Page 107 of Honorable Sins

It won't stay uncomplicated forever.

I don't know when that will change or which one of them will realize it first. I only know Mick and Wraith are both going to be impossible when it does.

A small body collides with my back.

"Sorry, Aunt Kara!" Joy calls without slowing.

She races after Cormac and Mavie, all three of them shrieking as they weave through the blankets spread across the first level of the lawn. Cormac has someone's abandoned badminton racket. Mavie is carrying one of the giant yard-pong balls pressed against her stomach with both arms, and Joy appears to be chasing them for the sheer pleasure of the chase.

They remind me of Fitz and Enoch at their first Labor Day picnic together, tearing across this same lawn with no understanding of how much their lives had changed.

Or maybe children understand change better than adults do. They accept joy when it is offered without demanding a guarantee that it will last.

"You're going to run into someone," Neeve calls from beneath the shade canopy.

Joy looks over her shoulder. "No, I'm not."

She immediately clips the corner of a picnic blanket and windmills both arms to keep from falling.

Neeve pushes her glasses higher on her nose and goes back to her book without comment.

Beside her, Sorcha is arranging a collection of animal figurines into two precise rows. Conor's two-year-old daughter sits cross-legged nearby, watching with grave concentration as Sorcha considers a small plastic fox.

"You can have this one," Sorcha tells her.

The toddler accepts it solemnly and puts it beside a spotted dog. Sorcha moves the fox so it stands directly in front of the dog, then gives the little girl another figurine to distract her from the correction.

I bite back a smile.

Mick's hand settles on my ankle. He's stretched out beside me on our picnic blanket, one knee bent and his bare feet in the grass. He has been talking to Miceli for the last few minutes, but some part of him remains aware of me no matter where his attention appears to be.

Things have been different since Christmas in July when I gave him the gift of total trust and he returned it by doing exactly what I wanted. There's a peace about him that wasn't there before.

He's settled deep in his soul as mamo would say.

And I am the reason because I am his reason.

Miceli glances toward the bay, where one of his men stands at the end of the dock watching Fitz and Sadie swim. He has men stationed at every access point to the property, along the beach and on two boats sitting far enough offshore not to interfere with the children.

Our security has always been extensive at the Labor Day picnic. This year, it could repel a small country size invasion.

Róise lowers herself onto the blanket beside me and bumps my shoulder. "He almost didn't come."

Well, I know they didn't bring their baby boy, who is staying with his grandmother, Aria, under even tighter security than here. So, she must be talking about Miceli.

"But he wasn't going to let you come without him and you were bound and determined to be here for me and Fiona."

Róise grins. "Got it in one."

Miceli's head turns in our direction. Róise smiles sweetly at him. He narrows his eyes.

Smart man.

I have no idea what my cousin has planned, but there's a look in her eye that says Miceli will both love and be appalled by it.

Miceli's attention ostensibly returns to my husband, his posture relaxed by anyone else's standards. I know enough made men to recognize how much attention he is paying to every movement around us though.

Just like Mick.