“Are you sure you’re okay with all the secrecy?” Wade had asked a dozen times.
“I am deliriously happy with all the secrecy,” she insisted.
“Gina’s going to pitch a fit when she realizes you’ve flown a caterer in to do all the food,” he pointed out.
“I couldn’t very well have had her do it. Besides, she’ll have other things to do. She and the other Calamity Janes are my bridesmaids.” She frowned. “I just hope Emma isn’t going to flip out at the dress I ordered for her. It is very difficult to find anything formal and flattering for a woman who is eight months pregnant.”
“I thought bridesmaids almost always hated their dresses,” he said. “Besides, I think she’ll look fabulous. There is something about a pregnant woman….” His voice trailed off as his gaze wandered over her. “I can hardly wait.”
“But wait you will, sweetie. We are not getting pregnant until after foaling season. I can’t imagine what I was thinking planning a wedding for now. I’m so exhausted I can hardly see.”
“Which is precisely why you are going inside, taking a long hot bath and going to bed,” Wade countered. “I’ll stay up with Miss Molly.”
“But I want to be here when she has Midnight’s foal,” she protested. “It will be their first.”
Wade hadn’t even tried to argue with her, which was why she was running around frantically the next day an hour before their guests were due and two hours before the ceremony itself. Miss Molly’s foal, a gorgeous colt, had been born just before dawn, which meant Lauren was operating on automatic pilot.
The kitchen was in chaos as the same Beverly Hills caterer who’d done Cassie’s impromptu wedding two years earlier moaned and groaned about the outrageous miracles people expected of him.
“Just do it,” Lauren ordered him. “I don’t have time to pacify you. You can go back to L.A. and tell everyone that you know the reason that I left, that I am certifiably crazy.”
Her offer put a gleam in his eye and he went back to putting the finishing touches on the elaborate wedding cake.
Lauren raced upstairs, showered and washed her hair and was just finishing her nails when the doorbell rang. Sighing, she put aside the polish and ran down to answer it. All four Calamity Janes simply stared.
“What?” she demanded.
“Are we early?” Gina asked.
“Exactly on time,” Lauren said.
“Then why aren’t you dressed?”
“Because I need a little help from my bridesmaids for that,” she explained, laughing when they stared at her with openmouthed astonishment.
“Bridesmaids?” Emma said cautiously, her hand on her huge belly. “As in, you’re getting married today?”
“Yep,” Lauren confirmed, then grinned. “Surprise!”
Wade hadn’t thought his life could get one bit sweeter, but that was before he stood in his own backyard wearing a tuxedo and watching Lauren walk toward him looking like a princess. It was exactly the way he’d envisioned it, yards of white satin, a gossamer-sheer veil and all. He’d be lucky not to trip all over the vows, she made him so tongue-tied.
Which was nothing like what she’d done to his mother. He glanced at the small collection of chairs for the guests and winked at his mother when he caught her eye. She had been astonished when he had introduced her to Lauren. Turned out Arlene was one of Lauren’s biggest fans, that she owned every one of Lauren’s movies on video. She couldn’t seem to get over the fact that her idol was actually marrying her son.
“Wait until I get home and tell everyone at the bar. They’ll die. They’ll absolutely die,” she said.
“Actually, Mom, we’ve been thinking you might want to stick around here,” he’d told her. “You don’t need to work anymore. We have plenty of room. You can have your own house right here on the ranch.”
Arlene had stared at him, perplexed. “But what would I do?”
“Nothing, unless you wanted to. You’ve earned the right to some time off.”
She had waved off the suggestion. “Absolutely not. You’re going to be newlyweds. I’m not about to be underfoot. We can discuss this after you have my first grandbaby.”
Now she caught his gaze and winked back at him. Then Lauren was at his side, and he had eyes for nothing else.
From then on everything was a blur—the exchange of vows, the congratulations from the Calamity Janes and their spouses and Arlene. Wade’s heart was too full to take any of it in. All he wanted to do was stare at his wife. His wife! He couldn’t get over it.
