Honor & The Shepherd's Bride
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Sherryl Woods
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Prologue
Even at forty-eight Lacey Grainger Halloran was still one hell of a woman, her husband thought with pride and a sense of wonder as he watched her begin the long walk down the carpeted aisle of Whitehall Episcopal Church. She had never looked more stunning or more confident.
More than twenty-five years of marriage, Kevin Halloran thought. So many troubled times, shared and apart. Yet it felt as if they were starting out fresh, as if this were the very first ceremony in which they would make a commitment for life.
Last time, like so many of their friends in the mid-sixties, Kevin and Lacey had skipped the traditional prayer book, church wedding in favor of a hastily arranged outdoor ceremony atop a country hill alight with the colors of spring. Kevin’s family, firmly entrenched in tradition, had been appalled. Throughout the brief service, with its unorthodox but heartfelt vows, their faces had radiated disapproval. But at least they had come.
Though Lacey had sworn it didn’t matter, Kevin had known that deep down she had feared his family would stay away, publicly writing off the match as a bad one. It had nearly broken his heart to see the relief and hope in her eyes when she’d seen his parents join the small gathering on that sunny hillside.
Today’s ceremony, a renewal of their vows, was every bit as significant as that first wedding day. His father and his son stood next to him, each nervously awaiting their own brides.
Kevin had been astonished to discover that long ago his father had been deeply in love with a woman whose name Kevin had never even heard mentioned. Now, just a few years after his own mother’s death, that woman—Elizabeth Forsythe Newton—had reappeared in his father’s life. Today they would be wed as his father had longed for them to be all those years ago.
With a sense of amazement, Kevin watched the transformation of his father’s stern face as his bride began the walk down the aisle. After two long years of sorrow and loneliness, Brandon Halloran looked downright invigorated by life. His damn-the-world, full-steam-ahead energy was back, and everyone was having difficulty keeping up with him.
Something warm stole through Kevin as he realized that it was possible for love to endure through so many years of separation.
Filled anew with a surprising sense of hope, Kevin glanced at his son and caught the expression of open adoration in Jason’s eyes as he waited for his wife to join him to renew their own vows. Within weeks Jason and Dana would be blessed with a child of their own—a boy if Kevin knew anything at all about the Halloran genes. The cycle would begin again.
All in all, it was quite a day for the Hallorans, Kevin thought as he took his wife’s slender hand in his. Lacey was trembling, he realized with a faint sense of amazement. He gazed into her eyes, blue and bright with unshed tears, and realized anew how very deeply he cared for her and how devastated and lost he would have been had they not found their way back to each other.
Squeezing Lacey’s hand for reassurance, Kevin began to speak. With his voice choked with emotion, he tried to find the words to tell her exactly what she meant to him, to express the strength he found in their marriage, had always found in her love. They were words he hadn’t said nearly enough through the years, words he had almost lost the chance to say at all.
“Lacey, from the day I first saw you back in the fifth grade, there has been no one like you in my life. You have been my friend, my confidante, my lover and my wife. I am a better man for knowing you and loving you. I beg your forgiveness for the times I have forgotten that, for the times when I have lost sight of all that truly matters.”
The memory of how hard his gentle Lacey had fought to save their relationship brought a smile to his lips. “I can’t begin to find the words to tell you how much I admire the courage it took to shake up our marriage in the hope that we would find something even better. From now on I promise you days that will only get better with each passing year.”
As a tear spilled down her cheek, he gently brushed it away, his own fingers trembling. Then he said in a voice that finally held steady, “I, Kevin, take thee, Lacey, a woman who has stood by me through hard times and good, who has provided love and understanding, I take thee again to be my wedded wife. For the blessing of your undying love, I thank God. For the joy of our family, I thank you. And I promise to honor you and all that you have meant to me all the rest of my days.”
As the solemn vows echoed in the old Boston church, his thoughts drifted back over those dark and lonely days when his own stupidity had almost cost him the most important thing in his life.
