Stay With Me (32 page)

“Not my finest moment, and it won’t happen again,
but thank you, Abby.” No wonder she had looked perturbed. It had probably been
difficult for her to spit out that compliment.

“This may not make sense to you, but Rebecca is
more Rebecca with you.”

She might not have expected him to understand that,
but he did. “Become who you are,” he murmured.

“What did you say?”

“Become who you are. It’s something Pope Saint John
Paul II said. I thought it was an interesting statement. I didn’t really get it
until now though. Rebecca has become who she is meant to be.” He wanted to say
“in Christ,” but that would be a conversation for another day.

Abby seemed nonplussed, and Ian stretched toward
the ballroom. “I’ll drag her out of there for you. You deserve some time
alone.” She reached up and kissed Chris’s cheek, and gave him a side hug with
her free arm. She turned and started toward the door and then turned back, her voice
elevated because of the distance. “You two better get working on some cousins
for my children.”

He opened his mouth to answer, but she cut in.

“Unless…Rebecca complained of queasiness this
morning. I dismissed it as nerves, but is she pregnant already?”

Chris’s cheeks heated. The pretty dark-skinned girl
who worked as a receptionist in Rebecca’s office strolled into the lobby.
Rebecca would be humiliated if she or anyone else knew tonight wouldn’t be
their first time. He hadn’t shared that information with anyone but Father
John. He figured Abby knew and probably Joel as well, but it wasn’t anyone
else’s business.

Chris made a downward motion with his hand trying
to tell her to lower her voice. “No, Abby,” he hissed. “She’s not.”

Her reply came at the same volume as before. “All
it takes is one good swimmer.”

Abby should win an award for the sheer number of
cringe-worthy statements she could pack into a conversation. He’d sooner die
than discuss his sperm motility with his sister-in-law. Thank God she resumed
her mission of finding Rebecca. She must have been successful, because in a few
minutes his bride emerged from the ballroom.

***

“I’m so sorry. People kept stopping me.” Rebecca
huffed an exhausted sigh as she came to a stop in front of Chris.

“Tell me about it.” He kissed her forehead where a
few of her long bangs were coming loose from their comb. Lowering his voice, he
said, “Our fashion plate photographer wants one more shot. He says I should,
and I quote, ‘carry my woman out of here.’ I won’t tell you what else he said I
should do with you.”

“Really? Ew.”

“Yeah. I said if he ever spoke about my wife that
way again, I’d crush his expensive lenses under the heel of my motorcycle
boots.”

“I love it when you get all chivalrous.” Rebecca
leaned into him as he slung an arm around her shoulders. Worn out from hours of
socializing, her introverted nature had re-asserted itself. “Where is he?”

“Restroom.” Chris nodded toward the men’s room. “He
said he’d be right out.”

In seconds he returned, and Chris swung Rebecca up
into his arms. “You’re not as heavy as I thought,” he said with a half grin.

“You will pay for that later, Mr. Reynolds.”

“And how do you intend to get your retribution,
Mrs. Reynolds?”

She snaked her arm down and around his side and
tickled him until he almost dropped her.

Chris carried her through the double doors laughing
as the photographer took a stream of successive shots. He deposited her on the
sidewalk outside where the sun had now fallen completely beneath the horizon.

Rebecca kept her arms wrapped around Chris’s neck
and stood on her tiptoes to whisper in his ear. “Someone implied once that if I
left a wedding with you, you would expect certain, uh, favors.”

Chris grinned and lowered his mouth to her ear. “I
can’t speak to the past, but starting tonight I’m expecting a helluva lot more
than that.”

A chill ran up Rebecca’s spine, and she savored the
feeling of their life together unfolding before them.

As they neared the curb, someone called Rebecca’s
name.

Her dad approached from the parking lot dressed not
for a wedding, but in casual clothes.

“Dad. You’re a little late.” She adopted a flat
tone, but reminded herself to be kind. Maybe he wanted to apologize for
skipping the wedding.

“Chris, I’d like a few minutes alone with my
daughter.”

Rebecca slid her arm beneath Chris’s jacket and
around his waist so that he knew she did not want him to leave her. “Whatever
you have to say to me you can say in front of Chris. We only have a few minutes
though before we leave on our honeymoon.” She would not allow him to drag this
out or in any way spoil their wedding night.

“Fine. I think this marriage is a huge mistake, and
I couldn’t come and support it.”

“You’ve made your opinion clear, Dad. Why are you
here now?” Did he think they didn’t know this already? They were married now;
couldn’t he leave it alone?

“Please, Rebecca, I’d like to speak to you in
private.”

“No. That’s not possible.” The muscles in her neck
tensed and her heart rate crept up.

He shook his head, which angered Rebecca. He acted
as if she was foolish for refusing to allow him to divide and conquer.

“You haven’t consummated this marriage yet. You can
still have it annulled.”

Rebecca let out a humorless laugh. “You can’t be
serious. You need to accept this, Dad. We’re married. And the sooner you get
out of our way, the sooner we can take care of the consummation part.”

Rebecca marveled at how easy it was to say that to
her dad. Not long ago, she couldn’t muster the courage to stand up to him about
trivial matters, let alone tell him to get lost so she could make love to her
husband.

Chris’s arm wrapped around her torso and with it,
his warmth and strength. She realized a large part of her newfound confidence
came from him and his love.

Her dad protested. “You’re still pure, Rebecca. You
can still find someone else, but this is your last chance. After this, no one
worth having will want you.”

She wanted to put him in his place. All the words
were there, ready to spill out. He would consider her worthless if he knew
she’d already lost her virginity. She gritted her teeth and breathed a large
intake of air, ready to fire off the words with machine-gun precision.

