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Elias nodded. “Right now.” He glanced up at me. “It’s perfect.”
They shared a look, and then Adrian drew him in for a tight hug. “Thanks, buddy.” I expected Adrian to stand, but he simply shifted so that he was kneeling on the floor in front of me.
“Adrian, what are you?—?”
“You’re the love of my life,” he cut me off. “You and Elias are the family that I never dared to dream about.” A lump formed in my throat. Is he doing what I think he’s doing? “Of course, this is the one day I don’t have the ring box with me.” He gestured to Elias. “But we’ve been waiting for the right time, and I’ve got to listen to my best man here.” He took my hand and rubbed his thumb over my ring finger. “As soon as we get home, I swear I’ll do this again, but for now, Nataliya Koza, will you marry me?”
I was nodding before he even got the question out. “Of course,” I breathed, tugging him off the floor and into my arms. Our lips met. “Of course, I will marry you.”
TWENTY-SEVEN
ADRIAN
Ten Months Later
“Hey, hey! Where did you get that lighter?” Zach shouted at his daughter, hurrying away from the grill after a giggling preteen girl waving a lighter and bottle rockets over her head. I laughed, watching him take off while I kept an eye on the hot dogs and hamburgers in front of me.
Our backyard was full of people laughing and yelling, and my chest was fit to burst. After getting Nataliya back from Ian Hayes, after everything we’d gone through, we’d promised to come together a few times a year to remember that we were a family, found as it was.
I wanted them with me on the 4th of July. It was my favorite holiday growing up, before my parents passed, and I hadn’t allowed myself to enjoy it in years. During my time in the SEALs, it was easy because we were mostly away on missions, but even the few times I’d been in the States, I had gone to ground and avoided the whole celebration.
This year, I wanted my family around me when the fireworks went off. “Do these look good?” I asked Drake as I poked at the hot dogs.
“Half of them look burnt.”
“Then they’re perfect,” Nate said and handed me a plate. “Pull them off.” I moved the hot dogs off the fire and put cheese on half of the burgers. “Dinner’s up!” Nate hollered, bringing everyone running for the picnic tables Nataliya and I had set up.
There were so many people gathered around. When Nataliya came to sit beside me, I smiled as she leaned into me, almost as if on instinct. “This is nice,” she said.
“Loud,” I pointed out.
“That’s all right,” she said with a shrug. “It’s been a quiet couple of months, after all.” She nudged my shoulder. “I wouldn’t want you to get bored.”
I snorted. “Being bored is not something I’m worried about,” I said.
Drake, who was across from me holding one of his sons while the toddler ate a hot dog that had been cut into pieces, laughed. “Seriously, Adrian?” he asked. “You’re not bored being stuck at a desk?”
Admittedly, I’d worried about boredom myself. But it felt right. I liked coming home at the end of the day to Nataliya and Elias. I liked all of us having dinner together and hearing about Elias’s day at school.
Being an analyst, too, was surprisingly fulfilling. I liked digging into the information and helping to put together a plan of action. Even as a SEAL, there was this underpinning of flying by the seat of my pants at all times, like no matter how trained I was, I always had to be ready for shit to hit the fan. Being an analyst made me feel solid, like I knew exactly what to expect.
I bit into my hamburger and chewed it, thoughtful. “I like it,” I said finally, deciding that the simple answer was enough.
“More than field work?” Nate pressed. He’d been the last of us to leave the SEALs, and he still struggled with it sometimes. He would never say it—he was more than happy to be settled down with Emily and Matty—but he was the youngest of us. He still had something of a wild streak.
I nodded. “Yeah, Shaw, more than field work.” I slung an arm over Nataliya’s shoulders. “I’m looking forward to spending time with a cute new coworker too.”
There were soft whoops all along the table, and Nataliya flushed with pride. “I haven’t even started my classes yet,” she said. “You’ll be waiting awhile.”
It took a small miracle to untangle the mess that Nataliya was in because of Ian Hayes. His trial had been relatively fast, and he’d been found guilty of treason. He wouldn’t see the outside of a maximum-security facility ever again. The men who conspired with him were also facing charges, but Nataliya and I both suspected that those trials would be far more drawn out.
But after he was arrested, Nataliya had to face Immigration since even though she’d come to the country legally, she’d been living in the US under a false identity. It took months of us leaping through the bureaucratic hoops to get immigration paperwork refiled, which allowed her to get proper identification and a residency permit.
By then, she’d met my boss, and once he’d seen what she could do on a computer, he’d encouraged her to enroll in FBI training. They were in desperate need of capable agents in the cybersecurity division. It wasn’t what Nataliya had imagined she’d be doing, but I could see how much she loved it.
She leaned her head against my shoulder for just a moment, and the conversation moved on around us. When the food was gone, everyone made their way back to the lawn to spread out blankets. We were going to set off some fireworks for the kids.
As everyone got settled, Nataliya helped me pass out beer to the adults. “Before we get started,” I said, “I wanted to raise a toast to Kyle Cuddy and Roger Gentry.” I raised my beer into the air before I took a sip of it, and the others followed suit. “Cuddy was everyone’s little brother. He just wanted to do his job well and be with his family. Roger was the other side of the coin: he was everyone’s big brother, always looking out for us.” Tears stung behind my eyes, but I blinked them away. I had been focused on getting justice for my fallen teammates for so long that I hadn’t let myself properly mourn. “I applied to get their names added to the memorial in DC for service members lost in action, and they approved it. Their parents are coming in for the dedication, and I’d like it if you guys could make it too.” There was a ripple of agreements, and that burning feeling was back again. I cleared my throat.
