by Marie Force
“I know.”
“And now you might be pregnant again, and while I’d love to have another baby with you, I can’t bear to think about all the things that could go wrong. Maybe we should move to the mainland. I could come out here to work and—”
Maddie kissed him, putting every ounce of love she felt for him into the kiss. “This is our home.” She gestured to the deck and yard. “Those are our people. Let’s go join them and get our minds off it all for a little while.” She knew he was on overload and would rather call it a night, but he followed her down the stairs to the yard, where his brothers and all their closest friends had formed a tight circle around the fire. As usual, Evan was messing around with his guitar as everyone talked and laughed and traded insults and good-natured jabs.
“We were just taking bets on whether or not you two were fooling around while we’re in your yard,” Evan said. “But even you aren’t that quick, Mac.”
“Bite me,” Mac muttered. “I have little kids. I can be quick when I need to be.”
“Mac!”
Maddie’s outrage sparked laughter as the circle widened to make room for them.
“Any more news from Providence?” Stephanie asked from her perch on Grant’s lap.
“Just that my folks are there, Janey’s awake and they have a beautiful son named Peter Joseph, who will be called P.J.”
“That’s such a relief,” Grace said.
“Seriously.” Adam put his arms around Abby and buried his face in her hair, apparently needing a moment to himself after hearing good news about his sister.
“How is she?” Grace asked.
“Sore but asking lots of questions and wants to see the baby. He’s in the NICU. They said his lungs need to develop some more, so he’ll be there awhile, but otherwise, he’s doing great.”
“Thank goodness,” Sydney said.
“I love his name,” Stephanie said.
“Pete was Joe’s dad’s name,” Mac said. “He died when Joe was seven.”
“It’s so nice they named the baby after him,” Maddie said. “I love that.”
“Carolina will, too,” Mac said.
“I sure hope Janey can have other kids,” Laura said, her hand resting on the belly that had sprouted early in her pregnancy.
“I bet no one is talking about the next one tonight,” Evan said.
“No shit,” Mac replied. “I’m putting a moratorium on babies around here.” This was said with a meaningful look for his wife. “No more.”
Maddie stuck out her tongue at him and patted her belly, which made him scowl playfully at her.
“Dude,” Owen said, “you’re sitting smack in the middle of what could be the biggest potential baby boom in Gansett Island history.”
Mac’s groan had everyone laughing and throwing empty beer cans at him. “Knock it off! You’re getting me all wet.”
“You’ve always been all wet,” Adam said, earning an obscene gesture from his oldest brother.
“We’d like to respectfully request a variance to your moratorium,” Luke said, earning a warm smile from Sydney.
“I’ll grant it for you,” Mac said. “But the rest of you have been warned.”
“Whatever,” Evan said. “Always the big bossy brother.”
“And don’t forget it,” Mac said.
“While we’re all here,” Sydney said, rubbing her hands together and turning her attention toward Jenny, “you have to tell us how the date with Mason went.”
Jenny’s deer-in-the-headlights expression was comical. “I do?”
“Oh yeah,” Abby said. “Do tell.”
“It was…nice. He’s very nice.”
The guys went crazy moaning and groaning.
“What?” Jenny asked. “He is nice!”
“No guy wants to hear that you had a ‘nice’ time after a date,” Shane McCarthy informed her. “That’s like saying a girl has a ‘nice’ personality.”
“What is wrong with the word nice?” Jenny asked.
“Are you going to see him again?” Grant asked.
“I…uh, I mean…”
“There you have it,” Grant said. “Nice is a nonstarter when it comes to dating.”
“Don’t listen to them,” Kara said to Jenny. “There’s something to be said for nice guys. I’d like to find one for myself.”
“Hey!” Dan said as the others howled. “That’s just rude!”
“What? Nice is hardly the word I’d used to describe you. Irritating, annoying, persistent…”
“Charming, sexy, a god in bed,” Dan finished for her.
“Extremely full of yourself,” Kara countered, starting a new wave of laughter.
Dan hugged her from behind and kissed her neck.
“So who’s our next fix-up for Jenny?” Stephanie asked.
“Here’s a big idea,” Jenny said. “Let’s talk about this another time.”
“No time like the present,” Laura said, glancing at her brother.
All eyes turned to Shane, who held up his hands defensively. “Don’t look at me. I’m far too nice for her.”
“Very funny.” Jenny threw a marshmallow at him. “I want that,” she said wistfully, glancing at Dan and Kara. “I want what all of you have. I want what I had with Toby.”
“You’ll find it, Jenny,” Sydney said. “Probably when you least expect it. That’s what happened to me. Just stay open to the possibilities.”