Chris’s grip tightened around her, and his fingers
dug into her ribcage. He had to know she verged on unleashing the fury of their
sexual sins on him. She couldn’t think straight about it now in her anger, and
out of respect for Chris, she tamed her tongue. Chris would say it was none of
her dad’s business, and that he’d only use that information to hurt her.

“Dad, we’re leaving now. I’ll call you when we get
back.” She turned and walked toward the limousine that pulled up alongside
them.

Despite the tension she felt in Chris’s arm, he
hadn’t spoken. Thank God he hadn’t let her out of his reach.

The limousine door clicked open, and he held it for
her as she descended carefully into the seat, trying to keep her dress from
dragging along the gutter or getting caught in the door.

Her dad approached the vehicle and got in one last
command. “Be smart, Becca. Make sure he uses a condom.”

With his hand tightened in a white-knuckled fist,
Chris slid into the seat and slammed the door behind them.

Her dad’s words hit her like a punch in the gut. He
wanted nothing more than to separate them. Not to mention he knew that as
Catholics, contraception was anathema to them.

Chris helped arrange her skirts, and she couldn’t
comprehend his ability to remain so stoic about this. Especially that last
comment in which her dad had relegated him to the role of poison papist seed
bearer ready to impregnate her. Chris brought her life in so many ways, and she
happily awaited the day she could tell Chris he’d brought life to her, inside
of her, in yet another way. It made her father’s remark even more offensive.
She leaned over Chris and pressed the button to lower the window.

“How dare you come here and try to ruin our wedding
night. If you hope to have any relationship with your grandchildren—and God
willing there will be a bunch of them—you had better think long and hard about
what you say to me and my husband. Chris is my first family now. Maybe if you
had come to our wedding and listened to the readings, you would understand that
a little better.” She expected him to say something. Yell, plead, complain,
anything, but he looked as if he’d been slapped, and he stepped backward in
silence.

With one touch of Chris’s hand to the door
controls, the window rose as the first tears escaped her eyes. “Please don’t
let him rob us of our joy tonight, Rebecca.”

Sadness sounded in his voice. Poor Chris. He had
really tried with her dad; she knew he had, and yet her father continually
rejected him.

Rebecca raised her head. “I won’t.” She sniffed and
wiped the tears that had rolled down her cheeks. There was a knock on the
window and even though the tinted glass between them muffled Dad’s words,
anyone with the most rudimentary lip-reading skills could make out his meaning
as he bit out a three-word insult.

Leaning to the side, Rebecca tried to avoid Chris’s
arm as he twisted in his seat, yanking off his tuxedo jacket. His hand
tightened around the door handle as he let out a growl. “That’s it. He crossed
the line.”

Rebecca reached across him and stilled his hand.
“We’re not going to let him do this to our wedding night.” He didn’t move for a
full half a minute, and then he pulled her into his arms as he told the driver
they were ready. They rode in silence for several miles.

“I want to know where we’re headed.”

 “Curious, huh?” There was a smile in his voice.
“South.”

“That’s it? South? As in the Carolinas or the Caribbean, or the Antarctic?”

“As in the Blue Ridge Mountains of Virginia.”

She should have known he’d want to go to his
beloved mountains. Then a stab of panic hit her. “We’re not camping, are we?”

His shoulder shook against her as a loud laugh
burst from his lips. “No, I’d actually like to
stay
married to you.
We’re spending ten days in a remote, luxury cabin in the Shenandoah Valley.
There’s a waterfall, a fireplace, and a hot tub. And it’s fully stocked. With
any luck, we won’t see another soul the whole time.”

“It sounds perfect. Thank you.” She turned and gave
him a simple kiss that immediately changed the mood. “So, we've got, what, a
three-hour ride?”

“Yes.” His blue eyes were bright and simmering with
affection. “Alone together at last.” Careful not to snag her hair, he lifted
the comb holding her veil in place, and swung it over her head, setting it to
rest on the seat beside her. Once the white tulle cleared his line of vision,
Chris’s gaze swept over her face. He smoothed her hair where he had loosed the
comb. “You’re beautiful.”

“I think you mean that,” she said, recalling their
first date.

She had never felt so contented as when she leaned
in against her husband—
her husband
—and it all began to sink in. As she
rested her head against his shoulder, all the day’s excitement and tension
melted away, leaving her spent. She eyed the limousine’s interior and wondered
if there was any way for them to sleep comfortably with her gown taking up so
much space. It wouldn’t be a bad idea to rest now and conserve their energy for
later.

Chris looped his arm around her shoulder, and his
hand ran up and down her arm is if he were trying to warm her. “How about a
toast?”

He slid forward on the seat and reached for a
bottle of champagne chilling in the limousine’s small bar. He poured a glass
for each of them, handed one to Rebecca, and took his place next to her.

The moon peaked out from over his shoulder,
reminding her of nighttime rides as a child and being awed at the moon’s
ability to follow wherever she went. Like in her
Harold and the Purple
Crayon
book, the moon remained a fixed and ever-present anchor when she
felt lost. In its waxing or its waning, eclipsed, or covered by clouds, the
moon abided.  A fiery ball looming large on the horizon, or a nearly-invisible
obsidian disc in a starlit sky, the moon abided.

Her gaze drifted back to Chris. She prayed their
love, like God’s, would abide from this day forward through all seasons, all
travails, every high and low. An anchor when the world threatened to throw them
off-course.

Lines creased Chris’s handsome face as he held up
his glass. He was beat, too, but it didn’t stop his mouth from lifting in a
smile big enough to show his dimples.

“Here’s to Holy Matrimony, wedded bliss, and a
whole ten days of seclusion.”

They clinked their glasses and sipped their
champagne.

It was her turn. She wanted to say something witty,
but something different filled her heart.