When she reaches me, I can see she’s been crying, but it doesn’t take away from the perfection of this moment. I know she’s overwhelmed and saddened. Her parents aren’t here to celebrate with us today. Brent handed his sister over without fuss, placing a kiss on her cheek. “I love you,” he whispers before taking his seat. Brent’s a really good guy with flaws, but none of those flaws take away from the fact that he loves his sister.
“You look angelic,” I mutter, staring into those watery blue eyes.
With a twinkle in them, she replies, “Only for today.”
I can’t help myself from letting out a laugh. I’ve never laughed so much in my life since I’ve her. “Good, one day is enough. I love you, Lindsay. Marry me?”
“With pleasure.” We face the officiant and let the ceremony begin. It feels like an eternity standing here waiting for her to be mine. My cock hasn’t gone down since she made her entrance. I’m glad I made sure to tuck the fucker under my belt because it’s obvious that I could hammer nails with him right now.
“You may kiss your bride,” he says, and I don’t for a second hesitate. Tugging her close I turn my head slightly and close my lips over hers. Her arms come up around my neck, then into the hair on the back of my head, massaging me as our kiss goes deeper. A round of hooting and hollering brings us back to the present.
“Now let’s serve some food and booze so we can be alone,” I announce to the crowd, leading my wife down the aisle and into the reception hall. The party goes off without a hitch. In the back of my mind, I’m still waiting for Guest to show his hand. He’s been off the grid for two weeks, but the fact of the matter is most people like him don’t get over their obsession until the person is dead.
As I wave off the last of the guests, I turn and steal a kiss from my bride. I’d do anything for her. And that’s when the shot rings off, I drop down dragging my wife to the ground. The spread of red covers her gown. My team is on the hunt. Everything is moving in a blur as they move us through the garage to a safe vehicle and we rush Lindsay to a hospital. We’re almost out of the gate when a body swings onto the front of the vehicle. It’s Guest. I tell Denver to gun it, thrusting this fucker into the front gate. Then we reverse, and two of the guards have guns trained on him as they drag him out of our way. Lindsay needs a doctor right away. I press a towel to her wound and whisper to hang in there for us. “I love you, Lindsay, you can’t leave me.”
Once we’re at the hospital Lindsay was rushed into the ER where a team of doctors and nurses take her into surgery. Denver does the hard part of making the calls for me. I can’t talk about Lindsay right now, or I’ll fucking lose it. Instead, I focus on the bastard that did this to her. As it happens, he’s being rushed to the same hospital. The team found the long range gun he selected. They’ve bagged it for the police and waited for a personal escort to the hospital. I’m going to kill him if I lay my eyes on him. I sit there, waiting with my hands in my hair hoping to hell that she pulls through. My whole existence revolves around Lindsay. Without her, I couldn’t go on. Everything changed that day, and I don’t ever want to look back to the miserable unwittingly isolated soul I’d been before.
“Where is she?” Brent says frantically.
“They’re operating on her now.”
“How could this happen?”
“He used a long-range rifle with a scope to hunt her down from the large tree at the edge of the property in the front. It happened so fast, I didn’t get her to the ground quick enough. I wasn’t paying enough attention.”
“It’s not your fault; the fucker must have had help. There’s no way that everyone was unaware of him in the tree unless someone made sure to keep everyone away from it,” Brent says.
I think about it. Several times he was too close to her, but I can’t see any of my guys willing to do this to us—to Lindsay. How did he get inside the property without help? Everything is triggered to go off even in the tree if it’s over a certain weight. Then it hits me. The dead animal had been a test run in the tree to determine the weight. I need to go home, and triple check the surveillance. It accidentally fell from the tree I’m guessing, and that’s what set off the alarm. I go into the hall where Denver is holding a crying Casey. I interrupt because this is more important.