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“Oh, my dear boy, I’ve waited so long to meet you.” She pulls away and wipes her eyes, looking so much like her daughter as she does. I laugh when she reaches up to thumb a stray tear from my cheek that I hadn’t even noticed escape. “Come now,” she says, grabbing my hand. “Let me introduce you to your family.”
The day is spent in chaos, not a moment of silence is allowed as the twenty odd people coming and going from the house love, laugh, and fight constantly. Ruby O’Reilly joined us later; she is not my cousin, but she is everyone else’s and I note how they all love her. She gives me a tight but polite hello and then a wide berth for the rest of the evening.
I’m surprised when Elle and one of Brent’s brothers-in-law get up to sing and dance to an old ‘NSync song. Neither of them make it through without laughing and the family heckling them—mostly him—the whole way through. My girl is at home here, her smile and laughter make my heart burst with joy.
My youngest cousin, Jules, must note my nerves and sits with me for most of the evening. Pulling me into private conversations about everything from books and movies to travel and hobbies, so I don’t have to keep up with the multiple conversation being thrown around the room. I decide right away that besides Brent, she’s my favourite. I know I should admit that, but I can’t help it. Her long red hair is the exact shade of Brent’s, and her almond eyes are all mine; she’s beautiful and sweet and I feel an overwhelming need to protect her in a brotherly fashion.
I go to change straight away and come back to the kitchen to find Hayden and Brent sat opposite each other at the table. Elle is perched on Hayden’s lap while the two boys try to teach her how to play a card game. By the banter that’s being bounced between them, I’m guessing she’s not picking it up. or not bothering to try.
I pat the pocket of my sweats, checking once again that the box is there and nervously join them.
“We need to talk,” I say, bringing their attention away from the game. Staring at me expectantly, I try to think of the best way to phrase it, but I just blurt it out. “I think we should get married.”
Silence.
I clear my throat and push forward. “I mean, uh, it makes sense for us to get married…”
“You want to marry me?” Elle asks, her surprise endears me.
I smile gently as I come to sit at the head of the table between Brent and Hayden and reach to grab her hand. “Of course I want to marry you, sweetheart. But…” Deep breath. “I actually think you should marry Brent, and Hayden and I will get married.”
Stunned silence. This isn’t going well.
“I mean…when Sydney died, all of his assets were passed to me and as all of Keith’s holdings were technically Dao property, they’ve been transferred to Brent. If anything was to happen to us, I’d want you two to be taken care of, so I think this would be the next logical step.”
I look at the wooden table in front of me and my clasped hands resting on it, my knuckles are white and there is a water ring staining the wood that I haven’t noticed before.
Elle throws her head back and laughs, bringing my eyes to land on her. “So, this is strictly financial?”
“No, yes…no, that’s not what I mean.”Shit.I scrub my hand over my face, catching the day-old stubble on my palm. “We can do the ceremony however you like, big, small, white, black, whatever, it doesn’t matter to me. We can ceremonially all marry each other or the three of us can all marry you, and Hayden and I will say our vows. It’s just, legally there can only be two people in a marriage so that’s why you should marry Brent and I’ll marry Hayden.”
Brent starts to nod slowly, seemingly thinking the whole thing over. “How about it, princess, want to get hitched?”
Once again Elle laughs, “I don’t know about you, babe, but that wasn’t the proposal I was expecting.” She turns to Hayden but he’s just staring at me, eyes wide and mouth gaping. Elle clambers off his lap and holds her hand out to Brent. “Come on big guy, let’s go talk about this somewhere else.”
They leave us alone and Hayden continues to stare at me. I wait for him to compose himself for a couple of minutes before my nerves get the better of me. “Will you say something?”
He doesn’t do so for another few seconds. “I…I…you, I mean, you…”
“Spit it out,” I snap, felling like the rejection is coming to slap me in the face.
“This is a bad idea,” he shakes his head.
There it is. Even though I was half expecting it, the sharp pang in my chest still hurts like a motherfucker.
“Lance, I love you and I am so fucking happy that you’ve told everyone about us, but there are still a lot of arseholes out there who are not happy about this.” He gestures between us. “If you marry me, you’re just adding fuel to the fire.”
I clench my jaw and stare at that damn water mark again.
“If it’s just about looking after us, you should marry Elle and Brent and I can legally get married. It doesn’t make any difference, right? Nothing changes between the four of us either way.”
I snap my gaze to him, anger dripping from my words as I slide my hand into his hair at the back of his neck and pull him to me. “Because I don’t wantBrentto marry you,Iwant to marry you.”
I crash my lips into him, taking by force the love I need right now. Kissing with frenzy and desperation, I let him feel how much I want this. How much Ineedthis. We break away panting and needy, he rests his forehead to mine, taking a moment to catch his breath and closing his eyes as if in pain.
“I want that too, Lance. I really do.” Hope blooms in my chest but I know the other shoe is about to drop. “But…” Pain. So much pain from one little word. “I don’t think you’ve thought this through. Give it some time, a month or so, and tell me if you still feel the same.”
I release him and lean back in my chair to reach into my pocket and place the small leather box on the table in front of him. He looks at it like it might bite, swallowing hard before he speaks again.
