The Gambler

by Denise Grover Swank

  “But what if he drives off with it?” Worry filled her eyes. “I can’t get married in black.”

  He gave her a quick kiss. “He won’t. I haven’t paid him yet. Come on.”

  He heard Gram’s muffled voice. “Noah! Did you butt dial me? If so, I hope that butt’s naked.”

  Shit. He put the phone to his ear as he held the door to the office open for Libby. “Sorry, Gram. No, I didn’t butt dial you, and no, I am not naked.”

  “That’s a pity,” she grumbled. “Still haven’t made progress with our girl?”

  “Actually, we’re walking in to get a marriage license, then off to Little Heaven Wedding Chapel to get married.”

  “You’re what?”

  A woman at the counter pointed to her ear and shook her head at Noah. “Gram, I’ve gotta go. Thanks for all your help.” He hung up and stuffed the phone into his pocket, ignoring the new round of vibrating. He’d deal with Gram later.

  There were two couples ahead of them. The first couple at the counter looked barely eighteen. The girl kept glancing around as if she was waiting for her parents to show up and ground her. Maybe she was.

  He looked down at Libby, his chest burning with love. He couldn’t believe he’d proposed. He couldn’t believe she’d accepted. Could it really have been this easy all along?

  No, neither one of them had been ready until now.

  Next was a gay couple. They looked like total opposites. The man who did the talking was stylishly dressed and had a take-charge personality, while his soon-to-be-husband wore jeans and a soft sweater. But when they looked at each other, the love in their eyes was unmistakable.

  Is that what people saw when they looked at Noah and Libby together? He glanced at the clock on the wall. 11:15. He tapped his foot impatiently. He had to make sure her dreams came true. Getting married before she turned thirty was important to her and he was determined to make that happen.

  Finally it was their turn and Libby practically bounced to the counter.

  “We’re here for a marriage license,” Libby said, the excitement in her voice unmistakable. “We’re getting married.” She looked up at Noah with wonderment on her face, like she couldn’t quite believe this was happening.

  He knew exactly how she felt.

  The clerk rolled her eyes. “Then you’re in luck. Marriage licenses are what I do here.”

  They filled out the form, showed their IDs, Noah paid the fee, and then they were climbing into Paul’s cab. The clock on his dashboard read 11:22.

  “We’re going to have to hurry.”

  Paul looked over his shoulder, sporting a huge grin. “Don’t you worry. I never back down from a challenge. I’ll get you there with plenty of time to spare.”

  “It’s okay if we don’t make it,” Libby said, leaning her head on his shoulder. “If we’re off by a few minutes, it’s okay.”

  Noah turned to her and lifted her chin so he could look into her eyes. “No, it’s not. We’ll do this. We’ll make it work.”

  He kissed her to show her how much he loved her, but then he realized he’d kissed countless other women. It hadn’t meant anything to him other than a prelude to getting laid. Could Libby tell the difference? He could. Just holding her hand gave him more of a thrill than he’d felt with any other woman.

  “Noah?” she asked softly, and he realized he was staring at her. “You okay?”

  “Never better.”

  “Really?” she asked hesitantly. Her eyes were more focused. She was obviously sobering up a bit. “Are you sure you want to do this?”

  Was she about to change her mind? Had she agreed only because her judgment had been impaired?

  “Yes.” He kissed her again, partially in desperation, and partly because he couldn’t believe he could—that she was so willing and accepting.

  “We’re here,” Paul said cheerfully.

  When Noah looked up, he saw they were parked in front of the Little Heaven Wedding Chapel. He fumbled with the door handle and scrambled out, pulling Libby with him. He dug out his wallet and handed the driver a handful of cash.

  “Thanks for the ride. You’ve been a lifesaver.”

  Noah started to turn away, but Paul called after him, “Hey! Don’t forget the dress!”

  Libby gasped and wrestled the bag through the door. If they had time, he’d love to watch her try to wrangle the dress that was nearly as large as she was, but the clock was ticking, so he took it from her, grinning. “Let me wrestle with it now, you can wrestle with it after you get it on.”

