“Are you sure?” I asked for the fifth time.

“More than.” Mitch kissed my cheek before pressing send. “There. Done.”

We’d talked on and off during the entire pregnancy about me working after the baby came. Mitch told me I should follow my heart...and I wanted to. But I also wanted to contribute more to the household than just the peanuts my brother paid me for keeping the books. Not that we needed extra income.

No, I was just being—well me.

Unlike so many people, my identity was not tied up in my career. I was fine not doing underwriting. More than anything, I wanted to be home with Calvin, but going from paternity leave to resigning felt like a huge step. A huge step I’d been second guessing myself on all morning.

“Thank you.” I leaned into his arm. “I needed that push.”

“I know, love. Are you ready to go?”

“Absolutely.” I closed my laptop and joined Mitch at the back door, where he had Calvin already in the buggy. He’d built a little ramp off the back door after our first weekend home with the baby, saying it was easier than carrying the buggy up and down the steps. Turned out to be the handiest thing ever.

We walked around the block, loving the fresh warm air of early summer and describing everything we passed to our sleeping newborn. Not that he’d have understood more if he were awake, it just felt natural to share all the wonders of this world with him, even if we sounded loony to anyone we walked past.

We were meeting Justin at the cemetery to introduce Calvin to Michael. When I’d suggested it, I expected this day to be melancholy at best. After all, we were visiting a grave marker...not a person. But for some reason, it brought me a sense of peace. I didn’t even pretend to understand why, but it affirmed my original thought that this would be good for all of us.

“I think I see Justin.” I pointed to a man facing out of the cemetery by the back fence, overlooking the river.

“Let me go first.” Mitch kissed me on the lips chastely and then kissed our sleeping bundle on the forehead just before he slowly walked to his brother. He wrapped his arm around his brother’s shoulder and they stood like that for what felt like forever but was probably only five minutes before coming back toward me.

“Hello, hot stuff. Damn, no one would guess you just had a baby.” Justin was such a liar. I still had twenty pounds on me, and the circles under my eyes almost reached my knees. But I still loved hearing it.

“Thanks. Your pants are on fire, but I appreciate it nonetheless,” I teased.

Justin’s eyes looked past me. “Shall we go?”

As if on cue, Calvin began to fuss.

“Come on little man.” I took him from his stroller and wrapped him in a blanket before holding him to me. “Let's go meet your Uncle Michael.”

I handed him to Mitch and pushed the stroller alongside them as we wove through the paths to Michael's grave marker. The ground was covered in flat stones you could only read while standing over them, and I avoided looking at Michael’s until after we were ready to leave. Seeing the dates and knowing how young he’d been was just too much for me.

“Hey, baby bro. You will never believe what our brother went and did.” Justin kneeled at his brother’s stone. “He done got himself an omega. Mister-I-will-always-be-single is officially off the market.” He looked back up at us and winked. “Any-who, they have a baby now. Would you like to meet him? He’s named after you.”

Justin patted the ground next to him and Mitch kneeled too, our little man snuggled in close to his chest.

“Hello, Michael. We miss you.” Mitch turned Calvin so that his face was visible by the tombstone, if such a thing mattered. “I did find my omega, and he is the most amazing man. You would love him...and look what we did. This is Calvin Michael. Isn’t he perfect?”

Mitch continued to tell his brother all about our life, just as Justin did the same with his, joining them on the hard ground. When all that was needed to be said was said, we got up and left the cemetery in silence, none of us talking until we reached the sidewalk.

“He’d have liked you, you know.” Justin’s hand settled on my shoulder. “Thanks for this.” He pulled me in for a hug, faux whispering in my ear, “Has my lame brother given you that blasted ring yet?”

“Asshole. I was waiting for the right moment.” Mitch grumbled in jest as he pulled out a ring box from his jacket pocket. “The asshat ruined it, as usual.”

“Or I made it better since Kaden is obviously going to say yes. Look at that sparkle in his eye. How long have you had that, anyway? Weeks?”

I loved watching Justin and Mitch banter most days, but I couldn’t be bothered to even focus on their words, my eyes on the ring. The ring he’d picked out just for me.

“Months.”

“Shit, what would you do without me?” Justin walked to the buggy and picked up a newly fussy Calvin. It was getting near his eating time, but he would be okay for a few more minutes. I was too distracted by that box in Mitch’s hand to think of anything else.

