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But then there was a picture of a scope ring trained at my chest. Not only where my heart would be, but where Saylor’s head would be once it’d passed through my body.

Then there’s the same fucking dick in the picture, letting us know that they’re one and the same.

But the guy had fucked up.

At least, in my opinion.

He’d accidentally allowed a tattoo to slip into the photo. It was on his hand.

From what little I could tell about it, it was a skull of some sort.

“My mom would give her as long as she needed,” I found myself saying. “If you can convince her to stay.”

Adeline’s eyebrows shot up in surprise.

“You’re not going to fight this?” she asked. “I haven’t brought it up to Kettle. I wanted to say something in private in case I couldn’t convince you.”

I shook my head and brought my glove up just in time for Kettle to launch the ball straight at my chest.

It went a little wide and would’ve hit his wife had I not moved quickly enough.

“Hey!” Adeline cried.

Kettle’s smile was bright.

“Sorry, honey,” he lied.

He knew I’d catch it, though.

“I want to do what’s best for Saylor,” I admitted. “And, seeing as there are two off-duty police officers here right now, and we’re in the middle of nowhere, I think you may be right. This place is like Fort Knox.”

My place was nothing to sneeze at.

I lived in a pretty well-to-do neighborhood in Kilgore. My parents lived in a much nicer house in the country on about two hundred acres of land.

But there wasn’t any escalation of crime happening in Benton. There was in Kilgore.

And he’d already proven that he could get close to us without us noticing.

I wasn’t one to take chances with the woman’s life, either.

Reaching into my pocket where I could feel the velvet-lined bag, I handed it to Adeline.

She took it, opened the tiny drawstrings, and looked into it.

Then she gasped.

“Do you think she’ll like it?” I asked.

Adeline’s eyes shined.

“We’re going to get a beer, Kettle!” Adeline said, waving us off.

I took the glove off my hand and tucked it underneath my armpit, walking side by side with Adeline as she poured the ring out into the palm of her hand and looked at it.

“Wow,” she said, speechless. “I can’t…. This is just perfect. She’s going to freak out.”

“Kettle’s going to blow his top,” Loki surmised as he leaned over and got his own good look at the ring.

“I haven’t asked him yet,” I found myself saying. “Is he going to kill me?”

Trance started to laugh.

“I think that’s a father’s right.” Trance looked at the ring, too. “But when Oakley and Pace got together? I was happy for them. I didn’t realize that they were going to be each other’s forever. When I did realize it, and Pace asked? I kind of knew that he’d protect her. Love her. And I’d lose her to him.”

I frowned. “You didn’t lose Oakley.”

“Yes, I did,” Trance confirmed. “Which is what is supposed to happen.” He tilted his head toward Kettle and Saylor. “Those two have been thick as thieves since the day she came into the world. But we’ve always known that our time as number one was tentative. We knew that one day they’d meet someone and that their entire world would shift to encompass them. That we’d shift to second place…and that’s okay. Because as long as they’re happy, we’re happy. That’s all we ever want out of life, for our kids to be happy. Who are we to say who they can be happy with?”

Adeline walked over to Trance and hugged him hard.

“That was sweet, Trance,” she said softly.

“But, saying that,” Loki said as he joined in on the conversation. “He’s going to give you a hard time about it.”

I had no doubt in my mind.

***

Hours later, palms damp from nerves, I sat on the porch with Kettle and tried to psych myself up to tell him the words that I’d been planning since I’d purchased the ring with my mother earlier in the day.

“You’re making me have a headache, kid,” Kettle said. “Just spit it out already.”

I snorted.

“What makes you think I have something to say?” I wondered.

He gave me a dry look.

“You’ve been fingering a goddamn wedding ring for the last twenty minutes,” he said. “Don’t you think that I can put two and two together?”

I looked down at my shorts.

Saylor had told me that the material was a little thin.

I guess I was lucky he was noticing the ring in my pocket, and not my dick like she did.

“I had planned on going through this big spiel about why I was perfect for spending the rest of my life with her,” I said. “How I’d be there forever until the day that I took my last breath.”

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