Protect & Serve(51)

“Yes?” he replied quietly, stroking my cheek.

I leaned into his touch, craving just a few more seconds of lucidity. “Stay with me… Stay with us…”

He nodded, leaning forward to press his lips against my forehead just above the bridge of my nose. “Always, Sandra,” he promised me. “I’ll always stay.”

I let his words wrap me in a tender embrace as I closed my eyes and drifted blissfully away.





19





Paris is cold in the winter. You never really think about that when you’re looking at pretty pictures of the Eiffel Tower and the quaint, narrow streets paved with cobblestones. It all looks so warm and inviting, and yet here I was, being forced toward shelter by the crisp and biting wind stinging my dark skin.

The dress wasn’t helping.

I shuffled up the steps of the huge church in the sheer, but billowing white folds of cloth. It draped beautifully over my frame, but did nothing to hide my obvious pregnancy. The strapless bodice was especially troublesome, as it exposed my expanding cleavage to the frigid air. At this point, I would have traded the whole outfit for a pair of yoga pants and one of Nathan’s big stretchy white t-shirts.

It was my fault, of course. I was the idiot who had to go outside for a breath of fresh air just a few minutes before the wedding. I’d taken on the Irish mafia, almost single-handedly dismantled a sex-trafficking ring, and exposed the corruption running rampant through my city’s police department, and yet nothing seemed so terrifying as walking up the steps and through the doors toward my destiny.

Everyone was waiting inside to start, cradled in the warmth of the cathedral. I was happy to see them, and obviously elated to be there, but this had all happened so fast… Was I ready? Could we truly be a family?

I thought back to everything that had led up to this moment. Unsurprisingly, Nathan didn’t want me returning to the force after I’d recovered, especially once I’d testified against the Captain. Right or wrong, cops looked after their own, and there was enough corruption to ensure I’d never see another promotion—or worse, that backup might not arrive next time I needed it. He told me I could oversee his security team, but that was just an excuse to keep me close while he found a suitable ring.

And what a ring it was.

I glanced down, the oversized diamond sparkling wildly in the colored light that streamed down from the stained glass windows. It was a platinum band with a sixteen-carat monstrosity situated right in the center of it. I wasn’t the kind of girl who spent her life dreaming of her wedding day, but on the occasions in which I had contemplated it, I never once imagined I’d have a ring or a dress as beautiful as this. Sure, it had to be custom-tailored to fit over my eight month pregnant belly, but that was a problem money could solve.

I looked away from the ring and toward the people staring expectantly at me from the pews. This was it. My moment. I almost laughed at the beauty of it all.

Everyone turned to watch as I stepped onto the red carpet leading to the altar. The organ began to play its marching tune, filling the space with warm, reverberating tones that disturbed the butterflies once lying dormant in my stomach.

Here comes the bride…

I tried not to look at the crowd, instead focusing on the man waiting for me just a few feet away. Nathan looked incredible. He was standing at the end of the aisle, that goddamn smirk spread wide across his handsome face, shifting in anticipation as he watched me steadily approach. I’d gotten used to looking at his thousand-dollar suits and his shoes that cost more than my car, but this was on a whole other level. There wasn’t a stitch on his clothing that had been made by a machine. It wasn’t just hand-tailored; it was molded, every fiber of the cloth handcrafted for this very moment. Ours were a pair of outfits suitable for a prince and a princess, worn by a billionaire and an ex-detective who wasn’t quite ready to wear several million dollars’ worth of diamond jewelry and a dress too pretty to sit down in.

I took my first step toward him, clutching my bouquet to my chest. I didn’t have a father to give me away. He’d left while I was still in elementary school, which either was because of, or had led to my mother’s addiction—I’d been too young to tell. Only a few distant relatives had come in his stead, and as much as I appreciated their support, I wasn’t about to let my uncle’s third cousin walk me down the aisle. Like everything else in life, if I was going to do this, then I was going to do it alone.

A certain solemnity hit me, just for a moment. I wished my mother could’ve been here, and Jenny—or at least, the versions of them I held so near and dear to my heart. In my mind’s eye, they were always sober, happy, and at peace, always living the best days of their lives. Nothing could have made this day any more perfect except for their smiling faces beaming at me from the pews. I felt a pang of regret sting my heart as I envisioned them doing just that.