From the Hat Down, page 41
“Meg Anders Tallmadge, will you take Gina Luisa Morelli to be your life partner?”
Meg’s heart jumped into her throat. Oh, hell yes. She grinned. “I will.” Her voice rang out sure and steady. She gently squeezed Gina’s hands, looked into her eyes, and fell into the secret places she saw there. The words came easily then.
“Gina,” Meg said, “from this day forward, I choose to walk this path with you, no matter the outcome, sharing in your joys and sorrows, in sickness and in health, offering my strength, friendship, and love. I will honor and respect the unique person you are, and work with you in partnership even as I support the ways that you seek to grow as an individual. I will stand with you, learn with you, be with you.” Meg paused, allowed herself to savor this moment. “Gina, you are my soul mate. My closest friend. My companion. My greatest love. To you I pledge my faith, love, and devotion. To you I pledge my whole self, heart to soul.” She paused for effect. “My whole self, from the hat down.”
Whispers and giggles broke out in the crowd.
“I love you, Gina. And I can’t wait to share the ride.”
A flutter of applause accompanied the end of Meg’s vows. Margaret turned to Gina, waiting a moment for Gina to wipe the tears that tracked down her cheeks. Gina drew a shaky breath and glanced at Margaret. She nodded once and turned back to look into Meg’s eyes. Meg held her breath. The whole world disappeared, narrowed to Gina and the heat of her hands in Meg’s fingers.
“Gina Luisa Morelli,” Margaret said, “will you take Meg Anders Tallmadge to be your life partner?”
Fresh tears gathered in Gina’s eyes. Her face lit up with her smile. “I will.”
And a single tear eased down Meg’s cheek at the simple, absolute conviction in Gina’s tone.
“Meg, from this day forward, I choose to walk this path with you, no matter the outcome, sharing in your joys and sorrows, in sickness and in health, offering my strength, friendship, and love. I will honor and respect the unique person you are, and work with you in partnership even as I support the ways that you seek to grow as an individual.” She drew a shaky breath. “I will stand with you, learn with you, be with you. Meg, you are my soul mate, my closest friend, my companion. You’re my greatest love. To you I pledge my faith, love, and devotion. To you I pledge my whole self, heart to soul, from the boots up.” She paused, holding Meg’s gaze with hers. “I love you, Meg. And I can’t wait to share the ride.”
The last word floated in the air and cheers erupted. Meg glanced around, smiling through her tears. She maintained her hold on Gina’s hands as they waited for the impromptu celebration to subside.
Sean stood waiting at the foot of the steps behind Meg, and Mary stood opposite her, behind Gina. Margaret nodded and both Sean and Mary ascended, each carrying a small black velvet box. Sean took a position on Meg’s left, between her and Margaret while Mary waited on Gina’s right. Sean opened the box she held and Meg released Gina’s hands so she could remove the ring. She did and Sean closed the box, smiling and silently crying. Meg winked at her, which only made her cry more.
“Gina,” Meg said as she took Gina’s left hand in her own left, “I offer you this ring, as a symbol of my love for you and our journey together.” Meg positioned Gina’s left hand in such a way that Gina’s palm rested on Meg’s. “A ring is a circle,” Meg continued, “never-ending, always beginning. With this ring I offer you my hopes, my dreams, and my wishes to guide you, protect you, and provide you comfort, no matter where in the world you are.” Meg slid the ring onto Gina’s third finger and Sean choked back a sob. Meg took Gina’s hand and brought it to her lips, touching them lightly to the ring. Sean started crying harder and a fresh round of tears trickled from Gina’s eyes.
Mary opened the box she held and Gina let go of Meg’s hands. She removed the ring inside and Mary shut the box as Sean had done. Mary’s lower lip quivered.
“Meg,” Gina said, taking Meg’s left hand in hers, “I offer you this ring, as a symbol of my love for you and our journey together.” She guided Meg’s hand into position and Meg fought an urge to start whooping at the top of her lungs. “A ring is a circle,” Gina continued, “never-ending, always beginning. With this ring I offer you my hopes, my dreams, and my wishes to guide you, protect you, and provide you comfort, no matter where in the world you are.” She slid the ring into place on Meg’s finger and the sensation of the cool metal against Meg’s skin and the power of this moment shook every foundation she had. She stared, transfixed, as Gina touched her lips to Meg’s ring, her fingers gently holding her hand. Mary drew a whimpering breath and started crying as hard as Sean.
