Читать книгу The Royals Collection - Ким Лоренс, Rebecca Winters - Страница 79

EPILOGUE

THEY RENEWED THEIR vows in a very different land from Kareshi. In Skavanga beneath an ice-blue sky, where the heat of their love threatened to melt the tundra, along with Tyr’s three sisters, Britt, Eva and Leila, who attended this very special ceremony of dedication and renewal of their marriage vows with their husbands, Sharif, Roman and Raffa. Leila and Raffa brought their twins along, as well as their newborn baby boy, while both Britt and Eva were heavily pregnant, though even in the last months of her pregnancy Britt had gone the extra mile to work her usual magic on the party.

The ceremony was being held in the open air on the shores of the frozen lake, outside the cabin that had been in the Skavanga family since that first prospector had followed his dream and slammed his pickaxe into the icy ground. Back then there had been no facilities to speak of at the cabin, but each generation had made improvements, and now it had been transformed into a twinkling haven of warmth and welcome: a cosy nest amidst the snow, with flowers of the desert arranged around the door, and around the wedding arbour outside, beneath which Tyr and Jazz would stand.

‘I’m happy to get you off my hands,’ her brother teased Jazz as he kissed her warmly on both cheeks.

‘No more wedding plans to make and break?’ she teased him back.

Sharif’s eyes were warm with amusement. ‘I knew this would happen before you did, but if I’d said anything...’

‘My stubbornness would have held things up even more,’ Jazz suggested wryly.

‘So long as you’re happy, Jasmina.’

‘You can see I am, Sharif.’

‘Yes,’ he agreed. ‘I can. And as my wedding gift to both of you,’ Sharif said in a louder voice so everyone could hear, ‘I am happy to announce that I am going to hand over control of home affairs in Kareshi to my sister, Jasmina, and to her husband, Tyr—my dear and trusted friend, who is like a brother to me. I do this because I know you will both put the interests of our people above your own, and I hope this edict will allow Jazz to continue with the work she has already started so successfully in Kareshi.’

‘Just hearing you call me Jazz is a great step forward.’ Laughing, Jazz threw herself into her brother’s arms and hugged him tight. ‘Thank you. Thank you, Sharif. There’s no limit to what we can achieve together.’

‘I think this might work, don’t you?’ Sharif turned his dark amused stare on Tyr.

‘I never had any doubt, Sharif.’

‘Oh, no. You don’t do that,’ Jazz exclaimed as she moved to stand between them. ‘I am never going to be invisible again.’

‘Invisible? Jazz?’ Eva exclaimed.

The two men exchanged a look over her head and laughed.

‘Not a chance,’ Tyr whispered as Sharif left them to join his wife, Britt. ‘You are the least invisible person I know.’

‘And now you’re distracting me,’ Jazz said, frowning as everyone left them to go inside the cabin for the feast the Skavanga sisters had insisted on preparing between them. ‘What was I complaining about?’

‘Not enough sex, I think,’ Tyr said, straight-faced.

Jazz could only be thankful that her brother had gone inside. There were a few things she definitely didn’t want to share with him.

‘And I’ve got something for you,’ Tyr whispered.

‘Later,’ Jazz warned.

‘No. Now,’ Tyr argued. Reaching inside the pocket of his impeccably tailored suit, he brought out a ring. It was studded with the flawless, flashing blue-white diamonds of Skavanga; he showed it to Jazz.

‘“For ever”,’ she said, having read the inscription on the inside of the band.

‘“And always”.’ As Tyr finished off the quotation he’d had inscribed inside the ring, he placed it next to the simple platinum wedding band on Jazz’s marriage finger. ‘This is for you, Jasmina—Jazz—the woman I’ve loved for ever, and will continue to love for ever. My friend, my lover, the woman who gave me back my life.’

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