take Roman William Anderson to be your lawfully wedded husband—”
“Yes,” she said, just as impatient.
“Do you have rings?” Abe asked.
Shit! In my rush to make it official, I hadn’t even thought about rings.
“We don’t need them,” Rimmel said smoothly. “I don’t need anything but this.”
I love you, I mouthed.
I love you, she mouthed back.
“Okay, then. Repeat after me.” Abe looked at me.
I cleared my throat. “I got this.”
Abe gestured with his hand that I should continue.
Rimmel was watching me, eyes shimmering with unshed tears, and my chest expanded.
“A lot of people say you stole my heart. You managed somehow to get the heart of a player who would never settle down. But that’s not the truth. The truth is you never had to steal my heart, baby, because I gave it to you. I’d give you anything you ask for, but you ask for nothing. You, with your gentle touch and fierce love of animals. I promise to love you even when you drag home fifty cats and fifty dogs because you couldn’t bear to leave them at the shelter for one more day. I promise to love you even when your hair tries to eat my hand and when my car cries because you’re a terrible driver. I never knew I needed you, Rim, until I saw you that night, soaking wet from the rain, sitting on the floor of the shelter, with a one-eyed cat in your lap. But I do need you. I need you so fucking much. I don’t know how or why you let me in, but thank you. Thank you for making me the luckiest bastard on the face of this earth. I’ll never take you for granted. I’ll love you long after I’m gone. I vow to you here and now, in front of all these strangers…”
She laughed. Then she sniffled and a few tears slid behind her glasses.
“We’re a team now, and as long as I’m breathing, you’ll never be alone in life, not ever.”
Rimmel pulled her hands free of mine and reached for the hem of my shirt, bent, and used it to wipe the tears falling freely down her face.
“You have a shirt of your own,” I pointed out, a smile in my voice.
“I like yours better,” she said, her voice raspy with tears.
“Can’t say that I blame her,” Kathy said, and the two women standing beside her made sounds of agreement.
Abe cleared his throat and turned to Rimmel. “And now you may repeat after me.”
Rimmel straightened and shook her head. “I got this.”
“I thought you might,” he said and gestured for her to take the floor.
Chapter Twenty-Five
Rimmel
I was crying like a baby.
There was just no stopping the tears.
We might be standing in a tiny office with an audience of people we didn’t even know, but it didn’t matter.
This was perfect.
It was exactly what I needed. It was everything I wanted.
And Romeo, oh my word, Romeo. I think one of my ovaries burst when he said his vows. He knew exactly what to say and how to say it. There was no way on earth I would ever say an
ything so eloquent and soul-shattering.
But I could try.
“I’ve spent a lot of time reading in my life. You know I like my books. I always read nonfiction. I never had time for fairy tales. But what no one ever knew was sometimes I would sit in the back of a library, in a place where no one would ever see, and I’d read a love story. They were always so epic and so maddeningly impossible, but it didn’t stop a little piece inside of me from wishing for something like that of my own. And then I met you. You were impossible, rude, and way out of my league. You drew attention wherever you went, and I’d spent most my life trying to hide. But there was no hiding from you. I don’t need to read love stories ever again, and not because they’re impossible, but because our love story is the greatest one I’ll ever know. Even when you try to boss me around and insult my driving, my love for you will always win. I promise to love you even when the reporters follow our every move and your mother drives me crazy. I promise to love every quarter of you I unearth, and I vow that nothing and no one could ever make me doubt the man you are. Thank you for turning my life upside down, for not running when I tried to push you away. I swear I’ll never take you for granted, and I’ll give you every piece of me that exists. You’ll never be alone, and you’ll always know you’re loved as long as I walk this earth.”
My voice fell away, and there was a long stretch of silence in the space all around us.
I’d never seen Romeo cry, not ever. But in this moment, I watched the way his eyes glittered and knew the reason they glistened so intensely was because unshed tears were in his gaze.
He tore his eyes from mine only for a second to glance at Abe. “Wrap it up, my man,” he said.
I giggled.
He said a few more things I never heard and then, “With the full authority and power vested in me by the state of Maryland, I now pronounce you husband and wife.”
I jumped up and down a little, unable to contain my happiness.
“Mr. Anderson, you can kiss your bride.”
“About time,” he drawled.
But he didn’t plant one on me right away, not like I thought he would. Instead, he slowly slid the glasses up onto my head, taking away the small barrier between us.
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