Page 66 of Saving Meadow

“I don’t know, they told me to walk down here and they’d be up in a minute,” Jack answered, helping himself to Nick’s TV.

Nick and Meadow stood off to the side and smiled. Controlled chaos, that was what Reagan had called it when the large group got together. It was perfect. Nick wouldn’t want it any other way. This was how Nick had grown up – surrounded with love and laughter.

“Where’s Jason and Kayla?” Meadow asked Emily about Nick’s cousin and his fiancée.

“They’ll be here soon. Jason forgot something at his house; they went to get it,” Emily explained.

It took a while, but Nick had ushered everyone into the backyard where he and Meadow had set up tables for the food and coolers for the drinks. It was a beautiful day; the sun was shining, Sally was in dog heaven having six kids under the age of fifteen to chase around.

Meadow looked around the backyard and smiled.

Perfect.

She loved their family. They were loud, they were hilarious, and they loved unconditionally. Nolan and Reagan tried to slip in unnoticed and sat at a table off to the side as if they weren’t thirty minutes late.

Nick, Lenox, Jasper, and Levi glanced over at the couple and busted out laughing. Meadow wasn’t sure what was so funny until she looked at Reagan. There was no doubt what the two of them had been doing with their time alone in their house.

Reagan’s flushed cheeks turned a deep shade of pink, and she smiled wide. “What? Can you blame me?”

Meadow couldn’t stop herself; she too joined the men laughing. “Not one damn bit.”

Nick tagged her around the waist and pulled her closer to him. “Really, Red?”

“What? There’s something about the Clark men that inspires…”

“Don’t finish that sentence.” Nick laughed, and Meadow winked at Reagan.

“Damn, I knew she’d fit right in.” Lenox smiled.

Meadow had fit right in. The moment they’d met her, she was accepted into the tribe and made one of them. She felt it four years ago, and she felt it now – there was no other place she’d rather be.

Ethan Lenox needed to talk to his parents. He’d been putting it off for the last week, and now the rock that had started in his stomach had turned into a boulder. He knew his parents loved him, but they were going to be so disappointed in him.

He’d fucked up, and he knew it.

He was sixteen-years-old, too young.

But he’d made up his mind.

“Mom. Dad. Can I talk to you a minute?”

Now was as good a time as any Ethan thought; better to just rip the scab off and bleed.

“What’s wrong?” his mother asked.

“Fuck,” his father muttered. Ethan was unable to hide his discomfort from his father. It wasn’t often Ethan screwed up. He was a straight-A student and excelled at sports. His parents had instilled great respect in him; his coaches and teachers loved him. So did the cheerleaders, and that was where his current problem started. “As long as no one’s knocked up, we can fix anything.”

“Lenox.” His mother slapped his father’s shoulder.

Ethan tried to keep his face blank and stop his flinch, but it was too late. His father saw it.

“Shit,” Lenox muttered.

The time had come for Ethan Lenox to become a man, years before he should’ve.

Ethan is up next in Chasing Honor