“Oh, my.”
Wade’s gaze instantly shot to Emma. There had been no mistaking the alarm in her voice.
“You okay?” he asked, noting the pale cheeks, the near hysteria in her eyes.
Biting her lower lip, she shook her head. “I’m so sorry,” she apologized.
“Sorry?” he asked, confused. “For what?”
“For upstaging your wedding. It seems I’m about to have a baby.”
Wade stared at her. “Now? You’re having the baby now?”
“Afraid so. Could you find Ford?”
“Absolutely, and I’ll get Lauren right over here, too. I think she’s inside.”
Within an hour, the entire wedding party had moved to the hospital waiting room to the bemusement of the other waiting families.
Lauren sat by his side, her hand tucked in his. “Isn’t it wonderful?” she said. “Emma’s having her baby on our wedding day. I was so afraid we’d upstage her and now she’s gone and done it to us.”
“If you ask me, we should have predicted it,” he teased.
“Why?”
“You are the Calamity Janes, aren’t you? Isn’t this just the kind of thing you do?”
A grin spread across her face. “You know, it is. And the most amazing thing is that you married me, anyway.”
“Oh, darlin’, it’s a part of your charm. I wouldn’t have you any other way. I imagine Rafe, Grady, Cole and Ford feel exactly the same way.”
“Amen to that,” Cole said, reaching for Cassie and drawing her into his lap just as Rafe slipped his arms around Gina and Grady kissed Karen.
Just then Ford emerged from the delivery room. “It’s a boy,” he announced, looking dazed.
“A boy,” Caitlyn said, looking disgusted. “I wanted a sister.”
“I think having another boy around will be cool,” Jake said. “With Aunt Karen’s baby and my brother and now this one, there are more of us. Maybe we can grow up together and be just like you guys.” He glanced at his mother. “We’ll be the Calamity Johns.”
“Absolutely not,” Cassie told him. “This group is one of a kind.”
Wade watched as she, Lauren, Gina and Karen gravitated together for a fierce hug. He glanced over at Cole and the other men.
“That group is one of a kind, no doubt about it,” he said.
“No doubt at all,” they agreed.
Rafe’s grin spread. “And we’re the lucky sons of guns who caught ’em.”
Wade shook his head. “Sorry, pal. I’m a hundred percent certain it was the other way around. We never had a chance.”
ISBN: 978-1-4268-5328-9
WRANGLING THE REDHEAD
Copyright © 2001 by Sherryl Woods
All rights reserved. Except for use in any review, the reproduction or utilization of this work in whole or in part in any form by any electronic, mechanical or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including xerography, photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, is forbidden without the written permission of the editorial office, Silhouette Books, 300 East 42nd Street, New York, NY 10017 U.S.A.
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*Vows
*Vows
*Vows
*Vows
*Vows
*Vows
‡And Baby Makes Three
‡And Baby Makes Three
‡And Baby Makes Three
‡And Baby Makes Three
**The Bridal Path
**The Bridal Path
**The Bridal Path
††And Baby Makes Three: The Next Generation
††And Baby Makes Three: The Next Generation
††And Baby Makes Three: The Next Generation
††And Baby Makes Three: The Next Generation
††And Baby Makes Three: The Next Generation
††And Baby Makes Three: The Next Generation
††And Baby Makes Three: The Next Generation
◊And Baby Makes Three: The Delacourts of Texas
◊And Baby Makes Three: The Delacourts of Texas
◊And Baby Makes Three: The Delacourts of Texas
◊And Baby Makes Three: The Delacourts of Texas
◊And Baby Makes Three: The Delacourts of Texas
§The Calamity Janes
§The Calamity Janes
§The Calamity Janes
§The Calamity Janes
††And Baby Makes Three: The Next Generation
§The Calamity Janes
Wrangling the Redhead Page 20