  There was a saucy grin on her face as she handed it to him. “Then we can wrestle it together when we get back to the room.”

  The thought of taking it off her again was distracting, shuttling blood away from his brain to his other thinking appendage. But he had the rest of his life to think about taking her clothes off—now he needed to make sure they made the midnight deadline.

  The rest of his life.

  With every other woman, Noah had considered marriage akin to a prison sentence. He hadn’t been able to fathom committing to one woman. Until Libby. He hoped to spend the next fifty or more years with her, and he was certain it wouldn’t be long enough.

  But what if he was rushing her? In the cab, she’d asked him if he was sure. He’d never asked that same question of her.

  He grabbed her hand and pulled her to a halt. “Lib, wait.”

  Worry flickered in her eyes.

  “You asked me if I was sure, but are you sure?”

  Her eyes lit up. “Yes. Very.”

  “Then let’s get married.” He put his hand on the small of her back and guided her to the door.

  As soon as they entered the lobby she stopped in her tracks. “Oh, my God,” she whispered. “You really did bring me to demonic cherub hell.”

  He wasn’t going to argue with her assessment. Cherubs were everywhere. Painted on the walls, the ceilings, the doors, and even the floors. Cherub statues lined the walls and sat on pedestals. A cherub statue cheerfully peed in the pool of the fountain standing in the corner. A counter with a glass display case was on their left.

  Noah gawked in horror. “Oh. My. God.”

  “I guess we know why it’s called Little Heaven.”

  Noah had started to turn around when a woman called out with a thick accent he couldn’t place. “You must be the couple my sweet Ned told me about. Welcome. Welcome. We have everything already prepared. I am Angelica. I hear you’re in a hurry.” She emerged from the dark hallway directly across from them and glanced down at Libby’s impossibly flat stomach. “A little one on the way? You need today’s date to match a due date?”

  “What?” Libby gasped.

  “No,” Noah said with more force than he’d intended. “We want to be married before Libby’s birthday. Which is tomorrow. But she needs to put on her dress. Is there somewhere she can change?”

  Libby glanced around the room, pressing her back to his chest, then looked up at him with a hesitant look in her eyes.

  He leaned down and whispered in her ear. “We don’t have to get married here.”

  “We don’t have time to go anywhere else.”

  She was right.

  He turned her around and put his hands on her shoulders, bending at the knee so he could look her in the eyes. “I know this probably isn’t how you imagined it.” He gave her a sly grin. “But you’re probably the only woman in history to have two themed weddings. Now we’ll have plenty of material for cocktail parties when people ask us about our wedding. No boring stories for us.”

  “Oh, Noah.” She threw her arms around his neck and buried her face in his chest. “How do you always know just what to say to make me feel better?”

  He had no idea. It was probably the only thing in his life that had ever come naturally to him. Only further confirmation they were perfect for each other.

  “Come, come,” Angelica said, tugging on Libby’s arm. “We must get you dressed.”

  The woman snagged the ba
g from Noah and grabbed Libby’s arm. “I’ll get her ready,” she said, tugging Libby down a cherub-lined hall. “You pick out the extras.”

  “Extras?”

  The door to the dressing room closed and Noah jumped when a man’s voice sounded behind him. “Flowers. Rings. The like.” He had a deeper accent than Angelica. It sounded like a bizarre mix of Italian and the Deep South.

  Noah spun to see a plump, bald man walking through a curtain behind the counter. The man tightened the sash of his white satin robe. Had he just gotten out of bed?

  “I’m Tito and I’ll be happy to assist you. So what will it be?” the man asked, his voice sounding like it was on autopilot. His head bobbed as he spoke, drawing Noah’s attention to the tufts of thick chest hair peeking above the V of his robe. “We offer several flower options.” He led Noah to a refrigerator full of bouquets and boutonnieres. “What does your bride like?”

