“Miles!” Nate shouts, calling my brother over.
“Yeah?” he asks, giving me a brotherly punch in the side as he joins us.
“What’s going on with this guy?” Nate asks, gesturing to me.
“You mean other than him being his usual juvenile self?” my brother says with a grin.
“Fuck off,” I say, clipping the back of his head.
“No, I mean with him being all cagey and shit,” Nate says, waving his beer around. “Something to do with this place, maybe?”
Miles turns to me, a questioning look on his face that makes me laugh. “Well?” he prompts.
I let out an exaggerated sigh as I take a sip of my beer, kind of loving fucking with these two. I know they all enjoyed saying, “I told you so,” when I finally admitted that I was dating Quinn and in a real relationship with her.
I’m pretty sure we’re going to blow their minds when we tell them what else we have going on.
I turn, scanning the yard for my girl. She’s with Lacey and Jonah, no doubt trying to work out if they’re together or somehow convince them they should be. She looks so fucking happy and relaxed, and once again, I can’t believe that she’s all mine.
“Babe!” I yell.
Quinn turns, a smile on her face. “Yeah?”
I wave my beer around. “Boys are getting antsy. Should we break the news?” I ask, laughing at the look on my brother’s face.
Quinn nods, and I watch as she takes a deep breath before saying, “Kai and I bought this place. We’re moving in together.”
There’s a collective squeal from the girls as they all wrap their arms around Quinn in a group hug, only Lacey hanging back as she signs everything that’s happening to Jonah. I watch as he looks over at me, a shit-eating grin on his face.
I flip him off, knowing this is not even the part that’s really going to blow their minds. “One more thing,” I say, as Quinn laughs, shaking her head at me.
“Oh my god, you’re pregnant!” Alana screams.
Chuckling, I take a sip of my beer as I say, “Not yet, but we are trying.”
The collective squealing from all the girls has me smiling like an idiot. I really didn’t expect this reaction. If anything, I thought they’d all think we’re crazy.
Honestly, it is crazy. We’ve only known each other for a few months, but I’ve never been more sure of anything in my life.
All it takes is spending five years of your life with an abusive asshole to be able to recognize when things are right. With Kai, there has never been a single red flag, not one moment when my trust in him wavered, or one person I’ve encountered who didn’t speak highly of him.
He never hid his past or blamed women for his fuckboy tendencies. If anything, he owns everything that’s made him who he is, and that brutal honesty is refreshing and comforting.
The girls are all hugging me, the guys are slapping Kai on the back, hitting him with high-fives and smiles. This feels like a family.
It is a family.
It’s the kind of family I’ve longed for, the kind I thought I would have found in Sean, but I couldn’t have been more wrong. I guess it appeared when I stopped seeking it out, when I stopped looking for it, and stopped desperately begging for it to happen.
“Oh my god, now I kinda want to have a baby too,” Daisy shrieks, bouncing up and down as she looks over at Miles.
The two of them are literally happiness personified—always smiling at each other, touching and laughing. It’s hard to believe they were ever apart.
Miles rolls his eyes, letting out a laugh. “I’ll get you a dog, babe,” he tells her, but she shakes her head. “I know it’s not the same thing, but let’s get this bakery running for a year or so and let the tour play out.”
“Why do you always have to be so logical?” she quips, hands on hips, narrowing her eyes at him. “How’d I end up with the rational Olsen brother?”
“Because I’m the better brother,” Miles jokes, and Kai hits him with a soft punch to the shoulder. “What? It’s true. You were always the firstborn, crazy one. The one Mom and Dad were worried would never settle down. That you’d be living in their house forever.”
