Page 29 of Vanishing Point (Bent County Protectors #1)

Thomas was furious.

First, the paramedics had insisted on splitting them up. They’d determined Thomas needed to ride in the ambulance but let Laurel drive Vi to the hospital. Thomas would have told them to go to hell, but Laurel took over and Copeland restrained him.

Okay, not his finest moment. He’d ridden in an ambulance with a very dead Dianne Kay, while Copeland and Jack Hudson had ridden in an ambulance to watch over Eric Carter.

Thomas had been admitted to the hospital, poked and prodded, all of his demands and questions ignored. When he tried to refuse surgery, one of the nurses—whom he’d gone to high school with—told him to shut up.

He supposed it knocked some sense into him. And since Laurel was able to come update him on everything before the surgery, he supposed that helped too.

Well, except for the part where she told him Vi was getting cleared to be discharged.

“She was injured.” He could see it all too clearly. The bruises on her face, her neck. And God knew what else that monster had done to her. She might have said no sorrys, but he didn’t know how he wasn’t supposed to feel responsible for that.

“Yes, and they’ve checked her out,” Laurel said evenly. “She can go home and recover there. With her daughter and lots of help and love and attention from her cousins.”

That’s not her home anymore . But Thomas didn’t know what… She’d said no sorrys, but how could some of this not be his own damn fault?

“Dianne Kay was dead on arrival,” Laurel continued while the nurses prepped him for surgery.

Apparently the doctor thought the bullet had fractured a bone.

“Eric Carter is still in surgery. He might live. He might not. If he does, he’ll go away for the rest of his life.

He can’t weasel his way out of this one, even if the whole state of Virginia vouched for him.

Now, I need you to be a good boy and get your surgery.

Maybe I’ll bring you a present if you don’t cry. ”

He glared at her, but also knew she was just trying to lighten the tension banded inside of him.

“They’re not going to let her in to see you before you go, so just… Stop being a jerk and let the medical professionals do their job. When you wake up, you’ll be able to see her.”

If she wanted to see him. But that at least was up to Vi. He sighed. “Fine,” he muttered.

And he did as he was told. So much so that the last thing he really remembered was Laurel telling him to stop being a jerk. When he woke up, he was groggy, not really sure what had happened.

It took a while to really come to, to remember, to hear what the voices in his room were saying.

“Tata!” He managed to get his eyes opened, focused. Vi was standing there, Magnolia on her hip. They both looked clean and bright and perfect.

Thomas tried to say something, but he realized it only came out garbled when Vi frowned and inched closer.

“I’m awake,” he finally managed to say firmly. “Just a little groggy.” He looked at his arm, all bandaged up. Desk duty for him for a while. Ugh.

Then he looked at Vi, and thought, well, maybe he’d just take some medical leave and soak her up.

If she even wants to be there.

“I wasn’t sure if I should bring her,” Vi said, her voice a little shaky. “I thought the hospital stuff might freak her out, but the hardest part has been keeping her from climbing into bed with you.”

“Tata!”

If he wasn’t so out of it, he might have cried. He tried to reach his arm out for Magnolia, but it didn’t quite work that way yet. “Heya, sweets. You’re both a sight for sore eyes.”

Vi smiled at that, but her eyes were full of tears. She cleared her throat and looked around, then tugged a chair over to his bedside. She sat, putting Mags in her lap and letting her lean forward and slap at the side of the hospital bed.

“I’m glad you’re here.”

She reached out, touched his temple. “You saved me.”

“You did a lot of saving yourself, Vi.”

She nodded, blinking back those tears in her eyes. “I did. I’m proud of myself for that.”

“You should be. I am.”

She sniffled a little, one tear falling over. “I’m sorry you got hurt. I—”

“I thought we weren’t doing sorrys.”

She heaved out a sigh. “We’re both going to really suck at that.”

“So hard.”

She laughed, and the sound was a balm for everything. Just everything. She was alive, okay, here. Mags was here. Everything… It would just be all right now. Before his surgery he’d been running on pent-up anger and terror, but now he was just…relieved. Just relieved.

So he watched her as she sat there and let Magnolia play with the hospital bed, and he tried to let that relief really sink in. But it had been so close. And she’d been so brave. And if they hadn’t…

She gave a watery laugh. “Stop looking at me like that.”

“Like what?”

“Like you can’t believe I’m alive.”

“It’s not that, Vi. I just keep thinking, if Franny hadn’t called me, I wouldn’t have known.

For hours more. I was going to be late and…

” It was no good. Thinking in what-ifs. He’d told a hundred people that in his line of work before, but it was hard sometimes.

Hard to let go of how close a call they’d had.

“I was going to be late. I was going to buy a ring.”

“A ring?”

“An engagement ring.”

“For me?”

He closed his eyes. He wanted to laugh but couldn’t quite manage it. “Vi.”

“Sorry, I just… Thomas…”

“Don’t worry. I’m not going to ask you now .” He was too tired to open his eyes. Too tired to…

“Why not?”

He blinked them open. She was frowning at him now. Blue eyes…petulant.

“Because… Because we’ve just been through something traumatic.”

