Page 64 of Tolerated By the Sigma (Mate Hunt 7)

My eyes watered a bit.

It was perfect.

I’d always been human, but I’d never wanted a fancy wedding. I didn’t care how sexy I’d look in that silky white dress—I wasn’t worried about having perfect pictures to put on perfect walls after the ceremony ended.

I just wanted someone to share my life with, In every way.

“We grabbed the dress, but everyone thought you might like something a bit different.” Vi winked at me.

She looked like she was tearing up just the tiniest bit, too.

I flung my arms around her, holding her fiercely close and squeezing the shit out of her. “Thanks for setting this up,” I whispered.

“You should thank your mate. He texted us the details a few days ago; we just showed up and brought a few things with us.” She grabbed a makeup bag. “Are we doing the t-shirt, or the dress?”

“T-shirt.” I didn’t bat a single damn eye.

“Okay, put it on, and we’ll throw on some mascara and tinted moisturizer and call it perfect.”

I flashed her a grin. “You know me too well.”

“Way too well,” she teased back. “Come on, Char. You’ve got a wedding to crash.”

My own wedding.

It was so surreal.

I swapped my chicken shirt for the nacho shirt, and then let Vi pull my hair out of its braid. I swiped my mascara on while she messed with my hair, and then I patted my face with moisturizer while she finished fluffing my hair as well as she could with her fingers.

“Ready?” she asked me.

“Hell yeah.” I flashed her a grin, and we strode out from behind that shitty makeshift wall together.

Vi took one of my arms, and Sam came up to hand me a bouquet of white flowers before he took my other elbow with a grin and a wink at me.

Having them both there, walking down the isle with me, meant the world.

When they finally handed me off to my grinning mate, I saw him wearing a black shirt that saidNacho Average Groom, and my eyes stung a bit more.

We exchanged vows as directed, sliding the rings that we’d picked out earlier onto each other’s hands at the designated times. And when he declared us man and wife—and wolf—we kissed a fuck-ton longer than we should’ve.

The party moved to Sab’s backyard shortly after the ceremony, and Ryder whisked me around the grass, both of us barefoot and laughing, like it was the best time he’d ever had.

And when the night had grown so dark that the moon finally beamed down at us, I beamed right back.

Because everything I had wanted hadn’t come to me in the way I thought it would, but it had come to me.

And it was perfect.

EPILOGUE

RYDER—EIGHT YEARS LATER

“More ice cream?”I murmured to Charly, brushing a hand over her arm and then over her bare belly. We were all outside, swimming in Ford and Ebony’s pool, and Evan and his buddies were having a blast tearing shit up and squirting everyone with water guns. I didn’t know where he’d gotten those, but I was confident that either Elliot, Rocco, or Zed was to blame.

“You know the answer to that question is always yes.” She flashed me a grin, looking away from her conversation with a few of the other pack ladies for the tiniest moment.

I chuckled. “Okay, I’ll be right back.”

I talked easily with some of the other guys as I scooped ice cream, taking a minute to rub the soft head of the newborn baby Zed was holding to his chest before I headed back out to the chaos that was our pack.

Nothing was perfect, but we were a family—and none of us would’ve wanted it any other way.