by Julia Kent
“Poor Calvin? Poor you.”
“Poor me?”
“I’m never, ever having sex again after learning all that about my parents,” Josie replied. “Get me to a convent.”
Alex laughed and went to put his arm around her.
“I’m serious. Ewwwww.” She shook him off.
“It’s kind of freaky to hear your dad was into, you know...”
“Air fucking?” Josie hadn’t used Alex’s term for outdoor sex in years.
He turned a furious shade of red and refused to look at her.
“Maybe it’s genetic,” he finally replied in an arch tone.
“You think? Maybe we should ask Meribeth if she—”
“That’s gross,” Alex grunted. “No.”
“See? Doesn’t feel good, does it? When it’s your parent, it’s different, isn’t it?”
They both sighed in unison, their attention drawn to the sight of Calvin’s big, thin hands cupping Cathy’s ass as they kissed and made up.
“Welcome to my Big Fat Ohio Wedding Family, Alex. I hope you’re happy. This was all your doing.”
He gave her a hug and rested his chin on her head, taking a deep breath in.
“I’m happy. I am.”
Chapter Two
Lydia
The campground office looked like an office supply store threw up in it. Lydia poured herself a cup of coffee and walked around to the desk. Sandy’s entire wall was nothing but tiny, colored sticky notes arranged on the giant whiteboard.
“What is this?”
“Wedding planning.”
“Whose wedding? Prince Harry’s?”
Sandy made a face. “You know perfectly well whose wedding. Laura and Dylan and Mike, and Alex and Josie. It’s the only wedding we’ve ever hosted here aside from, um....”
“Luke’s,” Lydia said softly. The subject of her deceased brother would never, ever be an easy one.
Sandy squared her shoulders. “Right. And because none of my other children has shown the slightest inclination to marry or reproduce—”
The camp store doorbell rang and Mike walked in. He snaked an arm around Lydia’s waist.
“—or listen to me about anything, for that matter—” Sandy continued, taking a deep breath as fortitude.
“Here comes the grandkid speech,” Lydia muttered under her breath.
“Is it the ‘when is someone going to produce a grandchild for me’ speech or the ‘when will one of my children have a wedding and then a grandkid’ speech?” he whispered, tightening his hold on her.
“I think it’s a little of both.”
Mike gave her a quick kiss on the cheek and, wisely, said nothing.
Smart man.
As Sandy spoke about the wedding, her paperwork and hand motions eerily similar to that of a general in combat, directing troops and receiving logistics reports, Lydia steeled herself for a long monologue.
Jeremy bounded in the door, drenched and wearing only his bathing suit.
“Blue kayak number 22 has a leak,” he announced, dripping everywhere as he made himself a cup of coffee.
Sandy sighed. “I’ll let Miles know. Where is it?” She picked up a walkie-talkie and told Miles to come to the camp office.
He looked down at himself. “In the water,” he explained, his words drawn out. “I was in it when I discovered the leak.”
Mike made a grunting laugh as Lydia burst into giggles.
“It’s not funny!” Jeremy protested.
“Losing a good rental kayak never is,” Sandy murmured as she waited for Miles to respond.
“I’m safe and just fine,” Jeremy said in an arch tone. “Thank you all for asking.” He looked pointedly at Mike. “I barely managed to tie it to the main buoy first from the dock.”
“We’re laughing at the thought of you voluntarily doing anything athletic. Your idea of exercise is dragging all the empty beer bottles to the recycling bin,” Mike said.
“Hey!’ Jeremy shot back. “That’s not...” He frowned. “Okay, that’s true,” he grudgingly admitted.
“Why were you kayaking?” Lydia asked, reaching up to touch his wet, curly hair. It hung in perfect little ringlets around his pale face. Mike was the athlete, on the ocean for hours with the kayak. Jeremy might play a pick-up game of basketball here and there, but he definitely wasn’t one to just go out in the ocean on a boat for fun.
