She tried to explain in a halting voice. “When I went back to training after I fell that first time, and I realized the arm hadn’t healed, I was afraid to tell you. I thought back to the fight we had over my going to the doctor. I was worried that you’d demand I pull out of the Qualifier.”
He shook his head with regret. “I’m sorry I lost it at you that afternoon. I reacted emotionally and that was a mistake. I just couldn’t bear to see you hurt.”
“Devlin, it was stupid of me not to tell you the truth. I felt awful the whole time. I’m so very sorry. And I never lied about anything else. You’ve got to believe me.”
She watched as his hand rose and then she felt the skin of his fingers stroke her cheek. “I do.”
There was a long silence and then he said, “I don’t want to be without you. I love you. I need you in my life.”
Tears welled in A.J.’s eyes and she wasn’t able to speak as they embraced. All she could do was hold on to him, and vow she would never let go. As they stood, chest to chest, hip to hip, she could feel the pound of his heart against her cheek, the warmth seeping from his body into hers, the sensation of his hands stroking her back and her hair. When the touch of his finger came under her chin, she lifted her lips for his kiss, a soft, gentle brush that was a declaration of love.
“Don’t sell him,” Devlin whispered.
She pulled back in surprise.
“Sabbath is your horse. No one else is going to be able to ride him like you can.”
“You’re saying I should go back in the ring?”
“It’s what you love to do. What you were born to do.”
“But how can you—”
Devlin kissed her, drowning out the words. This time his mouth was passionate as it moved over hers, his tongue coming inside and stroking hers with a demand she met feverishly.
When their lips parted, he said, “I want all of you. And that means the stallion and the eventing, too. I’m not saying we won’t clash again but I know we can find a way to work anything out. Our love will be strong enough. This I know.”
A.J. closed her eyes against the emotions that rushed over her. She felt gratitude, relief, happiness. When she looked up at him again, she brought his hand to her lips, kissing it before speaking.
“Losing you, and knowing I was responsible for it, has been the hardest thing I’ve ever faced in my life.” She laughed ruefully. “I don’t know. Maybe I got what I needed out of the Qualifier after all. Even though it didn’t turn out as I expected or wanted, I feel like I’ve grown up. It isn’t enough just to separate myself from my family or go into the ring on a flashy horse. If I want to be taken seriously, I’ve got to be more serious. Stop being so impulsive and reckless. Does that make any sense?”
“It does.”
She warmed under the respect and love that shone in his eyes.
He said, “And I’m ready to train you in the ring, if you want. I think we make a great team.”
“So do I,” she replied as she pressed her lips to his.
They were married two weeks later in a small church deep in the Virginia hills. Chester, Devlin’s best man, wore a tuxedo for the first time in his life. He liked it so much he declared he was going to throw out his overalls. Margaret said she loved him with or without the cummerbund. Carter Wessex, A.J.’s cousin, took tranquilizers to get on an airplane for the first time in ten years and flew in from her latest archaeological dig. The occasion was, she’d said, well worth the anxiety. And while Garrett walked his daughter down the aisle, his eyes were light even though his heart was heavy because he’d never missed her mother more.
Peter was a big surprise. After the accident, he’d quit his job, moved out of the mansion and taken up residence in a penthouse in New York City. He’d done it all in a matter of three days and, sooner than he had a working telephone, he’d signed on with an agent to represent him as an actor. Both the move and the agent had turned out to be good choices. He relished life in the big city and had just learned he’d been signed by a major soap opera to play a villain people would love to hate. When he shared the news with A.J., he said that playing Brock O’Rourke on Wings of Fate was going to be hard but, considering all he and A.J. had been through together, he had the character in the bag.
During the wedding, Peter sat in the front row of the church, and for the first time in anyone’s memory, there was someone sitting by his side other than his mother. The woman he’d brought with him was a brunette, with a flashing smile and smart eyes. An investment banker who was also a socialite; he’d met her at an art exhibition. Regina had hated the woman on sight.
It was going to be, Peter told A.J., a fair fight.
After the festivities and a reception at the Borealis Club, A.J. and Devlin returned to the farmhouse. As he carried her over the threshold, he stepped around the boxes of her things, which had been delivered the day before, and then took her upstairs to their bedroom. There, he removed her veil and released, one by one, the hundred or so pearl buttons down the back of her mother’s wedding dress. When he was finished, he slipped the acres of thick satin from her body and stripped his own clothes off so they were standing naked together.
“You’re so beautiful,” he told her softly, his lips caressing her collarbone. She felt his hands slip around her waist and pull her against him. His skin was soft, his body hard. “Now that you’re my wife, I only need one more thing to be complete.”
“What’s that?” she asked breathlessly.
He pulled back, and began plucking pins from her hair, releasing the waves from the chignon. “What the hell does A.J. stand for?”
Laughter filled the room.
“Didn’t you look at the marriage license?”
“I was too blinded by love. So?”
“You aren’t going to believe it.”
“Try me,” he said, as the last pin fell to the floor. He buried his hands in her hair, shaking it out around her shoulders.
“The first is Arlington.”
“Not bad. Better than a lot of other words that start with A.” His smile was warm.
She cast him a dry look. “It was the city I was born in.”
“Makes it easy to remember.”
“The other is Juniper.”
He froze in disbelief. “You’re named after a bush?”
“It’s a damn nice planting, a hearty shrub.”
Devlin was laughing as he said, “And the connection is…”