xVerity: Children, behave.
LoveHarley: lol!
TeenDad2: Knot, eww, gross
KnotMyProblem: I’m just saying, when he does walk through that door, I guarantee the marriage will have been consummated
TeenDad2: I need to burn my eyes out, brb
LoveHarley: Well, come back soon TD because we need you at the door pronto! I think the limo is arriving!
TeenDad2: omg RUN GUYS RUN
KnotMyProblem: I’ll bring the hot irons, TD
TeenDad2: omg
LoveHarley: xV, you still with us? We need you here, too! We can’t take our first ever Single Dad group photo without you here!
xVerity: I’m on my way.
Vincent turned off the screen of his phone and tucked the device into his pocket. There was a small wicker bin by the side of the sink that he tossed his used hand towel into, then out the door he went. Gwynning was about to arrive, and he needed to be there for the big moment.
The fun was about to begin.
* * *
Noneother than LoveHarley waited by the front doors of the banquet hall, his hands tucked casually in the back pockets of his suit, his broad shoulders relaxed and proud. Short blond hair crowned his head, kissed pale by the Californian sun. The scruff along his bold jaw was a few shades darker, showing off impressive bone structure. Harley wasn’t a giant, but his build was intimidating—muscular in a sleek, powerful way—and there was an undercurrent to his presence, a no-nonsense alertness, that reinforced the idea that Harley wasn’t someone to be messed with.
But as Vincent approached and Harley turned his head to acknowledge his presence, what Vincent had believed was hostility melted away. On Harley’s face was the sunniest smile Vincent had ever seen. Vincent’s trepidation vanished. Harley’s smile overshadowed his other physical features, and Vincent found himself at ease as he approached. Vincent hadn’t managed to track Harley down before the ceremony began, but there was no doubt in his mind that was who he was looking at. The sunshiny quality of his online persona matched his smile.
“xV?” Harley asked good-naturedly as Vincent approached. His sunny smile grew, impossibly, even more dazzling—he was genuinely excited to match a face to a name. “That’s you, right?”
“It’s me,” Vincent confirmed, returning his smile. When he came close enough, Harley clapped him on the shoulder, grinning from ear to ear. A row of pearl-white teeth, orthodontically aligned, brightened his expression. “It’s so weird to see you in person. I thought you’d look…”
“Older?” Vincent asked flatly, one eyebrow raised.
Harley laughed. “Yeah. Maybe. I mean, you’re no TD, but I thought you’d be forty or something.”
“I’m thirty-five, if it makes you feel any better.” Vincent quirked one side of his lips, smirking. “It’s all in the genes.”
“Well, fuck! At least one of us has discovered the whole fountain of youth thing.” When Harley smiled, fine lines deepened around his eyes. Sun damage, Vincent guessed, rather than a sign of his age. He didn’t think Harley could be much older than forty. “Speaking of TD…”
“Guys!”
Vincent looked over his shoulder. TeenDad2, who was barely more than a teen and looked it, bounded toward the door and skidded to a stop. He braced his hands on his knees and took a second to regain his breath, then looked up at them with earnest blue eyes. In his haste, golden-brown hair had fallen out of place and across his forehead. He brushed it back with a hand before he spoke. “I haven’t missed it, have I?”
Vincent gestured at the closed doors of the banquet hall. “Nothing’s happened. You’re in the clear.”
“Great!” TeenDad2—TD for short—stood up straight and plucked at his suit jacket. It had been clinging a little too closely to his barely there baby bump. “If I missed this, I would die.”
“Fantastic! Then you’ll be standing closest to the door, TD, so you can get the best view,” a new voice decreed, joining their conversation. It had a sly, mischievous quality to it that Vincent automatically associated with one man, and one man alone—KnotMyProblem. The snark in everything Knot typed matched the ever-playful tone of his voice, but to Vincent, the similarities stopped there. Vincent wasn’t sure what he’d been expecting Knot to look like, but the man who approached the group wasn’t it.
Every step Knot took, he owned. The click of his shoes announced his presence like trumpeters, and with his shoulders back and his hands slipped into the back pockets of his slacks, he looked every bit as regal as he projected himself to be. His body was graceful but muscled. By no means was he as broad as Harley, but he wore his alpha status on his sleeve. Knot was not a man to be meddled with.
Powerful pride lifted his chin. Posture proper, suit seemingly sewn to his body from its exquisite fit, he exuded confidence and superiority. There was a sharklike look in his gray eyes, made docile by humor. If Vincent had seen him without prior knowledge of his personality, he would have assumed that Knot was from stuffy old money—the kind of man whose identity was tied to the number of zeroes in his bank account, and whose fixation on material gain drained him of his humanity. Knowing Knot like he did, Vincent knew that wasn’t true at all.
“I’m going to stand at the far end of the group photo,” Knot declared as he joined them. “As far away from your plague-scheme as possible.”
