Chapter 30
Nate
THE CHRISTMAS SONG
I watch her across the altar as she trades jabs with Joshua.
The two of them making everyone laugh with her teasing him one last time about his wedding.
Joshua grabs Macy’s hand in his and kisses her fingers before aiming their conjoined hands to the sky.
“Married.” Everyone laughs as they cheer them on.
The two of them sharing one more look before making their way down the aisle.
Joshua shakes his father’s hand as he walks past him.
Zack with that proud look he has on his face most of the time we’re all together.
I clap my hands, turning my head to the side to watch Elizabeth, who smiles at them as they work their way down. I’m pushed forward by Jack, who is beside me. “Hurry up so we can get this over with, and I can go and be with my wife.” He pushes my shoulder to step forward.
Instead of walking forward, like we practiced yesterday, I tell him, “You take my place.” Trying not to let him know I want to walk with Elizabeth and not Belinda.
Belinda steps forward and looks at me, her eyes going big.
“Hurry.” I push him and he steps forward, smiling at her and then I step forward and hold out my arm for Elizabeth, who looks up at me with a smirk.
“Hi,” I say, my heart feeling like it’s finally beating at a normal pace, unlike when I watched her walk down the aisle.
I thought my heart was going to come out of my chest, and the only thing I could think was, she is beautiful and I want her to be mine.
Mine not just for the time she is here but for longer than that.
But then the dread came creeping back up, the back of my neck got so hot I thought someone was pouring boiling water on me.
It moved up to the back of my head and all I could do was look at her to calm myself down.
“Hi,” she replies softly as we walk down the aisle. Denise holds on to Zack’s arm as she smiles at us. “You look very dapper.” She turns her head to look at me, and I see the flash of the camera as they take a picture of us.
“You look like a million bucks,” I tell her. “More than a million, a trillion.”
“Whoa,” she jokes with me, looking down at her feet and then straight ahead again, smiling for everyone. Once we get to the end of the aisle, her hand falls from the crook of my arm as she walks over to Joshua.
“Now can I fuck with you?” she asks him and he barks out with laughter. His head goes back before he grabs her in his arms and the two of them share a big hug. “I’m taking that as a yes,” she teases and then Jack comes to them and the three of them share a hug.
“We need a picture of this,” Macy declares, “a truce has been formed.”
“She’s just having truces with everyone these days,” Jack teases her and then looks over at me, as if he knows what is going on.
“Not everyone.” She glares at him and that makes him laugh.
“If we can get everyone to clear out of this area,” Doreen instructs, “so the guests can come and congratulate the couple.” I step to the side and then look over when Elizabeth comes back to my side.
“She’s really bossy,” she mumbles and gives Doreen a chin lift.
“Stop making trouble, then,” I tease her, and she smirks at me before her face fills with a smile.
“Never,” she tells me as we are pulled away to take pictures.
There are pictures of just the groomsmen with Joshua and then the bridesmaids with Macy.
My eyes never leave Elizabeth’s as she smiles for the camera.
Then they have one with all of us. I stand next to Jack with Elizabeth in front of me, my hand on her hip.
She turns the hand that is hanging from beside her over so I can slide my other hand in hers, our fingers intertwined as we smile at the camera.
After what feels like an eternity, we finally are let go of our duties and we head toward the reception area. “We should get a drink.”
“I agree with this,” I tell her as we walk over to one of the empty tables that have been assigned for the bridal party. She puts her bouquet down as we walk to the bar.
I order her a white wine and a whiskey for myself. “Well, well, well.” We look over when a woman with short salt-and-pepper hair is walking toward us, round black glasses perched at the tip of her nose. “If it isn’t little Elizabeth,” she says walking to her.
Elizabeth smiles at her. “Dr. Torres,” she says her name as she kisses her cheek. “I’m so happy to see you,” she adds and then looks at me. “Nate,” she calls my name, “this is Dr. Torres, she is one of the reasons I went into medicine.”
I smile at the woman. “Oh please.” Dr. Torres shakes her head. “Nonsense.”
