Chapter 12
March, Mystic Hollow Public Library
“Never officiated anything in a library before, let alone a wedding,” Lachlan burred from behind the circulation desk turned altar. “But I cannae say I’m mad about it.”
“Of course it’s here,” Hunter said. “This is where she threatened me first. There’s poetry in it.”
And it was also perfect for her, for them. It was where they met, where their destinies collided. It was where she’d felt the safest, the place she loved completely. And today was going to be the day he took her name.
It shouldn’t matter–they were fated mates.
No need for more, right? Wrong. It mattered to him, for some reason.
And so he stood at the top of the short aisle between two tall shelves–romance section on one side, horror on the other.
How fitting. They had wound up twinkle lights on the shelves’ edges.
Candles in mason jars burned at the end.
A woven rug led to the altar, AKA the circulation desk.
The space was tight, but there weren’t many people anyway.
Dorian and Amelia, obviously the best man and Maid of Honor.
Daphne’s friends from the gym. Harper and Nick.
Hunter pulled at the tie and at the collar.
“Nervous?” Dorian asked.
“No. I honestly don’t understand how you dress like this every minute of your existence. This is torture.”
Dorian simply arched a black eyebrow. “Elegance, Hunter. Elegance.”
He had a comeback, somewhere, but Daphne appeared between the shelves and for a moment, Hunter forgot how to think. The dress, ivory chiffon and weightless, touched her anywhere he would soon.
He lost his balance as Dorian elbowed his side. “You’re fog, not a fountain,” he whispered. “Stop drooling and pull yourself together, mate.”
Easier said than done, because the bodice clung just right, and the neckline dipped in a clean V, showing off her breasts like it had been stitched by someone who understood how to make modesty a fucking tease.
She walked to him the way she’d always lived her life: alone and with her chin up. But she was smiling at him, knowing exactly what passed through his brain and loving every moment of it.
He took her hand when she stood at his side.
Lachlan cleared his throat and started the ceremony.
“You stand here of your own will, witnessed by those who know your hearts. What you vow now is spoken in truth, bound in love, and made to endure.” He gave a solemn nod.
“Do you, Daphne Claire Quinn, take Hunter to be your bonded mate, to walk with him in shadow and in light, to share in joy and in sorrow, to love him without condition, to honor him with your trust, and to choose him in every world you walk through, until time itself lets go?”
“I do,” Daphne said, her voice clear and sure.
“Do you, Hunter, take Daphne Claire Quinn to be your bonded mate, to walk with her in shadow and in light, to share in joy and in sorrow, to love her without condition, to honor her with your trust, and to choose her in every world you walk through, until time itself lets go?”
Every version of him, in every form he’d ever taken, all of him was hers. And so, his voice was steady and utterly certain when he said, “I do.”
“Then by word, by will, and by witness, I pronounce you demon and wife.” A smile curved Lachlan’s lips. “Go on then. Ye can kiss now.”
He did. And he, a demon who lived in nightmares, wandered through a thousand lifetimes but never believed in always, knew he’d found it.
Knew she was the shape of forever.
THE END