Page 86 of Secret Redemption

People who had come together as colleagues had become family; Dane and Lauren with their new babies, Nate and Skye with Noah, Daniel and Paige, Lucy and Sly, Celeste, Megan, Zin, Liam, and Drew.

Zin had caused quite the ruckus with his new-found strength but as was his way he waved it off and kept to the shadows. Even Colin had shown a marked improvement since his grandbabies had come home.

The day had gone off without a hitch, people had eaten and drunk the wonderful spread that Mimi, Helen, and Skye had cooked up, and the cake Skye had made was magnificent.

Now the dancing began. Zack took his wife's hand as they were called up onto the dance floor by Sly and Drew, who had appointed themselves as the DJ’s.

They had chosen the Barbara Streisand and Brian Adams duet, ‘I Finally Found Someone.’ It had seemed fitting and had struck a chord with them both. Pulling her close he looked into her radiant face and she took his breath away.

“Happy, Green Eyes?” he asked as they swayed to the music.

“Deliriously happy Zack,” she murmured. “It’s like a dream, and I never want it to end.”

“It won’t baby. What we have never ends, it just grows and even when we are old and grey, and one of us shuffles off this mortal coil it still won’t end. This love is infinite, and you ain't ever getting rid of me.”

“As if I would want to. It took me long enough to catch you.”

“Oh, you caught me, did you?”

“Oh yeah, I saw the handsome Brit with the sexy accent and tight buns and thought yep that’s the one for me.”

Zack threw back his head and laughed. “Tight buns hey!” As the song came to an end, he lowered his head and kissed his wife. It wasn't PG, and he didn’t care. She was his, and he would kiss her how he wanted. Her tongue met his, and his body came alight. Breaking the kiss, he deftly bent down and swept her over his shoulder and walked for the door.

“Zack, put me down, we have guests,” Ava demanded.

“Tough! I want ten minutes alone with my wife.”

“Ten minutes?” she said, as most of the men whooped and hollered.

“Fine, thirty minutes!” he said, and she giggled.

~~~

Watching the happy couple, he was glad he had put off his decision to tell Zack what he had seen. Roz was checking it out, and she had the perspective of distance that the Fortis team wouldn’t have. He would tell Zack his suspicions first thing Monday though. He wouldn’t keep something so momentous to himself for long.

Sitting at the bar nursing another vodka, Zin was afforded a bird’s eye view of Celeste as she was whirled around the floor by that prick Liam. Perhaps prick was unfair. He seemed like an okay guy, but right then, Zin was thinking of every torture method he knew and dreaming up a few more for the cockney.

Celeste had danced with every mother fucking man in the room and with each one, Zin felt his blood pressure rise. Maybe he could just kill them all or lock her away until he got this attraction to her under control.

Everything in him told him to go to her, that she was his, but he knew he couldn't. A barstool scraped beside him, and he barely noticed as Kanan sat down next to him and ordered whiskey. The man cast him a side eye, and he ignored him. He looked like he had his own problems.

“What a fucking pair we are,” Kanan slurred slightly. His eyes on the glass behind the bar. “She’s too good for you, you know,” Kanan stated coldly.

Zin remained silent. What could he say, he was right.

“You know your sister threatened to rip my balls off and shove them down my throat when I asked her to come as my date today,” he sneered.

“You're lucky she only threatened,” Zin said calmly. In truth, he was surprised Kanan had even managed to get her to answer her phone to him.

Kanan laughed at his reply, but it wasn’t filled with joy, but with a bitterness that he recognised. “Yeah, trust me to fall for a mean hellcat.”

Zin looked at the man then and wondered for the first time if perhaps the man opposite would be good for his sister. She had blamed herself for what had happened to him as a child, and cut herself from all emotion and yet he knew she loved him, and she showed her affection for her team, in her bizarre ways. “Korovka,” he said shortly.

“What?” Kanan asked with a frown.

“Korovka candy. It’s her favourite,” he said and stood up from the barstool, downing the last of the vodka from his glass.

He needed to get out of here before he did something they would all regret.