McKettricks of Texas: Austin (36 page)

He took a small velvet box from the pocket of his shirt, moved to sit on the mattress beside her.

Paige's breath caught and her eyes burned, and the only sound she could make in that moment was a little strangled, “Oh.”

Austin raised the lid of the box, revealing an exquisite diamond ring in an antique setting. “Clay McKettrick put this ring on his bride's finger when she agreed to marry him, way back when they founded this ranch and this family.” He paused, cleared his throat. “You could probably do a lot better than me, Paige Remington, but you'll never meet a man who loves you more than I do. If you throw in with me, I'll spend the rest of my life proving you made the right decision.”

Paige put a hand to her throat, waited for her heart to resume its normal rate again. Her vision blurred, and a tear slipped down her cheek. “Oh, Austin, I love you so much—”

“Is that a yes?” he asked. “I know you said
yes
out in the barn, but you were sort of—well—under the influence at the time.”

The phrase was apt. She'd definitely been “under the influence at the time,” all right—still spinning in the backwash of a tidal orgasm. Paige put out her left hand, ring finger raised. “It's a yes,” she confirmed.

She would have sworn that some sweet charge went
through her the instant Austin put that ring on her finger, but there was no time to ponder it.

He kissed her then, and she kissed him back, and it wasn't long until they were
both
under the influence.

New Year's Eve
The Silver Spur Ranch

T
HE GROUNDS SURROUNDING
the ranch house looked like some vast and exotic camp, with colorful canvas pavilions everywhere and dozens of potted trees twinkling with
millions
of tiny fairy lights. It looked to Esperanza, peering out through the darkening window above the sink, like an international convention of fireflies.

As if all those heated tents weren't enough, a stage had been erected, with row upon row of folding chairs set up in front of it. After the triple wedding, timed to wind up exactly at midnight, several of the most famous country singers in the world would perform with their bands.

Guests had been arriving since the day before, filling up every spare room in virtually every house for miles around, taking over hotels as far away as Austin and San Antonio.

The children hadn't been forgotten; out there in the pasture, a real Ferris wheel glowed, neon green and pink, against a clear but wintry sky. There was a carousel, too, and several other rides.

Esperanza, who had been directing workmen of all sorts since the day after Christmas, wiped her capable
hands on the little towel stitched specially into the waistband of her apron and beamed.

“These McKettricks,” chimed Maria, one of the housekeeper's many nieces, hired to help out with the house and the children and the dogs when the three happy couples left for their various honeymoon destinations, “they never do anything halfway.”

“No,” Esperanza agreed, blinking away tears as she thought of Sally and Jim McKettrick—how proud they'd be of their sons, and their future daughters-in-law, of the twins and Calvin, how thrilled over the baby Libby was already carrying under her heart. “To a McKettrick, if something is worth doing at all, it's worth doing with everything they've got.”

Caterers and their assistants moved around the kitchen in swirls of activity, but Esperanza paid little attention to them. They'd been around all day, and she was used to hubbub anyway. Working for the McKettricks, she'd learned to thrive in chaos.

“I heard there's going to be a spread about this wedding in
People
magazine,” Maria said, brown eyes twinkling. “Ron Strivens says there are reporters and photographers asking to camp out
in the barn.
”

Esperanza sighed and shook her head. She supposed an event like this one was bound to attract the media, and she didn't really care, as long as those three couples ended up properly married in the eyes of God and man.

Call her old-fashioned, but Esperanza was going to feel a lot better about all this when the gossips finally had to shut up about how this venerable old ranch house had turned into a hotbed of sin since the Remington women had moved in with the McKettrick men.

She crossed herself and turned just as Calvin came
rushing down the center stairway. He was the official ring bearer, and already wearing everything but the jacket of his miniature tuxedo. His blond hair was slicked down, and the lenses of his glasses, usually smudged, gleamed with cleanliness.

“Mom sent me down here,” he said, coming to a stop directly in front of Esperanza and tilting his head back to look up at her. “I keep asking her when we can ride on the Ferris wheel, Audrey and Ava and me, and she says she needs a break from all those questions.”

Esperanza hid a smile. She drew back one of the high stools at one of the counters and patted the seat. “Climb up here,” she told the little boy. “There are some extraspecial cookies hidden away, just for you and the twins.”

“Do
you
know when we can ride the Ferris wheel?” Calvin inquired.

