Jagger took the other side.
Keely got right down to it, flipping back to the front.
“Okay, this one, I can’t believe it, who remembered this?Ithad to be Millie.Maybe Rush got it from Naomi, which makes this is theonlything I’d ever thank that woman for, but this is us at the first Chaos hogroast I attended.I met your dad that night.”
On her words, Dutch zeroed in on the first picture in thatscrapbook that was just a photo of the two of them standing together.His dadwas smiling down at his mom, but in hearing what she said, he could see theflirty way she was standing, and the relaxed, confident line of his father’sframe.
“I played hard-to-get for, oh, I don’t know, all of abouttwo seconds,” she went on.
Dutch tore his eyes from the photo and looked across atJagger to see Jagger already looking at him.
What he was feeling was in his brother’s eyes.
They had something precious now, in that room, in thathouse…
And in a scrapbook.
Jag dipped his chin.
Dutch did the same.
“God, you look so much like him, honey.Every time I see it,I think it’s so cool,” Georgie breathed.
It was.
So cool.
His hold on her tightened.
Then he looked again at the book and Dutch settled back,leaning into Hound.
His woman settled, leaning into him.
And his mother kept talking.
He looked and listened.
When Hound came to them,reallycame to them, andmade them a whole family again, Christmases got good again.
It wasn’t that his mom didn’t give good holiday, she did.
It was just that Hound made it a whole lot better.
When they got Wilder, especially when he got old enough toget into it, it got off-the-charts better.
But that Christmas…
Right there…
Before the actual day even got there…
It was the best Dutch could remember.
“Murtagh, don’t eat that ribbon,” Georgie ordered.
“Mwrr.”
“Murtagh, don’t make me come over there,” Georgie snapped.