  “Uh . . . nothing too fussy.” The bouquets in the case looked like the ones Megan and Blair had carried—roses and lilies in formal arrangements. That wouldn’t work. “What about those?” He pointed to a pile of flowers at the bottom. A mix of yellow daisies, pink rosebuds and some other flowers in pinks and purples covered the floor of the cooler.

  “Those?” Tito shook his head, chuckling, then explained slowly as though Noah were a simpleton. “Those are the leftovers. The ones that weren’t good enough to be in bouquets.”

  Didn’t that describe him and Libby? Never feeling like they were good enough? He knew these were the flowers she’d want. “We’ll take those.”

  “You don’t understand,” the bald man said, enunciating each word. “Those aren’t for sale. They’re at the bottom because they were the leftovers.”

  “Then why are they in the case?”

  The man groaned. “Because Angelica gives them to her mother to make sachets.”

  Noah gave him a blank look.

  “You know, those little bags full of flower petals that stink up drawers.”

  “I still want them.”

  “They’re just loose.” He opened the door and snatched them up. “See? They’re not even in a bouquet.”

  Noah reached around him and grabbed a roll of twine. “So just bundle them together and wrap this around them.”

  The man lifted his hands in the air in defeat. “Take them if you want. You can have them for free. But your bride is going to walk out on you the minute she sees them.”

  “You don’t know my Libby.” His Libby. He marveled at his words. She was his. She was actually his.

  “Do you have rings?”

  “Oh, shit. We don’t have anything.” No wonder Libby had been so stressed over the last month. Even if Mitch had come up with the ideas, he knew she’d organized it all. Turned out there was a whole lot more to this wedding planning gig than two willing participants.

  “Not to worry.” A smug smile lit up the man’s face. “We can take care of everything.” He moved over to a glass case full of rings. “We have a nice selection of rings over here that will fit anyone’s budget. From the bare basics to the high rollers.”

  Noah seriously doubted high rollers got married here unless they were drop-dead drunk. But the selection ran from simple gold and silver bands to large diamond rings that he suspected might actually be cubic zirconia.

  “Let me see those.” He pointed to silver bands—his and hers. The larger band was thick and the smaller band daintier, but both were smooth silver with tiny beading at the edges.

  “After the bouquet decision, I’m not surprised,” the man grumbled under his breath. “These are part of our budget selection.”

  Noah had to admit the design wasn’t much, but he was certain Libby would love them. He’d get her a diamond engagement ring later . . . from a more reputable place.

  The man’s gaze zoomed in on Noah’s crotch and then moved slowly up his chest and stopped at his face. “What size are you?”

  Uh . . .” What the hell was he talking about? Cup size? Then it dawned on him. “I already have a tux. See? I’m wearing it.”

  “Not for the tux. The ring.” He pointed to Noah’s left hand, which rested on the counter. “What size ring do you and your bride wear?”

  “Uh . . . I don’t know.” Noah hadn’t bought a ring since his class ring in high school, and ring sizes had never come up in conversation with Libby.

  The man rolled his eyes and reached over to grab Noah’s hand. He shoved the ring on Noah’s left ring finger.

  “This is all so sudden . . .” Noah joked. “And I’m already taken.”

  Tito scowled and moved the ring around on Noah’s finger. “Lucky for you, it fits perfectly. Now we’ll see if the other one fits your bride.”

  “What else do I need to get?” Noah asked, glancing over his shoulder at the door and wondering what was taking her so long. He reminded himself that the dress was a monster to maneuver. They’d be lucky if they were married by midnight. But he couldn’t shake the worry that she might change her mind.

  “Professional photography? Minister? Music?”

  “We have to pay for music?”

  The man gave Noah a look that read cheap bastard. “We have a deluxe package that will provide it all and include a few extras.”

  “Fine. Yes to all of it.”

  The man grinned and then turned to his cash register to total everything up. “That will be nine hundred and ninety-nine dollars.”

  Noah knew he was getting screwed, but he handed over his credit card willingly enough. He’d pay a hell of a lot more than that to marry Libby. He wanted it to be perfect for her, but he reminded himself that there were demon cherubs watching their every move. “What are the extras that come with the deluxe package?”

