Total pages in book: 39
Estimated words: 37793 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 189(@200wpm)___ 151(@250wpm)___ 126(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 37793 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 189(@200wpm)___ 151(@250wpm)___ 126(@300wpm)
“Yes, I do. And I’ve seen the band you picked for me, and that is much bigger than the one I chose for you.”
“No. You picked diamonds for mine and then told me you would not be wearing any.”
He made a face. “It’s not me. The plain one you picked is perfect, though again, quite wide. I think it could have been thinner, unless you, like me, are sending a message.”
I was. He wasn’t wrong. “I want people to see it. I don’t want anyone to miss the ring. I mean, isn’t that the point?”
“Yes, love,” he murmured. “That is the point.”
I stared at him, and he stared back.
“I should get up and—”
“No, I’m getting a washcloth. Just stay there.”
“You now have dried cum on your gorgeous abs,” he said, pointing at me. “We need to get cleaned up and out of here.”
“We will,” I told him. “It’s not like they can start without us.”
“No,” he said, getting to his hands and knees. “So come take care of me.”
I felt the roll of arousal go through me.
“I am a bit tired,” he teased, putting his head down, leaving his ass in the air.
“What you’re doing—that’s not helping anything.”
“Well, I should hope not,” he said, chuckling. “Promise me it will always be like this, that we’ll never take ourselves too seriously and that we’ll want to constantly tear each other’s clothes off.”
“I promise,” I said, turning on the warm water.
“I’ll come over there.”
“No, stay where you are. I want to kiss you a little in the bed.”
“Oh.” He sighed. “Yes. Please. Come kiss me.”
So I did.
“You know,” Ian said thirty minutes later as I paced at the end of the bed he was reclining on. “I have something to say.”
I turned to look at him as I walked back and forth, and it struck me, as it did whenever I saw him, that for an average-looking guy, he had somehow landed a really handsome husband.
“You’re doing that thing again where you try to figure out why Miro married me, aren’t you?”
I nodded.
“You’re a dick, you know that?”
All I could do was shrug. “Say what you wanna say.”
“Fine. You never come to play poker at my house or eat or anything, and I’m sick of it.”
Not at all what I was expecting.
“I invite you, and you never show up.”
“But you always said you liked keeping your military life separate from your marshal life, and what was the rest of it?” I goaded him.
“Yeah, fine, okay. Normally, I am not a fan of mixing friends, because inevitably, something goes wrong, and then it’s awkward and you’ve got people in your life who hate each other.”
“There you go.”
“I’m making an exception with you.”
“Why?”
“Because you know my boss. You protect his daughter and also know his son. I am also acquainted with them. You know Harris, I know Harris. I know Colonel Colter, and so do you... I mean, in the Venn diagram of life, we’re fuckin’ connected more than others, and fuck all, George, I’m standing up at your goddamn wedding.”
“All valid points.”
“Plus, you know Miro.”
“Not well.”
“Yeah, and we should fix that.”
I stopped pacing. “You’re being serious?”
“Yes, I’m serious,” he snapped at me. “Come to fuckin’ poker night.”
“You’re sure?”
The bored look I got made me smile.
“Fine. I’ll show up.”
“And bring Kurt.”
“I dunno.”
“What?”
“Kurt’s a psychiatrist. He can read people. Maybe that’s not a great idea.”
He shook his head. “Fuck off. He ain’t reading nothing.”
I laughed at him. “Okay.”
“Yes?” he pushed, because Ian Doyle always pushed.
“Yes. We’ll be there.”
“Good.”
I started pacing again.
“Why are you doing that?” he asked, gesturing at me as he stood up, walking over to the table to put on his watch and his suit jacket.
“I’m nervous.”
“No, I get that. I just don’t understand the reason.”
“I don’t want to screw up.”
“Screw up what?”
“I dunno. Vows, whatever.”
He shook his head. “You can’t mess anything up.”
“This is why you got married at city hall, isn’t it? You didn’t want to have to stand up in front of people.”
“No. I wouldn’t have minded a wedding like this, but it was never the right time, and I started to worry that if we kept pushing it back, it might not happen at all. Turned out, Miro was thinking the same thing.”
I nodded.
“But you lucked out with this place. It’s beautiful here, and I love the quiet.”
So did I.
The Fox’s Glove, the charming, beatific establishment Dante Cerreto owned, was in the small town of Venice, Maine. To get there, we had all flown in the day before to the International Airport in Bangor, then driven from there to the B&B, situated on the edge of the Bigelow Preserve, between Bangor and Eustis. When Chris suggested it to me in September, I wasn’t sure about a destination wedding. That didn’t seem at all in keeping with the small, intimate celebration we were planning. But since I said I would consider it, I was on my laptop, checking it out, when Kurt walked by and stopped suddenly, seemingly rooted to the spot. When I glanced at him, I did a double take at how awestruck he appeared.