Beautiful Bride

by Tammy Falkner

  Table of Contents

  Beautiful Bride

  Pete

  Sam

  Paul

  Matt

  Emily

  Reagan

  Pete

  Friday

  The Reed Brothers Series

  Copyright © 2014 by Tammy Falkner

  Beautiful Bride

  By Tammy Falkner

  A Reed Brothers Novella

  Night Shift Publishing

  Pete

  I’ll never, ever say this out loud, but when Reagan decided to give our wedding to another couple, I was relieved. It’s stupid. I know it is. But I can’t get over the idea that maybe—just maybe—what if…what if I’m not good enough for her? What if she could do better?

  What if she wakes up one day and realizes she made a mistake by picking me?

  I have my arm around her shoulders as we watch Patty Michaels walk down the aisle that was meant to bring Reagan to me as my wife, wearing the dress that Reagan picked out, carrying flowers that Reagan was supposed to carry. Reagan has her hand on my knee and she squeezes gently. She looks up at me and blinks her eyes, staring at my face.

  “Are you all right?” she whispers.

  I nod. “Fine.” I kiss her on the tip of her nose.

  Her brow knits. “Are you sure?”

  “Mm-hmm.” I look at Patty and John, and I can feel the emotion rolling off of them.

  We met Patty and John at the beach, where we’re staying for a working vacation. We’re really here for a festival where we’ll be doing tattoos for our reality TV show, but it’s the first vacation we’ve taken as a family in a really long time. Patty and John own the house next to the one we’re renting. Patty has cancer and they already know she’s going to die. She’s done with chemo and there’s nothing more they can do for her.

  Reagan gave Patty and John our wedding. It was an impromptu wedding we threw together on the spur of the moment. It’s not like it’s something we’ve been planning for a long time. It was just supposed to be the two of us on the beach, with our families around, formally committing ourselves to one another.

  But then…

  Right after we announced to my family that we wanted to get married, Reagan said something that worries me.

  We were happy, and I said something about kids, since Matt’s wife, Sky, is pregnant again. I’m jealous. I want that. But the way she reacted when I brought it up, Reagan made me feel like she doesn’t want the same thing.

  So, yeah…now I have doubts.

  Reagan lays her head on my shoulder and I automatically tip my head to keep her there, leaning to get closer to her. Sometimes I feel like I could crawl inside her and stay there forever. But today I’m doubting myself.

  I shouldn’t be.

  But I am.

  Patty and John just got back together after a pretty long separation. If they’re lucky, they’ll get about a month together before the end, if that long. I look down at Reagan in my arms, and I think about all the ways that I love her. I know that if she were sick like Patty, I would be devastated.

  I think about Henry and the way that he loved Nan. I want that. I want to grow old with Reagan. But even more than that, I want to have kids with her. I want to grow to be more than we are now.

  Matt and Sky are sitting in front of us, and they have their four small kids with them. They adopted the oldest two girls, and then they had twins—a boy and a girl. Their family is getting bigger and bigger, and Matt loves every second. He’s going to have enough for a softball team if they keep going.

  Matt reaches behind him and plops Hoppy into my lap. I lift my arm from around Reagan and put my hands on Hoppy’s tiny little waist and she jumps up and down. “I’ll be right back,” Matt says. “Hold her for me for a second, will you?”

  With the way that Joey is dancing, I’m guessing he needs to take her to the bathroom. Sky has Matty in her lap, and Mellie is in the chair next to her. I chuckle when I realize that when the new one gets here they’re going have more children than they have arms.

  Hoppy makes a happy noise in my lap, and I pick her up so I can blow a razzberry into her belly. She laughs out loud, and Reagan shushes us. But she’s grinning, too. She claps her hands together and Hoppy jumps toward her, so I hand her over. Reagan sits back and Hoppy leans against her, still and quiet while she gnaws on a plastic container of gum Reagan pulled from her pocket.

