Chapter Thirteen
I honestly was going to let the story end with chapter twelve, until I had a barrage of e-mails and reviews that requested everyone's reaction to the marriage…and what happened afterwards.
So here it is…for better, for worse, for richer, for poorer, in sickness, and in health…
Jordan smiled as the plane leveled off, and glanced over at Woody, who still held her hand tightly. It was no secret she hated flying…and the worst parts were the take offs and the landings. She had a death grip on his hand until all was safe and the seatbelt warning light turned off.
"You okay now?" he asked, moving to put his arm around her.
"Fine until we land…and then I'll need your hand again."
Woody looked at his hand, still red from her grip. "Thank God that's at least another two hours…Maybe I'll have time to get over this before take off." He grinned ruefully at her, dimples in full view.
Jordan chuckled and leaned into his arm. "Are you sure about this?" she asked quietly.
"Sure. Nothing like going back to the scene of the 'crime' to finish up the details…" His grin widened.
"And what details do you have in mind, Mr. Hoyt?"
"I'm sure you know…all too well …. Mrs. Hoyt…."
Details….there were so many of them. Jordan's mind flew back to the night Woody had shown up at her apartment and offered her their marriage back. She had taken the ring and his name without a second thought or a look back.
Much less any regrets.
He had spent the night with her…and the rest of the weekend, although they seldom left her bedroom until late Sunday when Woody went back to his apartment to retrieve more clothes for work on Monday.
"That" Monday. The Monday they wore their wedding rings to work. Jordan couldn't help but grin at the memories. "Are we really up to this?" Woody had murmured against her lips that morning as they rode the elevator up to her office.
"You keep kissing me like that and we'll be up to more than just telling everyone we're married…" she had warned with a mischievous glint in her eye. "You ever done it in an elevator, Farm Boy?"
"There's a first time…" Woody never completed the sentence. The doors opened to the morgue and they both stepped out, Woody's arm around her waist. The first person they ran into was Nigel.
"Morning, Nige," Jordan casually greeted the Brit as she and Woody began to stroll toward her office.
"Morning …. you….two…." Nigel's voice trailed off. For two people who hadn't been getting along, those two sure looked cozy….too cozy…and Jordan had this glow… Nigel couldn't hide his confusion. "How …are ….things…?"
"Just fine…great, Nigel," Woody replied, struggling to keep a straight face.
"Ummm, yeah…." The criminalist disappeared behind the doors of trace, where Jordan and Woody heard him in an earnest conversation with Bug…..The last statement Jordan heard before Woody opened her office door and kissed her was, "Something's not right….odd…weird…, Bug."
"Nigel, it's Jordan….her moods vary with the weather…"
"No…look, mate…" Nigel urged Bug out the door of trace to catch Jordan and Woody in mid-kiss.
"What the hell?" Bug murmured.
Woody never faltered. He kissed Jordan thoroughly…and she responded in the most satisfactory matter. He was seriously thinking about calling in sick for himself and taking Jordan back home when he heard someone clear their throat.
"Yes?" Woody asked, releasing Jordan only to turn his head and look at the two doctors.
"Woody…uh…Jordan……uh…" Nigel for once couldn't find the words… "Is everything…all right? Are you two okay?"
"Everything is fine, guys. It is customary, even in Boston, for a husband to kiss his wife good-bye before they go to work…"
The word wife rang through the hall of the morgue.
And mass confusion followed. It took Jordan a full week to convince everyone that this wasn't a joke, it was real…even if they simply did it to help solve a case.
The precinct was even worse. Woody's fellow officers ribbed him horribly about Jordan going above and beyond her call of duty to help him with the heroin case.
"Jordan's helped me with a half a dozen cases and she's never volunteered to marry me," Seely teased.
Woody had grunted and hid out in his office until time to go home…when he walked back over to Jordan's office to get her. "What a day…"
"Don't I know it…let's never do that again…"
Woody spun her around and hugged her to him. "I don't intend to…I don't care if we got married just to help the heroin case get solved…I love you, Jordan Cavanaugh Hoyt, and I intend to spend the rest of my life with you."
And Jordan didn't argue. Over the days as people got used to the idea they were really married and were really serious about it, Woody mentioned that there was one very important aspect of the wedding they had forgotten.
A honeymoon.
A real one.
He floated the idea to Jordan a few weeks later…who promptly asked for some of her long-standing-five-years-worth of vacation time coming. Two weeks worth, as a matter of fact.
Now they were beginning it. First a flight to Louisville…then the short drive to Coldstream…and back to the Judge Thomas's cabin…for a few days. To revisit the scene of their "crime."
Then a flight out to Hawaii.
Jordan snuggled closer in Woody's arms, glad to feel them tighten around her. "Do you know what I was thinking the last time we flew into Louisville?"
"No…we were barely speaking then…"
"I know…you kept reading that damn file the entire time…I kept hoping that somehow, while we were out in the backwoods of Kentucky, we'd at least come home friends again."
Woody laced the fingers of their free hands together. "Guess you got more than you bargained for…"
Jordan laughed…a welcome sound in Woody's ears….it seemed over the past several months neither of them had laughed much. "I guess I did…a solved case and a husband…"