He smiled. “I want it, too. And for the first time in my life, I believe I can have it.”
“Jeremy is amazing,” she said, giving him a little nudge with her elbow.
“Jeremy is everything,” Charlie whispered as they neared the back row of chairs. The happiness in the words filled Becca’s heart up to overflowing.
The audience all stood. It wasn’t a huge gathering—a handful of Nick’s friends from various stages of his life, some of Becca’s hospital colleagues and spouses, friends they’d made along the course of the investigation—Detective Vance, Walter and Louis Jackson, Chen. Ike and Jess, who worked at Hard Ink Tattoo, sat to the far side holding Eileen by her leash—the puppy wore a collar with wedding bells hanging off it and a veil that ran down her back. And to top it off, nearly twenty members of the Raven Riders Motorcycle Club had come, some with dates, some without. Before all this, Becca had never before met a person in a motorcycle club, but without them, Nick and his teammates would never have been able to win all the fights that had ultimately allowed the guys to clear their names.
And finally put the past to rest.
Becca was looking forward to getting to know the Ravens more now that all the fighting was behind them.
Looking up, Becca found Nick straight ahead of her, looking as sexy as she’d ever seen him. His dress uniform highlighted the strong width of his shoulders and the trim leanness of his waist. Metals hanging on one side of his chest spoke of a man of honor, loyalty, bravery, and so much more. But what she most noticed was the expression on his face. Total, abject, unrestrained love, unconditional devotion, incredible respect.
If you had those things with the person walking through life with you, what more could you possibly want? Becca certainly didn’t know.
As she got closer, she could see the men standing up for Nick, standing by his side. Jeremy, who lived life with more pure delight than anyone she knew. Shane, within whom a fire to help and secure justice for others burned so bright. Marz, who was the most positive, loyal person she’d ever known. Easy, who would do anything for anyone, and who was one of the strongest people she’d ever met in her life, even if he didn’t yet know it. And Beckett, fierce and self-sacrificing, the quintessential good guy hiding under a gruff exterior. She loved that about him. She loved all of them.
On a table in front of the men stood seven framed photographs. Her father and the six men from their A-team who hadn’t survived that ambush on a dusty road in Afghanistan. They were all together again. Just as it should be.
Finally, she and Charlie reached the front. The chaplain asked, “Who presents this woman to be married to this man?”
“I do,” Charlie said. He kissed her on the cheek, then turned to take a seat.
Except before he could do so, Kat came down the two brick steps, grabbed his hand, and led him to stand with her. “You should be here, too,” she said.
It was the first moment all day that made Becca have to fight back tears.
Nick stepped forward and took her hand, and the glassiness in his eyes hammered the next nail into her effort to make it through the ceremony without smearing her makeup. As he guided her up the steps, he whispered, “I love you, Becca. I am absolutely the luckiest man alive.”
“I love you, too, Nick. Always and forever,” she whispered back.
And as they exchanged their vows and claimed one another with their rings and confirmed their commitment in front of everyone they loved, Becca knew this was what happily ever after felt like.
“Ladies and gentlemen,” the chaplain called out when they’d said everything that needed to be said, “may I present the new mister and missus Nick and Becca Rixey. You may seal your union with a kiss.”
As applause erupted, Nick slid his big hand behind her neck and slowly pulled her in. The kiss was deep and soulful and claiming, full of love and heat, the kind of kiss she would remember as an old lady, the kind of kiss that would make her remember that, once, she’d really lived.
But living was what she was all about now. And this kiss was what their happily ever after was going to feel like all the time. Full of life and passion and love.
And if they ran into some hard times along the way, they’d fight through them together. Side by side. Surrounded by their friends.
After all, hard ever afters were good, too.
Because hard is good.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
LAURA KAYE is the New York Times and USA Today bestselling author of over twenty books in contemporary romance and romantic suspense. Laura grew up amid family lore involving angels, ghosts, and evil-eye curses, cementing her life-long fascination with storytelling and the supernatural. A former college history professor, Laura also writes historical women’s fiction as Laura Kamoie. Laura lives in Maryland with her husband, two daughters, and cute-but-bad dog, and appreciates her view of the Chesapeake Bay every day.
www.laurakayeauthor.com
www.avonromance.com
www.facebook.com/avonromance
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ALSO BY LAURA KAYE
Raven Riders Series
RIDE ROUGH
RIDE HARD
Coming Soon
RIDE WILD
Hard Ink Novels
HARD TO SERVE
HARD EVER AFTER (novella)
HARD AS STEEL
HARD TO LET GO
HARD TO BE GOOD (novella)
HARD TO COME BY
HARD TO HOLD ON TO (novella)
HARD AS YOU CAN
HARD AS IT GETS
COPYRIGHT
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
“Hard Ever After” was originally published as an e-book novella in February 2016 by Avon Impulse, an Imprint of HarperCollins Publishers.
“Hard Ever After” copyright © 2016 by Laura Kaye.
RIDE ROUGH. Copyright © 2017 by Laura Kaye. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.
EPub Edition May 2017 ISBN: 9780062403391
Print Edition ISBN: 9780062403384
FIRST EDITION
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Laura Kaye, Ride Rough
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