Even Margaret looked a little teary, though Meg couldn’t be sure because her own tears blurred her vision. Margaret waited a moment before speaking. When she did, her voice resonated across the crowd, sending another chill down Meg’s spine.
“Meg and Gina, in front of this community of love, and with the authority I derive from my spiritual community and position, I invest this union with integrity through the love that you have for each other. I now pronounce you united in life partnership.” She stepped back and Meg stared at Gina for a long time, dumbstruck, completely undone.
Gina broke the tableau. She reached up and took Meg’s hat off and with her other hand at the back of Meg’s neck, she pulled her into a kiss that could turn tundra into tropics. Meg worked her arms around Gina and held her tightly as she melted into Gina’s lips, unaware of anything but Gina’s mouth against hers, Gina’s hand in her hair, Gina in her arms. When Gina finally pulled away, cheers and raucous whoops came rushing into Meg’s perimeter and she blinked as the world returned to real time. Both of Gina’s arms went around her neck and her lips brushed Meg’s cheek.
“Wow,” Meg said softly. “This is the most amazing moment of my life.” People crowded the platform but Gina was the only thing that filled Meg’s awareness.
Gina smiled in such a way that Meg wondered how her knees didn’t buckle. She brushed a tear off Meg’s cheek. “Mine, too,” Gina said in a tone that sounded almost shy. She leaned in and dropped her voice to a near-whisper. “Can I just say that the way you look makes me so damn weak that I’m barely able to stand here looking at you?”
Meg grinned. “Say it all you want. I almost fell off the platform when I saw you.”
Gina kissed her on the cheek and spoke softly against Meg’s ear. “Put your hat back on. Make me weaker.”
“Will do, ma’am.” Meg took her Stetson from Gina and replaced it on her head. Someone turned on the music.
“Sounds like it’s time for a party!” A male voice shouted and another round of cheers went up. The platform crowd dispersed, on their way to the lodge, leaving Meg and Gina alone for a few minutes.
“What do you say, Cowgirl? A little dancin’?” Gina stroked Meg’s cheek.
“Hell, yes.” Meg kissed Gina’s fingertip as it lingered on her lips. “I’ll go easy on you, though,” she added.
Gina raised an eyebrow with an “excuse me?” expression.
“I don’t want you to wear yourself out. You might need your strength later.”
“Oh?” Gina looked at her quizzically.
Meg allowed a slow, cocky grin to lift the corners of her mouth. “To keep up with me.”
“As long as you leave your hat on.” Gina pulled Meg against her. “But nothing else.”
“I don’t recall that being in our vows.” Meg slid her right arm around Gina and took her right hand in her left, swaying gently to the music.
“It’s implied.”
Meg rested her cheek against Gina’s and closed her eyes, holding Gina’s hand against her chest, above her heart. Gina’s left hand rested on her shoulder. Meg exhaled softly. “I’ll leave whatever you want on. Or off.”
“I’ll be taking you up on that.”
They slow-danced through another song until Gina’s sister Grace addressed them.
“Um, sorry to interrupt—”
“No problem,” Gina responded, still dancing with Meg.
“The photographer is waiting,” she said apologetically.
“We’ll be right there. Five minutes.” Meg smiled down at her. Grace returned her smile and started walking back to the lodge.
“Five minutes. Hmm. What can we do in five minutes?” Meg murmured, visions of Gina moving against her, kissing her, singing to her floated through her mind.
Gina looked at her and Meg was twenty-five again, following her out of the River Rest to the parking lot. Gina licked her lips and grinned. “I’m going to make out with my wife.”
“Huh. Same here.”
And then they stopped talking.
“So is the weather as shitty there as it is here?” Stan said with a laugh.
“Completely. But it’s kind of pretty.” Meg watched the snow fall in the ethereal light out the front window, big wide cottonball flakes that added to the eight inches already covering the ground. Gusts of wind pushed a miniature drift onto the porch. The footprints she’d left four hours earlier on the walk had nearly filled, leaving only faint impressions behind.
