13

Life involved a lot of waiting. For the most part, Case was philosophical about it, and he didn’t think it made much sense to get impatient. It didn’t help, after all. Usually, fretting and fuming only tore you up and made you feel like the whole thing was taking even longer.

Now, for the first time, he hit the limit of his usual laidback approach.

“I can’t stand this.”

He was mostly talking to himself, but it caught the attention of the guy a few feet away from him. He was burly and a few years older than Case, but he was surprisingly baby-faced.

“Can’t stand what?” the guy said.

Case gestured at the bathroom door. “I’m waiting for my fiancée to change clothes—”

He knew he hesitated a little around the word “fiancée,” which he was still getting used to—not that he would be using it for very long, since they were already on their way to the wedding. But he didn’t pause in the middle of his sentence, so there was no excuse for the guy barreling in to interrupt him.

“Oh, man. Believe me, buddy, I know all about it. My wife’s the same way. Takes fucking forever to do anything.” He waved his hand vaguely in the direction of the clerk’s office. “She’s in there right now renewing her license—made me come with her for the company—and I bet that’ll take forever too.”

Case didn’t even know where to start with that, but he was willing to try. It would at least be a distraction.

“You’re a grown man,” he said coolly. “Nobody can ‘make’ you do anything. If you came with her, it’s because you chose to, so that’s on you, not her. If you were going to throw a fit about it, it seems like you could have just stayed home. And if you did come to keep her company, it doesn’t seem like you’re doing a great job of it, not if she’s in there and you’re out here. So she got a pretty raw deal out of it, as far as I can tell.”

He also wasn’t sure that anyone would drag their license renewal out longer than they had to, so if the guy’s wife did take a while, it probably wasn’t her fault, but that felt like a more minor point.

What he really resented was how the guy had assumed they were going to have fun ragging on women together. Case had run into that attitude before, and he’d never liked it.

When Lydia was involved, even on the periphery, he liked it even less.

So this was the bit he really wanted to drive home.

“And it’s not that I can’t stand waiting for my fiancée to get dressed because it’s taking a while,” Case said. “I haven’t checked my watch. I don’t know how long it’s taking. I can’t stand waiting because I know she’s going to come out of there looking gorgeous, and I want to see her as soon as I can. Now, in fact.”

As if on cue, Lydia came out of the bathroom.

Case forgot all about the guy he was arguing with. He forgot about everything but the woman in front of him.

Lydia.

In the thrift shop, even the sight of Lydia holding the dress against her body had almost been too much for him. He’d figured looking at her actually in it would make his heart stop.

He’d been wrong: it was even bigger than that. His heart hadn’t stopped; the world had stopped. The earth was no longer spinning. Any second now, everything around him was going to start floating up into space.

He struggled to think of what to say. He got paid to form sentences, at least occasionally! He had to be able to put his awe into words.

“Wow,” Case said.

Too late, he remembered that the best he’d been able to come up with earlier had been “ditto.” It was a good thing he had all that work with his hands to fall back on, because his brain had definitely been failing him lately.

The tight wine-red velvet hugged Lydia’s curves, wrapping her up like the world’s most tantalizing valentine. Her bust, her hips, her butt, the slight curve of her belly—Case couldn’t lie and say he hadn’t noticed them already, but the red dress made it almost impossible to look anywhere else. The fabric looked so soft that it was easy to imagine touching it, and he couldn’t stop thinking about how touching it would mean touching Lydia too, touching her the way he had in the truck, only this time they wouldn’t have to stop—

Lydia met his eyes. She didn’t seem to mind that all he’d been able to say was that dry-mouthed “wow.”

Her gaze said her temperature was running just as hot as his, and that she agreed that the world had stopped spinning.

That gorgeously sexy dress was an invitation, but it wasn’t a general one. It was for the two of them. Lydia would feel the velvet from the inside, and he would feel it from the outside, and they were going to get the chance to take it off together.

“Your man here is an asshole,” the guy next to Case said.

Case blinked, feeling like he was being drawn out of the best dream he’d ever had. He really had completely forgotten that guy existed.

Lydia didn’t miss a beat. “He’s very much not an asshole, actually,” she said, “but you I’m not so sure about.”

