We’d decided on a big brunch the next day. I was going to be gone nearly two months, and we wanted the family celebration we had yet to have for our wedding, the one that would be quiet and intimate before the fireworks-style affair Emily had been planning.

By eleven, Lydia, Fiona, and Josh were in the lounge riffling through possible website upgrade options for Fiona’s business. My mother was oddly quiet and compliant as she sat drinking tea at the kitchen table. I could tell by looking at her expression that she felt contrite. Just that morning, she’d looked at the ring on Lydia’s finger and she was “glad it was on someone so deserving.” Hell had, apparently, frozen over, pigs could fly, and the fat lady was singing.

Even Frank was there, drinking his coffee at the other end of the kitchen island; while I wasn’t concerned about retaliation for the MI6 operation—I knew Jack had it handled—Lydia was still a media target, and I wanted to know she was protected. Especially while I was away.

At that moment we were only waiting on Emily and Will, and I had a handful of hours before I’d have to head to the palace to meet up with Richard and then to the airport. It had been odd that Will was there at all the previous night—kind and all, but odd all the same. I suppose it took something like an intelligence mission gone awry to suss out who your family really included, realize just how big it actually was.

I was finishing up a couple of work-related emails before joining everyone, but I couldn’t get my mind off how things had changed, how last night I’d wanted to tell her that everything I’d ever said about not wanting children was shite. That I wanted a family with her. For the first time I’d wished I’d been born a bloody Yank like she had, willing to talk it out at a drop of a hat. Instead I was daftly hoping I could somehow convey the message by shoving my dick in her. Christ, I was a moron.

When I got back from this trip I was going to man up and actually talk about this with her and just hope to god that she wanted this as much as I did. Hope I could convince her that she’d be a perfect mother. The truth was, I wanted this brunch to be over, to get on that goddamn plane and get my arse back here as soon as fucking possible so we could get through the wedding of the century and get our life started.

King and the Bresnovs were in custody and would be put away for life by month’s end. Humboldt was working properly, I was in the process of putting it back in my name, and one by one the crooked lines left by my father had been smoothed out. I had a plan for Hale Shipping. Hale Architecture and Design was having a banner year. The path was clear, and the only one I wanted on it with me was Lydia.

My own pathetic sigh was interrupted by Emily plopping her enormous handbag on the kitchen island by me.

“Well that was a nightmare. I hate to admit it, but I’d generally prefer you not go playing the saint anymore, risking your life, fancying yourself some kind of kung fu–style hero. Can we agree that that was bollocks and you’re done playing double-O seven?” She was giving me one of her I-can’t-believe-I-put-up-with-you kind of stares.

“Have you ever even seen a Bond film?” I asked, smiling.

“Ugh, you know I hate the cinema,” she said, scoffing. “I mean what is the point of sitting in the dark to watch overpaid actors scream at you?”

I laughed and pulled her against me. “Aww, Em. It’s nice to know you care.”

She made a sound of disgust and shoved me away just as the doorbell rang. She suddenly perked up. “I’ll get it,” she sang and marched away from me.

A few minutes later, I entered the dining room to see my beautiful wife sitting, coffee in hand, next to her friends, my mother, and my sister.

My sister.

Holding hands.

With Will.

I realized I wasn’t the only one staring, slightly openmouthed. I looked around the table and everyone looked slightly confused. Everyone except for Lydia, who was smiling. What was going on?

“Will?” I asked, looking at his hand linked with my sister’s.

“Hiya, mate,” he said, smiling nervously and leaning forward a bit. He should goddamn well be nervous. What the ever-loving fuck? “So, um, about this.” He looked at Emily and raised their linked hands to his mouth and kissed her fingers.

“Will and I are dating. Ta-da! That’s all there is to say. So, where is the coffee?” Emily reeled off every word at lightning speed, and started to drag Will towards the kitchen.

“Oh no,” I said, smiling and moving to block the exit to the room. “Please, take a seat. And by all means, Will, what were you going to say? Or perhaps my darling wife would care to elaborate?”

