CHAPTER 8
LIAM
The warm evening breeze grazes my face, the wildflowers woven in the simple arch above the altar whispering in the late summer air while copper sunlight bleeds through the surrounding trees.
The soft music and the cheerful murmurs from the guests who have already taken their seats are not enough to cover the sound of my heartbeat thundering in my ears.
Or the way I keep shuffling my feet and fidgeting with my jacket, while my dad, Nate, and Lizzy try to pretend they’re not pressing their lips together to smother a laugh.
I feel the shift in the air before my eyes have even started to look for him.
I have never been able to explain why I always seem to know where he is, why he always seems to know when I’m looking at him.
He’s already there when I turn my head—at the end of that small path, illuminated by the setting sun and the flickering fairy lights, his blue eyes trained on mine.
He smiles at me and time stops. There are no murmurs, no whispering trees, no lovely music. There is only him.
Cooper. My best friend, the love of my life, in his powder-blue suit that makes him look breathtaking, his black hair perfectly framing that face I’ve kissed and touched so many times.
He’s so damn beautiful, it hurts.
But it’s when he starts walking to me amidst the purples, whites, and soft yellows of dried lavender, meadow wheat, and wild daisies that I find myself almost shaking with the need to be near him.
As if I didn’t just leave him minutes ago.
As if I didn’t kiss him moments earlier, telling him I’d be waiting for him.
That he’d done enough waiting, and that this time, I wanted to be the one waiting for him.
It was mere moments ago, and it feels like ages.
I can only breathe normally again when he’s standing right in front of me, my lips pulling up into a smile that mirrors his.
That speaks of pure happiness.
I manage to tear my eyes away from him only when my dad starts speaking.
“Good evening, everyone.” His green eyes, so similar to mine, are smiling. “We’re gathered here today to celebrate the love between Liam and Cooper.”
I sneak a glance at Coop, and the grin he aims at me makes my heart flutter like mad.
My dad’s eyes are shiny as he looks at us.
“I have never seen two people radiating so much happiness just by being in the same room. You are proof no measure of time and distance can truly keep apart two people who were always meant to be each other’s family. I’m so glad you found each other.”
His voice catches, and I feel the same lump in my throat because I know what he’s thinking. It had always been me and my dad after my mom died when I was very little. Our small, two-person family. Until Coop came like a wrecking ball and adopted us both into his loud, wonderful chaos.
Cooper is watching me softly, and the words seem to float around us as our eyes remain locked, as our lips mouth our ‘I dos,’ and we exchange our vows.
I promise to love him and cherish him for as long as we both shall live, and he gives me a secret smile at the generic vows we both agreed on, warmth filling my entire body, knowing our private vows will come later.
My skin tingles fiercely when I take his hand to put his ring back where it belongs. He does that same, and it feels like I’m holding my breath until my dad pronounces us husbands.
“You may kiss the—”
Cooper is already halfway into my arms as I reach for his nape and pull him in, slamming our mouths together. He melts into me like he always does, and the possessive beast inside me wants to fucking roar at finally having him.
He’s mine.
Heat and love swim in his hazy blue eyes when we separate, and the things I want to do to him right now are definitely not appropriate, considering where we are.
A wolf-whistle cuts through the moment that is all Nate’s doing, and the chuckles that shakes Cooper’s body and mine are the same coming from everyone as cheers and claps erupt around us.
We keep our fingers threaded when we join our friends and family, and we only let go when congratulations turn into fierce hugs, Cooper swallowed up in a group hug with his twin sisters while my dad pulls me in and pats me hard on the back.
It’s a whirlwind of movement that spills into the reception. Everyone is slowly ushered to the beautifully decorated tables, the atmosphere cozy and private.
It’s like a big bundle of merriment, and Cooper fucking glows in the middle of it all.
When the music for our first dance starts playing, we come together as if we’ve been rehearsing this our entire lives.
The surprise in his eyes makes it impossible to suppress my smile, even as his body fits with mine.
“Is that—”
“The country song you played on the radio on our first camping trip? Yes.” A slower, softer version, but the same.
His gaze is so open, I can practically see everything he’s feeling as we move together.
“I can’t believe you remember that,” he whispers for my ears only, and I tighten my arm around him.
“You’d be surprised at the things I remember when it comes to you, Coop. Especially about that trip.”
