Free A Beautiful Wedding by Jamie McGuire Page B

make breakfast? You want eggs?”
    “It’s just after ten.”
    “Still qualifies as brunch.” When I didn’t respond, he offered again. “Okay, an egg sandwich?”
    I paused, and then looked over at him with a smile. “Baby?”
    “Yeah?”
    “We’re in Vegas.”
    Travis’s head popped up and he flipped on the lamp. Once the last twenty-four hours finally set in, his hand emerged from under his pillow and he hooked his arm around me, pulling me
beneath him. He nestled his hips between my thighs, and then bent his head down to kiss me; softly, tenderly, letting his lips linger on mine until they were warm and tingly
    “I can still get you eggs. Want me to call room service?”
    “We actually have a plane to catch.”
    His face fell. “How much time do we have?”
    “Our flight is at four. Checkout is at eleven.”
    Travis frowned, and looked over at the window. “I should have booked an extra day. We should be lying in bed or by the pool.”
    I kissed his cheek. “We have classes tomorrow. We’ll save up and go somewhere later. I don’t want to spend our honeymoon in Vegas, anyway.”
    His face screwed into disgust. “I definitely don’t wanna spend it in Illinois.”
    I conceded with a nod. Couldn’t exactly argue that. Illinois wasn’t the first place that came to mind when I thought
honeymoon
. “St. Thomas is beautiful. We
don’t even need passports.”
    “That’s good. Since I’m not fighting anymore, we’ll need to save where we can.”
    I smiled. “You’re not?”
    “I told you, Pidge. I don’t need all that when I have you. You’ve changed everything. You’re tomorrow. You’re the apocalypse.”
    My nose wrinkled. “I don’t think I like that word.”
    He smiled and rolled onto the bed, just a few inches from my left side. Lying on his stomach, he pulled his hands under him, settling them under his chest, and he lay his cheek against the
mattress, watching me for a moment, his eyes staring into mine.
    “You said something at the wedding . . . that we were like Johnny and June. I didn’t quite get the reference.”
    He smirked. “You don’t know about Johnny Cash and June Carter?”
    “Sort of.”
    “She fought him tooth and nail, too. They fought, and he was stupid about a lot of stuff. They worked it out and spent the rest of their lives together.”
    “Oh yeah? I bet she didn’t have Mick for a dad.”
    “He’ll never hurt you again, Pigeon.”
    “You can’t promise that. Just when I start settling in somewhere, he shows up.”
    “Well, we’re going to have regular jobs, broke like every other college student, so he won’t have a reason to sniff around us for money. We’ll need every dime. Good thing
I still have a little left in savings to carry us through.”
    “Any ideas where you’ll apply for a job? I thought about tutoring. Math.”
    Travis smiled. “You’ll be good at that. Maybe I’ll tutor science.”
    “You’re very good at that. I can be a reference.”
    “I don’t think it’ll count coming from my wife.”
    I blinked. “Oh my God. That just sounds crazy.”
    Travis laughed. “Doesn’t it? I fucking love it. I’m going to take care of you, Pidge. I can’t promise that Mick will never hurt you again, but I can promise that
I’ll do everything I can to keep that from happening. And if it does, I’ll love you through it.”
    I offered a small smile, and then reached up to touch his cheek. “I love you.”
    “I love you,” he said right back. “Was he a good dad . . . before all that?”
    “I don’t know,” I said, looking up at the ceiling. “I guess I thought he was. But what does a kid know about being a good parent? I have good memories of him. He drank
for as long as I can remember, and gambled, but when his luck was up, he was kind. Generous. A lot of his friends were family men . . . they also worked for the mob, but they had kids. They were
nice and didn’t mind Mick bringing me around. I spent a lot of time behind the