“Okay, now that we’ve got our marriage license, how and when do we make it official?” Brandon asked eagerly.
“We can go downstairs and finish up there with a quick ceremony. That’s what I had planned originally. Or we could wait a few months and throw a real wedding and have everything made official then.”
“I want to marry you now, Erica. Right now. I want to make you my wife, and I don’t want to wait another moment,” he said, grabbing her hands. “I need your acceptance of me as the man who’ll take care of you and look after you for the rest of your life. Our family’s not here or anything, and I know you probably want your mom here, just like I’d love to have Alec, Connor, and my mom here, but we don’t have to tell anyone just yet. We can say we got engaged and then throw the big wedding later. What do you say?”
Erica smiled, her eyes wet. “You read my mind. Let’s do it,” she said. “But just so you know, we need a witness. I hired someone from the street to act as a witness earlier—guess we can still use him.” She grinned.
Brandon considered his prospects. He couldn’t think of anyone he trusted to have discretion and get down there fast enough. He even considered calling Connor up for a moment, but Connor wasn’t the greatest with secrets.
“Deal,” he said. “Bring ‘cousin Skeeter’ or whoever the random is on down. Let’s do this.”
After their quickie ceremony, they spent most of the rest of the day locking lips and at least part of the day at Brandon’s place, reacquainting themselves with each other’s bodies.
The first person Brandon called when they came up for air was Connor.
Brandon could barely contain his excitement and had to keep checking himself, reminding himself not to let the big news slip.
“Connor, it worked! I got her back. Erica and I are engaged now.”
“Sweet!” Connor said. “I knew it would happen. I’m so glad for you, bro, and I hope being with her is all you wanted and more. Can’t wait to see her and say hi. She still has that frizzy-ass hair?”
Brandon laughed. “Her hair has multiple personalities and I love each one. She’s amazing, Connor. God, I hope you get to feel this way about someone someday.”
“Okay, stop right there. Don’t try to marry me off—I’m still far too young for that.”
“Yeah, well, I thought I was, too. But if the one who does this to you crosses your path, don’t let her go. Anyway, when the time comes, you’ll see.”
As soon as he hung up from Connor, Brandon glanced over at Erica and then called Alec when he saw her on her cell phone in her own world. He figured she was probably spreading the news of their ‘engagement’ herself, talking to her mom first.
He focused on Alec once he heard his big brother’s voice.
Alec congratulated him and then asked him about the date.
“We haven’t decided yet. Hey, what do you think of a double wedding?”
Alec laughed. “I don’t think Dahlia will go for it. Besides, I don’t feel like sharing her that day, anyway. And I want her to have her sparkling moment solo.”
“So neither of you will go for it, is what you’re saying,” Brandon said, smiling.
“I guess so. But I’d bet your girl doesn’t want to share the big day either—just a hunch. Did you even run this by her?”
“No.”
Alec laughed again. “You’ll learn.”
Brandon looked over at Erica again, who, at that moment, had thrown her head back in laughter, and all he could do was stare at her beauty and wonder at his luck.
Erica looked amazingly right in his condo.
She didn’t have a lot of stuff, so moving her in didn’t even take a U-Haul since she basically only came with clothes, shoes, and books.
Stanley made himself scarce the day she arrived to clear out her stuff, and Brandon could tell she still felt bad for what she had done to him. But he knew with each passing moment that her sadness would shrink and be replaced by equal or double parts joy.
Now that she was here with him, married to him, and looking unbelievably sexy in one of his T-shirts, Brandon still couldn’t believe his eyes and all that had transpired over the past several months.
He also looked forward to their upcoming movie nights—he had promised to watch a video of her first big play, and she had promised to sit through his rough-cut documentary.
They both eagerly looked forward to screening the movie they’d made a decade ago; Brandon had dug it up in one of his storage facilities.
“Erica Wilde,” he said. “What do you think about a double wedding with Alec and his woman?”
She gave him a look that answered him clearly.
“Okay, how about we skip the whole thing? The most important part is done, and you know what? I don’t even care about making a big event of it—I already have everything I want.”
She walked slowly over to him with a small smile, then kissed him on the forehead.
“Yet another thing we don’t have in common, it seems, because I care about a big event very much. Don’t worry, I’ll do the planning—you just show up in whatever I pick out for you. I’m having that wedding I imagined back when I was fourteen, Brandon Wilde.”
He grinned at her. She could have whatever the hell she wanted.
Brandon watched her staring back at him, loving the way she seemed to get trapped by his gaze sometimes—like she couldn’t take her eyes off of him even if someone pushed her.
“With whom did you imagine this wedding?” he said in faux-outrage.
Her smile widened, and her cheeks flushed a bit. “Who do you think?”
Brandon felt a warm tingle pass through his body from the top of his head to the tip of his toes, despite already knowing the answer before asking the question.
“Anyway,” Erica continued, “the first thing I want to sort out is where we’ll have it.”
Brandon thought about it for a second.
Then he said, “So I’ve got this gorgeous beach house in Hawaii…”
END
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