Sunset gives way to pink twilight, and the twinkling fairy lights all around us make him look like a damn prince.
“Tell me, please?” he mutters softly and sighs when I lean in to kiss his temple.
“I remember us cruising in my dad’s old car and you dozing in the passenger seat because it was too early in the morning for you.
” He chuckles, and I feel that chuckle in my bones.
“You wore those aviator-style sunglasses that always made you look so pretty, and I had to fight not to reach out and touch you.” He pulls back just enough so he can pierce me with his intense gaze.
“And I remember how beautiful you were when you hopped out of the car and looked around that place. I couldn’t stop staring at you. ”
Cooper’s mouth parts in an exhale, and I’m not even sure the song is still playing. I notice pretty much nothing but him as I go on.
“Your nose and cheekbones were permanently red from the sun the entire time we were there, and you grumbled every time I beat you at a card game, but I’d never seen you more excited.
” My heart thunders in my chest at the way he drinks in every word.
“You snuggled against me in that tent and I wished I could have frozen time so we could stay like that forever. And when I slipped up and kissed you that night, for just one moment, I felt whole for the first time in my life.”
I watch him swallow, his clear blue eyes shining in the fading light of day.
“Can I ask you something, Li?” he mutters.
“Anything.”
“Are you happy now?”
Fuck it.
My hand slips into the short hair at the back of his head, and he almost arches into me.
“No, Coop. ‘Happy’ doesn’t cover how I feel right now.”
His face splits into a blinding smile that could light up my entire world, and it’s impossible not to taste that smile, not to suck on that perfect mouth and sample it for myself.
“The song is over,” he murmurs against me, his voice a tiny bit raspier than earlier, his lips visibly redder, and I know that if we weren’t in the middle of something really important, I would have already thrown him over my shoulder and carried him off somewhere.
I hold him tighter.
“And?”
He huffs out a soft laugh, burrowing deeper into my embrace.
“And soon, we’ll have to listen to what I’m sure will be many embarrassing toasts. I bet everyone is dying to give us shit.”
A laugh rumbles in my chest, because he’s one hundred percent right on that.
But I just want a little bit more.
“I want one more dance with you, Coop,” I admit against the shell of his ear, and I hear his breath quietly hitch. “Let me have a few more moments with you like this.” Let me hold you, knowing you’re mine, knowing you won’t disappear when I let you go. Knowing I’m holding my dream in my arms.
He simply nods, clutching me just as tightly for three more songs.
Nobody interrupts us, our friends swaying along to the music themselves, or chatting happily with a cocktail and an hors-d-oeuvre in hand.
I only let him go when it’s time for the evening to move along—to the toasts, to dinner, and the delicious chocolate cake we chose.
The night is warm, the sky full of tiny stars.
Cooper never stops smiling, and it’s so hard not to just watch him all the time.
I make a valiant effort to focus on the different conversations around me, and to some extent, I think I do my best. But it’s only because I never stop touching him, keeping my hand on his thigh, caressing the back of his hand, dipping my head to kiss his neck when he’s not looking.
I feel drunk. On him. On a happiness I never thought I’d get.
He’s a gift, and I only want to be able to show him.
Good thing we have the rest of our lives for me to do exactly that.
***
COOPER
It’s pretty late when we get home, but the drive feels oddly short, shorter than the drive there. Almost as if time has compressed to help us get home faster.
I’ve just turned the key in the lock of our apartment when I’m suddenly lifted off my feet by a pair of strong arms.
My voice is definitely not breathless when I meet Liam’s dark-green gaze and devilish smirk.
“What are you doing?”
“Carrying you inside.”
And fuck, he does, reminding me exactly why I can never get enough of the way he can pick me up and manhandle me so easily, like I weigh nothing to him, even though we’re pretty much the same height and size.
It does things to me. So many tingly things.
“Why?”
His eyes burn into me.
“Because I wanted to carry my husband into our home.” He leans in, and I shiver at his hot whisper in my ear. “And because I know how much my husband likes to be carried.”
Good. God.
Liam calling me his husband in that rough voice might very well make me expire.
To be honest, I’m not sure how I can still function after the last few hours with him. After the things he said to me while we danced. After the way I felt his attention on me all evening, making me feel warmer that any summer night ever could.