"This is insane, you guys. Will you really have enough people for this amount of food?" I looked up from the mound of onions I was dicing to look around at the mountains of food piled around the TAB center kitchen.

Kyle pulled a large turkey out of the oven, setting it aside to cool before sliding the next one in. He stepped away from the food, then dabbed at his sweaty forehead with a towel he’d kept hidden in his apron pocket. "Trust me, everything will be eaten. You'd be surprised by how many people have nowhere to go for Thanksgiving."

"Just wait, honey. You think this is a lot of food? You haven't even seen the desserts yet," Houston said with a groan. Rolling his shoulders, he glanced back toward Kyle. "How many more breadcrumbs do you need? I think I've chopped up about five baguettes already."

"Keep going until you run out of bread," Kyle answered absently, already busy with his next project.

"And you guys really do this every year?" I continued to chat, trying to keep my mind off my watering eyes. Damn onions.

"Yeah, we started doing this the first year the TAB foundation opened. The original idea was to have a family-style meal for any families who were still recovering from their loss and might not have any family nearby. But in honor of Lukas and Gideon's past, we opened it to the homeless too. The first sitting will be for our foundation families. The second dinner service will be for the homeless, and then at the end of the day, our family will have our own dinner," Dallas explained, looking up from the potato he was peeling.

"Austin mentioned something about Gideon and Lukas having been homeless at one point. It's amazing to see them now, after hearing where they came from." I shuddered as I spoke, unable to imagine the awful things my brothers-in-law had survived. "At the risk of sounding shmoopy, it makes me twice as thankful for everything Austin has done for me. I was literally like two seconds from living in my car when he took me in."

"Don't downplay yourself, honey. You've done a lot for him too," Houston said, wagging a finger in my direction. "I've never seen my brother like this before. And the way he nursed you last month when you were sick? That's just not him. You go on and keep softening his edges like you are, and I might just win my bet."

"Not gonna happen," Lukas singsonged as he sat down beside me and started peeling onions. "Austin is never going to change the terms of their agreement, because he'd never want to feel like he was pressuring a pregnant omega. You can take that to the bank, because that is certified gold right there."

Houston blew Lukas a kiss. "Keep on thinking that, Lukey. You just enjoy that little safe feeling you have right now until I swoop in and collect my twenty bucks when I'm proven right."

"I really feel like I should be asking more about this bet." I glanced over at a snickering Houston and shook my head. On second thought, I definitely didn't want to know what their bet entailed if it involved my marriage. "Actually, never mind. I think I'm good."

"What's going on?" I looked up when Austin walked in. He was wiping his glasses with the hem of his shirt and looking back and forth between Lukas and Houston suspiciously. "Please tell me the bet isn't a real thing?"

"Don't worry your pretty little head about it." Houston waved a hand as he spoke. "We wouldn't want you to get all upset and work that tight little man-bun loose."

"Hey, leave Austin's man-bun alone. It's the most interesting thing about him." Dallas chuckled as he walked past Austin, stopping to playfully tug at said bun.

Austin flinched away from his brother's hand. "Hands off the hair, jerk. Speaking of which, now you have to go wash your hands. You can't touch hair when you're dealing with food, don't you know that?" Austin slid his glasses back on, frowning in Kyle’s direction. "Haven't you taught your husband any of the basic rules for safe food handling? We’re going to be feeding people from this kitchen; we can't have people just going around and touching hair willy-nilly."

"Willy-nilly?" Houston snorted, then turned to wag a finger at me. "I gave you an oil can for a reason. Your job was to keep the tin man lubricated; I thought we discussed that."

"Austin's just fine, he doesn't need any lubrication," I said stiffly. For some reason, that whole tin man nickname just rubbed me the wrong way now that I knew Austin better. I hated to see him get teased for something he couldn't help.

"I thought I told you back at the courthouse that I don't need to hear any private bedroom details," Dallas joked, then his expression softened as he smiled at me. "It's okay, Owen. It's a sibling thing. We give each other a hard time, but it's all in love, I promise."

"Sure is." Beau walked past, catching Dallas in a headlock so he could rub his knuckles over the top of his head. "If we fuck with you, it's because we love you."

