All eyes went to the parents’ table to see Gary standing, holding up his Champagne glass.

When conversation died, his eyes to Vi and Cal, he started speaking. “I apologize. I have something to say, but I’ve had concerns if I should say it. In the end, I felt it needed to be said. I talked with Bea and we decided it was more appropriate tonight, in close company, than tomorrow.”

He drew in a deep breath and his voice got softer, but it still carried when he went on.

And now his eyes were just on Vi.

“My beautiful flower,” he started, and I didn’t even know what he was going to say, but the way he started made me deep breathe in an effort not to start crying. “This day was a day I never thought would come to pass. This day was a day I never would wish to come to pass. But here we are, witnessing you closing one book and opening another that’s empty. A book you get the privilege of writing, the story of the life you’re about to start making. Bea and I know, to the depths of our souls, just like the extraordinary story you crafted the first time so magnificently” —he tipped his head toward Kate and Keira— “this one will be no different.”

“Holy crap,” I whispered, and Ben’s hand went from dangling off the side of my seat to wrap around my arm.

Gary’s eyes went to Cal.

“This day is a day I never would wish to come to pass. But you must know, Bea and I are honored beyond imagining that you’re the kind of man who would allow us to be here tonight, to share in your joyous celebration tomorrow, to keep us stitched into the fabric of your life. However, it’s more, Joe Callahan. Bea and I are honored beyond imagining simply to know a man with such love in his heart, he would give it freely to our girls, strength in his mind and body to protect them, firmness in his resolve to take care of them. Regardless if this new book you’re writing with Violet means Bea and I must close our book, a book that has no hope of reopening, there is no other man in the world we would wish to sit in the seat you’re currently occupying. We’re pleased to know you. We’re pleased to have you as a part of our family. And we wish you, Vi, Kate, Keira, and little Angie have all the beauty you deserve as you write your story.”

He lifted his glass as I heard Vi make a whimpering noise, but I didn’t look at her as Gary kept going.

“To the soon-to-be Joe and Violet Callahan, wishing you a life story full of all the love, hope, promise, joy, and laughter you not only deserve, but you’ve earned.”

A variety of “here here’s” and “To Cal and Vi’s” were shouted as we all grabbed our drinks and took a sip.

Except Violet, who got up from her chair, walked with red cheeks and shining eyes to her father-in-law, wrapped her arms around him, and shoved her face in his neck.

And I sat there thinking I loved that. I loved that emotion from Vi. I loved that she was the kind of person who could take something possibly awkward, but knowing the players, understand it would end up stunningly beautiful.

And I sat there looking around, seeing Cal give his attention to Kate and Keira, both overwhelmed with emotion from their grandfather’s speech, both not his by blood but his all the same. I took in Vinnie and Theresa, who were there not only as relations but also because they’d earned their spot there, being the only real mother and father Cal had his whole life.

And then there was me. Loving one brother who was killed and, years later, loving another one because he was everything a man should be and he gave all that beauty to me.

And I sat there thinking that what was in this room was it.

This was life.

This was family.

This messy, strange, awkward, crazy conglomeration of people that totally fit when they shouldn’t. That could make beauty like Gary’s speech, even through the heartbreak of knowing they were there because their son was not.

This was what I’d always wanted.

And this was what I’d always had. Maybe mine was messier, stranger, more awkward, and definitely more crazy.

But this was family.

And sitting beside Benny Bianchi, surrounded by family, I knew without any doubt there was no place on the planet I’d rather be.

***

I stood at the panoramic window of Benny’s and my cabin, staring at the dark lake.

The hotel had seventy-five rooms and a string of cabins along the lake. Benny had checked us into one for the whole weekend. So after the festivities tomorrow, Ben and I would have nearly a whole day to ourselves surrounded by beauty.

Before that, though, tomorrow, Ben, Kate, Kiera, Feb, and I were going out on the lake in Colt’s boat that he’d brought down. We were going to tube and water-ski.

Cheryl and Vi were going to the hotel spa to get a massage, facial, and polish changes before having hair and makeup done.

I’d been invited to the spa, but I didn’t need any of that. I’d had a mani/pedi yesterday and I could totally do my own hair and makeup.

What I needed was time with Benny and time in a speedboat on a beautiful lake with two gorgeous girls, a cool chick, and a nice guy.

Ben had walked up to the hotel from the cabin for the rehearsal so he drove me and my Z back down.

He was taking my bag into the bedroom.

I was staring at the lake, thinking I’d never felt the feeling I was feeling. I didn’t know what it was because it wasn’t just happy.

It was more.

I was thinking I felt like how Vi looked that night (when she wasn’t crying due to Gary’s speech).

Serene.

“Thinkin’ that Cal didn’t think it out when he demanded they get hitched so close to Angie comin’ into the world,” Ben called as he walked into the room. “Girls are goin’ up to Chicago to spend the week with Bea and Gary. But Angie’s goin’ with Vi and him down to Virgin Gorda. So I’m not sure the honeymoon will be all it can be.”

“Cal’s determined to do something, I figure he’ll make it work,” I told the window.

“Yeah,” Ben answered, then asked, “Fridge is full, baby. You want a drink?”

“No, I’m good.”

And I was good.

Better than I’d ever been.

Two seconds later, I got even better when Ben fitted his front to my back and slid his arms around me.

I felt his face in my neck and got even better when he whispered, “My baby’s quiet.”