  “You sure you’re okay?” Reagan asks me. She looks worried and I want to reassure her, but I’m not sure I can.

  I nod and tuck a stray lock of hair behind her ear.

  I don’t know how to tell her what I’m feeling.

  I wish I did.

  Reagan watches Patty and John as they exchange their vows, and she wipes a tear from her eye. I can’t help it. I’m a little choked up too. Even knowing that Patty’s life is nearly over, they took the opportunity to reaffirm their love for one another. It’s heartbreaking. And so fucking beautiful.

  When the ceremony is over, everyone goes to Patty and John’s beach house to sit on the deck, and Emily plays the guitar for us. Patty looks tired, but she also looks like she’s going to push through it, so no one insists that she take a nap, or take a break, or anything else. They just let her enjoy it. That’s what life’s about. Enjoying it.

  When the party is over, I help clean up the chairs and party decorations, and Sam comes toward me carrying a football. “Want to toss the ball around?” he asks.

  I shake my head. “I think I’m just going to take a walk.” I look around for Reagan but she’s not outside. That’s probably for the best.

  “I’ll go with you.”

  I heave a sigh and nod. Sam is quiet as we walk down the beach. The sun is setting and the wind blows softly. It’s beautiful out here. But inside me, it’s not quite so beautiful.

  “What’s bugging you?” Sam asks.

  I jerk my head up to look at him. “What do you mean?”

  “I mean you’ve had a bug up your ass all day. What’s wrong?”

  I shake my head. “Nothing’s wrong.”

  I keep walking.

  “Dude, we shared a uterus,” Sam says. “Spill your guts.”

  “It’s nothing,” I mutter.

  “You’ve got every hair on my body standing up.” He holds out his arm for me to see. “So, spill it so I can stop feeling all the spooky twin shit.” He shivers dramatically.

  They say twins can sense when something is wrong. That’s true with us. We’ve always been that way. Even when we’re separated, I know when something is bothering Sam. I know when he’s in trouble. I know when something is wrong. And I wouldn’t take no for an answer if I asked him about it.

  “It’s just…” I shake my head. “Nothing.”

  He tosses the ball into the air and catches it. “You having second thoughts about getting married?”

  “How did you know?”

  He grins.

  “I fucking hate you,” I say.

  I walk in silence for a minute and he lets me. He just tosses the ball up and catches it, over and over.

  “I want to have kids and shit,” I mumble.

  Sam cups a hand around his ear and leans toward me like an old man. “What?” he croaks.

  “I want kids!” I stop walking and stare at him.

  He shrugs like I just said the most stupid thing in the world. “So knock her up. What’s the big deal?” His eyes open wide. “Wait, is there something wrong with your junk? Some reason you can’t knock her up?” He looks toward my shorts and up to my face, over and over. “You caught some weird disease in prison, didn’t you? Lowered your sperm count?” He throws up his hands like he’s surrendering. “Hey, I’m not judging.” He dodges when I try to hit him, but he’s gri
nning.

  “You’re not amusing,” I mutter, but I’m also biting back a smile.

  He puts a hand on my shoulder and squeezes. “Seriously, your junk isn’t the problem, is it?” He can’t hold the serious face but a moment. Then he grins.

  “Reagan likes my dick just fine, thank you very much.”

  “Dude, TMI.” He pretends to be startled. Then he sobers. “Then what is it?”

  “I don’t think she wants kids.”

  His brow furrows. “What makes you think that?”

  “She said it around the campfire. You heard her.”

  He shakes his head. “That’s not what she said.”

  “Yes, she did.”

  “Shut the fuck up,” he says. “She didn’t. She said you two have kids around you all the time. That’s what she said.”

  “Exactly.” I blow out a breath.

  “She’s right.”

  “What?”

  He shrugs. “She’s right. You do have kids around you all the time.”

  “We do not,” I protest.

  “Yes. You. Do.” He glares at me. “Not that it’s a bad thing. But you always have at least one of the kids from the program with you. And Edward and Gonzo. They pretty much live at your house.”

