Chapter 18

Teri went out of the forest and put her shoes back on; then emerged in the hall. The hall was filled and more were still coming. She walked back to the wedding table. Terrence was welcoming people when he saw his bride walk in the room.

“Excuse me,” He said to the group he was talking to and went over to Teri.

“Hi honey,” Teri said sweetly and kissed him.

“Wow.”

“Is that what you say to the love of your life?”

Teri swung her arms around his neck and he put his arms around her waist. He was completely in love with her. She pulled him tightly to her and whispered.

“Terrence I love you, I will always and forever.”

“I know, I will love you always and forever too.”

The reception was about to begin. Gabe and Serine came over and hugged Teri and Terrence.

“Teri welcome officially to the family,” Gabe said.

Serine gave Teri a small silver wrapped box.

“I want you to open this first. Before the others,” Serine said winking.

Teri looked down at the box and slowly opened it. As Teri removed the box lid she saw something unexpected.

“We found it in that abandon house you and Terrence bought. Teri we know. It was your mother’s,” Gabe said quietly.

“Thank you. This is the best thing I could ever get.”

There in the box lay the golden wedding ring of her mother. Never would she have though. She guessed they took time and pieced her life together. It was brilliant; she hugged them both.

“You are like parents to me over all these years. Thank you.”

Teri slipped the ring on her ring finger, over her wedding ring.

“It’s time for the toasts,” Gabe said.

The crowds soon settled into their seats and quieted for the toasts. Terrence’s brother, the best man, Ignatio stood and took in his hand his Champaign glass. Then turned to Teri and Terrence.

“I’ve known you for only three years, but when you first came to us you had something about you I just had to love. It’s too bad my brother got to you first,” Ignatio said as the hall stifled a laugh. “My brother had suffered the loss of his girlfriend the month before you came to us. I never thought he’d find someone ever again. His life changed forever when you came to him. So I give a toast to you Teri so that your love may heal our love stricken world. So you live a long life with Terrence, Always and forever.”

“To Teri,” Resounded to hall.

Teri knew what was happening outside of Maine’s woods. The greatest war of the world. Beyond the east coast there was complete destruction from the nuclear war between the world and Russia. Teri knew her job and her love had to be shared. Ignatio sat down and Vailana stood up taking her glass in her hand as well.

“Terrence through out these last three years I’ve walked with you and Teri. You two have so much love for each other that if you two stood in the middle of the world I think the Russian’s would melt, kind of like the Wicked Witch of the west,” the stifled laughs a rose and again died. “Even through the storms you two seem stronger, after every tide or tsunami, every type of weather you two come out twice as victorious. May she bring you joy and happiness all the days of your life, Always and forever.”

“To Terrence,” the hall resounded again.

Vailana sat down. The next people Teri didn’t know at all very well. Her mind wandered to her many tasks at hand.

The war. It was destroying everything. The Russians had built up an alliance with India and promised not to destroy it’s people. The Indian’s and Russians then attacked and destroyed Europe. Africa was targeted next. The United States formed an agreement, which they upheld, with South America, Central America, Canada, and Australia to help fight the Russians. The Russians had secretly built Nuclear and Atomic bombs to kill everyone on Earth.

The United States CIA service had discovered these secret operations on June 1st, 2008. This realization created panic in the government so they too began building bombs. The Americas and Australia were bond to protect the human race and Russia wanted to destroy it. Early in the war Russia turned on India and completely destroyed all of India.

This set the world in an up roar. All of the world allied with the Americas and helped create bombs that could target only the headquarters which were in Moscow, St. Petersburg, and Serbia. They didn’t want to harm anyone else. Secretly though the world had been sending undercover agent into Russia to retrieve all the people so no one would get hurt. The progress was minimal, but they had not yet been found out by the Russians. This made it easy to remove the people.

Teri’s job was twice as hard and more complicated. She had to rely on what Chris taught her if she was going to succeed in saving the world.