The Navy SEAL's Bride (20 page)

Caitlin tried to push him away but he had hold of her and he was too strong. “No,” she whispered back, wriggling so she was facing him. Tom grabbed her and she wrapped her legs around his waist as he lifted her in the air. “But you can tell me all you like.”

“You’re cute,” he repeated on command.

“Kiss me,” she ordered.

“Yes, ma’am,” he replied, touching his mouth to hers.

“Don’t call me
ma’am,
” she told him, trying not to laugh.

“Yes,
beautiful,
” he said instead, cupping his hands beneath her bottom to keep her in place against him.

“Now that’s more like it,” she said, nose to nose with him.

Caitlin kissed him then. Arms and legs wrapped around him, lips pressed to his, in the middle of the street for everyone to see. As if they didn’t have a care in the world.

And they didn’t. For the first time in years, she was safe in the arms of a man she loved, and she couldn’t get enough of him.

EPILOGUE

C
AITLIN
wriggled from foot to foot in front of the floor-length mirror. She couldn’t stop staring at herself.

“Stay still,” Penny ordered.

Caitlin sighed at her soon to be sister-in-law’s bossy tone. It had been like this all day—being told what to do and feeling as though she was looking down somehow and watching herself rather than actually living through the experience. Kind of the way she used to feel when she was on stage performing, like a guardian angel looking down from above.

“I need to get down there,” she said, suddenly panicked, heart racing. “Do you think he’s here yet? Do you think he’s waiting?” Her heart started skipping even faster. “You do think he’s coming, right?”

Now it was Penny who was sighing, watching Caitlin in the mirror with a pained, almost humorous expression as she pushed a final pin into her hair and sat down beside her. “Yes, he’s here, of course he’s coming, and you don’t have to wait much longer. Just
enjoy
this. You’ll be spending the rest of your life with him, another fifteen minutes of being apart isn’t going to kill you. Now stop stressing!”

A loud knock echoed out. Caitlin looked at Penny, confused, until she heard his voice.

“Hey, beautiful, you in there?”

“Tom!” Caitlin called out, she couldn’t help it, even with Penny glaring at her. “Tom, come in.”

“Go away, Thomas!” Penny barked, fierce, marching across the room toward the door. “Don’t even think about opening that door.” Her voice was low now, like a growl.

Caitlin took a step back. So this was how Penny had been such a formidable soldier. Her tone alone was enough to send a weaker woman whimpering in the other direction.

“I need to see her,” Tom called back, sounding impatient. “Let me in, Penny.”

Caitlin stood, hitched up her dress and marched after Penny, confidence returned. “Let him in,” she said, trying to look as fierce as the other woman. “He’s my fiancé and I want to see him.”

“No!” Penny yelped. “You’re the bride and he is
not,
I repeat
not,
going to see you yet.”

There was silence and then a thud. Tom came crashing into the room, a sheepish expression on his face.

“Tom!” Penny yelled.

Caitlin laughed and pushed past Penny to get to him. To hell with tradition. “Hey,” she said, opening her arms. “Hey, you.”

“Hey to you, too,” Tom said, bending for a kiss, wrapping his arms around her so she was enveloped in his hold, tucked safely into his body. “I’ve missed you,” he whispered, pressing another gentle kiss to her lips.

“You two are…” Penny threw her hands up in the air, beyond frustrated.

“What?” Caitlin asked, trying not to laugh. “We’re what?”

“Maybe neither of you have been to enough weddings, but you generally wait until
after
you become husband and wife to kiss the bride,
Tom,
” Penny insisted, hands on hips again as if she was really angry. “There’s this little thing called tradition.”

“Maybe we don’t like tradition,” he quipped.

Caitlin laughed and swatted at the air, shooing Penny away. “I think I’m as ready as I’ll ever be,” she told her, genuinely thankful for all her help. “I appreciate everything, Pen, but we can take it from here.”

“Yeah, thanks, Pen, but we can handle it from here,” said Tom, mimicking Caitlin and rolling his eyes at Penny as she continued to glare at them.

Now Caitlin swatted at him, but he caught her hand and pulled it into his.

“What do you say we walk down the aisle together?” he asked.

She slipped out of his grasp to check her hair and her makeup one last time.

“You look gorgeous, Caitlin, honestly you do,” Tom said, walking up behind her and cupping his body to hers, bending his head to press a kiss to the nape of her neck. “Good enough to eat.”