"That's what he said," Houston said with a snicker. Dropping his knife, he leaned back to stretch his arms over his head. "Finally, the bread is all cubed. Hurry, somebody give me another job before Kyle does. I don't like the boring tasks he gives me."

"Really? Because I was just going to suggest that you might enjoy decorating desserts for a while," Kyle said in a teasing tone. "I mean, I have all the icing just waiting in the piping bags. All it needs is somebody with a little bit of flair that doesn't mind adding some pizazz to make things pretty. But you're right, that's probably not the kind of task you'd be into."

Houston practically bolted from his seat as he rushed toward Kyle. "Show me where they are, you big, gorgeous hunk of man! I'm on it."

"Are you sure? I mean, I wouldn't want to bore you," Kyle teased, then looked over at me. "You're the artist in the family; why don't you help Houston? My food processor finally arrived, so I can dump the rest of those onions in there."

Beau walked over to a box he’d set down on the way in and pulled out the food processor in question. "Sorry I got delayed, you guys. Rosie had a diaper blowout on our way out the door and Gideon was in the shower, you know how it goes."

"That's fine, Rosie comes first. Remind me to thank Gideon later; he really saved the day with that. I can't believe mine died on Thanksgiving Day, and with all these mouths to feed." Kyle shook his head as he came to take the machine from Beau. “At least Dallas knows what to get me for Christmas this year.”

Lukas shot Beau a concerned look. "Did Gideon and Rosie come with you, or did he stay home to rest? He hasn't had a lot of sleep lately."

Beau smiled gently, an oddly sweet expression on such an outwardly hard-looking face. "I left him napping, yes. Rosie and the rest of the tribe are currently in daycare, if you want to go check on them when you get a chance." He rubbed his hands together as he looked back at Kyle expectantly. "I'm assuming there's still a lot of work to be done? Point the way, good sir."

"Just give me one sec to get these two busy on desserts, and I'll show you what I need to get done. In the meantime, you could help your brother peel potatoes. Austin, if you want to be a doll, you could pitch in with potato duty for a few too." Kyle was in top form as he quickly got everyone busy and motioned for me and Houston to follow him into another room.

The morning flew by in a flurry of food preparation and before I realized it was happening, the doors were opening to let the long line of people in who'd been waiting patiently outside. I frowned as I took my place just inside the door where I'd be passing out paper plates and cutlery to our guests. I wanted to be serving food like the rest of the family, but Austin had insisted that I needed to stay off my feet. He did have a point; my feet were so damn swollen.

After the first food service, Austin pulled me back to his office. I blinked in surprise at the cot that was set up across from his desk, complete with a fluffy pillow and soft-looking quilt. Austin shyly scratched the thick stubble on the side of his jaw where he was growing in a beard. "I thought you might want to lie down. It's been a long day and we still have a whole other crowd to feed before we get to our own meal."

He waved a hand toward his desk. "Kyle left lunch here for us. I was thinking maybe we could share a bite and then I'll leave you in peace."

Taking a deep whiff of the yummy smells coming from the desk, I turned and impulsively hugged Austin. "I don't know what I did to be so lucky, but thank you for taking care of me. I really am hungry and tired, now that you mention it."

Austin shrugged as I pulled away, his cheeks flushing pink as if I'd embarrassed him. "It's not a problem; I'm just worried about you. You're eight months pregnant, of course you're tired. I really don't like the edema in your ankles, though. I think lying down will help."

I wasn't sure how to respond to that kind of consideration, so I just left it alone and went over to the desk and sat down. Austin was right there, lifting the lid to the tray and setting it aside before taking his own seat.

My eyes bugged out as I stared at the plate of food. "It's a shame that we're already married, because I might have to propose to Kyle after seeing this." I wasn't even sure where to start.

Austin looked a little green when he saw me spreading cranberry sauce over the turkey and then pouring gravy on top of the whole mess. I winced with a guilty shrug. "Sorry, pregnancy stomach knows no bounds." I bounced happily in my seat as I waved my fork over the plate. "I can't believe he even gave me a double serving of the green bean casserole and candied sweet potatoes."

Austin chuckled. "You were pretty excited when you saw them being made earlier. It's not surprising that Kyle figured out that you might like them." He shuddered and scrunched his nose at the marshmallow-covered yams. "I still don't understand how anybody can like that, and yet it seems to be such a traditional dish this time of year."