  Tito smiled as he handed Noah the receipt. “Our top-of-the-line service, including an audience.”

  Noah put his credit card back in his wallet. “Wait. An audience?”

  “We’re ready!” Angelica shouted from behind the door.

  A sigh of relief escaped Noah’s lips and he started for the dressing room, but Tito stopped him. “Where do you think you’re going?”

  “To see my bride.”

  He shook his head. “Oh, no you aren’t. Give me that ring and march yourself inside the chapel and wait up front.”

  He pulled the ring off his hand and handed it him. “But . . .”

  “You don’t want to see her before she comes down the aisle.” He picked up the bouquet Noah had tied together with the twine. “I’ll give this to the bride.” He leaned to the side, partially covering his mouth. “And I’ll give you a heads-up if she takes off after seeing it.”

  “Ha. Ha,” Noah mumbled, but his nerves were kicking in now that the majority of the alcohol had left his system. Libby had to be sobering up too. What if he was wrong about the flowers? What if she changed her mind about everything?

  He really wanted to talk to her one last time, but as much as it killed him to admit it, Tito was right. Given how superstitious Libby tended to be, he didn’t want to press his luck by forcing his way in to see her. He pushed on the double wooden doors that bore a placard reading Holy Seraphim Chapel, took one step inside, and froze, completely unprepared for what he found there.

  The chapel looked like it had been cobbled together by a drunken construction worker fired from Caesar’s Palace. They had tried to emulate European chapels with the domed ceiling, Corinthian columns, and stained glass, but on a much smaller scale. The effort had failed miserably.

  The back wall was encased in an arch and a backlit stained glass window filled most of the space. It might have been pretty if not for the design. The panes were covered with the figures of grown men sporting short stubby wings and flowing fabric wrapped around their johnsons, which made them look like they were wearing diapers. Naked women surrounded them, gazing up in adoration. All the male figures were identical, as were the female figures, and to make matters worse, they had clearly been modeled after Angelica and Tito. />
  Oh. Fuck.

  Crooked columns held up the arch and the platform floor in front of the window was painted a faux gray marble, as was the short aisle leading to the altar. The front of the room had held Noah’s attention so long he realized he’d missed the rest of the chapel. There were three arched niches on either side, all filled with concrete angels, which thankfully bore no resemblance to the two owners. The insides of the arches appeared to have been spray-painted a metallic gold.

  The mural on the ceiling was composed of multiple scenes of a naked angel bearing a remarkable resemblance to Tito, although Noah was certain the artist had over-exaggerated the man’s penile girth and length. Angelica was there too, with wings this time, and there were multiple images of her and Tito in the throes of passion. One particularly memorable composition showed the two fornicating on a bench in a garden, with Tito thrusting from behind wearing a shit-eating grin.

  Holy hell. Some things couldn’t be unseen.

  Noah took several hesitant steps down the aisle, telling himself that Libby would probably love it. He suspected she was the only person on the planet who would.

  It wasn’t until he stepped onto the small platform that he realized the back row of folding chairs was occupied by six men, most of whom appeared to have been plucked from a holding pen at the police station. One man wore a grungy knit cap and slurped from a can of Campbell’s soup, while another leaned his head against the wall, releasing a small snore.

  “We’re all ready,” Angelica singsonged as she entered the chapel through the double doors, her hands pressed together at her breasts as if in prayer. “Your beautiful bride is ready. Shall we begin?”

  He nodded, finding it difficult to push out a yes. His chest was so tight with nerves he could hardly breathe. He noticed a clock on the wall over the entrance, the hands in the shape of angel wings. 11:49. At least Libby hadn’t taken off yet.

  Angelica glided over to a stereo system in the corner and pressed a button. Music poured into the room and the double doors swung open as if by magic.

  Libby filled the doorway, Noah’s bouquet in her hands, looking more beautiful than he’d ever seen her. Their eyes locked and everything else fell away. However strange and unconventional this was, it was right. It was them.