When it was my turn, I didn’t hesitate either, but at least I let him finish his question before I gave my answer. “Yes.”
Kate glanced at me and I inhaled sharply when her gaze met mine, realizing this was the first time I was looking at her as mywife. At least the word had come out confidently, even if it had felt like my world had tilted on its axis when I’d said it.
Either way, the lawyer nodded briskly, apparently satisfied, and said a few final words that sounded official enough to count. Then he gestured between us. “You may kiss the bride.”
Kate snorted quietly under her breath, like this was the most ridiculous thing ever, but she turned to face me anyway. I went in for a quick kiss, not planning on turning it into anything dramatic, but as soon as my lips touched hers, everything else fell away.
The field, the paperwork, the pressure, and even the noise in my head. For just that one moment, there was nothing other than Kate, mywife.
Shit, that really is going to take some getting used to.
I stepped back before I could linger too long and turned toward the small folding table they’d set up with the paperwork. If I didn’t keep moving, I’d start thinking, and thinking would be dangerous right now, so I just picked up the pen and signed my name.
It looked surreal on the page, that one word I’d now suddenly added to my very identity.Married.
Meanwhile, Kate was already talking to the lawyer again behind me. “I still think I deserve a hot dog.”
“I said I’dconsiderit,” he replied.
“You promised.”
He frowned. “I didnotpromise.”
“Okay, you implied with great enthusiasm that you’d buy me a hot dog if I didn’t make this difficult for any of you.”
I shook my head slightly as I finished signing and chuckled under my breath, sliding the certificate back across the table. The lawyer took it carefully and passed it over to Kate with a pointed look on his face.
“Let’s talk about that hot dog after you put some ink on this paper.”
Leaving her to bicker about her right to a snack, I turned around to see Will watching me, but he wasn’t smiling anymore. Instead, he lifted his eyebrows slightly and tipped his head toward the outfield in a silent question.
A request to talk, I suspected. I walked over, curious about what was going on, but my brother didn’t say a word until we were far enough away that Kate’s voice had faded into the background. He glanced back once, like he was making sure we were out of earshot. Then he looked at me again.
“Congratulations,” he said.
“Thanks, but you didn’t call me over here for that, so what’s this about?”
His gaze moved from one of my eyes to the other, his expression completely serious now. “Have you taken care of the Emma thing? Please tell me you took care of it before you got married.”
My heart tripped over itself and I opened my mouth to answer, but I had no idea what to say. How was I supposed to explain that the woman I’d spent five years falling in love withwasthe woman I’d just married? That the problem had solved itself in the most chaotic way possible?
Before I could figure out where to even begin, Kate’s voice carried across the field as she walked toward us, one hand holding the brim of her cap against the breeze. “Nate?”
Will glanced at her, then back at me. Something unreadable flickered across his face. Then he clapped me on the shoulder. “It’s okay. We’ll talk later. Bye, Kate.”
He gave her a quick hug, then waved at us as he left, heading back toward the tunnel with his hands in his pockets.
Kate watched him go with mild confusion furrowing her brow before she turned back toward me. “What was that all about?”
“Nothing particularly important right now,” I said, but even as the words came out, I wasn’t entirely certain they were true.
Will knew about Emma. He knew how messed up I’d been before I’d known Emma and Kate were the same person, and I suddenly couldn’t help wondering if telling him the truth back then had just become a complication I hadn’t seen coming.
CHAPTER 38
KATE
Ididn’t quite have words to describe how surreal it was, sitting down to dinner with myhusband. Maybe it was the fact that I’d gotten married on a baseball field in what could only be described as an insult to Yankees fans everywhere.