"That's exactly why I like it, if you want to know the truth." I paused to take a bite, my eyes fluttering closed as an involuntary moan sounded in my throat when the heavenly taste of brown sugar and cinnamon with a hint of citrus coated my tongue. Yeah, candied sweet potatoes were the best thing ever.

When I opened my eyes, I noticed Austin watching me intently. His pupils were slightly dilated, and the way he was watching me so hungrily caught me off guard. I blushed when it slowly dawned on me that I'd probably been groaning over my food like a porn star.

He gave his head a slight shake and cleared his throat, sitting up a little straighter in his chair. "So you were saying… you, ah, like those dishes because they're traditional? Why's that?"

I was almost relieved to go back to easy conversation and put my mind off the distracting way my dick had twitched from that look on his face. "When I was a kid in foster care, I used to fantasize about what it would be like to be part of a regular family and have traditions. In practically every TV show and movie I saw, the people would be eating green bean casserole and candied yams with their turkey dinners. I guess on some level, these dishes always represented home and family to me." I smiled nervously after sharing something so personal and jabbed my fork into a green bean. "The fact that they're yummy just makes them that much better."

Austin carefully cut a sliver of turkey and quietly ate for a moment while he thought about what I'd said. "I never thought about it that way. That is, food being representative of family. I suppose it's true, though, now that I think about it." He started meticulously slicing another sliver while he talked. "For example, at Christmas, I always host a brunch because my mom always did that. After we'd eaten and the kitchen was clean, she was done cooking for the day. We were welcome to go make ourselves sandwiches or help ourselves to whatever we wanted from the leftovers, but Mom was off the clock, as she'd say."

"That's a fun tradition; I wonder what made her start it?" I spoke conversationally as I plowed into my turkey, not nearly as neat with my knife work as Austin.

"Oh, that’s simple. She said that when the twins had their first Christmas, she’d missed them enjoying their new toys because she was so busy in the kitchen cooking Christmas dinner. After that, she vowed that was never happening again. So we opened our gifts after brunch and my mom and dad would play with us all day." He gazed off to the side as his lips curved with a reminiscent smile.

Turning his attention back to his plate, he focused intently on cutting his meat as he spoke. "This Christmas you'll find out for yourself, since you will be there to share my family's tradition."

"I'm looking forward to it," I said softly, taking a big bite of mashed potatoes before my mouth ran away from me and I said anything else. The idea of sharing the Christmas holiday with the Logans was almost too wonderful for words.

After we’d finished lunch, Austin pointed at the cot. "At the risk of sounding like a nagging husband, why don't you go lie down now? I'll take the dishes with me when I go, but I'll feel much better knowing that you're resting."

"Thank you, that sounds lovely." My voice sounded overly polite to my ears, but I was being careful not to be too needy.

Nobody liked clingy people, and I'd be willing to bet that Austin really wouldn't be able to handle it if he knew how much I wanted him to lie down on that cot with me and cuddle. I smiled to myself as I lay down. His brothers would have a field day with the idea of somebody considering the so-called tin man as a snuggle buddy.

After he'd turned off the lights, Austin stood in the doorway and looked back at me. His arms were loaded with our dinner trays, but with the light from the hall shining around him, it caught me off guard how handsome he was. I’d noticed it here and there, but in that moment, he almost took my breath away.

I blinked when he spoke in a tentative voice. "Will you be alright if I leave you here? You can text if you need me, and I'll come right back."

"I'll be fine, you don't have to worry," I said in a thick voice, my heart beating double time at the idea of somebody worrying about me. "Are you sure you guys can spare me now? I'd hate for you all to be shorthanded because the pregnant dude needed a nap."

"We’ll be just fine," Austin reassured me gently. "More volunteers have probably arrived by now. Every year, we find that more people are available to help later in the day, especially for this shift where we’re feeding the homeless. And it works perfectly for us, because that's about the time we’re running out of steam. Anyway, I'm going to get out of here and let you rest. I'll come back and get you when it's time for dinner."

After he closed the door, I closed my eyes but couldn't sleep. I lay there in the dark for a long time, my head too full of everything—especially Austin—for me to even think about resting.