“She has the best emergency clinic I’ve ever been to.” He smiles at the woman. “A place I used to end up frequently with two older brothers.”
I laugh. “You were very accident prone,” I tease her.
“How is the clinic?” she asks Dr Torres, who smiles sadly.
“I’m shutting it down,” she informs her. “It’s time for me to retire and I never found anyone I trusted enough to take it over.”
“What?” Elizabeth says, her hand coming up to hold on to my arm. “That clinic is…” She shakes her head. “It’s the only clinic that I know of in the area.”
“I’m sure someone will come around and open a new one once I’m gone,” she mentions. “Excuse me, dear, I’m going to go and congratulate Joshua.”
“I can’t believe it,” Elizabeth whispers.
“See this scar?” She lifts her bare arm and I see a little V scar.
“Joshua threw a plastic chair at me.” I roll my lips, trying not to laugh.
“See this?” She puts her head back and points to another small scar.
“Four stiches, running up the steps from Joshua because I scratched his DVD of The Fast and the Furious.” My hand comes up to touch her chin gently. “I can’t believe it.”
“If we can get everyone’s attention,” the emcee announces. “We’ll be serving the first course in five minutes, so everyone take their seats.”
I walk side by side with her to the table and Jack comes over with Evie, sitting down with us. “Did you know Dr. Torres is closing down her clinic?” Elizabeth asks Jack, who looks like he’s in shock as well. “I know.” She pffts. “She can’t find someone she trusts to take it over.”
“That’s so sad,” he replies. “I was wrestling with Joshua once when I was sixteen”—Jack turns to Evie—“and I fucked up my elbow. I told Mom and she ignored me. Said something about not roughhousing.”
Elizabeth and I both laugh because she would always say that. “Two days later I went to tell her that I was in pain still. She took one look at it and called me an idiot, but then told me to get in the car. My elbow was fractured. I ended up in a cast and missed my bantam hockey year playoffs.”
“What did that teach you?” Evie asks him.
“To never go to my mother when I was in pain. I would go straight to my father.” We all laugh at him.
Joshua and Macy are introduced to everyone as husband and wife. The two of them doing their first dance to “Come Away with Me.”
Everyone claps when he dips her. “Isn’t that sweet?” Elizabeth says sarcastically when they finish and the food comes out.
The plates are cleared when another song comes on and I see people head to the dance floor. I push away from the table. “Will you dance with me?” I hold out my hand.
“Again?” She smiles up at me as she takes my hand and I almost, almost whisper out always. But instead, I just nod my head.
“If you keep this up”—Jack follows my lead, getting up and holding out his hand for Evie—“people are going to think you like each other.” We look at each other before laughing at Jack and walking away.
I slide my hand around her waist while she puts one of her arms over my shoulder, her fingers sliding into the back of my hair.
“So on a scale of one to ten,” Jack quips from beside us, “how happy are you that in two days you can finally have your room back?” He looks at Elizabeth with a smirk on his face. It’s a look I’ve seen before, many times. A look that says I’m going to fuck with you until you tell me the truth.
“What?” Elizabeth says to him as I look at her, the both of us moving side to side.
“Well, everyone is pretty much leaving tomorrow night, max by the twenty sixth, so your room will be free.”
“Oh,” she replies softly and I feel the tightness form all over my body.
“You can always still stay with me,” I offer. “Baby Cat has gotten used to you anyway.”
“Is that why?” Jack asks and then Evie laughs.
“Would you leave them alone?” she scolds. “He thinks the two of you have been hooking up.”
My stomach lurches. “What?” I say.
“So,” Elizabeth interjects at the same time, “if we were, which I’m not saying we are, what does it matter?”
“If you aren’t,” Jack teases her, “then what does it matter if we know or not?”
I look down at Elizabeth and see her shake her head. “I guess you’ll never know, then.”
“The two of you need to knock it off,” Evie advises, “it’s Christmas Eve and it’s Joshua’s wedding.”
“Please,” Jack scoffs, “he’s so happy she showed up, he couldn’t care less.”