She tucked her arm through Case’s and led him down the hall.

With Lydia pressed against him, Case instantly forgot about the guy all over again. He started humming the Wedding March.

Lydia laughed. The sound was lower and huskier than he remembered it being before, and realizing that it was deepened with arousal made heat radiate through him.

“I know some people have a violinist or even a string quartet for this, but I think your humming is just as good.” She squeezed his arm. “I’m glad you like the dress.”

“Trust me, ‘like’ doesn’t even cover it.”

“I know it’s a little risqué for a courthouse, but I figured you only get married once.”

God , Case thought, the words twisting his heart, I hope that’s true. I hope this sticks, and not because you feel like you owe it to me. I hope you want this as much as I do.

The red dress, like the passion in her kisses, certainly said that she wanted some of it. That was good. He could wait to see if they were on the same page about everything else.

*

Judge Abner wasn’t a member of Lydia’s pack, but he was a fellow shifter—a buffalo, if she remembered right—and he seemed to have some idea of what a big, potentially life-saving deal her marriage would be for her pack. He pumped her and Case’s hands with great enthusiasm, gave them both hearty congratulations, and launched straight into the wedding ceremony, like he suspected time was of the essence.

Some small part of Lydia regretted losing the sense of ceremony, but her more practical side was relieved that this was getting officially taken care of at almost record-breaking speed. And at least Case had been able to put the bakery bag down first.

Still, it was strange. Even as a little girl, she’d never let herself indulge in that many fantasies about romantic, soft-focus weddings. There had been a couple of daydreams, though, and she had definitely never envisioned that there would be this many mediocre oil paintings of stern old men looking down on her while a buffalo shifter rushed her through her vows.

But even if her wedding was far from normal, she realized she was happy with it. Sure, she didn’t have a frothy white dress, but the seductively clinging red one, as scandalous as it was, made her feel incredible. She had never worn anything that did so much for her self-esteem. What train or veil or dreamlike confection of lace could mean more than that?

And how could any half-realized fantasy from back then compare to Case? He was so much better than any of her surreptitious childhood crushes.

She’d never believed she could ever be as happy as she was right now. When she felt this good, she could convince herself that it didn’t matter if it didn’t last. She would still have the memories.

Judge Abner started in on Case’s vows. His voice was a pleasant rumble in the background, but all Lydia could focus on was Case.

“I, Casey Jackson, take you, Lydia Vasquez, to be my lawful wedded wife, to have and to hold, to honor and to keep, in sickness and in health, for richer or for poorer. I promise to love and cherish you.”

It was a beautiful promise. But there was no way he would actually want to keep it. He wouldn’t want to give up his whole life for her.

It doesn’t matter , Lydia told herself. People get married all the time knowing things might not work out. It’s just some old-fashioned wording.

And yeah, divorces happened. They weren’t always tragic. Her own parents had gotten divorced, and they’d been happier apart than together.

But deep down in her bones, she couldn’t help feeling like seeing Case walk away really would kill some important part of her.

That didn’t mean she wouldn’t risk it. And in the privacy of her own thoughts, and in the middle of her own wedding, she could even admit that by now, it wasn’t about what was good for the pack. Not really. It was about how she had felt when she’d come out of the bathroom and seen the look in his eyes.

She cleared her throat and repeated after Judge Abner.

“I, Lydia Vasquez, take you, Casey Jackson, to be my lawful wedded husband—”

And mate .

“—to have and to hold, to honor and keep, in sickness and in health, for richer or for poorer. I promise to love and cherish you.”

“Would you like to exchange rings?” Judge Abner said. “I know your timeline has been, ah, accelerated, so if you don’t have them, we’ll breeze right past that.”

Lydia nodded, feeling a stab of regret that—accelerated timeline or not—she hadn’t found an opportunity to duck into a jewelry store and find something for him. He had such nice hands, lean and strong and capable. They deserved some kind of ornamentation. Maybe after they’d driven Reeve away, she could find him the ring he deserved.

“I’m sorry,” she said to Case, hoping he would hear how much she meant it.

He shook his head. “Don’t worry about it. But I do have—” He fished a velvety box out of his pocket.

