Chapter 11
Royal
I groan and let my head fall onto the table.
“I told you so,” Nash says, rubbing soothing circles on my back. “Have some water.”
“Here’s some aspirin, too,” Zade offers.
I sit up reluctantly and take both items offered by my men and then close my eyes and tilt my head back.
“I wish I was dead,” I complain as my head throbs.
“I know, you can sleep on the plane; that will help some.” Nash kisses my cheek tenderly, and I tilt my head to rest on his shoulder, while tangling my fingers with Zade’s.
“Oh hey, look who it is,” Zade calls out excitedly as Madden and Thane enter the hotel restaurant hand in hand. “Congratulations, you guys.”
“For what?” Madden asks, furrowing his eyebrows.
“You two tied the knot last night,” Zade says, looking between them. “Didn’t you?”
“Uh, no.” Thane shakes his head.
I cock my head and pull up the doc again on my phone to make sure I hadn’t seen it wrong last night. But no, it’s there clear as day, a checkmark next to the Wedding Photo item.
“Then who the hell got married?”
“Who do you think it was?” Madden asks, plopping down in one of the empty chairs.
“Had to be Adam and Nox, right?” Thane guesses.
As if on cue, Adam and Nox enter the dining room hand in hand. A glint of metal on Nox’s left hand catches my eye.
“Congratulations,” I call out to them.
Nox’s face falls.
“How’d you know? Adam, I can’t believe you told them before I could,” Nox complains.
“I didn’t tell anyone, not even Gage,” Adam defends.
“It wasn’t hard to figure out after Madden and Thane said it wasn’t them.”
“What wasn’t them?” Nox asks.
“The Wedding photo on the scavenger hunt list.”
“Wait, someone got married last night?” Adam says, pulling out a chair for Nox and then sitting down beside him.
“It wasn’t you guys?” Nash looks between them with a furrowed brow.
“We got engaged, not married.” Nox shows off his ring and smiles.
“That’s awesome, congrats guys,” Madden says, pulling Nox in for a side hug.
“So, who got married?” Adam asks.
Owen and Dani enter the dining room next, both looking a little worse for wear. Dani looks like she slept in a dumpster. Her teal hair is sticking up in all directions, she’s wearing the same clothes as last night, and has on a pair of sunglasses inside.
“How are you feeling?” I ask her with a stifled laugh.
“Fucking peachy,” Dani grumbles.
“Um...you two didn’t get so drunk you ended up at the altar last night, did you?” Thane asks them.
“What?” Owen looks horrified. “I don’t think so. Did we?” he asks Dani.
“No, I was with…someone. I didn’t get back in until well after you’d passed out.” Dani shoots him a significant look.
“With someone? You got laid? Way to go, Dani!” I hold up my hand for a high-five.
“She ran into an old friend; I told her to go catch up,” Owen offers.
“Yeah,” Dani mutters and reaches for the carafe of coffee on the table. “And that subject is now officially off the table. Let’s move on to why you thought we got married.”
“Someone did. Unless the item was checked off by accident.”
Gage and Beck walk in hand in hand, and all of us turn to look at them.
I’ve never seen Gage with such a big smile on his face. And I don’t understand how the rest of us look like we’ve been run over twice, yet Beck is fresh faced and all made up, looking gorgeous as ever.
“I guess you guys already figured it out?” Beck says, stopping and looking at Gage, his expression dripping with love. Then, Beck holds his left hand up and shows off a sparkly ring with pink and white stones in the band.
“You guys got married?” Adam looks at Gage with surprise.
“Yeah, till death do us part and all that.”
“Psh, we’re not parting at death. I’m haunting your ass until you join me in the afterlife.”
“I’m holding you to that,” Gage agrees before sweeping Beck into his arms and kissing him. When their lips part, Beck whispers something in Gage’s ear, and they both smile. If you’d have told me a year ago that Gage could be this happy, I wouldn’t have believed it.
“Not to change the subject, but I have to know…” Madden takes a deep breath and turns toward Dani. “Did you really mean what you said last night? When you called me in the middle of the night? Or was that a stupid drunk thing?”
Dani cocks her head like she’s trying to remember what she could’ve called about, then understanding dawns on her face.
“Shit, I wanted to tell you in much better way than that. But yes, I meant it. It’s my wedding present to you both.”
“Oh my god.” Madden puts a hand over his mouth, and tears form in his eyes. “Oh my god, I fucking love you.” He jumps out of his chair and hurries over to Dani to wrap her in a hug.
Thane is more restrained, but I can see the emotion written all over his face as well as he gets up to join Madden in hugging Dani.
“I feel like we missed something,” Nash says.
“I’m going to be a surrogate for them.”
“Holy shit, that’s awesome,” Zade says. “Congrats guys. I know how much you’ve been wanting a baby.”
Once Madden and Thane finish heaping praise and hugs on Dani.
“This calls for a toast,” Adam announces.
“Can you toast with coffee?” I chuckle.
“You can now.” Adam fixes me with a look that dares me to argue. “To being together forever, with all the ones we love.” We all share looks with our partners and our friends...our family.
“To forever,” I agree.
“I guess we’re paying for your room and everything this weekend since we didn’t get a single item off the list,” Thane notes.
“Ugh, of course we’re not going to make you pay for our shit on your bachelor weekend. Just acknowledge that we totally kicked your ass and are superior to you in every way, and we’ll call it even,” I offer.
“Royal,” Nash chides.
“I’m kidding,” I defend myself with an innocent smile in Nash’s direction. “It was all in good fun, and we won so that’s all that matters.”