“I want to live here,” I tell him again. “Honestly. It’s the best option. You don’t have to give up your business, and I get the chance to move away from my childhood and everything that comes with it. This is what growing up and becoming an adult means, right? Getting out of your hometown, finding somewhere else, seeing more of the world.”
“Not everyone sees it that way,” Jonas points out. “Some people stay where they were born. Sometimes even in the same house.”
“Alright, but I’m not one of those people.” I give him a firm look and tug lightly at his tie. “I want to stay here. You’ve given me so much already. I don’t want to start this marriage by taking something from you that you don’t have to give.”
“But what about you?” he asks, smoothing down my hair over my head. “You’re leaving your family behind.”
“And joining a new one,” I remind him. I tilt my head up to kiss his lips, just once sweetly. “I’m fine with this. In fact, I’m excited. Look at this property – it’s so high-end and stylish. It’s not far outside of the Strip, so you wouldn’t be far for work, and it’s a really lovely home.”
“With room to expand, too,” Jonas muses.
“Expand?” I laugh. “There are already five bedrooms in this one. How many more could we need?”
Jonas eyes me with a look that makes me blush. “That depends on how hard it is to keep my hands off you after the first three children, I suppose.”
“Oh,” I say, considering that for a moment. “Then, I suppose we’ll need a lot of room to expand.”
He grabs me around the waist and lifts me until my legs automatically wrap around him, holding me in place, making me giggle. He starts nuzzling my neck, then abruptly stops and pulls back to look at me.
“What?” I ask.
“Tomorrow,” he says.
“Tomorrow, what?”
“Your parents are coming in tomorrow, right?”
“Yes,” I say, wondering if I should be concerned by the gleam in his eyes right now.
“Then let’s get married tomorrow,” Jonas declares. “I don’t want to wait anymore. Why should we? This is Vegas. This is where quick marriages are the normal thing. Why should we wait to arrange a traditional wedding with all the trimmings? We can always do that later for the rest of your family and our friends. But I want you to be my wife. I want you to be Mrs. Savannah Fairchild.”
“Right away?” I ask, even though I am already getting excited at the idea. Yes – I want this. I just have to be sure it’s right for him too.
“I don’t want to wait a single hour longer,” he says, kissing me hungrily. “But out of respect for your parents, tomorrow is as long as I’m willing to wait.”
I can’t help but find my smile stretching so big my jaw hurts as he kissing my neck and jaw.
Is it fast, yes. It’s so fast that most people would think we’re being stupid, getting carried away. I know what people say about Vegas weddings, especially when they happen out of the blue. They think that it won’t last.
But there’s no point in waiting around when you’re absolutely sure about something, about someone. When you’ve found the person that you want to spend the rest of your life with, and you know you’re never going to change your mind.
I know who I want to be with forever. So why wait to let forever start? There’s already been so much time that we’ve both been on this earth and couldn’t be together.
Jonas is right – there’s no point in wasting even one more hour.
Chapter Thirty-One
Jonas
I stand in my tuxedo, adjusting my bow tie for the seven hundredth time, for lack of anything else to do with my hands. I don’t know when I forgot how to use my hands, but now I just can’t seem to remember what I’m supposed to do with them.
“First time?” the officiant, who thankfully is not dressed like Elvis, asks me with a knowing smile.
“Yup,” I tell him, shoving my hands into my pockets to keep them still. I instantly realize that this makes me look like a slouch and then pull them back out again, which leaves me once more with the dilemma of how to stand.
“You’re going to be fine,” Marco puts in. I glance over at him gratefully. When it came to figuring out who should be my best man on short notice – and given that it obviously couldn’t be the father of the bride – there was one very obvious candidate. As my assistant, he’s been doing much of the planning both for our intended move and our later, “family and friends” wedding.
“I know,” I tell him. “I can’t wait for this to be done. I just want it all to go… well, perfectly. As perfectly as a shotgun Las Vegas wedding can go.”