“Miles asked me to test out the...oh, I’m going to kill him.” Jeremy’s mouth tightened. “He knew there was a leak in that kayak.” He looked down at his soaking wet body and grimaced. Lydia, on the other hand, took in all six-and-a-half-feet-plus of him and felt a stirring deep in her belly that she tucked away for later. He was fine. A fine, fine man made even finer by standing here in only swim trunks and a scowl.
Even Sandy laughed this time.
“I don’t have time for this,” she said, looking over the papers all over her desk. Lydia knew her mother loved the complications of such a huge event, though. “The wedding group starts to arrive tomorrow. A hundred and ninety people, all staying in cabins and tents. We have to do a huge lobster and steak dinner for the reception. Thirty-seven kids under the age of eighteen. Two people in wheelchairs. This is a logistics feat.”
“If anyone can do it, Mom, you can,” Lydia reassured her.
“And we’re all helping,” Miles declared, walking into the office and edging past Sandy to grab a cup of coffee. He gave Jeremy a long look. “You’ve been swimming?”
Jeremy tossed a pen at him.
“Well,” Miles said dryly, “now I know blue kayak number 22 is out.”
“You asshole,” Jeremy muttered.
“How’s the wedding planning, Mom?” Miles asked, eyes twinkling. Lydia knew that Jeremy would find a way to get back at her brother. The two had a strange mock-adversarial relationship. Miles had definitely gotten the upper hand this time, though.
Jeremy would need to up his ante.
“It’s our biggest event yet. And it’s all planned out perfectly, but we’re one big storm away from disaster,” Sandy fretted. “Plus, this isn’t the most, ah...conventional of weddings.”
“We’ve got the media under control,” Mike said. “I talked to the bride—”
“Which one?” Sandy asked nervously.
“Laura Michaels. She and Mike and Dylan are the ones who’ll get news coverage,” he explained patiently. Lydia watched him, marveling at how cool and collected he was. Her mom was most worried about the media frenzy. Her dad was worried about her mom. When her grandma, Madge, had suggested Escape Shores Campground for the double wedding and the brides and grooms had all agreed, they hadn’t realized how the Boston-area media might hunt down the story.
Nervous about the media coverage bleeding into Lydia, Jeremy, and Mike’s privacy, Sandy’s stress level had jumped.
“And you think we won’t have the news stations descend like locusts?” Sandy asked Mike in a pleading tone.
He shrugged. “I can’t guarantee anything, but we came up with a plan to throw them off. Most of the fake leaks we’ve sent out seem to be working. Security will be tight at the perimeter of the campground. We even have a few boats lined up for any overly-enthusiastic paparazzi that try to get to the wedding via water. We have some consultants looking at social media and so far, most of the news sources think the wedding’s next week.”
“Let’s keep it that way. There are so many things that could go wrong, and we’re not even talking about the wedding party itself.”
“What do you mean?” Lydia asked, puzzled.
“Well,” said Sandy, “there are four mothers. Three grooms.” She looked uncertain. “Two brides.”
“And a partridge in a pear tree,” Jeremy sang.
Lydia whacked him. She got a very wet embrace and a hot, coffee-flavored kiss in return. That stirring deep inside turned into a throbbing as Jeremy grabbed her ass, his palm becoming a hot promise. Mike’s eyebrows turned down just enough to make her realiz
e he knew what was going on.
Good.
Three’s company, right?
All her blood rushed between her legs and she struggled to maintain composure to continue the conversation with her mom and brother.
“And one of the mothers of the bride just got arrested in Portland for having sex with two college hockey players in an airplane bathroom,” Miles added without emotion.
Everyone turned to him, eyebrows up.
He held up his hand, smartphone in it, and wiggled his wrist. “Am I the only one following social media for this shindig?”
“What?” Sandy said, her voice turning into a giggle at the end. “A threesome in an airplane what?”
“Not sure which is more scandalous,” Miles added. “The airplane bathroom part or the threesome part.”
Lydia shot him a look that could peel paint.
“Depends,” Pete muttered. Lydia jolted, not realizing he was there, sitting in a small office chair behind a partition, eyes focused on a folder stuffed with papers he was reading. “Which hockey team?”
