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The show is too good to look away. Maybe I should go give Max some unsolicited advice, like he did me.
Eva looks our way and makes a slashing motion across her throat. Max's eyes flare and he grabs the woman’s face between his hands.
“Yep. I think you’re right because Max just kissed her.”
CHAPTERFIFTY-ONE
Lunch is a total riot. And I thought Vegas was chaotic. This is right up there. Everyone’s talking at us at once, asking a million questions about the wedding.
Not the fake wedding. The real wedding. And as I expected, the girls grumble about the fact that they didn’t get to attend. Which Kieran—Kenley—says, “Why don’t we have another here? People do that kind of thing all the time.”
All of us turn to look at Eva. The fading bruises on her from getting tackled at the wedding make me wince. But she’s full of vinegar like always.
She’s having none of planning another wedding, apparently. Her eyes are as violent as the shake of her head. She yells, “No. Just no. Don’t even look at me! I’m done.”
“But you did such a good job!” I joke.
Knocking her hands together like she’s ridding them of dirt, she says, “And now I’m on to another case.”
My husband raises a brow, “What kind of case?”
“The kind where Max Stone isn’t working,” Eva says crisply.
Max, with a patient, but determined expression, wraps his large hand around the back of Eva's neck and leans down to whisper something in her ear.
She blushes furiously. Or is she red from being angry? It’s the first time I haven’t been able to tell what the little dragon is thinking.
He chuckles and leans back in his seat, a smug grin on his face.
Ariel clears her throat. “Okay. Well, let’s talk about something else. How about what sights you saw in Vegas?”
We both snicker and look at each other with our eyes dancing. “Um... the pool.”
Because we pretty much didn’t leave our room for the entire week unless it was to catch some sun, catch our breath, and drink some fruity cocktails while we ate like royalty.
“Can we go play?” Finn, bored with the conversation, asks Nikki. She tells the kids they can all go.
When they tumble across the yard in an excited knot of chatter, I’m reminded of Shauna and Sheila. Both of their husbands were arrested in the raid. Things will be so different for them too. They’ll be free of their marriage shackles, free to start over again. It’s time for me to call them together, so we can talk about our future as a family even though we don’t share blood.
When I come back from my thoughts, all the adults are looking at me. Nikki asks, “How does it feel now knowing all those people are locked up?”
“So good,” I say with a long, happy sigh.
Kieran looks down at his hands for a beat, then says, “All of my life, I’ve wanted to take down this city’s trafficking rings. You may not know, but that’s how I lost my sister and parents. My little sister got caught up, and my parents were killed trying to get her back. I knew I had to do whatever it took to keep that from happening to other families.”
“Well, man, you did it.” Max holds out his glass toward Kieran. They clink glasses and drink, letting a comfortable silence settle between them. Then Kieran says, “It’s still hard to believe that my life is really mine now, that we’re free to do what we want.” He squeezes my shoulder, “Right, babe?”
With tightness in my throat, I say, “It’s still hard to believe. Really, all of it, from the agonizingly long engagement, to being whisked away to the cabin, to getting kidnapped, moving in here, then the whole staged wedding. Then the real wedding in a chapel called the Lucky in Love Wedding Shack.” I laugh and lean back in my seat as my husband tightens his hand around mine.
There’s so much more. But the rest of the memorable moments, both good and bad, I’ll keep closer to my chest.
Max says, “Speaking of the kidnapping, we found out why that happened. It really bugged me that the guy was Italian. Didn’t make much sense for this case, and if there’s one thing I can’t stand, it’s a puzzle that can’t be solved. Turns out, the last guy who was wanted by the Italian mob? They thought you were his girl. The way they figured was, since they didn’t get to kill him, they would grab the next best thing. You. As you already figured out, the guy was allergic to bees, and apparently, when he was carrying you through the woods, he got stung. Things didn’t work out so well for him, as you know.”
Eva’s glaring at Max like he’s totally at fault for all of it as I say, “Oh jeez! It was just a case of mistaken identity?”
Max continues, “Yes, unfortunately, safehouses aren’t always as safe as we’d like for them to be. Sometimes they have lingering ‘issues’ from past tenants.”
Eva huffs out her anger. “Totally preventable ifsomeonewould have provided enough protection. I didn’t come on the case until after that, but I would have handled it much differently.”