“Sure, but you were going to ask me before that.” She waved it all away like it didn’t matter. And he realized it did and it didn’t. It mattered in that it happened, but it didn’t matter to who they were or what they would be.

“And I would have said yes.”

“You would have?”

It was her turn to say only his name in a kind of disapproving tone.

“Maybe I wouldn’t have been quite as sure as I am right now.

Maybe there would have been a few doubts about…

myself. Not you. Never you. Myself. But I don’t have them anymore.

I saw…” She swallowed against the emotion in her throat.

“It’s awful, but I watched that woman fall victim to the same thing I did.

I saw it, and nothing has ever made me realize how little was my fault than seeing it on someone else.

” Vi shook her head. “Good thing I’ve got a therapist, I guess. ”

He wanted to reach out and touch her but couldn’t manage it. So he figured he might as well ask. “Give me your hand, Vi.”

She heaved out a sigh, but reached out and took his right hand in hers. She squeezed. Mags babbled.

“Did they tell you what’s going on with Dianne and Eric?”

She nodded. “Last I heard, Eric was still alive, but they weren’t sure how long he’d last. If he does survive, if he goes to trial, I’m going to testify. Whatever I need to do to put him behind bars, I’m going to.”

“Me too, and that’s a promise.”

She looked down at their joined hands. “Dianne didn’t deserve to die.”

He wished he had the empathy to agree with her. “She kidnapped you. She might have been his victim, but she made choices that you never made. To hurt other people. You aren’t the same.”

“Maybe not. But she didn’t deserve to die at his hands.”

“No, maybe not.”

Vi swallowed and shook her head before meeting his gaze again. “I don’t want to celebrate the end of people’s lives, but I feel… Free. For the first time in a long time, there aren’t any clouds hanging over me.”

“So, marry me, Vi. Be my wife. I’ll adopt Mags. We’ll get her under your name where she belongs. We’ll be a family.”

Vi nodded. “Yes. I’ll marry you.” She leaned in carefully, keeping Magnolia from grabbing any wires. “Because we are a family.”

T HEY DIDN’T WAIT to get married. What was the point? Neither of them wanted anything fancy. Just their friends, their family and each other.

But Vi did buy Magnolia a ridiculously frilly flower girl dress. And they had to wait a few weeks still, to get their parents out to Bent. Her mother couldn’t—wouldn’t—make it, but Dad and Suze did. Vi was more at peace with that than she’d ever been.

Thomas could get around and do most things for himself, though he pushed harder than he should. To take care of Mags, to help with whatever wedding things.

And still, she appreciated the time. Where he didn’t have to work, and they could sort out how this all would go . It wasn’t as if they agreed on everything, but merging their lives felt more natural than anything she’d ever done.

Because this year had given her perspective she’d desperately needed. To stop and be grateful for every good thing.

And she had so much good.

On the day of the wedding, she got ready in her old bedroom at the Young Ranch. She was wearing a simple white dress, and she didn’t need a lot of fussing to get into it, but still, Audra, Rosalie, Franny and her stepmother all packed into the bedroom and helped her get ready, passing Mags around.

“He was such a skinny thing,” Suze kept saying, as if she couldn’t quite believe that fifteen years later Thomas might have grown up. “I just can’t get over it.”

Vi smiled every time. Because sometimes she still saw a glimpse of that skinny teenager in the amazing man he’d become. And she loved them both. Always would.

Once she was ready, they headed outside.

Audra and Rosalie had set up a simple archway, some chairs and a runner down the middle of the chairs to create an aisle.

For the past few days, Vi had taken Mags out to do a couple trial runs.

Her daughter liked playing with the flower petals more than anything, but Vi knew she wouldn’t do that at the wedding.

The chairs were full now with her family and his. And their friends. Because the world Thomas had built for himself had folded her and Mags into it. Everyone but Magnolia and her father took their seats as Vi got ready to walk down the aisle.

Thomas stood under the pretty floral arch, waiting for her. Wearing a suit. A big grin on his face.

Vi crouched to Magnolia. “Okay, Mags, do you remember what to do?”

“Tata!”

Vi laughed. “Yep. Throw your flowers and walk down to Tata. Slowly.”

She let Magnolia go, and just as Vi had suspected, Mags did not walk slowly or throw flower petals as they’d practiced over and over. She just ran for it. Right to Thomas. Who scooped her up into his arms.

He only winced a little.

Then her father walked her down the aisle. “I always liked Thomas,” he whispered.

Vi laughed in spite of herself. “No, you didn’t.”

“Well, I didn’t hate him,” he grumbled. And he led her right to Thomas under the arch.

“Hi,” he said, and she thought about that moment outside the general store all those months ago. When she’d been at her wits’ end, a completely different person.

And all she’d really needed was this man in her life again. Now here he was. Hers. Forever.

“Hi,” she offered.

Then they turned to the minister, who gave a short introduction and led them through their vows to become man and wife.

It would take some time to get through the red tape, but by the end of the year, they’d all be Harts.

But it didn’t really matter. Not names or paperwork. They were each other’s, no matter what. A family.

And that was what she told him, promised him in their vows. While he held her little girl. Their little girl.

Because this was the life she deserved. And she’d fought for it. Always would. For him, for Mags, for herself.

Always.

* * * * *