Early Imprint [Book 3] ✔️

40 • Bachelor Party

QUIL'S POV

"And then I'll pronounce you husband and wife and say 'You may kiss the bride.'" The minister told us.

I leaned over and kissed Claire because I honestly couldn't help myself. Collin whistled. The minister cleared his throat.

Breaking away, I muttered a sheepish "sorry" and let the minister continue with the rest of the wedding rehearsal. There was a cool breeze coming off the water. I could smell rain in the air. I hoped that Alice's prediction that we were going to have nice weather tomorrow came true. It would suck if we had to get married in the middle of a downpour.

"I will then introduce you to the witnesses as Mr. and Mrs. Quil Ateara..." The minister said. Claire beamed at hearing that and I squeezed her hand. "You then walk down the aisle."

Claire and I turned and walked down the beach a little ways. The chairs weren't set up yet, so we had to pretend there was an aisle. We stopped walking and turned to watch the wedding party take their leave of our make-shift alter.

Cora and Jacob followed after us first as they were best man and maid of honor. Next were Lindsey and Claire's brother Nick, then my sister Kya and Nate, Claire's friend Ashley and Collin, Amber and Ryan, and finally Gracie and Seth. Gracie had seemed relieved when we first told her that she wouldn't be walking with Ryan.

However, there was certain softening in Gracie's attitude towards Ryan since the girls' weekend in Seattle a month and a half ago. Were they friends again? No. But Gracie stopped leaving the room as soon as Ryan walked in it. So there was some progress at least.

I could certainly relate to what Ryan was going through. I had gone through the same thing with Claire at one time when she was going through her "Goth" phase as a teen. Claire had refused to speak to me then too. And when she did finally talk to me again, I had to put up with the pain of her dating Sully. Ryan had a long road ahead of him still. It almost made me chuckle though as I looked at Claire. Claire and I had gone through hell, but look where we were now.

As soon as we were done rehearsing, we broke up into little groups. I watched as Ashley quickly walked away from Collin. The girl really couldn't stand him for some reason. She made her way over to Amber who immediately started going over details of the wedding. Collin ran over to Lindsey and started making out with her. I watched as Amber turned her back on the rest of group, raising her voice as she continued to speak to Ashley.

"Amb..." Ashley interrupted in a whispered tone.

"Not now Ashley...please just give me a break." Amber said in a pleading tone.

"Fine," Ashley sighed.

What was that about? Man, why was there always drama at a wolf wedding? I turned my attention back to my future bride.

"So where exactly are you going for your bachelorette party?" I asked, trying to sound casual.

"I'm not sure yet," Claire replied, before smirking at me. "Are you worried?"

"Just promise me you won't make out with a bunch of strange guys."

"With your sister there? Very unlikely." Claire laughed.

"Would you want to even if she wasn't there?" I questioned, beginning to feel very uneasy about the night. It wasn't that I didn't trust Claire. I didn't trust her former college roommate Jessica who was in town for the wedding.

"The only man I ever want to kiss is you...I promise." Claire said before standing on her toes to kiss me. Breaking away, she asked, "What about you? What are your plans tonight?"