“Goin’ to the outdoor chapel and you’re gonna get maaarried,” Audrey began to sing as she twirled at the end of the bed, then grabbed Grace and spun under her big sister’s arm. Ava smiled as she watched her sisters dancing. She loved any time that the four sisters could be together, which wasn’t often.
Audrey and Vivien had settled in Hope Falls after opening Brewed Awakenings. After living abroad, Grace had settled in Los Angeles and was working at an entertainment law firm there. Ava and Ian had moved around a lot for Ian’s career. First for his school, then his residencies and job opportunities. They’d lived in New York, Texas, moved back to Southern California for nine months, and now they were settling in Chicago where he’d gotten the opportunity to be the attending physician in cardiac surgery.
The last time all the sisters had been together was after the robbery seven years ago. Grace, Audrey, and Viv had all flown to New York to be with her.
Ava lifted her hand to her shoulder and touched the scar that was left from the bullet that had travelled through her. If it wasn’t for tall, dark, and dangerous she wouldn’t be here. He’d used himself as a human shield and saved her life. And she’d never been able to thank him. She’d tried to find out who he was, but the police wouldn’t tell her anything. They said that they couldn’t comment on an “ongoing investigation.”
She’d tried to find clues in newspapers, but no one had reported on the incident. It was almost as if it hadn’t happened. She didn’t know if the man that saved her life had sacrificed his own, or if he was alive and well. She’d never gotten the chance to see him, to thank him in person. She had left a necklace for him with a Saint Michael medal on it, which she felt silly about since she wasn’t Catholic and had no clue if he was. But a student in one of her classes at NYU had told her that he was the patron saint of people that protect others, so she’d thought it was fitting.
She had no idea if the man had ever received her gift. The officer she’d left it with said that he would “see what he could do” about passing it along. But that was it.
That was why she was still having dreams about him all these years later. She hadn’t had any closure. Or at least that’s what she told herself so she didn’t feel guilty for dreaming about another man when she was walking down the aisle with Ian.
As two of her sisters danced around the room, Viv plopped on the bed beside Ava and wagged her brows. “You were dreaming about tall, dark, and dangerous again, weren’t you?”
A few years ago, Ava had made the mistake of asking Vivien, her most sex-positive sister, if she’d ever had recurring, vivid sex dreams about the same person. Her sister had immediately disclosed that yes, Charlie Hunnam and Tom Hardy were both recurring costars in her X-rated dream-porn. Knowing that wasn’t the same thing, Ava asked Viv if she’d ever had a recurring sex dream about someone who wasn’t famous.
That was where she’d gone wrong. The specificity had put Viv on the trail that there was someone in particular Ava was asking about. After about thirty minutes of denying and dodging her sister’s inquisition Ava finally admitted to Viv that her very hot, very vivid dreams were about the man who had saved her life all those years before who she referred to as tall, dark, and dangerous.
Viv nudged Ava, and she begrudgingly nodded.
A wide smile spread on Viv’s mouth. “That’s hot.”
It was hot. That was the problem. Ava had had better dream sex with a stranger than she’d ever had with the man she was marrying in just a few hours. If she was being honest with herself, she’d had stronger feelings for tall, dark, and dangerous than she’d ever had for Ian.
But that was because he’d saved her life, right? There was no other explanation.
Except, I had those feelings even before the shooting, Ava not-so-helpfully reminded herself.
There’d been tingles, and butterflies, and an inexplicable magnetic pull to the man in the back of the store.
The man who ended up being involved in the robbery, Ava helpfully reminded herself.
She was scared that with each year that had passed since the traumatic event, she’d romanticized her feelings for the sexy stranger that saved her life. The recurring dreams certainly weren’t helping matters.
Before Ava could delve too deeply into that particular rabbit hole of red flags, there was a knock on the door.
“I ordered room service,” Grace announced before heading toward the door.
All four sisters had spent the night together at Mountain Ridge, the resort where the wedding was taking place. It hadn’t been easy to plan a wedding from across the country, but luckily two of her sisters lived in the town so they’d been a huge help.
She and Ian had set the date a year ago after he accepted a position at Mercy General in Chicago. The two of them had moved around so much over the past seven years and they were finally going to settle down. He’d signed a five-year contract, so they knew where they were going to be.
Everything in her life was falling into place. Her future was set. All she had to do now was walk down the aisle to the only man she’d ever been with. This was the day she’d been looking forward to, dreaming of since she was a teenager. She was even getting married in the town she’d always envisioned her wedding taking place. When she was ten she’d seen a man propose to his girlfriend at the waterfall that the town was named after and from that moment on Ava had always associated Hope Falls with weddings and happily-ever-afters. Both of which she’d be experiencing today.
So why wasn’t she happier?
Why did her feet feel like they were in an ice bucket?
Nerves. That’s all it was. Every bride probably felt the exact same way on their wedding day. She’d figured that she would’ve skipped that part since she’d been with Ian for twenty years, but apparently two decades with someone didn’t preclude you from having cold feet.
It was days like this that she really missed her mom being around. Cora Wells was a romantic, through and through. Their mother loved love, was a firm believer in fate and would have been beside herself that Ava was marrying Ian. She’d always been Ian’s number one fan. From the first time her mom met her middle school boyfriend she’d told Ava that he was a “keeper.” Even at twelve, he’d known that he wanted to be a doctor and Ava’s mom always said that whoever ended up with Ian would be a lucky lady. And Ava was lucky. She knew that in her head, it was just her heart that was having some trouble buying into that theory at the moment.
Ava pushed that thought from her head and focused on the promise that she’d made to her mother after the doctors had given her three months to live. Her mother had held Ava’s hand and made her promise that she’d marry Ian. And she was keeping that promise today. For better or worse. Through sickness and health.
Yep. All of it.
Grace opened the door, she stepped out into the hallway. Her head turned back and forth. “That’s weird, no one is there.”