“Oh, no, no, no,” Lydia said. “I had no idea. I mean, I may have suspected, but have you met your sister? I wasn’t exactly going to confront her about it.”

“You suspected?” I could feel my eyes bugging out of my face.

“Dylan.” Lydia came up, linked her arm in mine, and stood on her tiptoes to whisper in my ear. “Leave them alone. Let’s have a nice brunch, and then you can take Will out back and give him the old one-two punch mano-a-mano hashing-out thing, or whatever is you intend to do, after we’ve eaten.” She gave me a look that said it all. It said don’t be an arse and get over it and you don’t have two legs to stand on and a thousand other things. As I’d known for some time, that woman had me by the fucking balls, and I fucking loved her for it.

And fucking hell she was right. After five awkward minutes, I did let it go. I mean of course I’d still rip him a new one at some point, give him some fatherly lecture, and he’d probably laugh his arse off as I did it. And the truth was, I knew better than anyone that love came when and with whom you’d least expect it. So, fuck it. He just better goddamn well not break my sister’s heart.

Over the course of the meal I realized just how much the flavor of things had changed. Maybe it wasn’t just that I apparently wanted to impregnate my wife like some kind of Neanderthal. Maybe there had been some kind of tectonic shift that impacted everyone. I looked at my mother, a woman who was emerging from a grief I was only now beginning to understand. My father was a classic wanker, through and through, but she’d had history with him. She had two children with him. Her life had become inextricably linked to his. I didn’t doubt that what I had with Lydia was more intense and intimate by a factor of ten, but if my mother felt even a fraction of what I would feel if I lost my girl, then I guess I bloody well had to accept that she had the right to be out of sorts. If that were me, I wouldn’t be held accountable for the damage I’d cause. She hadn’t been a perfect mother—hell, she hadn’t even been a good one, but I knew her better now than I did before. I knew she loved me.

I felt Lydia’s hand squeeze my own, and I looked at her. She looked so calm and replete, even though I knew part of her was buzzing with the anticipation of our separation. I returned the squeeze and slipped my hand around her thigh as she turned to talk to Fiona. She was building a life here. I’d caught her on arrival, been lucky enough to swoop in ahead of any other halfwits who might have tried to claim her as their own, and fuck if I wasn’t thankful for it every day. I thought about who she’d been in New York, how it felt as though all of Brooklyn held her up as their sun. She was making it happen here, and it was goddamn beautiful.

A year ago I was a lonely bastard who’d fooled himself into thinking he’d be content with the emotional scraps he’d been handed. From where I sat at that table, looking back on that version of me, I saw a sad bloke, someone who had no idea of the utter bliss headed his way.

Thank fucking god.

Then I looked around and I saw my baby sister, someone who less than a year ago I saw pretty much as a mousy, irritating, albeit lovable child, and saw this competent woman who was my peer, whom I went to for advice. When the fuck had that happened? In fact…

I tapped my knife against my glass and everyone silenced as I stood up. “Despite this being somewhat of a wedding brunch, I’m not making a toast about my incredible bride,” I said, looking down at Lydia. “But fear not. I promise you all plenty of that in a couple of months.” There were just enough giggles to confirm that they had indeed been expecting a soliloquy about my damsel. “No, I actually have an announcement to make about our family business, Hale Shipping. Our grandfather started the business because he wanted to help build things, make things, do something concrete for people. And he succeeded because he was a damn fine businessman. On the books, I am meant to follow in his footsteps, to run the company that has now been in our family for three generations. However, as you all know, my heart is in a different kind of building, and Grandfather supported my love of architecture, so I know that he’d approve of me handing the company off to another capable business mind. Someone with the savvy and instincts to do the job well and the backbone to do it right.” I saw my mother lock her eyes on mine, wondering, but I turned my gaze to Emily. “And if he were here now, I’d expect him to chide me for taking this long to figure out whose hands Hale Shipping should be in.” Everyone was quiet for another moment, waiting. “Emily, if you’ll have it, the job is yours.”

