Chapter 22: Garden Wedding

I’ll do weddings as long as Nessie keeps making cakes. Oh, yeah. And those stupid fuckers want to get married.– Trigg

Priscilla stood with Camille and the musketeers in the main room. Megan stepped up with six-month-old Dakota in her arms and Aramis held his arms out for his daughter. The baby settled in against his chest, her small hand buried in his beard.

“Stay away from my father, you’ll make him want another baby,” Priscilla fixed the little sock that was sliding down her foot to tiny toes.

“He’s here,” Camille whispered.

Priscilla looked up at Aramis and Athos, “Please be nice.”

“They will be,” Megan assured the younger teen as she pinched both men on their sides. They each jumped away from her and mumbled a ‘yes, ma’am.’

Turning away from her friends, Priscilla smiled at Leo as he approached her. He wore a crisp white Oxford shirt that still had light creases from where it was folded. She smiled at his attempt to dress up while still wearing his jeans and club cut.

“Brothers,” Leo said as he stopped in front of the group.

He was proud that he was now one of the Saints, a brother to her friends. They on the other hand were less impressed. Both Saints gave noncommittal grunts in greetings.

“Prospect,” he said to Camille who nodded at him before excusing herself to go do her duties for the day.

“Your dad is motioning for us to go on in,” Athos said as he waved at Molly.

Priscilla took Leo’s hand and guided him out to the garden where the wedding would take place. Propane heaters were set up around the area casting a warm glow over the chairs. Athos gave them a simple salute as he headed to the front where he would stand as a groomsman for his brother and his best friend.

The remaining friends settled into chairs near a heater and Megan wrapped a blanket around Aramis and Dakota. He shifted and pulled his girlfriend in under the blanket too. Priscilla was watching them, thinking that this was what she wanted in a partner when Leo wrapped a large blanket around her and tucked her against his side as they sat down.

Leo smiled at her and when she looked up at him, he pressed a light kiss to her temple. “Thank you for giving me another chance.”

“You’re welcome,” she snuggled in against him, more for warmth than anything else.

Just before the doors opened for the bridesmaids to enter, Camille joined them with a heated blanket plugged into a portable power converter. Aramis cocked an eyebrow at her and she shrugged and flipped him off.

“Prospect,” Aramis warned, but was unable to hide the amusement in his voice or smile on his face.

“Lowery,” she replied with his last name that dripped with sass.

“If I didn’t like you so much…” he teased.

“You’d date me because your choice in women sucked big donkey dick,” Camille grinned at her friend. “You got to admit before Megan, they were all horrible, and even at the beginning that was questionable. No offense.”

“None taken,” Megan laughed as the last few words were aimed at her. “I admit, my life before Aramis was completely questionable.”

The outside speakers began to play a Hank Williams Jr song that spoke of the beautiful women from Texas as Evie’s sisters walked down the aisle. For a brief moment, the Alabama song, Dixieland Delight, played causing a ripple of laughter for those who understood the joke. Evie’s siblings all groaned and Law begged for a bleach lobotomy.

As the Temptations sang about their girl, Evie’s three dads walked her down the aisle. The three identical triplets had some differences, mainly in how they wore their hair and the tattoos and scars on their skin. But Priscilla would admit that she could never keep them straight. To her, they were simply Dad One, Dad Two and Dad Three, in no specific order. And of course, there was also Dixie, whom Priscilla often referred to as Only Mom.

Evie wore a short veil that softly brushed against a satin ivory cape that covered her shoulders and arms. She wore her mother’s satin and gossamer ivory dress with a square neck and wide straps and an empire waist that helped to accommodate her large belly.

Megan leaned over Aramis and touched Priscilla on her knee. “Is she wearing flip flops?”

Priscilla nodded and softly whispered back, “Her ankles are swollen and those were the only shoes she could fit her feet in. It was them or rainbow Crocs.”

“Rainbow Crocs would have been great,” Camille softly declared as her father told the crowd that there was a script for weddings. “The man threw away his book of shit for weddings. And yes, that’s what he wrote on the front cover.”

“Who the hell are you three and why are you giving such a lovely creature to these deviants?” Trigg asked the triplets.

“We are her fathers, and we are giving our youngest daughter to the men who hold her heart.” Dad One said.

Trigg pulled Dad One off to the side and then motioned for Dixie to join them.

“This is when Trigg tries to talk the bride out of getting married.” Priscilla told Leo.

“Why?” he asked, and the friends laughed.

“No one knows,” Camille offered. “Hell, I don’t even know if my dad knows what he’s going to do.”

“I’m now hoping that he doesn’t,” Aramis grinned. “That would make these crazy ass weddings of his even better.”

Trigg moved back to the center of the small stage where he admitted defeat.

“I tried to talk her parents out of this. But they seem to think that you two are deserving of such a sweet girl. I’m reserving judgement. So, if you would relieve your father in laws of your bride.”

Evie’s parents all kissed her cheeks before they sat on the front row with one of the dad’s pulling Only Mom into their lap. Tank and Ink both placed arms around Evie’s waist before they each gave her a light kiss.

“We’re not there yet.” Trigg huffed.

“Maybe we could get there and go inside where it’s warm?” Camille suggested softly and her friends laughed as Ink pointed out that Trigg no longer had his book of scripts.

“What happened to the book of scripts?” Leo asked.

“He threw it away at Mia and Celt’s wedding,” Priscilla grinned as the men at the front bantered and Trigg told Ink to tell his bride why he wanted to marry her.

“Evie,” Ink caressed her cheek before resting his hand on her large belly, “you came to us, seeking comfort and peace. And you gave us a completeness that we did not know we needed. You are everything that we could have asked for. And so much more than we ever dared to hope for. You are the heart and soul of our family. I love you with all my heart.”

Then it was Tank’s turn to tell their bride why he wanted to marry her.

“You are the light in my darkness. The reason why I still get up in the morning. You are the reason I breathe. And you are giving me two more reasons to keep going. I love you with every fiber of my being. I cannot imagine our lives without you, and I don’t want to.” Resting his hand on her belly, he leaned in and kissed her.

“And you, beautiful,” Trigg asked Evie, “do you take these two idiots to be your husbands, to love and honor them from this day until your last?”

“She doesn’t have to obey?” Ink asked.

“Oh, you know that she’s going to obey,” Aramis chuckled.

With a giggle, Evie agreed. “I do. I take them both as my husbands, to love, honor and obey from this day until our last. You found me when I was broken, and you made me whole again. You put color back into my life. You gave me your darkness to shine in. You gave me a reason to see the morning. I love you both. Except when the herd of elephants decides to play soccer.”

Ink and Evie both spoke softly before her men knelt beside her to softly sing “Ring of Fire.”

“For those of you that didn’t get to see this like I did, that was pretty damned awesome.” Trigg admitted before looking at Athos. “Does that happen a lot?”

“Is that where you learned all those songs?” Megan asked Aramis as Athos and Law gave praises to the dads-to-be as they stood up.

“They’re very good daddies,” Evie smiled. “I’m just the incubator.”

Grinning, Trigg asked, “Do you two have rings for your incubator?”

After slipping on the rings and exchanging kisses, Trigg turned them to face the crowd, “Ladies and gentlemen, I proudly present to you…. Mister…. And Mister…. And Mrs…. Reagan.”