Page 113 of The Reluctant Viking

“It doesn’t have to be,” Ruby said shakily, raising her tear-filled eyes.

Thork quirked an eyebrow and wiped an errant tear that hung on the edge of her eye with the pad of his thumb.

“Marriage could be the melding together of two people destined to be together. It could be a sharing—a partnership of a man and a woman with a common goal. It could be a touch of paradise on earth.” Ruby couldn’t believe she was spouting such flowery words, or that she actually meant them. She closed her eyes bleakly.

“Is that how you envision our marriage?” Ruby’s eyes shot open. For the first time, Ruby noticed the raspiness of Thork’s voice, the odd glow in his eyes.

“Yes,” she whispered hopefully and restrained herself from reaching out to brush a strand of hair that fell over his forehead.

“Even if I wanted that kind of marriage, what do you think my brother Eric would do?” Thork said huskily. “Think you that he would let me plant my feet in one spot for long? That he would not harm those I cherish?”

Cherish! Ruby’s hopes soared. Hesitating several moments to select just the right words, Ruby finally said, “Life is so short. It seems to me such a waste to spend those precious days looking over your shoulder, worrying about what might happen. We have to grasp the moment.” She inhaled deeply and scrutinized his face to see if he understood what she was trying to say. “Oh, Thork, wouldn’t you rather have a day of happiness than a lifetime of ‘what might have beens’?”

A gentle smile turned up the corners of Thork’s lips. “’Tis odd that you should say that.”

“Why?”

“’Tis the selfsame reason I returned for you.”

Ruby studied his handsome face, which just now seemed to relax from some rigid tension that had held him in its grasp. She frowned in puzzlement, not sure what he meant.

“When Hrolf and his men bound me and I lay two days with no food or drink in his prison, I had to face the prospect of dying. Oh, ’twas not a new threat. I flaunt death at every turn as a Jomsviking. But the idea of dying and never seeing you again—that, I discovered, I could not bear.”

“Thork, what are you saying?”

“Nay, let me continue. I asked myself this question as I lay contemplating death: What would you do today if you knew there would be no tomorrow? The answer was simple: I would marry Ruby and cherish each moment, no matter how few they may be.”

Ruby hesitated for only a second, then threw herself into his arms, despite the dozens of people who watched from the other side of the hall. He caught her and lifted her so her toes barely touched the floor. Ruby buried her face in his neck, sobbing out the weeks of desolation she’d suffered in his absence.

“Shush, sweetling. ’Tis over now.”

“You beast,” she accused tearfully, “standing here like a statue, letting me think you didn’t care.”

“You deserve a little torture for all you have put me through,” Thork teased as he nuzzled her neck. When he pulled away slightly and looked down, he exclaimed with feigned horror, “Good Lord, woman, you are sopping my entire cloak with your tears.” Lowering her to the ground but keeping an arm looped over her shoulder, he said in an aside to Hrolf and Dar, who had moved closer, “Is this what I will have to put up with for the rest of my life—a weeping, slobbering woman?”

Hrolf gave his grudging congratulations, and Dar bear-hugged her, stating gruffly, “’Tis all as I had planned.” Poppa joined them, and they discussed the ceremony to be held the next day.

Thork winked mischievously at Ruby and ordered with mock sternness, “I would like to have cheeseburgers and baklava for my marriage feast tomorrow, woman. Dost think thou could manage that betwixt your bouts of blubbering?” Then he followed with his now familiar, annoying pattern of tweaking her behind.

Ruby didn’t care. He’d said “for the rest of my life.” That was a promise she liked.

The hastily arranged wedding in the Rouen cathedral went off surprisingly well the next day, considering the small amount of time they’d had for planning.

Ruby did, in fact, supervise the making of cheeseburgers and baklava to supplement all the sumptuous foods Poppa ordered for the nuptial feast. It turned out to be a monumental task. The Vikings, known for their voracious appetites, consumed two hundred cheeseburgers and fourteen platters of baklava.

“Can you move?” Ruby teased, patting Thork’s flat but stuffed stomach.

“Yea, I can, and will show you just how well in a short time. Ne’er doubt it.” The heat in his eyes showed how much he wanted to do just that. Hrolf had infuriatingly refused to allow them to sleep together on the eve of their wedding.

“Well, I don’t know. You are an over-the-hill married man now, and—”

Thork gave her a quick kiss on the mouth to stop her devilry. That caused their guests to bang their goblets on the tables, calling for a more serious effort. He laughed, pulling Ruby onto his lap, and kissed her thoroughly.

Later, as he spoke to his grandfather on his other side, Ruby marveled at the contrasts between this wedding and her previous one, and the similarities. She still couldn’t separate the two men in her mind. In a way, she felt as if she’d married Jack all over again—an earlier, more primitive version, but her husband just the same.

And the biggest constant of all was her all-consuming happiness. Jack had been her perfect first love. He’d brought her everything new and hopeful in the world, and together they’d forged a life based on the youthful belief that anything is possible in the gift of life if the package is tied with the strings of love. Thork was the other side of the same coin. Not so young. Certainly jaded, seemingly without hope. Definitely not perfect. But he loved her, and that’s what real, mature love was all about, Ruby realized. When a man and woman love each other despite their flaws, despite the stumbling blocks life throws their way, that is true love.

“Why so pensive, sweetling?” Thork asked, running a rough palm caressingly up and down the sleeve of her silk dress.