*****

We'd just finished our family meal and were diving into the pumpkin pie while Lukas and Gideon told me their story. I'd commented on how interesting it was that instead of having a fancy dinner saved just for them, the family had made our meal out of leftovers from the day. As Gid casually talked about all they’d been through, I shook my head in wonder—trying to reconcile the two men I saw in front of me with the homeless waifs they'd once been.

"I think you guys are fantastic. What you did here today, hell, what you do every day for this community, is amazing. I like that you all give back instead of sitting at home and counting your money." I took a bite of pie, trying to figure out a better way to articulate just how much I admired them without sounding trite or effusive.

"It's just how our parents raised us," Dallas gently explained. “They taught us to do for others. For all of us to get together and continue the tradition is our way of honoring them."

"That's interesting because Austin and I were just talking about traditions earlier. I think I like the ones you have," I said with a shy smile in Austin's direction.

"What about you, honey?" Houston shifted the baby in his lap and kissed the top of her head as he glanced my way. "What kind of traditions do you have?"

"I don't really have any to speak of, especially now that Josh is gone." I shrugged. "He and I used to watch the Die Hard movies every Christmas and kill a six-pack or two. Other than that? As you guys know, I was a foster kid. I was never in any home longer than a year, so I don't have any solid memories of childhood. It's mostly a blur of moving from one family to another. When they’d get tired of me, they'd move me on to someone else. I was relieved when I aged out and earned a scholarship. Once I hit college, I never looked back. Of course, I also met Josh my freshman year, and he was probably the closest I ever came to family."

Gideon tipped his head to the side, resting his round cheek on the palm of his hand as he leaned on the table. "Josh was your friend who died, right? How did you guys meet in college? Were you boyfriends or roommates or classmates or what?"

"None of the above." I chuckled. "I was an art major, and he was the uptight ROTC guy majoring in military science. He had to take a humanities course, and he was struggling. I ended up tutoring him, and that was that. We were besties from the get-go."

"But you never dated?" Gideon asked curiously, his eyes straying toward my stomach.

"I mean, we tried?” I smiled as I thought back over the years I’d known my buddy. “We were always friends and occasionally friends with benefits, but dating didn't really work for us. He knew he wanted to be career military; that's why he was taking ROTC training. He had an eye toward leadership. Hell, we were just kids when we met. We would've laughed if you told us that we’d end up being friends for over a decade."

"I noticed you skimmed right over that part where dating really didn't work for you," Houston commented. "I feel like there's a story there, honey."

I shook my head. "Not really. We tried dating, but it was never going to work. He pissed me off with his need to constantly live by a schedule, and I drove him nuts because I'd get so lost in my art that I'd show up three hours late for a date." I laughed as a montage of memories began flooding through my head. "Hell, he used to set alarms on my phone to remind me to eat. We fought more than anything when we tried to date, so we agreed to call it a failed experiment and remain friends." I motioned toward my stomach with a wry grin. "As you can tell, we remained very good friends."

"So basically, he wanted you to live on a military schedule, huh?" Houston rolled his eyes. "That would never have worked for me either."

"Hell no, it wouldn't," Cody said with a chuckle. "This boy's gonna be late for his own funeral."

While everyone was laughing, I noticed Austin looked slightly troubled. "Are you okay?" I asked softly.

"Yeah, I was just thinking that you broke up with your best friend because he was too regimented, and then you find yourself inconveniently married to a guy who organizes his spice rack." Austin was straightening his unused silverware as he spoke, perfectly aligning them beside his plate as if to distract himself from whatever was going on inside his head.

"That wasn't entirely the problem." I frowned, trying to think of a way to put Austin's mind at ease without making a big deal about it. "Besides, you've never once griped at me for being late for breakfast because I decided to sleep in—you just leave a plate in the fridge." I stopped to flash him a grateful smile, happy to see that he'd relaxed slightly.

"Wait, are you even being serious right now? The tin man actually puts plates of food in his refrigerator for you?" Houston gasped dramatically, looking around the table with wide eyes. "Are you guys hearing this, or am I dreaming? Because I seem to recall a guy who made me scrub his refrigerator after I left a sandwich in there to finish later."

