Chapter Nine
“Would you please take it easy,” Sam chastised as he took the basket from Arcadia’s hands.
“Nope,” she said, rising up on her toes to kiss her Viking.
A puked a little in my mouth at the sweetness. Cady looked at me and laughed. “The expression on your face is priceless. It’s not that bad.”
I toed the corner of the picnic rug until it was straight.
“It’s not that bad, maybe once or twice, but seriously you lot totally overkill it with the public displays of affection. It’s so sweet it’s giving me cavities.”
Arcadia snorted. “Says the person who had sex in the middle of the town square in an Italian village. I shudder to think where else you have gotten it on in the public eye.”
She eased down on the ground, and I passed her Estrella. It had been two months since her surgery aka the longest seventeen hours in history aka my new version of hell. But she lived.
I don’t know if it was Eli ditching his pride and begging that changed the Big Guy’s mind, or if it was the fact that he was the last redemption, or if the Father was just having a good day. I didn’t care. The important thing was that she lived.
A month after she came home from hospital, they decided to move from SoHo to a massive estate outside of Boston. The rural lifestyle wasn’t as fun as New York in my opinion, but hey, if this was what made them happy, so be it. And it was closer to Clary and all those crazy Mulligans. Besides, the kids probably needed a yard.
I watched Adnan race around the yard on his new prosthetic. It was state of the art, of course, and the kid adapted to it since day one. He was being chased around the yard by Nazir and his therapy dog, Muffin. When Tolliver had suggested a PTSD support animal, I’d been all for a support chicken. But apparently a Labrador was a better fit for a 12 year old boy. I’d only pouted for a week.
I looked over and caught Arcadia staring at me. Again. “What?”
“I just can’t get used to you sitting beside me. Speaking out loud. Sometimes in the middle of the night, I wake up to tell you about this really weird dream I had and I’m halfway through explaining when I realize you aren’t in my head anymore.” She smiled, but it was tinged with sadness. I knew the feeling, it had been a little like losing a limb there for awhile. I looked at Adnan. Probably the wrong turn of phrase.
But I wasn’t going to tell Cady that. “Toughen up. It’s not that bad.”
She laughed. “It has been nice having sex without the peanut gallery, though.”
I wanted my eyebrows. “I’ve seen all your guys naked. There ain’t any peanuts in those galleries.”
Tolliver came over, Hope in his arms. He passed her to me and sat down behind Arcadia, his whole big body wrapped around hers. Ugh, more PDA’s.
“Is Luc coming?” he asked, and I shrugged.
“I think so. A coup broke out in one of those tiny Middle Eastern countries so he’s pretty busy, but he said he’d pop in. Gus and Memphis should be here soon though.”
Oz walked over to us too, carrying a cooler. He handed me a beer. “Like this party wasn’t a big enough sausage fest.” He clinked his bottle to mine and sat on the cooler. It groaned a little ominously.
Arcadia and the guys were having a housewarming potluck. I was just here to see the fireworks when the strict Roman Catholic Mulligans realized that Arcadia was a partner to all seven of the guys.
Arcadia was staring again.
“I love you, Acerezeal, you know that right? Even though we are two people now, you are still a part of me.”
I turned away from her earnest face and nodded, blinking rapidly because I had an eyelash or a twig or something in my eye.
“You too,” I squeezed out. Apparently near death experiences make people prone to throwing deep and meaningful things out there in normal conversations.
Oz slapped me on the back. “Luc’s here. Saved by the Devil.”
I watched Luc stop and talk to the boys halfway across the lawn. He made a football appear in his hand and the kids whooped with joy and the dog barked happily. That ball was gonna last two seconds if Muffin got hold of it.
“You know what I think has been the most romantic thing about this whole experience?” Arcadia asked, and apparently it was rhetorical because she just barreled along anyway. “This whole thing, from start to finish, has been your love story, Ace. Your happily ever after. A fairytale about how far a man would go for the woman he loves. It’s beautiful,” her eyes misted up and I resisted the urge to roll mine. No more Nicholas Sparks books for her. I was putting a blanket ban on it.
I'd never admit it to her, but she was right. Through all the pain, the arduous journey to get the guys redeemed and then to save Arcadia, Luc’s love for me was a force in the background, unwavering in its intensity. I laid Hope on the picnic rug and stood, walking toward my heart. He met me halfway.
“Good afternoon, my love. You look beautiful, as always.”
I turned my face up for a kiss and he was all too glad to supply me with a one that made my toes curl.
“I love you, Luc.”
“I know, Acerezeal. I love you too, with a force strong enough to tear the heavens apart.”
Sheer happiness, finally, made my face stretch wide in a smile.
My smile turned mischievous though, when Grandmammy Mulligan, eighty year old Matriarch and all around Irish Catholic badass, arrived and was mentally doing a headcount of the ratio of men to women. This was gonna be good.
Let the fireworks begin.