“Well, I care,” Evie states. “Do you want me to be sad?”
“Yeah, Jack, do you want her to be sad?” Elizabeth jumps on his ass.
“She has been looking a little bit sadder every day that goes by. You need to stop worrying about who I’m hooking up with and pay attention to your woman and her needs.
” I roll my lips. “They are clearly not met.” She sighs.
“Get away from us before I yell ‘stranger danger.’”
“Okay, that’s enough,” I intervene, moving her away from him. “You are—”
“The best, I know,” she fills in for me. “You don’t have to say it, I already know. You’re welcome, by the way.”
“For what?” I ask her, and fuck, the need to kiss her is as strong as it is to keep breathing to stay alive.
“For not telling him that we’re hooking up,” she answers. “He would kick your ass.”
I throw my head back and laugh. “He would not kick my ass.” I pull her closer to me. “He would definitely turn around and tell your parents.”
“Can you imagine?”
“Yeah,” I reply, wanting to be able to kiss her when the fuck I want to, “I can.”
“Okay,” the emcee says, “it’s the big moment.”
I let her go a little, turning her in my arms as her back is to me. My arms go around her chest and she leans into me. “It’s time for all the single ladies to come up to the dance floor.”
“Eeww,” she moans out, “absolutely not.” She pushes me back. “Move, move, move.”
She’s about to escape when Denise comes running up to her. “Here is your chance.”
“For what?” Elizabeth asks. “I already have a bouquet of flowers.”
“Shut up and get on that dance floor and catch the fucking bouquet,” she swears and Elizabeth and I just look at each other, trying not to laugh.
“Just move out of the way,” I mumble to her and Denise glares at me.
“You’re next,” she tells me. “He’s throwing the garter and you better fucking catch it.”
“I don’t want it.” I scrunch my nose up and shake my head. “It was on Macy’s leg. That’s gross. I don’t want it. I think it’s even a bad omen if the best man catches the garter that was on the bride’s leg.”
She doesn’t say a word to me, she just pulls Elizabeth to the dance floor while Zoe drags Lexi, who smiles at her mother, but it’s a smile that says she’s not going to catch that thing.
“The best part is she’s dating Jaxon’s best friend,” Jack shares from beside me, motioning with his chin to the guy who is standing at the side, smiling at her. “From what I was told, he helped her get away from her asshole husband,” he says. “Whatever he did, she’s thriving now.”
“Okay, here we go,” the emcee starts, “one, two, three.” Macys throws the bouquet over her head and it lands right on Elizabeth, who folds her arms to her chest in reflex.
“Noooo,” she groans out, “that—” She doesn’t say anything because Denise is jumping up and down as if she just won the Stanley Cup.
“She’s next.” She holds on to Zack’s arm, who just smiles down at her. “Oh my God, she’s next.”
“I’m not next,” Elizabeth retorts, moving off the dance floor.
“Okay, where are my bachelors?” the emcee asks.
“That would be you.” Jack pushes me to the middle of the floor and I’m surrounded now with some of the men and Gavin.
“You should catch this,” I tell him and he smirks.
“I plan on it, since it’s customary for the person who catches the bouquet and the person who catches the garter to dance with each other.” The minute he says the words, I want to throat punch him. He claps his hands together and I just look at him. “Been trying to catch her attention all night.”
I don’t listen to anything else because the emcee is counting down.
Gavin beside me moves side to side, as if he’s getting ready to run a play in football.
He bounces up and down on his feet, and when the garter flies through the air, I move my hand up and he may be wider than me but I’m taller, so it falls right in my hand.
Joshua turns around and howls with laughter when I hold up the garter hanging on my finger. I walk over to him and tuck it back in the pocket on his tux. “You can keep that. Thank you very much.” I slap his chest, turning and seeing Elizabeth on the side laughing and shaking her head.
“You just had to, didn’t you?” she teases me and I smile at her.
“How else would I get you to dance with me again?” I tease her, pulling her to me and bending my head to her ear. “You can thank me later.”