"Now you need to back your happy little ass right up and tell the truth, brat." Austin leaned forward to shake a finger at Houston. "If the sandwich had been on a plate and covered with something, it wouldn't have been a problem. But you left an egg salad sandwich on the shelf with nothing under it. Who does that? That's just gross! Even a paper towel wrapped around it would've been better than setting a soggy sandwich in there. By the time I found it, the bread was soggier than one of your kids’ diapers after nap time. The egg salad was leaking through and covering the shelf. Damn straight I made your ass clean it. The whole fridge stank."

"Whatever, tin man. Calm down before you stroke out or something." Houston rolled his eyes and stuck his tongue out at Austin.

Gideon ignored them and turned back to me. "Did it bother you when things didn't work out with Josh? Didn’t some part of you always wish it had gone differently?" He slapped his forehead with a palm, shaking his head so hard that his curls bounced from side to side. Sliding his hand down slowly, he peeked at me through his fingers for a moment before lowering his hand enough to speak. "I'm sorry I'm so nosy." He leaned sideways to rest his head against Lukas' shoulder. "It's just that Lukas and I were always friends too, before it grew into more. I can't imagine how I'd feel if we'd gotten closer, only to go back to the friend zone."

I smiled at Gid. I was coming to discover that he really was the sweetest thing ever born. "Josh and I had a different friendship than you and Lukas. We had college years and keggers, you know? The sex was an occasional part of our friendship when we were both uninvolved with other people. We were hooking up long before we tried dating. But it just wouldn't have worked in the long run, and his friendship meant too much to me to let it go. It was a little hard for the first few months after we stopped seeing each other, but after a year or two of us dating other people, we were right back to normal. The biggest problem for us was that Josh grew up in a straitlaced upper-class family, and he'd always felt strangled by it. While all I wanted was the kind of roots he'd escaped."

"That would be a deal-breaker for me too," Houston said. "When Cody and I were secretly dating, it killed me to have my boyfriend deployed and off gallivanting for Uncle Sam in some godforsaken part of the world instead of being home in my arms where he belonged. I totally get how someone who was dreaming of white picket fences wouldn't have wanted to tie himself down to a soldier." Houston glanced around to see if any of the children were paying attention before lowering his voice. "Now, playing adult games with soldiers? Oh, honey. That's a whole other subject."

"Isn't it though?" I giggled, then rubbed my belly as a fresh wave of grief for Josh swept over me. "The hardest part about being this close to delivery is knowing that Josh won't be there. Not because of anything romantic, mind you. Or even because he's the baby's father. It's just weird to imagine that I'll be going through the biggest moment of my life without being able to share it with my best friend."

Gideon was dabbing his eyes with a napkin, sniffling as he nodded in understanding. "We'll all be there for you, Owen. I know that none of us are Josh, and we don't have a decade of friendship with you yet, but you won't be alone." He sucked in a ragged breath, leaning his cheek back against Lukas' shoulder again. "I'm so sorry you lost your best friend."

Thinking of the alpha sitting beside me who'd already shown himself to be a pretty good friend as well, I reached out without thinking and rested my hand over Austin's. "Thank you for saying that, Gideon. But if I can put the grief aside for a moment, I would like to say one thing. On this day of Thanksgiving, I want to say how grateful I am to have Austin at my side. Your so-called tin man has been my rock, and I can’t imagine where I’d be without him."

Austin turned his hand over to clasp mine. His smile looked a little brittle, despite the range of emotions sparkling in his eyes. "Just doing my job as your husband. I thought we’d established that we have to take care of each other. We have a prenup and everything."

"What exactly does that prenup consist of, anyway?" Houston asked, his eyes lit with curiosity.

Tightening his grip on my hand, Austin smirked at his brother. "Basically, I've agreed to provide Owen with all the comfort and security that comes with being my husband, while Owen promised to help clean the house and not molest me in my sleep."

Houston turned to me. "That's what the oil can was for, honey. It's not molesting if you use enough lubricant to make it go down real smooth."

Gideon whipped his head around with a fierce glare on his normally serene face, curls bouncing as he hissed at Houston. "Children are present, Uncle Houston. Children are present!"

I snickered at the look on Gideon's face and flashed Houston a wink. "Yeah, Uncle Houston. Think of the children."