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He gave me one of those winning Danny grins. “Yeah, I’m alright. Got a wicked new scar from it, too.” He undid a few shirt buttons and showed me the ragged mark where the bullet had entered. Then he rubbed his pec. “It’s just a bit stiff, sometimes.”
“You know what’d help with that?” asked JD, sauntering over.
“Don’t say yoga,” Danny told him firmly.
“Yoga.” JD was a convert. We did a session each morning and his back injury didn’t bother him anymore. He put an arm around me and pulled me close. “Changed my life.”
“I’m not wearing Lycra,” said Danny. “Or saying Ommm.”
“It’s not like that.” JD clapped him on the back and led him away.
Erin started the music playing. I checked on Cody, who was happily playing with Rufus, then wandered over to where the women were talking. When I’d first visited Mount Mercy a few months ago, I’d been nervous about meeting them. But they’d been nothing but warm and welcoming. It helped that we were all in the same situation. We might come from very different backgrounds but we’d all moved to this small Colorado town to be with our men. We hung out at each other’s houses, went for drinks in the town’s quirky, German-themed bar and supported each other when the team was away.
As we all started talking, I noticed something weird. Gabriel’s girlfriend, Olivia, the ER doctor who’d saved my life remotely when I was poisoned, was…not nervous, exactly, but definitely different. She was smiling, which was a little unusual in itself because she was always so serious. But it was more than that.
I started talking to Erin, who was full of plans for a trip to Texas. “Ever since you and JD visited, my mom’s been demanding to know when she’s going to meet my guy.” She looked across at Danny, who was talking with the other men. “I think Danny’s nervous about meeting my dad. We’re not sure how he’ll react to a Brit.”
“Jack was really nice to me,” I told her.
“Yeah, but JD’s his son. It’s different, with daughters. You should have seen what JD was like when he found out I was seeing Danny, and he’s just my brother. Texas guys can be a little over-protective.”
“Talking of trips,” said Emily, “That trip to New York got me thinking: we should go somewhere.” She looked around. “All of us. Just us girls.”
Everyone leaned forward, intrigued. I looked at Olivia again and narrowed my eyes. Everyone looked excited but Olivia looked like she was going to burst.
“I’m ready for a break,” said Bethany. “This year’s been pretty tough.” She was redoing her second year of med school. “Where are we talking?”
“Somewhere hot?” said Erin. “With a beach?”
“Are we inviting Gina?” I asked. I looked across to where Gina was talking to Cody, quizzing him on parts of a helicopter. For someone who claimed to hate children, she looked happy. Then she saw me looking and did her best to look grumpy.
“Of course!” said Emily. “It’ll be good to spend some time with her.” None of us knew Gina as well as we knew each other because she was usually away with the team.
“What if we got cheap flights to Europe and—” began Stacey
“Gabriel asked me to marry him,” blurted Olivia, then looked apologetically at Stacey.
We all swung around to stare at her. “What?” I asked all of us.
“Last night,” said Olivia. “He took me for a drive, up in the hills, and we got lost…or I thought we were lost. We walked into these woods and suddenly the trees all started lighting up…he’d put fairy lights everywhere, like the whole forest was made of light. And then he drops to one knee…” She put a hand to her chest, her eyes suddenly swimming, “and asked if I’d make an honest man of him. Or as honest as he can be.” And she held out her left hand. The ring was gorgeous, a delicate web of silver that held two oval sapphires and one large, round diamond in the center. We all oohed.
“It’s beautiful,” said Emily. “Looks old. Is it vintage?”
“It’s from the 1700s,” said Olivia. “A pirate gave it to his lover when he settled down and married her in London: there’s a whole story. It bounced around the world for years. Then a few years ago, some really unsavory drug trafficker in Colombia got hold of it. Gabriel, uh...liberated it to give to me. I think he sees himself in that pirate.”
“And what did you say?” demanded Stacey.
“Yes! Of course yes!”
We all hugged her at once, and that got the guys asking Gabriel what was going on. He blushed as he told them and then they were all punching him on the arm and slapping his back.
Stacey, always the planner, started asking Olivia about what sort of wedding she wanted. She seemed lighter and more relaxed, since we all got back from New York. She’d shared, over drinks one night, that Bradan was doing much better. He was sleeping soundly and seemed to have made his peace with his past. I saw him and Cal talking a lot, so maybe that had something to do with it. I looked around at the group of women and smiled. After never having many female friends growing up and then having my BFF turn on me, I’d suddenly found myself with a whole group of women I really liked.
