At last they turned down their street.
Cars lined either side, and covered nearly every inch of the front yard—a front yard he’d never coaxed into growing grass. Well, always next year.
Rett’s Jeep, Jimmy’s car, Lisa’s, and a few others. Lucky stepped out of the SUV and breathed in the faint hint of approaching summer in the air, and meat cooking on the grill behind the house. Already he made out voices.
This time Lucky didn’t freak out at the cars parked in his driveway, or the crowd waiting inside. This time, they weren’t there for him.
Cake eaten, Walter celebrated, now came the calm after the storm.
Lucky sat wrapped in Charlotte’s latest attempt at a crocheted blanket, Jenny a warm lump against his chest. He hadn’t been shot at in months, though mixed martial arts exercises with Jimmy’s brother left him a bit sore. Also, Vivienne needed to find someone else to practice on while instructing her new protégé, who’d recently joined undercover ops.
Bo sat in the next Adirondack chair, snuggling a sleeping Andro. Charlotte and Ty’s chairs sat empty—for now. Soon, they’d need to add two little chairs.
Keep this up and they’d need a bigger deck.
Moose snuffled lightly from his position between their two chairs where he’d squeezed his bulk. In the dim light Lucky couldn’t make out the shorter hair around his knife injury. Cat Lucky lay sprawled on the railing, for once not giving the neighbor’s beagle the evil eye through the fence.
Lucky reached out and laced his fingers with Bo’s, the warmth of his lover’s—soon to be his husband’s—hand a comfort.
A thousand stars lit up the night sky, and a few critters chirped and cheeped out in the grass he’d need to cut soon. Maybe he could convince some of it to migrate to the barren front yard.
He’d gone from loner to family man. The kids would grow up surrounded by love.
No one loved them more than the die-hard sonofabitch who’d terrorized the SNB for so long.
“What’s going to happen at Southwestern, you reckon?” he asked.
Bo squeezed Lucky’s fingers. “I’m not sure yet. I see a lot of meetings in my future while we figure things out. The internal affairs committee is cleaning house. Diaz would be facing some serious charges if he was still around.”
Another bastard who’d never meet Lady Justice’s wrath. He’d never woken up after being hit by a car, and Garrison remained missing. Every day it seemed someone else went to jail, all because of greed. Sometimes having job security sucked.
They sat in silence for a few moments more.
“Do you want a big wedding or a small, intimate one?” Bo asked.
Lucky didn’t need a wedding at all. Give him a marriage license and two “I dos”, and he’d be happy as a pig in mud. “I dunno. What you got in mind?”
“Well, first there’s premarital counseling with a priest, then maybe that fancy Catholic church up town. What do you think about Catechism classes?”
“What?”
“Learning to be good little Catholics.”
Was that required? He’d do it for Bo, but…
Bo chuckled. “I’m kidding. Though I figured giving you an extreme scenario would get you to make better suggestions.”
Lucky rolled ideas around in his head. “Charlotte and Rett are already talking about flowers, tuxes, and caterers.” Which made Lucky run screaming from the room.
“Not their wedding. This will be whatever you want. Whateverwewant.”
Still, would Bo’s family, or Lucky’s, ever let them hear the end of it if they snuck off? So tempting to do the deed and not tell anyone.
Charlotte beamed while talking wedding details. If Lucky didn’t let her plan his, would she start planning her own?
Way too soon. She’d not even been dating Jimmy a year yet, had she? She’d just had a baby. Besides, she wouldn’t let anything derail her plans of finally, finally, becoming a nurse.
“Neither one of us are churchgoing types.” Though they’d at least christened Andro in the Catholic faith, at his mother’s request. Would a church even let Lucky in the door? Other than the christening, he’d not been to a building with a cross on top since his brother’s funeral—reason enough not to choose one to marry in.