Esperanza laughed. “Not specifically,” she said. “And why are you in your wedding clothes already? The ceremony doesn't start for several hours—suppose you get dirty?”

“Well, I'd change if it meant I could ride the Ferris wheel,” Calvin said.

Esperanza put three small and very fancy cookies onto a plate and set them in front of him. “I'm sure you would,” she said with a smile.

Audrey and Ava arrived next. Unlike Calvin, they were still wearing their regular clothes—flannel-lined jeans and the bright red sweaters they'd gotten at Christmas. They would be flower girls in the wedding, clad in pink dresses as soft as any rosebud, and they were practically vibrating with anticipation.

“Come and have cookies,” Esperanza said gently.

The girls scraped stools back from beneath the counter
and climbed up onto them, perched on either side of Calvin.

“Daddy wants to see Libby in her wedding dress,” Ava confided, “and she won't let him.”

“She locked him out of their bedroom,” Audrey added. “She's never done that before.”

Esperanza crossed herself again, asked silently for guidance. “There's nothing to worry about,” she told the child, patting her hand. “Everybody's just excited about the wedding, that's all.”

Calvin nodded sagely. “Have you heard anything about when we get to go on the Ferris wheel?” he asked the twins, his mouth full of cookies.

Esperanza sighed, thinking of the elegant ceremony ahead, and all the photographs that would be taken. She fetched a dish towel from a drawer and tied it around Calvin like a bib.

“How about right now?” a masculine voice asked.

Everyone, including Esperanza, turned to see Garrett standing just inside the back door. To look at him, in his torn jeans and his old shirt and those boots that had no business touching her spotless kitchen floor, nobody would ever guess that he was about to get himself married.

All the kids cheered, jumping down off the stools, and the cookies were forgotten.

Calvin bounded for the door, and Garrett caught him easily by the waist, spun him around once, and set him back on his feet. “Whoa, buddy,” he said. “If I let you go outside in those duds, your mother will nail my hide to the barn door.”

Calvin went big-eyed at the idea.

Esperanza gave Garrett a disapproving look. “Honestly,”
she said, with a cluck of her tongue. “Garrett McKettrick, children take statements like that
literally.
”

Calvin had moved on. “Well, what am I supposed to
do?
” he cried, flinging his little hands out from his sides for emphasis. “Mom sent me down here because I'm underfoot up there where she is, and I don't know how I'm going to change into different clothes if I can't even
go upstairs—
”

Esperanza ducked into the laundry room and returned momentarily with an entire set of clothes for Calvin—jeans, a heavy sweatshirt to keep him extrawarm, and even a pair of high-top sneakers.

“Thank you!” Calvin fairly shrieked at such a fever pitch of joy and excitement that he snatched the garments right out of Esperanza's hands and ran wildly for the nearest bathroom, so he could switch outfits.

By then, Audrey and Ava were already bundled up in their play jackets and the family dogs were converging on that kitchen like something out of a Disney animal movie.

Old Hildie and the two pups, Buford and Ambrose, clattered down Tate's stairway, while the beagle sidled down Garrett's on his three strong legs. As if on cue, Shep descended Austin's steps, tail switching, eyes bright.

Garrett laughed and took the whole bunch of them, kids
and
dogs, outside, into the gathering twilight.

The intercom buzzed.

Esperanza made her way over to the device and pushed a button. “Yes? This is Esperanza speaking.”

Julie was on the other end. “Did I just see Garrett crossing the yard with three kids and five dogs, headed for the Ferris wheel?”

Esperanza drew a breath, took the time to let it out slowly.
Very
slowly. “Yes,” she said. “You did.”

“Was Calvin wearing his tuxedo? I've made him take it off at least twice already, but he keeps putting it back on.” Julie didn't sound angry, just nervous.

Esperanza smiled. “Calvin is wearing play clothes,” she assured the fretful bride. Since both of Julie's sisters were also getting married, and all three of them had decided against having bridesmaids, there was only their mother to fuss over them, and Marva had been dashing from one section of the house to another all day. “Is there anything you would like for me to do for you?”

“You're busy overseeing the caterers and the extra staff,” Julie said with a brave sniffle. “I'll be fine.”

Esperanza rolled her eyes, but she loved Libby, Julie and Paige like daughters. They were the best thing that had ever happened to those rascal men of theirs. “I am right here if you need anything,” she said gently.