“I’d have taken my omega to Paris and proposed on the top of the Eiffel Tower.” He looked at the ring and back to me with his eyebrow raised.

I nodded, a tear of joy escaping my eye.

Mitch took the ring out of the box. “Now I just have to stand here in front of the most important people in my life and tell him how my world is brighter, more complete, and a hell of a lot sexier now that he is in it, and I want him to be my husband. Lame.”

“Perfect,” I whispered. One tear became dozens and then became a stream, the happiness overwhelming me as I threw myself into his arms.”And yes.”

It was true too. Were we perfect individually? Heck to the no on that one, but we fit together perfectly. I felt like every cheesy romantic comedy in the theaters when I thought about how very much he completed me.

“You owe me Paris though,” I sassed as Calvin went from a little fussy to I need to eat now mode. “Let’s get inside, so I can feed our little man.”

“Paris—done. Want to head to Joan’s for lunch?” Mitch asked both of us since the diner was closer than our home.

“I hear they have great omelettes.” Mitch winked at me and pinched my ass.

Justin grabbed the stroller, looking so natural behind it. One day, I wanted to see him with his alpha, walking down the street and headed out to get eggs. For now, he could borrow our little family.

“I wouldn’t know. Last time we headed that way, my water broke.” And the craving never left, so Mitch’s idea was perfect. “Remember that next time you offer to take a pregnant omega there, brother in law.”

“Duly noted.” Justin gave a curt nod as we walked the short distance to the diner, just the four of us.

My mind wandered back to Ike, and I wished he could be there with us too, but he had his own things to figure out. But things were looking up for him. Or so he said. I held on to that because Ike deserved a good life.

“I’m buying.” Justin pushed out his chest all “protective big brother”...and quite ridiculous.

“Good.” I brushed by him with Calvin in my arms. “I resigned today.”

I settled into a booth and began to feed Calvin as my new fiancé and future brother-in-law slid in across from me.

“Whacha drinking?” The waitress popped up out of nowhere, startling all three of us from the look of it.

“Three chocolate milkshakes. Today is a day for celebrating.” Justin didn’t even bother picking up a menu.

Milkshakes were the furthest thing from my mind until he mentioned them. The man was almost as brilliant as his brother.

The waitress brought our order to the kitchen and we sat there laughing and telling stories, including the one about my quest for eggs before the two of them told story after story to Calvin, who was pretty much in a milk coma by then, about his uncle. The joy they expressed as they told tale after tale far overshadowed the sorrow that had been shrouding both their lives for so long.

It was a powerful thing, new life. It had a way of making the darkest days brighter than the sun.

“So, when are you guys getting hitched?” Justin asked basically out of nowhere after telling a story about their brother stealing Halloween candy from their bags in the middle of the night.

Mitch pulled a card out of his jacket pocket and slid it my way.

Inside the envelope was an invitation to a wedding—our wedding and the date—that afternoon.

I stared at the card with only one thought going through my mind. “Explain.”

Justin wrapped his arm around Mitch. These two buggers were in on this together.

“What do you say? Wanna get hitched after milkshakes and eggs?” Mitch’s face was beaming.

“How can I say no to an offer like that?” Truth was, I couldn’t, nor did I want to.

“You can’t...I’m irresistible.” Yes. Yes, he was. So completely so that I still woke up each day wondering if it had all been a dream and I was back to being awkward and lonely old me.

“Why now?” I’d have said yes for so long and would have been fine waiting. I felt in my core that Mitch was mine one hundred percent. A marriage wouldn’t change that.

“I wanted you to meet my brother. I know that’s weird, but when you suggested we bring Calvin, I knew that was my hang-up. Leave it to you to know what I needed, even when I didn’t.”

“I’m not crying, you're crying.” Justin sniffled, and I wiped a tear from my cheek.

“You are the most amazing man.” And before I could continue, the waitress came with milk shakes and a desire for my order. Which was fine. The important things that needed saying were said.

Mitch was mine and I was his.

And later that afternoon, we professed the very same things in front of each other, a judge, my brother in law, and our son.

“I love you,” Mitch said before our first kiss as mated alpha and omega, husband and husband, forever and always.

And wasn’t that what it was all about. Love. And thanks to a silly beer contest, some major pheromones, and throwing caution to the wind, that was exactly what I had found.

Love.

There was nothing better than that.