Page 32 of Bailey

Whispering Pines would become his new home, and Cole loved how it sat nestled in the forest just outside of Dog Valley. It felt removed from civilization, and he’d never experienced the level of silence he’d found at Whispering Pines.

More aunts, uncles, and cousins started arriving, and they all wanted to talk to Cole. His heart expanded with love with every hug and congratulations he received, because his family had made the trip from Coral Canyon to Three Rivers, Texas for this wedding.

To date, he was the only Young to get married outside of their small Wyoming town, and Cole honestly wasn’t sure if everyone in the family would be able to make the trip.

But they had, and he clung to his grams the longest, pressing against the tears that kept threatening to spill out of his eyes. “Gramps made it okay?” he asked when he stepped back.

His grandfather stood a half-step behind Grams, leaning one hand on a walker. She moved to give Gramps access to Cole, and he stepped into him and hugged him too. “He did great,” Grams said.

“I love you, Gramps,” Cole whispered.

“I love you too, son,” his grandfather said. “I wouldn’t miss this for the world.”

“Cole,” Sunny said. “Rachel and her family just arrived.”

His pulse pounced through his veins, bobbing up to the top of his skull and the back of his throat. “Okay,” he said, and he released his grandfather carefully, so he could find his balance.

With all the people in the house, Cole was sure he’d have to dodge through the crowd to get to his fiancée, but he shouldn’t have worried. Her daddy, the famous rodeo champion Wyatt Walker, had a personality bigger than Uncle Tex’s, and he stood just inside the room, clapping a hug around Uncle Blaze.

Daddy stood only a hair behind him, and he too hugged Wyatt as they both laughed. Rachel emerged from behind her father, and everyone else in the room disappeared. Cole could only see her, and that golden hair, and those pretty pink lips as they curved up into a smile.

She said something to her mother, and then looked back at Cole. He headed her way, pure joy filling him. She’d grown up here, and while she and her brothers had been up in Dog Valley for about eight years now, she’d wanted to get married here.

All of her aunts and uncles lived here, all of her cousins, and she’d wanted to get married at her mother’s runways. Her momma had once flown crop-dusters, and she still owned the business, though she didn’t pilot planes anymore.

“Hey, love.” He gathered her into his arms and swept a kiss across her cheek. Magic buzzed through his body whenever he saw Rachel, and Cole had only been able to identify it as happiness and love.

“Hey, yourself.” She flirted with him, and Cole grinned and touched his mouth to hers.

Applause began, swelling to fill the house, and Cole broke the kiss as a measure of embarrassment filled him. Cowboys whooped and cheered, and with every eye on him and Rachel, Cole had never felt so loved.

The noise quieted down, and everyone seemed to be looking at him for what to do next. His emotions surged like angry waters in high wind, but he managed to swallow and tuck Rachel’s hand in his.

“Thank you so much for coming,” he said. He looked around at everyone, meeting the eyes of Bryce, Harry, Cash, Boston, Joey and Adam, Rosie, Corrine, Liesl—his cousins who’d been at his side for so many years.

He let the tears fill his eyes now, especially as he took in all of his father’s brothers, their wives, and their little kids. They’d all come. Every single one of them. Grams and Gramps.

Sunny.

His heart lurched, and while his mother would be at the ceremony later today, she hadn’t been invited to this Young family breakfast.

He met his almost-bride’s eyes, and she smiled at him encouragingly. “Rachel and I are so grateful you’re here. It means a lot to us.” Cole swallowed, and watched as his dad nodded to the counters full of food.

“We have vats of French toast casserole,” Cole said next. “And fruit, and bacon, and sausage.”

“And a whole juice bar,” Rosie called. “Apple, orange, grapefruit, and even tomato.”

Cole beamed at her. “There’s a table in here, and a few outside. I turned on the fans and misters myself, so it shouldn’t be too sweltering.”

His eyes moved back to his father, who nudged Uncle Blaze. Cole loved his father so powerfully in that moment, because he’d allowed Cole to lead, though he hadn’t done hardly any of the work for this breakfast.

“My uncle Blaze is going to say grace, and then we’ll eat,” Cole said. “Unless we have any family announcements.” He swept the crowd again. “We sometimes do that at big parties in our family.”

“We do too,” Rachel said, and she looked over to her parents. Wyatt grinned like he’d just won the lottery, and Cole hoped it was the son-in-law lottery.

“Nothing for us,” Marcy said, though she checked down the line of her sons. Warren, Cole, and Harrison all shook their heads. Cole liked Rachel’s brothers, and they seemed to like him. Warren and her brother Cole traveled a lot, and trained more than that. They shared a cabin at Whispering Pines, and while Harry had been living with Rachel, he’d moved out and into a brand-new house they’d built on the corner of the property just for him. It had a music studio, as he composed and recorded his own songs.

Several beats of silence filled the house, and with the Youngs, that was a miracle.