Brandon Barash and Kirsten Storms Tell PEOPLE All About Their Dream Wedding

Ever since General Hospital stars Kirsten Storms and Brandon Barash told PEOPLE they were expecting their first child together – a girl! – and that they’d secretly gotten married in June, they’ve been overwhelmed with the positive well wishes from fans.

Now, the couple has decided to share the story of their clandestine nuptials, as well as a photo from their magical day. Barash, a gifted raconteur, tells the story in his own words of how the couple assumed new monikers – Mom and Dad, and Husband and Wife – in the span of a week:

We had just left our first baby doctor’s appointment, and were riding high. Even though our baby was more in the shape of a pancake with a heartbeat, we were quite jolly. My dad was playing in the World Series of Poker at the time, a lifelong dream, so he and my stepmom were in Vegas for the weekend.

On our walk home – yes, we actually walked in L.A. – we received a text from them that he had been knocked out in the first 45 minutes. He was crushed. Kirsten and I looked at each other and said in unison (a common occurrence with us), “Wanna go to Vegas and get married?!” That was all we needed.

We called our respective parental units and immediate family and planned an impromptu rendezvous for the weekend at Caesar’s Palace. The universe conspired with us and offered us no resistance.

By the following afternoon, Saturday, I had proposed to Kirsten with a blue raspberry Ring Pop in hand at a gas station in Wrightwood, Calif., and we had planned our wedding ceremony with the team at Caesar’s. To say they went above and beyond would be a severe understatement. They’re always closed on Sundays but their coordinator offered to open just for us the next day, and we took her up on it. She gave us our pick of chapels, officiants (none of which were donning Elvis duds or personas), live piano music … we chose Led Zeppelin, flowers, etc. It was nothing short of a dream wedding.

There were about 10 of us in a chapel that seated 200 comfortably, and it was perfect. All I remember was my face feeling like Niagara Falls, stomping on the glass – the one religious element he chose to include – and Zeppelin’s “Over the Hills and Far Away” playing as we walked down the aisle. Perfection.

After the ceremony, we shared an impeccable meal with our loved ones at Il Mulino, our favorite restaurant, and spent the night playing roulette. Again, we felt the universe on our sides as we hit the numbers of Lil B’s due date and our newly established wedding anniversary repeatedly on the roulette table. It was magic, and we wouldn’t have had it any other way.

We kept it under wraps for so long by only telling those close to us. Luckily (almost) everyone stayed tight-lipped – yet another beckoning from fate. As I said before, given all of the possible and spontaneous complications with early pregnancy, we wanted to wait until we were out of the proverbial woods.

One more thing …

As we were cleaning out our apartment, we found a soap magazine from 2009 with us on the cover and a caption reading, “Will Johnny and Maxie sleep together?” We got a laugh. Johnny and Maxie didn’t do the deed, but Brandon and Kirsten picked up where they left off and … Got. It. Done.