Mike burst into laughter and gave her dad a fist bump.
“Maybe the threesome thing runs in the family?” Sandy asked, leading to a look of incredulity from Miles.
“You have something you and dad want to share with us, Mom? Is Mr. Michaelson from the dairy farm your secret third?”
Her dad started hyperventilating, his laughter coming out like a hyena’s gasp.
Sandy turned the shade of the lobsters she cooked by the hundreds. “That is not what I meant!” She smacked Miles’s arm. Lydia’s brother could tower over Sandy by a foot, but he was still her naughty little boy.
“And besides,” she added, “if I were picking a man to join me and your father, it certainly wouldn’t be Stan Michaelson.”
Miles turned green.
“Do we really need to have this conversation?” Miles groused.
Jeremy watched his nemesis with glee, then turned his attention to Pete. “You could always have another woman join you,” he said casually.
Now Lydia felt green, because what daughter wants to think about her parents in a threesome, and—
“Enough! Enough talking about your sex life!” she announced, giving Sandy and Pete a distressed look. “Let’s talk about the wedding.” If nothing else, the discussion about her parents’ potential threesome sex life dimmed her own arousal.
“What about your wedding?” Sandy asked again, giving Mike and Jeremy a look.
Four palms went in the air, all male, all facing her mother. “Don’t blame us!” Mike said in a low, emotion-filled voice. “We keep trying.”
“If I can’t marry you both, why bother marrying at all?” Lydia replied, her voice tinged with a familiar exasperation. Sandy seemed to be on a schedule. Poke Lydia and her guys at least once a month about the wedding issue. Today must be the day.
“I think Laura, Dylan and Mike would disagree,” Sandy argued.
“The two guys actually married,” Lydia clarified.
Jeremy and Mike suddenly looked at anyone but each other.
“That was to protect the custody of their kids,” Mike finally retorted. “If I had no choice, I’d marry Jeremy under the same circumstances, too.” Fortunately, they weren’t in the same situation. Mike’s mother loved Lydia and had accepted their unconventional threesome with an amazing level of love, while Jeremy’s parents had died years ago.
All things considered, Lydia and her guys had it good in the extended-family-acceptance department. She was deeply appreciative for that.
Not everyone had such a luxury.
“Can we really drop this? Mom, I don’t want to get married. You have a bazillion kids. Focus on Miles. Give all your attention to his wedding.” Lydia couldn’t even choke out the words before she curled in on herself with hysterical laughter.
Miles. Wedding. No way. Not happening. Not ever.
“Even Shrek found a female ogre to love him and live with him in his swamp,” Jeremy called out as Miles stormed away from the scene.
“I’ve got a parasail you can test out for me!” he shouted back, flipping Jeremy the bird.
Sandy pretended to be shocked by Miles’ rudeness, but no one really was. Of all of Lydia’s siblings, he was the one who would remain at Escape Shores Campground forever.
Like it or not.
Lydia smelled Mike before she felt his arm wrap around her waist, his essence all ocean air and man sweat, a great, intoxicating combo. She leaned against him, his hard body familiar now. Two years of being with Jeremy and Mike had given her the space to settle in. Though they traveled constantly, the campground was home base, and last year their house had been finished. Her mom had calmed down considerably once the small Cape Cod-style home had been complete, the cedar shingles still so vibrant in comparison to the aged ones on her parents’ and brothers’ homes.
They would age.
So would everyone.
A wedding. Unlike other little girls, Lydia hadn’t fixated on the whole bridal fantasy. She’d always assumed she’d marry one day, but life had different ideas about who she’d be with. Three years ago, if her best friend had told her she’d be with a secret billionaire and a not-so-secret ex-CEO/playboy, she’d have assumed poor Krysta had been slipped some acid.
And speaking of Krysta, here she came, arms overloaded with a box filled with something that jingled.
Mike plucked the heavy box with no true exertion and peered in it. He looked up, arctic-blue eyes amused. “Candles?”
“Centerpieces. That’s the first of seven boxes of them.”
