This Side of the Grave (#5 Night Huntress)

A choked noise escaped me hearing that. I stabbed my fingernails into my palms, hoping the slight physical pain would distract me enough to
control my raging emotional anguish. It didn’t. My heart constricted, aching from an injury that no amount of supernatural healing abilities could
soothe.
Moments later, I heard a familiar booted stride and felt power in the air that I’d recognize anywhere. God, Bones had gotten here fast. That only
further hammered away at my fragile control. He’d come quickly because he knew how devastated I’d be, and I loved him more for it even as it
reminded me of how much I’d hurt when Don was gone.
Then Bones was beside me, his dark gaze raking the room to take in everything in an instant, hard arms reaching out to pull me to him. I allowed
myself a few precious seconds to sag in his embrace, not needing to pretend I was strong with him, before turning around to give Don a forced
cheerful smile.
“Look who else made it.”
“I see that.” Then a pained cough came over my uncle. Bones took my hand as his heart had several ominous pauses in between beats. “You
turned out to be a better man than I expected,” Don rasped once he’d regained control.
Bones stared at my uncle, his gaze steady and serious. “So did you, old chap.”
“Bones and I talked,” I said, trying to smile so I wouldn’t burst into tears at the knowledge that this was their way of saying goodbye. “Remember
your offer to give me away as a bride? Well, we’d like to take you up on it.”
Don’s mouth twitched in a wistful smile before his features tightened, his thoughts revealing that more pain flared in his chest. I glanced at the
EKG machine even though I knew what it would say. My mother’s blood had brought him back, but it wouldn’t be for long. His heart was failing right
in front of my eyes.
“ ’Fraid I won’t be around for your wedding, Cat,” he murmured, eyes fluttering closed.
“Yes you will,” I said, so strongly that Don’s eyes reopened and stayed open. “Because we’re going to renew our vows here and now.”
“Cat.” His face pinched with sadness. “You were planning a big wedding once things were . . . settled down. You don’t have to ruin those plans .
. .”
He paused to close his eyes, his breathing and heart rate dipping for a moment. I bit my lip, squeezing Bones’s hand until a cracking noise let
me know to loosen my grip.
“These are hardly the right circumstances,” my uncle finished a few moments later, waving vaguely at the machines by his bed.
I thought back to when I was a little girl and how I’d imagined what my wedding day would be like. I’d pictured wearing a white dress, of course.
Imagined my grandfather fussing over his tie like he always did when he was forced to wear one, and my grandmother replying that yes, it was
straight, with that little roll of her eyes. My mother would be there, smiling because she was so happy for me, and I’d have friends who would be
helping me get ready to walk down the aisle. My bouquet would be roses and wildflowers, my hair would be up, and I would look at my husband-tobe
through a filmy white veil that would only be lifted once we were pronounced man and wife.
Of course, I’d imagined all that back when I didn’t believe in vampires, let alone realize I was half one. Bones had wanted to give me a close
version of that dream, somehow knowing I’d still held on to it, but the lives we led kept interfering with making that white wedding fantasy a reality.
My wedding would never play out like that dream from when I was a child. It wouldn’t be now, either, in the hospital wing of a secret government
facility that policed the activities of the undead. My wedding had been on a blood-spattered arena, witnessed not by friends or family, but by
hundreds of vampires I’d never met before. My bridegroom hadn’t lifted a white veil from my face at the pronouncement from a minister that we
were married. Instead, he’d cut his hand and held it out to me, swearing by his blood that I would forever be his wife, should I choose to accept him
as my husband.
That was my wedding day. Pretty much the exact opposite of everything I’d ever dreamed, but I wouldn’t try to substitute it with something else.
The image I’d had of myself as a child was someone I’d never be, and it was only recently that I realized it was okay to be who I was. That bride
might have worn a slutty black dress instead of a beautiful white one, or had blood in her hands instead of holding a bouquet, but no woman had
ever been as lucky as I was the day Bones held out his hand and declared me to be his wife.
“This isn’t about circumstances,” I replied, continuing to fight back tears as I tried to sum up everything I’d only recently learned. “It’s about family.”
Don hadn’t been there on that day. Neither had my mother, and my grandparents had been dead for years by then. But both of them could be
here for this. It wasn’t a new ceremony for my sake, but a reenactment of the previous one for theirs.
“Will you do it?” I went on.
Don’s eyes misted. Through his thoughts, I heard how much the request meant to him even though he only spoke a single word in reply. “Yes.”
“Tate.” I turned toward the doorway, knowing he’d lingered in the hall this whole time. “You think you could bend the rules to let that disobedient
new recruit back up on the floor for a little while?”
A grunt escaped him; half laugh, half disbelief as he filled the door frame. “Jesus, Cat.”