  I snort. “They’re not kids anymore.” Edward is a mechanic now and he’s a damn good one. Gonzo is in college.

  “And your little-brother program. And the juvenile-offender program. Not to mention all Matt’s kids. And now Paul and Friday have PJ, along with Hayley. And Em and Logan have Kit. There are fucking kids crawling the walls twenty-four/seven. Sometimes I have to get a hotel room just so I can take a nap when I visit. It’s ridiculous.”

  I consider what he’s said. It’s true. Reagan never complains, but we do have a lot of kids all over the place. They’re everywhere. Last week, Matt lost one of the twins and we found him hiding in the drapes.

  “You think that’s what she meant?”

  He nods.

  I heave a sigh. “Okay.”

  “You should talk to her about it.”

  I nod. I should. Here I am worrying when there might not even be a problem.

  “You want to marry her, right? This isn’t just an excuse to get out of it?”

  “Fuck no.”

  “Good, because her dad will make good on his promise to chop your nuts off if he finds out you’re never going to marry her.”

  “Oh, I’m marrying her, no matter what.”

  He grins. “You like your nuts. I know.”

  “I love her. Even more than my nuts. And I’m kind of attached to them.”

  He laughs. “So did I fix your problems?”

  “Yeah.”

  He cups his hand around his ear again.

  “Yes!” I bellow into his hand. He jumps back and pretends to be offended.

  He’s quiet as he starts to walk. The hair on my arms stands up. Oh fuck.

  “So, what’s up with you?” I ask.

  He shrugs. “Nothing new.”

  I hold up my arm.

  “Fuck,” he breathes. “Fucking twin shit.”

  I motion for him to continue.

  “So I think I made a mistake,” he says.

  “You? I didn’t think you made mistakes.” I laugh.

  He glares at me. “Very funny.”

  “What did you do?”

  “You remember Peck?” He looks at me out of the corner of his eye.

  “Yes,” I say slowly. She’s in a band Emily plays with, Fallen from Zero. “The drummer, right?”

  He nods.

  “Please tell me you didn’t fuck her,” I say, tossing my head back in frustration.

  “No,” he says. “I think that’s the problem.”

  “That you didn’t fuck her?”

  “Yeah. Now she won’t talk to me.”

  “Because…” I prompt him by rolling my finger.

  “We went out a couple of times.”

  “And…”

  He shrugs. “And she invited me back to her place.”

  “Did you go?”

  He nods. And his face flushes.

  “And?” God, getting information out of him is like pulling teeth.

  “And we were kind of making out.”

  I don’t prompt him this time.

  “And she turned out the lights.” He says it in a big rush, really quickly. Then he shuts his mouth.

  “You really like her, don’t you?”

  He nods.

  “You like her so much you don’t want to talk about intimate stuff.”

  He nods again.

  “Well, it’s about fucking time!” I shout. He finally found someone he won’t talk about, which means he has real feelings for her. Because when you meet the one, you don’t want to talk about intimate details with anybody but her. I learned that from Reagan, because when I’m with her, it’s different. Like she’s a piece of my soul, and I’ll get it dirty by talking about it with anybody but her.

  He bites his lips together. “So, she wanted the lights out.”

  I motion for him to continue. I know he won’t give me details. But still. “So you do it in the dark. No big deal.”

  “It is a big deal.” He heaves a sigh. “I got the feeling she wanted the lights out to keep me from seeing her. But I kind of want to see everything. All of her.” He shakes his head and mutters, “It’s stupid.”

  “Was she just feeling self-conscious?”

  He nods. “I think so.”

  “So she wanted to keep fooling around, but would only do it in the dark.”

  He nods again. “That’s all I’m telling you.”

  I hold up my hands like I’m surrendering to the cops. “I get it. Did you ask one of the girls what it means?”

  He shakes his head.

  “That’s where I’d start.”