Her eyes went wide for a moment, and then they went soft. I saw Will take her hand, and in that moment I was both utterly confident that I was making the right choice and utterly grateful that she seemed to have someone in her life who might support her the way Lydia supported me.

“Dylan,” she started, and for the first time since our father had died, I saw tears in her eyes. “Are you sure?”

“There are few things I’ve ever been this certain about,” I said, and gripped Lydia’s hand beside me.

The stunned look on Emily’s face lasted only a nanosecond longer, and in typical Emily fashion, she was up and flying out of her seat like some kind of crazed bird with a huge smile on her face. “Dylan,” she said, and wrapped her arms around me in a kind of hug I was pretty sure might never happen in our sibling life ever again.

I looked down at her, saw just how right this was, and wondered why it had taken me so long to figure it out. “Emily, you were meant for this.”

“I know. I kind of was, wasn’t I?”

I rolled my eyes and gave her another squeeze. “It’s going to be a lot of work. You’ll have put in time there while you finish school, and we’ll slowly transfer authority, as you’re ready. Are you sure you’re game?”

“Completely.” Emily’s expression revealed the perfect amount of respect for what was ahead of her, and genuine enthusiasm.

My announcement unlocked something, tightened a loose thread, tied a bow that needing tying. I could feel things settling into place.

It was four in the afternoon. Our guests had been gone since two, and at that moment I lay naked in our bed and watched my gorgeous girl walk back to me from the bathroom completely starkers. Her creamy skin so warm and gorgeous in the sunlight.

After they’d left I’d forced the poor girl to wrap those perfect legs around me and hauled her to bed. I needed to taste her once more before I left, needed to feel her tighten around my tongue, needed to feel her lips around my cock. I needed every sensation to take with me for a bloody two months. I’d been fucking demanding. After I’d coaxed the fourth orgasm from her lithe little body, she’d collapsed against me, and we’d napped. Or she’d napped. Her head on my chest, my hand in her hair. I’d held her against me and loved every second. Not wanting to sleep through any part of it.

Now I needed to leave, and we both knew it.

“Stay,” she said, crawling across the bed and nestling back into me.

“Baby, you know I wish I could.” She sighed in defeat. “You could come with me?” We’d been through this before, but I figured it was worth one more shot.

“You know I can’t.” She said it in a way that made her frustration clear.

“Can’t blame a bloke for trying.” I squeezed her and rolled her so she was atop me, her legs settled outside my thighs, and her perky tits sat there fucking tempting me. Shite. I was going to get another hard-on, and our playtime was over.

“Plus,” she continued, smiling. “Even if Emily seems content to run the wedding show, I think she might throttle me if I left completely. The party is set for only a week after you return.”

“Right.” I sighed. I kept forgetting about that. I was already married, so the idea that we still had to contend with wedding nonsense seemed mental. “Are you going to get lonely without me? Will you take a lodger for company?”

She let a giggle go, and I fucking loved that little laugh of hers, the one she tried to keep in because she knew it would please me too much to give in to my daft humor.

“Not a bad idea. I’ll just call up Michael, and see—” As if I would let her get away with that. Her old neighbor who’d professed his interest in her months ago wasn’t setting foot in this house while I was gone. She shrieked as I pounced over her, caging her in.

“You saucy little thing. I’m going to have to give you a proper reminder of who’s boss around here, aren’t I?” She laughed out loud as she rolled onto her belly and tried to hide under the covers. “Someone’s got to make sure you’re all sorted before I leave, don’t they?” I pulled her up by the hips so her perfect round arse was perched in the air, and I landed a smack on that pink flesh that made my dick twitch.

“Dylan!” She screeched, giggled, and flipped to her back. Instead of skittering away from me, the feisty thing wrapped her entire body around me and pulled me to the mattress. We stilled and I held her against me for a moment. “You have to go.” She sighed as she said it. She was right. I did.