Julie thanked her kindly and ended the conversation. She'd barely turned to walk away when the device buzzed again.

This time it was Paige calling from the rooms upstairs. She and Austin had been sharing them ever since her cast was removed, just ten days before. She'd rented out her house in town.

“Hello? Is anyone there?”

Esperanza smiled. “I'm here,” she said. “What do you need?”

“I need for this wedding to be over,” Paige replied. “I just want to be married, for heaven's sake. Why does this whole thing have to be such a circus?”

“Now, now,” Esperanza said soothingly. “It will not be long now.”

“You're right,” the youngest bride conceded, with an extended sigh. “Have you seen our mother?”

“I believe she may be with Libby,” Esperanza replied. “Shall I send someone to find her, and ask her to join you?”

“God forbid,” Paige said. “I was going to ask you to give Marva some job to do, so she'll leave us alone. She's driving me crazy!”

Esperanza chuckled. “Have patience,” she counseled. “She is not merely the mother of one bride, but of
three.
The poor thing must feel as if she's being pulled in every direction, and I'm sure she's doing the best she can.”

Paige made a strangled sound of pure frustration and signed off.

Esperanza smiled and went back to the preparations. There was still a great deal to do, after all.

11:45 p.m.

T
ATE, STANDING ON
a low platform in the largest of the pavilions, the space lit with candles and carpeted in pink, yellow and white rose petals, watched as Libby appeared in the doorway at the top of the aisle, holding Garrett's arm.

There was a hush, then the music began, and the hundreds of guests rose from their folding chairs and turned to watch. To Tate, they were barely more than a smear of color at the periphery of his awareness.

Then his daughters came into sharp focus. Audrey and Ava fairly skipped along the aisle, in their carefully chosen dresses, carrying baskets filled with still more flower petals and flinging them around like confetti. They
did just enough grandstanding to elicit a grin from Tate and a ripple of fond laughter from the gathering.

Reaching the platform, Tate's daughters hiked up their skirts—more amusement from the crowd—and hurried over to him with their baskets.

He smiled and bent to kiss the tops of their heads, and sent them to stand in their appointed positions, as previously rehearsed. They made a production of finding the spots where they were supposed to stand—the wedding planner had marked the floor with two Xs of pink tape.

Next came Calvin, standing up as straight and tall as he could in his little tux, carrying a thick red velvet pillow with three wedding bands gleaming on top. Each band was tied with a different-colored ribbon—Libby's ribbon was blue.

Calvin, unlike the twins, used the steps to mount the platform, and took his place, looking as solemn as a little judge. Although he'd said nothing could ever be as special as the day he'd spent with his mom on the class trip to Six Flags, it was clear this wedding day was going to create a lot of precious memories for the precocious youngster.

The organist struck a more decisive chord then, and Tate knew the moment he'd been waiting for, for so long, had finally arrived.

Libby, the woman he loved more than his life, was moving toward him, resplendent in her vintage ivory wedding dress. Even through the veil covering her face, Tate could see that her blue eyes were glistening with tears.

He adjusted his tie, which was choking him, and reminded himself silently that women cried when they were happy.

It was just one of many divine mysteries.

 

G
ARRETT BROUGHT
L
IBBY
to Tate's side, and then turned and waited as Julie stepped into view, her gloved hand resting on Austin's arm. Looking at her, in that wild confection of a white gown, with its yards of silk and lace, its sprinkling of tiny crystals, he felt his throat close up tight and his eyes burn.

“I love you,” he mouthed to Julie.

And through the sparkles of her veil, he saw her touch her fingers to her lips and blow him a kiss. Austin escorted Julie to Garrett, then added his own touch by kissing Julie's cheek, then Libby's, right through their veils, before finding his mark—a slash of masking tape—and standing on it.

 

BRENT BROGAN,
looking mighty out of his element in his rented tuxedo but spiffy just the same, filled the opening to the pavilion, practically pulling Paige to his side.

Paige's wedding dress was floor-length but fitted, and instead of a veil, she wore a round-brimmed hat the same shade of white as her dress with all sorts of gauzy stuff and flowers on the band. Her beautiful face was clearly visible.

God almighty,
Austin thought, looking at her.
I'm the luckiest man who ever lived.

She swept up the aisle, holding Brogan's arm, and never looked to the right or the left the whole way, but only straight into Austin's eyes. Straight into his soul.

I love you,
he told her, with everything but words.