Rounding out the wedding party today is my date.
My perfect, sweet, lovable, light of my world.
“Tisses me too, Mama?” Bash says.
I squat next to my 21-month-old son and peck his cheek. “Absolutely,” I whisper. “Go get kisses for you too.”
Theo pulls Laney back to her feet and slides a look at me that very clearly says he heard me telling his favorite nephew—fine, hisonlynephew—to go interrupt their first kiss.
And Bash does.
He sprints as fast as his chubby little legs will carry him to my brother and my new sister-in-law, who are barely four feet from us. Theo swings him up in the air before he can charge his head into Laney’s six-months-pregnant belly, which is, unfortunately, his new favorite game.
Bash squeals in delight. “Unka Deo, higher!”
Sabrina snorts softly behind me, and I know she’s seeing the same thing I am.
Laney’s face telegraphingno higher! No higher! You’ll drop him!
My brother has never met a boundary he wouldn’t test or a rule he wouldn’t break. No matter how much Laney brings out the best in him, he will forever be a tatted bad boy at heart.
And we love him that way.
Much like we love Laney exactly as she is, whether she’s braving new adventures and having fun or lapsing into her natural rule-following tendencies.
“And I now pronounce this wedding over,” Zen, Grey’s nibling and one of my very favorite people in all of Snaggletooth Creek, announces. Laney and Theo asked them to officiate today. “Where’s the cake? We’ve all earned some—excuse you, sir, this is a closed wedding ceremony. If you want to—oh my sweet baby Nora Ephron.”
Zen’s brown eyes fly to me.
Theo’s brown eyes go flat and deadly.
Sabrina sucks in a breath.
Creepy-crawlies inch up my arms, over my shoulders, up my neck, and into my ears, which tickles like hell.
And then I hear someone speak behind me.
“Emma?”
Two syllables in a voice that has haunted my dreams off and on for two and a half years.
I feel like I’m trying to run through water in a dream as I turn to verify with my eyes what my ears are telling me—Jonas Rutherford is here.
And he is.
Oh, he is.
It’s not right. He doesn’t fit here. He doesn’tbelonghere.
Jonas Rutherford, standing on the sidewalk at the edge of the lush green grass surrounding the statue of Ol’ Snaggletooth, staring at me likeI’mthe ghost andhe’sthe haunted one.
His brown eyes are saucers. His white skin has gone a mottled gray beneath his dark stubble. His dark hair looks like he’s been raking his fingers through it, and his button-down shirt is mis-buttoned.
My soul suddenly feels identical. Never mind that I’m in a bridesmaid dress, heavy makeup, and a fancy updo.
My soul is just as disheveled and shocked as his entire appearance is.
His gaze moves past me to where I know Laney and Theo and Bash are standing, and panic takes over.