“Well, I’d sure like to see you and Gina, but I don’t think Christmas dinner is in the stars for us this year.” He sounded disappointed. “Unless a thaw takes hold tomorrow morning and clears the roads for the next day.”
“We’ll come for New Year’s,” Meg said. “Gina’s looking forward to it. And that’s just next week.”
“I know. It’s okay, hon. I just wanted to spend your first married Christmas with you.”
Meg smiled. “We’ll call you and Gina’ll sing a carol for you.”
“I’ll sing what?” Gina asked from halfway down the hall.
“‘Silent Night’.” You know how that one goes. Sound young virgins, slender and wild—”
Stan started laughing and Gina grinned. She kissed Meg on the cheek. She was wearing one of Meg’s sweatshirts and a pair of baggy blue sweats, but she still looked amazing.
“Put that wife of yours on the phone,” Stan commanded.
“Yes, sir.” Meg handed the phone to Gina. “Master of all he surveys wants to have a word with you.”
She took the phone. “Hi, Dad Two. What’s up?”
Meg grinned and went to the back door to let Moonshine and Booger in. She closed the door that separated the kitchen from the utility room so she could wipe them off before they went inside. Once done, she let them in and they checked their respective food bowls before they went into the living room.
Meg opened a kitchen cabinet and removed a box of arrowroot. Next she took a container of Italian powdered chocolate out that Gina had brought from California, along with sugar and a small bottle of vanilla. She mixed the dry ingredients—arrowroot, cocoa, and sugar—in a saucepan then she added some water and stirred it in. She set the pan on the stove over low heat, listening to Gina talk and laugh, and thinking there was nowhere else she’d rather be.
She put two Italian cappuccino cups on the counter with their saucers and stirred more water into the saucepan along with a cup of half-and-half. Gina walked past the kitchen doorway on her way to the back office, still talking to Stan. She blew Meg a kiss and winked. Meg grinned at her and continued stirring, watching as the mixture heated. After a few minutes, she dipped a spoon in and removed it, watching how the chocolate coated it. Done. She turned the heat off and poured the hot chocolate into the two cups. She’d gotten pretty good at this step and didn’t leave drips. Meg set the pan on the stove and sprinkled nutmeg over the mixture in the cups. She garnished each with a peppermint stick and picked one cup up so she could take it to Gina in the office.
Instead, Gina stood watching her from the doorway. Meg had been so absorbed in her chocolate ministrations she hadn’t heard her. Gina took the saucer and cup out of Meg’s hands. “Sit with me,” she said, eyes shining. Meg picked up the other cup and saucer from the counter and followed Gina to the living room, where they carefully sat on the new sofa, a deep red nuovo-European style affair with clean lines. Meg especially liked how it could look at home in a bistro or a ranch house. Gina kept the cushions covered with Pendleton blankets should the dogs decide to avail themselves of it. A matching chair stood at a right angle to the sofa’s end, also covered in a Pendleton. Moonshine was sprawled on the rug near the coffee table, snoozing. Booger had made herself at home on the chair.
Meg placed her cup and saucer on the new coffee table, whose surface was covered in festive tiles. Gina took a sip of hers. “Damn, honey. I’ll make an Italian out of you yet,” she said appreciatively.
“An Italian cowgirl, huh? That could be a fun mix.”
Gina stirred her cocoa with the peppermint stick. “Where do you think the term ‘spaghetti western’ comes from?”
“Lesbian rancher-types hooking up with Italian-American journalists?”
Gina laughed. “Picture this. There you are, out in the wilds riding fence on Destry. And you stop and build a fire so you can get your espresso going.” She looked at Meg over the rim of her cup, a little smile dancing at the corners of her mouth.
Meg nodded sagely. “And I’ll always have a stash of biscotti. ‘Here, li’l lady. Almond anise for you and your horse there’.”
Gina laughed. She put her cup down and leaned over so she could brush a kiss on Meg’s cheek. “I love you. I love you so much I can’t stand it.”
“Enough to maybe move into a bigger house with me?” Meg asked, raising her eyebrows, teasing.
“More than enough.”
“Enough to listen to me complain about what a pain in the ass it is to move?”