She giggled. Caitlin actually giggled, and it sounded so weird coming from her mouth that it turned into laughter. He made her happier than she’d ever realized she could be, and it never ceased to amaze her.

“I think you’re right,” she said, leaning into him as his arms encircled her from behind.

“That you’re gorgeous?”

“No!” She turned in his arms, took a moment to put her cheek against his chest and relax. To listen to the steady, familiar beat of his heart. “About us walking down the aisle together.” She’d had no illusions about her father ever walking her down the aisle; she didn’t even know if he was alive. But what she did know was that the man she was going to spend the rest of her life with should be at her side—partnering her down the aisle before they said their vows.

Over the last year he’d proven to her that he’d do anything to make her happy, that he was the man she’d thought didn’t exist, and nothing was going to stop her from exchanging vows with him today.

“You ready?” Tom asked, finding her hand and clasping it firmly in his.

“More ready than I’ve ever been,” she said, scooping her bouquet off the bed and walking toward the door. She turned back when she noticed that he wasn’t moving. “Tom?”

The expression on his face worried her, but the curve of his smile, kicking his mouth up at the corners, calmed her nerves.

“There’s something I want you to have,” he said, closing the distance between them and reaching into his back pocket.

Caitlin didn’t move, kept her eyes trained on his as he slowly withdrew his hand and brought it toward her.

“Turn around,” he ordered.

Caitlin obeyed, smiling to herself as she shut her eyes and spun away from him. She felt the cool touch of a chain against her neck, but waited before looking.

“I’ve been waiting to give this to you.” Tom’s voice was deep, sounded on the verge of cracking.

Caitlin walked to the floor-length mirror, felt Tom’s presence behind her as she looked at the gift he had given her.

Wow.

“Your trident,” she said, fingering the symbol that now hung around her neck on a fine chain. “You told my class about this that first day I met you.”

Tom nodded behind her, dipping his head to kiss her cheek. “It’s my most special possession and I want you to have it.”

Caitlin fought the tears tickling at the back of her eyes, not wanting to cry. “Thank you,” she whispered. “I love it.”

“Not as much as I love you,” Tom said simply.

Caitlin turned in his arms and kissed him, the slightest brush of her lips to his.

“Let’s get married.”

Tom touched the trident where it sat at the hollow of her throat, then touched his fingers along her chin, before taking her hand and pressing a kiss to her engagement ring. “Let’s go.”

They made their way down the stairs and through Tom’s mom’s house. Caitlin spied the small group of guests waiting for them and laughed to herself as the band hurriedly launched into the music as they saw them standing there.

The garden looked gorgeous, understated yet elegant, with a petal-strewn walkway leading down between the row of seats.

Caitlin looked up when Tom nudged her. “I love you, you know that, right?”

She looked into his amber-brown eyes, trying to stop the tears as they threatened to escape. “I love you, too,” she whispered.

Tom took her hand and held on tight. “Let’s not keep our guests waiting.”

Caitlin walked by his side and couldn’t help the smile that burst onto her face. She would have walked with him wherever he wanted to go, and that’s why she’d finally said yes to marrying him.

Because he was her one person in the world, the one she’d thought she’d never find.

And Tom Cartwright had been well worth the wait.

* * * * *

Keep reading for an excerpt of
The Rebel Rancher
by Donna Alward!

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CHAPTER ONE

C
LARA HAD HEARD A LOT
about Tyson Diamond. Some of it good, a lot of it questionable. But none of the reports had warned her that he was over six feet of sexy cowboy with a break-your-heart smile and a devilish gleam in his eye.

And now he was striding this way as Angela, still resplendent in her wedding dress, waved him over.

Clara wondered if she could say her final congratulations to Sam and Angela and escape before Tyson reached them. She’d managed to avoid him up to this point, after all. She’d been helping his father, Virgil, with his rehab after his stroke, and her off-duty hours were spent helping Angela plan the wedding from the safety of Butterfly House, the transition shelter Angela managed and where Clara currently lived. And Ty had been wrapping up his business up north and spending time with Sam as they worked together running the ranch. Somehow she and Tyson had failed to cross paths in the weeks leading up to the wedding.

Until today.

This afternoon he’d turned up spit-polished in his black suit with his hair just a little messy. Her mouth had gone dry just looking at him. Ty was exactly the sort of man she tried to avoid. Tall, sexy, confident and careless. The kind that ate shy girls like her for breakfast. The kind that girls like her could never resist.