AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Liam ended the argument about whose gift to open first by closing his eyes and reaching out his hand to take one. Seriously, sometimes my team acted like kindergarteners. There seemed to be something of a theme. Andrea got him a soft throw with the Army emblem. Dante got him a Navy SEAL hoodie. Pete got him a US Navy fleece.
Liam was smiling from ear to ear. “Why do you all think I’m cold all the time?”
“Because you’re soft and squishy,” Gabe said with a chuckle. He took the box with his gift out of his pocket. “This won’t keep you warm, but I wanted to get it for you because you saved my life.”
Liam opened it and immediately teared up. He ran his finger over the black caduceus. “Oh wow. That’s really nice.” He went over to Gabe and hugged him. “Thank you.”
Gabe squeezed him back. “Thank you for being an awesome nurse.”
My inner caveman was freaking the fuck out. I took a breath to calm myself. I pulled the envelope from behind my back and handed it to Liam. He opened it and pulled out the card with a picture of the Milky Way on the front. He read the inside aloud. “This card is good for one night of stargazing on my brother’s boat. Happy Birthday. Marco.”
“Oh, Marco,” he breathed. He blinked away tears. “This means a lot to me. Thank you so much.”
I stood and pulled him into a hug. I only barely resisted kissing the top of his head. “You’re welcome. And we can go as early as this Tuesday if you want. It’s the new moon and the spring equinox on the same day.”
He leaned back and smiled up at me. “It sounds like you did your research.”
“I wanted it to be special for you. To thank you for taking care of me. Of all of us.”
He stretched up and kissed me on the cheek. “Thank you. And I would love to go out on Tuesday night.”
He rested his cheek against my chest, and I wrapped my arms around him tighter. I looked up and saw each of my teammates staring at me, and none of them looked happy. Fuck.
28
Liam
Marco insisted on picking me up for our stargazing trip. We had dinner at the restaurant on the Belmar marina and then he took me to his brother’s “boat.” Why is boat in quotation marks? Because it was ayacht. A freaking yacht. I stared at it for a few minutes after Marco pointed it out. “Your brother has a yacht.”
“Yes,” he replied, elongating the word. “Is that a problem?”
“No, of course not. It’s just that you called it a boat, and I was thinking one of those little things the fishermen take out.”
Marco snorted and shook his head. “Nah. Santino’s a big-time lawyer. You won’t catch him on some dinky fishing boat.”
“Okay then,” I said. “I guess I’m going on a yacht.”
Marco put his arm around my shoulders. “Trust me, you’ll be much warmer and way more comfortable on Tino’s yacht.”
I had to admit, I was happy about that. Although it was technically the first full day of spring, it was a bracing forty-five degrees, and it would feel colder once we were out on the water. As we walked up the dock, I noticed there weren’t a lot of other boats in the water. “Is it too early in the season for boating?”
“Technically yes,” Marco answered. “But money gets you a lot of things, and Tino has a lot of it.”
“Alrighty then.” A thought occurred to me. “Wait, did he put his boat in the water early so you could take me out tonight?”
“Yeah. He did it because I asked him to. That’s what family does.”
I didn’t have much to say about that because I was sure Sean would do the same if he had a boat. Only he would probably ask ten thousand questions first. When we got to the slip where the yacht was tied, I snickered when I saw the name: Not Guilty. “Nice name,” I said.
Marco chuckled. “Yeah. He bought this boat after he won a big defense case. Someone framed his client for murder, and his team dug up the evidence that the police ignored because they thought they had an open-and-shut case. The family went on to sue the city and won a hefty settlement, which he got thirty percent of.”
“Nice.”
Marco stopped by the back of the boat up against the dock and said, “Let me get on first and then I’ll help you aboard.” He stepped onto the yacht with the ease of many years of practice. Then he turned and held out his hand for me. “Just go slow and make sure your first foot is steady before you bring the other one on.”
Once we were on the boat, Marco untied it from the dock while I stayed out of the way. He was quick and efficient, and we were soon underway. We cleared the marina and got into the river that led to the ocean, and Marco picked up speed. He was certainly right about the yacht being way more comfortable than a small fishing boat.
I sat on the bridge with Marco as he navigated through the travel lanes of the inlet and out into the ocean. He told me about the different light configurations on the different vessels and what they meant. Thankfully, there weren’t many boats on the water since it was still cold. He did ask me to be a second set of eyes to look for the unexpected.