Lydia gasped. “How many tables?”
“Twenty-five,” Krysta replied in a strangled voice. Each table held eight, so—
“My God!” Lydia gasped. “Two hundred people?” It began to sink in. No wonder her mom was freaking out. Sure, she’d heard Sandy planning for this for a long time, but seeing the sheer amount of equipment coming into the campground pounded home the enormity of this event.
“Closer to two-fifty. A ton of families, plus ski people for one of the grooms, a pile of firefighters and paramedics for one of the other, and your grandmother invited half the Jeddy’s regulars to show up for fun.”
“I thought this was going to be an intimate affair!” Lydia exclaimed.
Her brother Caleb approached the group, carrying a box that matched Krysta’s. “Make yourselves useful and carry a box!”
“Mmmm, firefighters,” Krysta said pointedly, waggling her eyebrows. “Hot, single firefighters. There’s an intimate affair I could join...”
Caleb frowned and bristled at the same time. If he sprayed himself down with a cologne called Jealousy, he couldn’t have been more obvious.
For the past few years, Krysta’s adoring crush on Caleb had been an accessory to Lydia’s friendship with her, like a sidecar attached to a motorcycle, yet one no passenger ever used. Lately, though, Lydia had felt the electricity between her little bro and her best friend.
It made her feel, well...
Green.
And not with jealousy.
When did life become so complicated?
Maybe when you fell in love with two guys, a voice inside her whispered.
She laughed quietly to herself, making Mike pull back and look at her with amusement.
“Something funny?”
“I’ll tell you later.”
“Thinking about hot firefighters?” Krysta asked with a wink as she strolled back to where the rest of the wedding supplies were being unloaded from various trucks. The big event was in two days, and Pete and Sandy had called every friend they knew to come work for the long weekend. Krysta told Lydia she would have done it for free, but everyone was being paid.
Which was even better.
Lydia, Mike and Jeremy all planned to donate their wages to one of Jeremy’s microloan funds in Southeast Asia, a fact her parents knew. Stubborn as mules, they still insisted on paying them for their time.
Having
their daughter in a relationship with two very, very rich men made no difference to her parents. They treated everyone the same.
And that extended to persistent questions about weddings and grandchildren.
Without thinking, Lydia touched her belly at the thought of grandchildren. Someday, she thought. Someday.
But not yet.
“We need seven cribs!” Miles shouted from the area where the trucks congregated, parked in drunken lines at various angles, ramps extending out of open backs like grey metal tongues. “We only have six.”
Pete groaned, then pulled off his wide-brimmed hat, scratching his head. He gave Lydia’s mother an amused look. “We have any leftover from Caleb?”
“A crib from the early 1990s?” she scoffed. “No. We need to get some of those portable things. What do they call them?”
“Pack a potties?” Jeremy mused. “Port a crib? Pack ’n Port? Baby in a Box?”
Mike snorted. “Pack ’n Play.”
Lydia shot him an appraising look. “How would you know the name of a piece of baby equipment?”
He shrugged. “Hotels? I don’t know.”
Sandy’s eyes narrowed as she took them in.
And Lydia’s hand stayed in place, palm warm against the soft skin on her body, right where a baby might grow.
Someday.
Chapter Three
Josie
Managing her mother was like holding a feral baby possum in your hands while juggling cooked spaghetti.
Josie and Alex had gotten Aunt Cathy, Uncle Calvin, her mother, and Uncle Mike to the hotel where they were staying for the night, before the whole crew would go on up to the campground where the wedding was being held.
But they’d been dropped off at the hotel on the ocean’s edge, Aunt Cathy gasping at the sight of the grey-green water. Landlocked for life, her Ohio relatives were finally seeing the Atlantic, and the thrill of knowing how excited they were took some of the sting out of her mother’s arrest.
Yes, arrest. Marlene would face charges, though at this point she was released to go with Aunt Cathy and her uncles, with a requirement that they go back to the airport to talk with some governing authority. In the haze of the evening, Josie hadn’t been too clear on what was going on.