And then she took it.
* * *
“Dearly beloved, we are gathered here today in the Crystal Heights Casino and Chapel to witness the union of this man and this woman in holy matrimony.”
The Elvis impersonator even talked like the legend.
“And me, too,” Ethan interrupted. “This man and this woman and don’t forget me...”
Standing there in his jeans and T-shirt, with Miranda still in her scrubs and Tad in the jeans and shirt he’d pulled on that morning, the boy didn’t seem the least bit fazed about the strange turns his life had taken that day.
Pushing his glasses up his nose, he glanced at his mother. “Are you sure Tad really knows what he’s doing?”
Grinning, Tad looked at the boy. “I think it’s the mom and dad who have to get married first, and then the kids,” he said.
“Wait a minute.” Ethan took a step back. “Dad? I’m going to have a dad?”
“Is that okay with you?” Miranda asked. She’d been handed a cheesy bouquet of flowers when they’d walked in the door. It was shaking in her hands.
“Yeah!” The upward lilt in Ethan’s voice left no doubt that Tad had a place in this family if he wanted it.
What Tad wanted was to give her a proper wedding, as soon as their lives settled down. She deserved so much better than this.
What he wanted just as much was to take away Brian O’Connor’s power over them.
“I don’t mean to be rude, but can we get on with this?” Elvis whispered. “We got people waiting and time is money, if you know what I mean.”
A minute later, with two quick I dos and no chance even to kiss the bride, they were pronounced husband and wife.
* * *
Though Ethan was all about seeing the lights, getting ice cream and visiting a hotel swimming pool, he was asleep five minutes after they were back in their newer SUV.
Pulling off to the side of the road, Tad grabbed a phone she didn’t recognize out of the glove box. “It’s the burner phone I’ve been using to communicate with your father so that no one could trace me to you,” he said. “Now that the deed is done and we’re married, we need to call Chantel. You want to do it or do you want me to?”
“She knew your plan to kidnap us?”
“She knew I planned to marry you if you’d have me.”
Oh.
She took the phone. Looked at him in the darkness. “What are we doing now?”
Getting out of town safely, getting a car, getting Ethan something to eat when he woke up, getting married...one thing led to another.
And now, here they were, parked on the side of a desert road outside Vegas with no bed to sleep in.
“I say we find a place to stop for the night. And then head back to town in the morning.”
“You were serious? We’re just going back?”
“Either your father will see the wisdom in admitting defeat on this one, with the hope of one day seeing his grandson, or he’s going to lose his temper, in which case, I’ll be there when he breaks the law and we’ll have something to charge him with.”
She frowned, shaking her head.
“Wh
at?”