  He shakes his head again. “I only told you because you asked. Twin thing.”

  “It’s not like you haven’t done it in the dark before.” Shit, we used to share a bedroom.

  “It was like she was hiding herself from me.”

  “Oh.” I breathe out slowly. Now I get it.

  He nods and starts throwing the damn ball again.

  “So maybe you need to dial it back a little. Get her to where she feels comfortable with you.”

  He shakes his head. “She won’t take my calls.”

  “So go to her house.”

  “She won’t answer the door.” He’s quiet for a moment and then he blurts out, “I fucking love her body. Every square inch of it.” He makes grabby motions with his hands. “Her ass, oh my god, it’s perfect. Enough to grab and hold on to. And her thighs. I want to nibble her all over.”

  I bite back my grin. “Well, that was awkward.”

  “She’s perfect.”

  “But she doesn’t feel perfect.”

  “Apparently not.”

  “You have some work to do.”

  He sighs. “Where do I start?”

  “I was afraid to touch Reagan when we got together.”

  He nods. “I remember.”

  “We had to work on it. Together. Slowly.”

  He blows out a breath in frustration. “You’re no help.”

  At least the hairs on my arms aren’t standing up now. I run down the beach and motion for him to throw the ball. He sends it in a long arc, straight into my arms.

  “So why didn’t you just do it with the lights out?” I yell from down the beach.

  “Because I like her,” he yells back. “I really, really like her.”

  Good, I can’t help but think. And I throw the ball back to him.

  Sam

  I knock softly on Paul and Friday’s door, and press my ear against it. When I hear a grunt, I doubt the sanity of this particular mission. Oh, shit. I came at the wrong time. I back up, ready to turn and run down the hall in the other direction, but suddenly Paul’s door opens and he sticks his head out.

  He rubs the sleep from his eyes. “What
do you want?”

  “Are you busy?” I fidget nervously. His eyes narrow at me when he catches me, and I force myself to stop.

  He opens the door all the way and lifts a finger to his mouth. Hayley is sprawled across their bed, and Friday is sitting in a cushy chair with PJ attached to her boob, nursing. I look everywhere but at her, and she laughs and adjusts her clothes so that she’s totally covered.

  “Happy now?” she asks. She shakes her head.

  I walk over and press a kiss to her forehead. I look down at PJ, and see how happy she is. How happy they are. Friday moves her feet and kicks the footrest out a few inches. I sit down on it and heave a sigh.

  “What’s up?” Paul asks, his brow furrowing.

  “I kind of need some advice,” I say.

  Paul chuckles. “Let me guess. This is about a girl.”

  “The girl,” I say.

  “The cheerleader?”

  I dated one of the team’s cheerleaders last year, but she wasn’t for me. She was beautiful, but that’s about as deep as it went.

  “No, it’s about Peck.”

  Friday snorts. Paul shoots her a look. “Sorry,” she whispers dramatically. She sticks a finger in the corner of PJ’s mouth and pops him off her boob. “Don’t look, Sam,” she says.

  I turn toward Paul and watch him, instead. He looks at Friday like she’s his whole world. With the way he’s looking at her, I have to look at her too, just to see if her face mirrors his. She meets his eyes, her face soft and inviting. It’s intimate and perfect and I’m so fucking jealous that I can barely see straight.

  “So…about Peck,” Paul says. “What did you do wrong?”

  “What makes you think it was me?” I ask, pretending to be offended.

  I lean back against Friday’s knee and she reaches out to scrub a hand across my cropped hair. It feels good, so I put my weight on her. She laughs and scratches her fingernails against my scalp for a minute. I preen like a kitten.

  “Sam,” she says, her hand slowing. She jerks my head so that I have to look at her. “Have you ever actually talked to Peck?”

  “We went out a few times,” I rush to say.

  She shakes her head. “That’s not what I mean.”

  “Of course I talked to her.”

  “With words? From her mouth?”

  I think back. Did I? I’m sure I did. “Yeah.”