“No!” she cried. She had forgotten where they were. She slid off the chair to her knees and caught his fingers, lacing them through her own. “No, I don’t want a different diamond, I want the old one—”
“You still have it?”
“Yes!”
“And the wedding ring?”
“That, too.”
“I have mine, too. And I’ve asked your father for you all over again, I thought that our parents had a right to know, and—”
“I love you, Brendan,” she interrupted, and kissed him. And then, when a loud roar went up, Kaitlin realized at last that they had one hell of an audience.
“Excuse us, will you?” Brendan said casually. He stood, pulling her up with him, and smiled, then swept her from the hall and ran through the corridors with her until he found an empty room.
And, once inside, he kissed her.
Open-mouthed, sweetly, hotly passionate. The kind of kiss that had made her melt at eighteen.
The kind of kiss that made her melt right now. And then, trembling, she was in his arms, trying to say all the things she had to tell him.
“I don’t need a big wedding. I never did, really. I just didn’t realize it. Oh, Brendan, I don’t care, I don’t—”
“I care,” he insisted, his eyes gleaming. “This is the last time I want to marry you, Kaitlin. I want it to be perfect. I found out that since we were married by a justice of the peace the first time, we can get a dispensation to be married in the church.”
“Brendan, I don’t care—”
“Kaitlin, I do. And think how good we’ll be at weddings by the time we get to our own! We still have to see Barbara and Joe legally wed, then we can get to our own.”
“Oh, Brendan…”
“You haven’t answered me yet, Kaitlin.”
Very, very slowly, she smiled, her arms looped around his neck, her eyes radiant, dazzling. “Okay, a big wedding. On one condition.”
“What’s that?”
“You don’t disappear for almost a month again. We, er…”
“We what?”
“We get to fool around in the meantime. Maybe we could even go ahead and start thinking family a wee bit before the ceremony, as Gram might say.”
“With her teeth in,” Brendan agreed.
Kaitlin laughed and, once again, he took her in his arms.
She was certain in that very moment that their vows were sealed. She didn’t need the wedding. She never had. She needed Brendan. She loved Brendan.
And she had never really lost him….
But weddings were wonderful, she decided long moments later.
At this one, she had found her way back home.
Epilogue
Okay, so it was worth it.
Yes, definitely worth it, Brendan decided.
This just might be the most beautiful wedding he had ever seen, and it was his own.
The church was dressed in flowers, red and white, and regal candles burned atop elegant long brass poles attached to every pew. Kaitlin’s mother and his own were seated to the glorious notes of “Ave Maria,” and then, as the organ continued to play, their wedding party began to appear.
First came her little cousin, Brandy, in the elegant cream and black dress Kaitlin had chosen, her red curls adorned with a tiara of flowers. Then her junior bridesmaid walked down the aisle with the ring bearer, handsome in his very traditional tux. The ushers escorted her bridesmaids and her two matrons of honor, Donna and Barbara.
And then came Kaitlin.
Escorted on her father’s arm, she was achingly beautiful. She wore a traditional gown, but it was a soft dove gray, not white. Yet Brendan had never seen anything more elegant. Seed pearls had been sewn into a beautiful design, along with soft, glimmering sequins. A veil covered her face, and a sweeping train followed behind her. Her hair was free and flowing down her back, just shaded by the gauze of her veil. The gown’s bodice was medieval, the sleeves long and tapering, and the veil was held in place by a narrow crown of seed pearls and flowers.
And yet, most beautiful of all were her eyes. Sapphire blue that day, glimmering through the gauze of her veil until she reached the altar. Then her father lifted her veil, and the two of them smiled at one another with pride and love and just a hint of tears.
Someone sniffed loudly. Either her mother or Brendan’s, she was certain.
And then her father was handing her over to him, and the love in her eyes touched him. Somewhere deep inside his heart, he felt a quiver. And even before the service began, long before they exchanged their vows, he knew that this time it would last forever.
His voice was steady and firm as they exchanged their vows. Hers was crystal clear, but her finger trembled slightly when he slipped on her wedding ring.
It was the same ring he had given her twelve years before. She had kept it, just as he had kept the ring she had given him. Perhaps the diamond was small. It didn’t matter to either of them. What did matter was that they both still had the rings. And they both knew that no other rings could possibly do.
They pledged their love. They knelt, they rose, Barbara adjusted Kaitlin’s train.
There was another sniff from somewhere. Brendan smiled. Gram. Lizzie Boyle Rosen. She was right behind them, he knew, next to Brendan’s mom, her arm linked through her beloved Al’s. Bless you, Lizzie, Brendan thought. You were always rooting for me, weren’t you?
He heard the words and the music. But most of all, he felt Kaitlin beside him. Felt her hand when they touched, felt the trembling inside her. Breathed in the sweetness of her perfume, and met the shining happiness in her eyes.
To love, honor and cherish…
He smiled, and as Father Mulraney said that he could kiss the bride, he swept her into his arms to a cacophony of applause.
She was his wife again. Kaitlin, with her laughter, her spirit, her beauty, her sky-blue eyes and waves of strawberry curls. With her temper, too, but with all her wisdom and, most importantly, all her love.
It had been beautiful. A perfect wedding, he thought as he tasted her kiss. The wedding she had always seen in her dreams.
It was perfect for him, too. The wedding he had envisioned when he had been so much younger. If only Sean had been there.
Even as that thought touched his heart, she broke from his embrace, and smiled at him radiantly, her fingers still locked in his own.
Once again he felt the trembling deep within his heart. Her emotions were so easily read within the blue beauty of her eyes. Her lips were curved into a smile of such sweet warmth that even now he felt a growing wonder that it could be for him.
It almost seemed that there was a whisper breathed against his ear. Sean’s whisper. “You’re lucky, cousin. You’ve got love. When you’ve got love, you’ve got everything.”
He had to kiss her again. He pulled her into his arms, and there was a burst of applause as their lips met and he kissed her for another eternity.
When he released her, there was laughter in her eyes, and just a hint of tears. Then he took her hand, the music started, and he led her down the aisle and out of the church.
Before the others could follow too closely behind him, he swept her into his arms, delicately planting a kiss on her forehead.
“I love you, Kaitlin O’Herlihy,” he told her.
“Oh, Brendan! I love you, too, so much! You gave me everything! Everything I wanted!”
Barbara and Joe were behind them by then. Joe was claiming a kiss from the bride, while Barbara congratulated Brendan and hugged him warmly. And then Barbara and Donna were hugging Kaitlin, and Joe and Bill were there to pump Brendan’s hand, while the others were pouring out of the church.
So many good friends and relatives to greet them.
Lizzie and Al. Brendan’s mother, with tears in her eyes. His father, proud, pleased. His cousins, her cousins. His family, her family.
Their family, now. And all their friends.
Everyone told them what a perfect wedd
ing it had been. And it had been perfect, he thought, closing his eyes for just a second as a smile teased his lips. It seemed that Sean had made this wedding. In wisdom, in spirit.
Before anyone could part them again, he found his bride’s hand and pulled her into his arms. “No,” he told her. “You gave me everything. I have your love, Kaitlin, and love is everything.”
Just for good measure, he kissed her long and hard again, heedless of those around them.
They would just have to wait…because love was everything.
ISBN: 978-1-4268-1638-3
WEDDING BELL BLUES
Copyright © 1990 by Heather Graham Pozzessere
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Wedding Bell Blues Page 18