Of course he had bought her a ring. She knew there hadn’t been any in the thrift store, either, which meant he must have done it yesterday, when he hadn’t even had known that her bite would take and that they would be able to go through with the marriage. He’d known how much of their future was up in the air, but he’d still decided to control what little of it he could and make it good for her.

She wasn’t falling in love with him. She was in love with him, plain and simple. She’d hit the bottom of her heart and found that he’d been there all along.

Case slid the ring on her finger. It was an antique, Lydia realized—either something he’d been lucky enough to find or a family heirloom he was inexplicably willing to turn over to her. The diamond was surrounded by a ring of sapphires, like a star in a deep blue night sky.

“I know it’s small—”

“It’s beautiful,” Lydia said fiercely, pressing her thumb against the band to hold it in place in case he tried to take it away.

Case’s smile was even brighter than the diamond. “Well, I’m glad you like it. I should have given it to you earlier, since that’s more of an engagement ring. But I’ve got the wedding one too.”

Of course you do , Lydia thought again. She felt like she was going to melt.

The wedding ring was a shimmering white gold, the mellow moonglow to the diamond’s starlight.

It was technically less eye-catching than the sparkling engagement ring, but for some reason it meant even more to her. Maybe because no matter how short-lived their marriage would ultimately be, this was a symbol of it. The engagement ring represented the promise to go through with this, but the wedding band stood in for whatever would come afterwards. And if it wasn’t as obviously glittering as its counterpart, it meant standing in line at the DMV together. Turning down the thermostat at night because you knew you’d want to spoon. Having all the time in the world, for the ordinary as well as the extraordinary.

“I love it,” she said softly. “Thank you.”

“They suit you,” Case said. He sounded as wonderstruck as she felt, and this time, Lydia didn’t think she had to give any of the credit to the dress.

In fact, if she had to guess, she’d say the dress was only getting in the way of what they both wanted right now.

She wanted to give him everything, but she couldn’t. Not here. But ....

“Wait!” she said, before Judge Abner could wrap things up. “It’s not even remotely a ring, but I do have something for you.”

She dug into her purse and brought out a rectangular package swathed in a thrift store plastic bag. No one else would have been excited about it, but Case knew instantly what it was.

“That’s what you snuck back there for!” he said, his smile changing into a goofy, adorable grin. “You bought me a book!”

He tugged it out of the bag. Not only was it missing its dust jacket, it was missing nearly any clue to its contents. Lydia had deliberately chosen a book with a title so ambiguous and generic that he would be able to go in with no expectations whatsoever.

“ Shadows ,” Case read off the cover. “This is amazing. I have no idea what I’m getting into.”

“I figured you could call almost any book Shadows and have it sort of work, so you’d really get the grab bag experience.”

“It’s perfect. You’re going to have to listen to me tell you about it as I make my way through.”

She liked the mental image that created: the two of them sitting up in bed at night like an old married couple, with Case making his way through his mysterious book and occasionally pausing to read bits of it out loud to her.

“I’d like that,” she said quietly.

He met her eyes, and now she was back to thinking about the two of them in bed without a book involved. She was pretty sure he was too.

Judge Abner had to clear his throat to get their attention back on him. He gave them an indulgent look, like he was constantly running into newlyweds who almost had breakdowns over wedding rings, enthused over used books, and then looked like they were on the verge of tearing each other’s clothes off.

“You may now seal your union with a kiss.”

He refrained from adding, And you seem like you want to do a whole lot more than that, but try to stop there, but Lydia could almost hear him thinking it.

Then Case kissed her, and she lost track of the judge completely. All she could possibly think about was Case’s mouth on hers, warm and passionate and sure . It was a chaste kiss, even if it was a long one, because a tiny bit of residual dignity was keeping them from openly making out in front of poor Abner, but that didn’t matter. This wasn’t about sex. (Well, it wasn’t entirely about sex, even if she couldn’t deny that was where her mind kept going.) This was about ... everything .

We sealed our union , Lydia thought as they reluctantly let the kiss draw to a close. We made vows, and they meant something to him like they did to me. I know they did.

What if Case wanted this to last just as much as she did?

Lydia touched the tip of her tongue to her lips, which still felt like they were tingling.

“So that’s done,” she said. “Do you want to get started on our honeymoon?”