Once again, being the hormonal mess I was, tears filled my eyes. “Thank you, Dad.” I smiled.
Veronica looked at me with her tear-filled eyes. “You are simply gorgeous and this is the best day of my life,” Ian’s mother said. “To finally be a part of my son’s life and now I have a daughter and two granddaughters on the way. I feel like I’ve finally been blessed.”
Ian walked over and placed his hand on the small of my back. He placed his other hand on my stomach and held it there. “I can’t wait for you to meet your granddaughters, Mom and Dad,” he said.
Connor and Ellery walked over to us, grinning from ear to ear. “Congratulations!” Ellery exclaimed as she hugged both of us.
“You look absolutely stunning, Rory.” Connor smiled.
“Thank you both for coming,” I said.
“We wouldn’t have missed this wedding for the world,” Connor replied.
Ian
After the photographer was finished taking pictures of us, I escorted Rory to the limo that was waiting for us. Adalynn and Daniel, along with the rest of the guests, took separate limos back to the hotel, where I had arranged a small, intimate reception.
“You are so beautiful, sweetheart. When I saw you walk down that aisle, I swear my heart stopped beating. I thought I died and I was in Heaven.”
She placed her hand on my cheek. “Thank you, Ian, my husband. I felt the same way when I saw you standing at the end. You have no idea how hard it was to hold back the tears.”
“Yes, I do, because I had to do it too, sweetheart.”
“How did you pull this off in such a short amount of time?” she asked.
“Anything’s possible when you’re madly in love and you want something bad enough.”
“I want to make love to you right now.” Rory smiled.
“I want to make love to you too, and we will tonight, after the wedding reception. All night long, I will make you come multiple times.”
“God, Ian, stop.” She smiled. “You’re making me wet already.”
“Okay, Rory. We need to stop talking like that. I don’t know if I can hold back. So, tell me about Andre.”
Rory laughed as she held my face and kissed me. We arrived at the hotel and I took Rory to the room where the reception was being held. The wedding cake turned out perfect and Rory was very happy. We shared a wonderful celebration dinner with our family and friends and then Rory and I cut the cake. As we danced our first dance as husband and wife, Rory made a comment to me.
“Have you noticed that Andre and Mandy haven’t left each other’s side since the ceremony? They even sat next to each other.”
“I did notice that, sweetheart. I wonder if they’re falling for each other.” I smiled.
“Come to think of it, they did talk quite a bit when he was staying with us,” Rory said.
“Good for them. I hope they find in each other what we have.”
It was finally time to take my wife up to our hotel room and make love to her for the first time as Mrs. Ian Braxton; something I’d been looking forward to all day. I carried her into our room and laid her down on the bed while I hovered over her and stared into her beautiful brown eyes.
“I love you more than anything else in this world, Mrs. Braxton, and now I’m going to show you how much you mean to me and how special you are.”
“I’m looking forward to it, Mr. Braxton, because I plan on showing you the same thing.” She smiled.
I growled and kissed her passionately as we made love a few times that night and celebrated our marriage.
Chapter 41
Rory
3 Months Later…
I stood in the middle of the nursery and looked around. It was huge. Ian had the wall knocked out between both bedrooms and had them completely renovated. I felt sorry for the workers because Ian was on their asses every second of every day to get the job done. They finished two days early. I slipped them some cash and apologized for my husband’s behavior. It turned out exactly the way Ian and I had planned. We decorated with the colors of soft pink and cream. It was perfect and so were the two paintings that Ellery painted for us that hung above each of the girls’ cribs.
“It’s beautiful in here,” Ian said as he wrapped his arms around me.
“It is. Now that it’s complete, we just need to wait for our daughters to be born.”
“Ah, they’ll be here soon, Rory. Filling this room with laughter.”
“Laughter won’t come for a while, babe. They’ll fill the room with cries.”
Ian chuckled and kissed my head. “I can’t believe all the things we got from the baby shower. People were so generous,” I said.
“They always are, sweetheart.” He smiled.
Ian and I went out to pick up a couple more things for the babies. As we were walking down the shopping plaza, we ran into Andrew. Suddenly, I felt sick as I held onto Ian’s arm.
“Ian, Rory. Wow, look at you. You look great,” Andrew said.
“Excuse us, Andrew. We’re in a hurry,” Ian replied.
Rory and I began to walk past him and then stopped when we heard him speak.
“I need to apologize to both of you. I want to apologize to both of you.”
Ian turned around and looked at him with anger in his eyes. “How dare you.”
“I’m in therapy, and I have been for months. I even met someone that I think is really special.”
“Good for you, Andrew,” I said. “Keep getting that help.”
“I miss your friendship, Ian,” Andrew said with sadness.
“Yeah, I miss your friendship too, except the part where you had my wife pinned to the ground on a cold bathroom floor in a club. I hope you get all help you need, and I hope that your relationship works out. Take care, Drew.”
Ian took my arm and led me down the sidewalk. He didn’t say a word for quite a while after that. I knew there was a part of him that missed Andrew, but he would never forgive him for what he did, even if I had made peace with it.
“I have to pee,” I said.
“You just went to the bathroom ten minutes ago,” Ian said.
“And? What’s your point? Do you have any idea what it’s like to have two human beings inside of you, pushing down on your bladder?”
“Good point, sweetheart. I apologize. Now let’s get you to a bathroom.”
****
Ian and I were lying in bed. He was doing some work on his laptop and I was looking through a Cosmopolitan magazine. Suddenly, Ian looked over at me and smiled. “Can I play with my girls?”