Chapter Twelve
And for the first time in her whole life, Kendall understood what it was to have a real family.
Not just a family, but people. A whole community.
They all streamed inside and somehow, what could have been just another rendition of the same old depressing Darlington family song turned into a party.
And then, quickly enough, it turned into a kind of wedding reception.
Because everyone came up to the two of them, Harlan and Kendall, to offer their congratulations. The Bennett sisters started bringing out food and drinks, someone picked up a guitar, and before Kendall knew it, she was laughing. And dancing.
And being twirled around the floor of the patio, there beneath that beautiful summer sky, by the men who had claimed her as a sister.
When they’d all had a turn, it was time for the man who’d called her his daughter.
“I never had a father, Zeke,” she told him, only a little shyly.
“I never had a daughter, either,” he retorted. “Said so.”
“I think we’ll make it work,” Kendall said, and smiled so wide it made her cheeks hurt.
They danced a moment or two, and then he cleared his throat. “I think you’re good for this family,” Zeke told her gruffly. “And not only because you’re going to sit in that booth tomorrow and convince tourists to buy my spurs.”
“At exorbitant prices,” Kendall agreed happily.
“I think you’re good for him,” Zeke said, nodding over at Harlan. “A man can get too used to being alone. He’s better with you.”
Kendall looked over at Harlan too, aware that she was flushed all over again. And Harlan was engaged in conversation with his friends, but he caught Kendall’s eye. He always did. Because he always knew exactly where she was.
The kind of tracking device she could come to depend on, she thought, as his dark eyes gleamed, telling her he saw that flush too.
She couldn’t wait to go home with him. To their home.
Kendall forced herself to return her attention to her father-in-law as he gently two-stepped them around. She studied him a moment, taking in his own flush, that looked a lot like good health to her. “Can I ask you something shocking?”
The old man looked at her, his gaze canny. “Careful you don’t get too shocking. The old ticker isn’t what it used to be.”
“Are you really sick?”
Kendall regretted it the moment it left her mouth. Zeke frowned at her and she thought he was going to rescind all the nice things he’d said to her—
But then, still dancing, he grinned.
“Let’s just say,” he said, pulling her close and keeping his voice low, “that I wouldn’t be surprised if the beautiful grandbabies you bring into this world one day trigger a remission.”
She considered that. “A long remission?”
“You might very well give a man new life,” Zeke replied, his eyes twinkling.
And then he sang along to the song as they kept on dancing.
When the song was done, he delivered her, at last, into the arms of her husband.
The husband she had never dreamed about, because she wouldn’t have believed that he could be real. The husband who had changed everything, because he believed in her.
“I’m proud of you,” Harlan told her now, pulling her into his arms and holding her while the music soared all around them. “I’m so damn proud of you, Kendall.”
“It’s because of you.” She slid her hands up to his face and held them there, right where she wanted him. “I never could have stood up to them if you hadn’t believed in me, Harlan. If you hadn’t showed me the way.”
“I didn’t show you a thing,” he said, smiling. “Except maybe who you’ve been all along, despite them.”
“What I’m trying to say is that I love you,” she told him, her gaze on his and her heart painful inside her chest. “I think it’s possible I loved you from the very first moment I saw you, sitting in that booth in that saloon. I think—”
“You think?”
Kendall smiled, big and wide, and she didn’t care if the whole world saw it. “I know. I love you, Harlan. It feels like I always have. I know I always will.”
He gazed down at her, this good man who loved her back. Who looked at her and didn’t see a Darlington. Who had made her a Carey. Who had given her a home.
Who was the first thing she wanted to see each morning and the last thing she wanted to see each night, and who she wanted to hold on to in between, curled up together like puzzle pieces that together made a beautiful whole.
“I know,” he said, his mouth curving in the way she liked best. “Baby, I know. But I sure do like hearing it.”
When he kissed her then, everybody cheered again. Louder this time.
And it was different, she understood. Their actual wedding had been like a handshake, a deal they’d made.
But this was a whole other kind of wedding. The stand up in front of everyone who matters to you and promise you’re going to love each other forever kind of thing.
The forever kind of thing that was the very least of what they were going to be for each other.
Starting right here, right now.
So Kendall kissed him back. Then she smiled out at all these people who’d stood up for her. Her real family. Her true friends, and who cared if they were new. They’d get there.
She knew they would.
This was the whole fairy tale, right here, surrounded by pine and love and an endlessly blue Montana sky.
Her happy ever after was starting right now.
And with Harlan beside her, forever was a given.