“Your baby’s happy.”

His arms gave me a squeeze.

“Thank you for givin’ this to me, Benny Bianchi.”

He heard me. He got me. And he knew what it meant to me.

I knew this when he growled, “Jesus, Frankie,” into my neck, his arms going super tight.

“A while ago,” I said to the lake, “you told me you love me.”

His arms didn’t loosen, but his lips slid up to my ear. “Yeah? When was that?”

Like he didn’t remember.

Still, I told him, “The day Angie was born.”

“Well, I didn’t lie.”

He remembered.

I closed my eyes so I could fully feel the magnificence of those words sliding through me.

“You never said it again,” I noted.

“Showed it,” he replied.

He did do that. Constantly.

“Yeah,” I whispered, gliding my hands along his arms where he was holding me and settling them there. “Do I show it?”

“Tesorina.”

He said nothing more.

“I want to show it,” I said so quietly I could barely even hear myself, but I felt my words trembling with the feeling behind them. “I want to know I show it. I want to know you feel it. Even when you’re away from me. I want to know you wake up every morning knowing you have my love and you go to sleep every night knowing the same thing.”

“Never said it, Frankie.”

I opened my eyes and looked at the lake. “Well, I’m saying it now. I love you, Benny Bianchi. Even when you aren’t with me, I wake up knowing how much I love you and I go to sleep knowing the same thing.”

I just got out the word “thing” when I lost my view of the lake because Ben turned me in his arms. One hand slid up in my hair, the other arm crushed me to him, and he bent his head to me.

Then he kissed me, slowly, deeply, gorgeously.

But when he lifted his head, he simply said softly, “Let’s go to bed.”

There was no other place I’d rather be.

I didn’t tell Ben that.

I just felt him let me go, take my hand, and then he led me to bed.

***

“Babe, I gotta get to Cal!” Benny called toward the bathroom where Frankie had been for half an age, shrugging the jacket of his tuxedo on and thanking God that Cal was as Cal was. That being a man who hated ties and, therefore, a man who not only was not wearing one to his wedding, he didn’t expect the men standing up with him to wear one either.

Cal’s groomsmen were wearing tuxes with deep purple shirts, the whole getup Cal and Vi had tailored specifically for each of them, all of it, including the tuxes, they could keep.

He didn’t need a tux, though he didn’t say no. But even deep purple, the color was dark, the material was fine, so the shirt was the shit.

Cal was wearing a black shirt with his tux. Then again, except the blue of his jeans, Cal never wore anything but black.

“Go!” Frankie called back through the closed door. “I’ll take the Z up.”

“Don’t need two cars up there and the lot’s gonna be packed. By the time you get up there, you’ll have to hoof it a mile. You need to take me. You can hang with Mimi,” Ben returned.

He was walking toward the bathroom to open the door but stopped suddenly when the door opened and Frankie stood there.

Her hair was done, up in a large, messy, sexy, loose arrangement at the nape, the curls and waves leading to it. Her makeup and jewelry were one step up from yesterday but probably because it was a formal wedding. She wasn’t wearing any shoes.

He liked her heels but that dress didn’t need shoes.

Turquoise, strapless, short, tight, it had two thick strips of black lace running diagonally across the dress: one at the hip that slanted up around her ribs, one at her ribs on the other side that slanted up over a breast and ended at the line of the top of the dress, the scalloped edge protruding past the turquoise so fucking sweet, it was like another accessory.

She was always varying nuances of crazy-beautiful.

Right then, he’d never seen anyone, not in his entire life, so fucking stunning.

“I’ll just grab my shoes—” she started.

“Seriously?” he cut her off.

She ceased moving and her eyes came to him.

She read him and he knew it when she started backing away, saying, “Benny, my hair—”

“Seriously,” he said it again, a statement this time, and started stalking toward her.

“We can’t do this, Benny. You have to be up at the hotel.”

“We’ll be quick,” he replied, and she ran into the wall.

She started sliding along it, but he stopped that when he made it to her and put a hand in the wall by her side.

“Even quick—” she began.

“Pull up your skirt,” he ordered, taking his hand from the wall, the other one joining it, spanning her waist as the rest of him got in her space.

Her eyes had widened, but they also flashed and he knew what the second one meant.

Still, she declared, “We don’t have time, Benny,” but her voice was wispy.

“Skirt up, babe.”

“Ben—”

He dropped his mouth to hers. “Now.”

Her lids fell and her hands went to her skirt to yank it up.

When she had it up, his hands went to her panties to yank them down.

Then he lifted her and pressed her against the wall.

Hands on her bare ass, mouth touching hers, he told her, “Need your hands, baby.”

She knew what he needed and her fingers went to his pants. Not wasting time, she had him free and took her shot to give him a firm stroke, taking in the whole length.

Jesus, Frankie.

He clenched his teeth and through them ordered, “Guide me to you.”

She ran her teeth over her lower lip, catching his when she did, something that scored straight down to his dick, as she slid him through her wet and the tip of his cock caught at her pussy.

“Fuckin’ ecstasy,” he groaned and thrust in.

Her hands lifted so she could round his shoulders with her arms and she whispered, “No, baby, that’s ecstasy.”

She was not wrong and it got better as he banged her hard and fast against the wall, her arms and legs clamped around him, her pussy clenching tight, her lips brushing his, their breaths escalating until his was labored and broken by grunts and hers was panting.