“Marry? Who’s getting married?” Ethan and Holly emerged from the private section of the tent. Holly had marched toward the door, and judging by the submissive way that Ethan followed her, Gregory assumed that she’d reasoned or threatened him into falling in line with her plan. Ethan paused at the door of the tent, his dark expression brightening. “I am perfectly willing to officiate at your wedding.”
“Are you some sort of a religious personage who can do that?” Gwen asked, wrinkling her adorable forehead.
“Not in the least. But my mother is a demigod, you know.”
“I don’t see what one has to do with the other.” Gwen looked even more puzzled.
Gregory smiled at her, just to let her know that he was not upset about the thirteen men with whom she had opted to share her life before they had met.
She looked startled, then pleased, then somewhat flustered. He didn’t think he could adore her more. No, not adore . . . love. He loved her.
He almost took a step back at the revelation, so stunning was it. He loved Gwen. The word rolled around in his mind for a bit while he tried to get used to it.
“We will have to see how he shapes up as a husband.” Gwen’s second mother frowned. “We shall have to have the ceremony at home, though. I’ve always envisioned Gwen marrying her ideal woman at home, in a dignified, quiet ceremony.”
This newfound love was a strange thing to him. Oh, he’d felt infatuation before. Lust came with the territory of being male, but love . . . He narrowed his eyes as he thought about it. Love was new. Love was different. He hadn’t ever loved a woman the way he loved Gwen.
“In the bower!” the first mother said happily, clapping her hands in delight. “When the roses are in bloom!”
It was as if a warm burst of sunlight filled his chest, leaving him gently glowing with the wonder that was love for Gwen.
He looked at her again, wondering if she could see the love spilling out of him.
“Argh!” Gwen screamed, her hands making vague gestures of frustration. “No one is listening to me! Gregory, make them list—are you OK?”
He beamed at her. He’d never been one for beaming before, but all this love had to go somewhere, and although it wanted to go straight to his penis and get down to the business of lovemaking, he was a reasonable man, and he knew that Gwen would have an issue with him simply scooping her up and carting her off to the nearest bed. Therefore, the excess of emotion needed a target, and Gwen was the likeliest recipient.
She stared at him as if he was deranged.
“I’m in perfect health, thank you.”
“OK.” She gave him a disbelieving look. “It’s just that you have this pained expression on your face. I wondered if the lightning hurt you.”
“It’s not pain. It’s love. I love you, Gwen. Marry me so that I can take you off and make love to you for days on end without your mothers being upset that I’m male.”
She froze, her eyes huge. “You . . . what?”
“I love you. With all my heart.” Given the stunned look she currently wore, she needed that clarification.
“Glorious goddess!” Gwen’s first mother said, clutching the second mother. “Isn’t he wonderful? I’m not upset that you’re male at all, young man. And neither is Alice.”
“Well . . . ,” the second mother started to say, but at a look from the first, she added, “Gwen has clearly made up her mind, and since you make her happy, then we shall welcome you to our family without reservation.”
Gwen closed her eyes for a moment, shook her head, then opened her eyes to give him a steely look. He beamed more love at her. He couldn’t stop himself; it just seemed to keep welling out of him.
“Maybe we should talk about this later,” Gwen said, nodding toward the two men on the floor. “Things are a little bit hectic right now.”
“Life,” he said with as much sagacity as he could muster, “is never too hectic for love.”
“August!” the first mother said. “We must have an August wedding. The bower will be in full bloom then.”
“Consuela!” Ethan bellowed out the tent entrance. “Bring my datebook. What does my schedule look like in August? Can I get away for a wedding at a bower? No, I don’t know where it is, but clearly they need me. Diego, no!”
Holly reappeared, grabbed Ethan by his alien hand, and pulled him out of the tent. The faint cries of, “Holly! You’re hurting Diego! You know he’s just going to want more of that later—” trailed behind them.
“Gwen?” Gregory took her hand and pulled her against his chest. The mothers were busily planning what events would take place at the wedding, while Ethan could still be heard, arguing with Holly about whether or not he could leave Anwyn. He didn’t like the stressed look around Gwen’s beautiful eyes, and thought seriously of kissing her silly right there. “You do want to spend your life with me, don’t you?”
She wouldn’t look him in the eye. She stared at his ear, and a line appeared between her brows. The faintest shadow of doubt pricked his skin. What if she truly did not want to wed him? What if she couldn’t learn to love him as he loved her? What if he was just a number on a long list of men with whom she spent time?
Fear gripped him hard in the pit of his belly at her words. “I’m not sure what I want. Everything’s so confused right now, what with those men trying to hurt my moms, and Death chasing me down, and we have to find that bird or else Aaron won’t let us go, and . . . and . . . I just don’t know.”
She didn’t want him. He released her, wanting to stagger over to the nearest chair and weep as he’d never wept before.
She truly did not want him. How could that be? How could he love her so fully and deeply and irrevocably as he did—he ignored the fact that just a few minutes before he hadn’t the slightest inkling that such an emotion existed—and she not reciprocate those feelings?
He wanted to cry. He wanted to yell. He wanted to beg her to love him, even just the tiniest little bit. He’d be happy with just a tiny little morsel of love.
“That’s a lie,” he said aloud, despair swamping him. “I wouldn’t be happy with a morsel. I want it all. I need it all. If I can’t have it, then . . .” The sentence trailed off, unfinished.
He truly did want to cry.
“I’m sorry, Gregory. I just don’t know what I want—” Gwen’s gaze met his, and in her eyes he saw the only hope he had of happiness. And as her pupils flared with awareness of him, of what he hoped they had between them, she gave a little hiccuping sob and threw herself into his arms, kissing his jaw and chin and nose and finally his mouth, and with that touch, the love within him threatened to burst forth in a blaze of . . . well, love. He couldn’t think of an appropriate metaphor, not with Gwen kissing him like she’d been without his lips for a lifetime, and it would have been rude of him not to give that kiss all his due consideration.
“Of course I want to spend my life with you,” she said a few minutes later when he was forced to stop kissing her so they could breathe. “Even though you are the enemy, I want to be with you. But what are we going to do—”
He laid a finger across her mouth, stopping her from finishing the question. She bit his finger. “We’ll work something out. I don’t suppose you’d like to tell me now how very much you love me? Perhaps a quick statement regarding how you can’t live without me, and how life would be bleak if you were forced to do so?”
She stared at him.
“Too soon?” he asked.
“Yes.” She reached behind him and pinched his ass.
He couldn’t possibly love her more than he did at that exact moment.
“What are you going to do about what?” her mother asked. “Is there a problem with you marrying? He’s not married already, is he?”
“No,” he answered quickly. “There are just a few people that must be taken care of. These two”—he nudged the man nearest him with his shoe—“and another woman who’s hanging around Ethan’s camp trying to find Gwen. Not that I’ll let that happen, but I’ll have to deal with her once and for all.”
“Not the reclaimer!” gasped the second mother. “She’s here?”
