"Hi," I whispered when I reached him.
"Hi." His voice was wrecked. "You look..."
"I know."
He laughed. Wet and broken and perfect.
We turned to face the officiant. A friend of Rodriguez's, a chaplain who'd served with the FDNY for thirty years. He said the words that people always said at weddings. The promises and blessings and official declarations.
But all I could see was Garrett. All I could hear was my own heartbeat and his breathing and the quiet certainty that we'd earned this moment with everything we had.
Then it was time for the vows.
"I promise to stay," I said. The words I'd written and rewritten a hundred times, trying to get them right. "I promiseto choose you, every day, for the rest of forever. Through fire and grief and everything in between. I promise to run toward you instead of away. To trust you with the hard things. To build a life that's ours, not mine or yours, but ours." My voice broke. "I promise to be your home. The way you've always been mine."
Garrett was crying. I'd rarely seen him cry — not when we lost the baby, not when Rebecca died.
But he was crying now. And he didn't bother to hide it.
"I promise to catch you when you fall. To run into every burning building for you. To fight for us, even when it's hard." He took my hands. Held them tight. "Especially when it's hard."
"I promise to never let you go. Not again. Not ever." His voice steadied. "You're my heart, Sloane. You always have been."
The chaplain said something about rings. Shane handed Garrett the band. Maya handed me the one I'd picked out for him.
We exchanged them. Made the promises official.
"By the power vested in me," the chaplain said, "I now pronounce you husband and wife."
The firehouse erupted.
Cheering. Applause. Shane's whoop echoing off the ceiling. The fire engines' horns, two short blasts that made everyone jump and then laugh.
Garrett kissed me. Deep and thorough. His hands cupping my face. His mouth smiling against mine.
"I love you," he said.
"I love you too." I laughed through my tears. "Husband."
"Wife." His grin was blinding. "I like the sound of that."
We turned to face our family.
Shane and Maya, their baby boy asleep in the stroller between them. Zoe with her arm around Lily, both grinning. Brian and Ava, her belly round with their first child. Rodriguez and Maria, their kids already sneaking toward the dessert table.
The people who'd become my people somewhere along the way.
Later that night, after the dancing and the cake and the toasts that made me cry all over again, we stood on the sidewalk outside the firehouse.
The city hummed around us. Cars passing. Distant sirens.
"So." Garrett looked at me. "What now?"
My husband. The word still felt new in my mouth. Strange and right and exactly where it belonged.
"Now we go home. And we start the rest of our lives."
"Just like that?"