“Well, we still have a few months before we have to do that. I mean, winter ends around here in. . .what? August? Plenty of time.”
“Yes, and then we have the two-week window of summer to get everything over to the new place.”
“Sounds doable.”
Meg reached over and brushed a lock of hair off Gina’s forehead. “So what’d Dad think of the story?”
“He loved it.” Gina grinned. “And, guess what? My editor loved it. ‘Another Decade at the Diamond Rock’. He just emailed me. He’s sending me more work. He wants me to create this whole ‘Way of the West’ series and he’s putting me in charge.”
Meg sat back, staring. “Are you serious?”
“As a bad case of foot rot.”
“Nice. You already sound like a rancher,” Meg said, laughing. “And that is awesome news. The series. Not the foot rot.” She took Gina’s hand. “Congratulations.”
“It’ll require some travel,” Gina said, tentative.
“Whatever you need to do.” Meg ran her thumb along Gina’s knuckles, along the ring on her finger. She loved seeing the ring on Gina’s finger, loved seeing the one on her own. “I told you. I’m your base.”
“I just don’t want to be away from you for long. At all, actually.” Gina kissed Meg’s hand. “We’ll see how this goes. Maybe after I get some things in place I won’t have to travel too much. And maybe you can come with me sometimes.” She ended with a hopeful note.
“I’d like that.”
“So hurry up and get Haley into vet school so she can run things while we gallivant all over the place.”
Meg laughed and kissed her. What started as one turned into several, which happened quite a bit. She pulled away finally, breathing heavily.
Gina pushed her back against the end of the couch, a gleam in her eyes that rendered Meg powerless. “So, Doctor Tallmadge, seeing as how the weather precludes any sort of gallivanting at the moment, maybe you’d be amenable to some sort of substitute activities?” She raised an eyebrow and traced Meg’s lower lip with her tongue and it felt like a tiny fireball on Meg’s mouth.
“I might,” Meg said, pretending disinterest though her heart pounded and she ached between her thighs. “What’d you have in mind?”
Gina picked up her cup and dipped the peppermint stick in the chocolate. She ran it gently over Meg’s lips. Meg’s blood galloped through her veins as Gina leaned in and sucked the chocolate slowly off her lips before pulling away.
“God, I love snow days,” Gina said as a sultry smile lifted the corners of her mouth. She dipped the peppermint stick again. “Hold still, Doctor. This won’t hurt a bit.”
And then there was no more talking.
Would you like to know how it all started for Meg and Gina?
Then pick up a copy of From the Boots Up, available on Kindle.
Pre-vet college student Meg Tallmadge comes home to southern Wyoming in May 1999 like she has every summer since she started school to help her father Stan run the family ranch. He’s managed to get theLos Angeles Timesto send a reporter out to do a story on the Diamond Rock, which doubles as a dude ranch. Meg knows the ranch needs all the publicity it can get to bring in more customers, but she’s not looking forward to babysitting a reporter for a week. When the originally scheduled reporter can’t make it, Meg worries that they won’t get a story at all, which is worse than dealing with a city slicker for a few days. Fortunately for Stan and the ranch, theTimes finds a replacement, and Meg prepares to be under scrutiny, under the gun, and the perfect hostess. She knows what this opportunity means to her father, and she’s hoping that if it goes well, it’ll ease some of the tension between them as a result of her coming out a few months earlier. What she’s not prepared for — and never expected — is the reporter herself and the effect she has on her.
In spite of what she feels, Meg can’t risk the fallout that could result from overstepping a professional boundary. But as the week draws to a close, she learns that not taking a chance becomes the biggest risk of all.
Andi Marquette was born in New Mexico and grew up in Colorado. She completed a couple of academic degrees in anthropology and returned to New Mexico, where she decided a doctorate in history was somehow a good idea. She completed it before realizing that maybe she should have joined the circus, or at least a traveling Gypsy troupe. She fell into editing sometime around 1993 and has been obsessed with words ever since, which may or may not be a good thing. She currently resides in Colorado, where she edits, writes mysteries, speculative fiction, and romance and cultivates a strange obsession with New Mexico chile. You can find out more about her and her work at her website, andimarquette.com.