“I know. You’re right.” Jenny paused and seemed to make an effort to shake off the unusual melancholy. “Anyway… Enough about me.” She turned to Abby. “Are you guys all moved in?”
“Getting there. He has a lot of stuff.” Abby used her thumb to point at Adam. “Where am I supposed to put four computers in that little house?”
“You get me, you get my computers,” Adam said.
“Oh jeez.” Mac sat up straight. “That just made me think of Janey and her traveling zoo. Someone needs to go over there to let them out and feed them.”
“We’ll do it,” Adam said as he and Abby got up to leave. “I’m fully trained on the menagerie.”
“I’ll take the morning shift,” Mac said.
“We’ll all take turns until they get back,” Evan said.
“We’d better go, too.” Owen helped Laura to her feet. “Our days start early with Holden.”
“And the puking,” Laura said. “Let’s not forget the puking.”
“I’d love to forget the puking,” Owen said with a grimace.
“I hope it lets up soon, Laura,” Maddie said. “That’s got to be so miserable.”
“It’s horrible. I can’t wait to get through this trimester and hopefully start to feel better. I’m just glad I felt up to coming today after my visit to the clinic yesterday. I would’ve hated to miss Tiffany and Blaine’s big day.”
“Let us know if you need anything,” Grace said. “I’m happy to help with Holden if need be.”
“Thanks, Grace,” Laura said. “We may take you up on that. Thank goodness Sarah is with us. I’d be lost without her.”
“You’d better hope my dad doesn’t steal her away from you,” Stephanie said with a teasing smile.
“Bite your tongue!” Laura said.
As the party broke up, Mac and his brothers put out the fire and gathered up the last of the empty cans and cups. Mac and Maddie walked to the driveway to wave them off and then went into the house, shutting off lights as they went.
“If the mess is any indication, another successful party,” Maddie said, eyeing the mountain of dishes in the sink.
Mac took her hand, shut off the kitchen light and led her to the stairs. “It’ll still be there in the morning.”
“I’m going to pretend the magic fairies are coming overnight to make it all go away.”
“Let me know how that works out for you.”
“Spoken like my number-one morning cleanup man.”
“Great.”
They checked on the kids and found that Ashleig
h had moved from the air mattress on the floor to Thomas’s bed. The toddlers, who were fast asleep, had their chubby arms wrapped around each other.
“How cute are they?” Maddie whispered.
“Best friends forever.”
After making sure Hailey was also asleep, they went to their room and got ready for bed.
This was the best part of Maddie’s day—the time she spent alone with Mac after they’d taken care of everyone else. It was their time, and she cherished every minute she got to spend with him. He was waiting for her when she crawled into bed, exhausted from the hectic, emotional day.
As always, he welcomed her into his embrace, his strong arms wrapping her up in his love. “Everything was great today, honey. You throw an amazing party-slash-wedding.”
“I could’ve done without the emergency C-section in the middle of it, but all that matters is they’re both okay.”
“And we’ve got a new nephew. P.J. Cantrell. Mom said he’s small but so cute. I can’t wait to see him.”
“I bet he’ll be Hailey’s BFF.”
“Probably.”
“Mac, I want you to know I heard what you said earlier about moving to the mainland.”
“I was venting. We’d never be happy there, although we would be closer to major medical facilities, which would come in handy in this family.”
“True,” she said, smiling as she kissed his chest.
“It makes me crazy, as husband and father and uncle and son and brother, to know that so much of what happens is out of my control.” He sifted his fingers through her hair as he spoke. “I remember being here as a kid and feeling so confined, and now it’s the isolation that gets to me. The thought of you or one of the kids or anyone in my family needing something and not being able to get it…” His deep sigh finished the thought for him.
“We need to have faith that whatever happens, we’ll figure it out, and we’ll do our best, because that’s all we can do. Our kids will grow up with their cousins and so many friends and people who love them. I’d rather surround them with love than shelter them with safety.”
“Say that last part again.”
“I’d rather surround them with love than shelter them with safety. That part?”
“Yes, that.”
“Do you agree?”
“Yeah, I do. It’s a good point.” He continued to play with her hair and look into her eyes. “Life was so much less complicated when I was living alone in Miami.”
“Want me to get your old place back for you?” she asked with a teasing smile.
He shook his head. “You couldn’t pay me to go back to that life. Not unless you were there with me. And our kids.”
“We kind of like it here, and we kind of like having you here with us.”
“Just kind of?”
She snuggled in closer to him, close enough that she could kiss the pout off his lips. “When we got married, I thought I had this love stuff all figured out because you’d shown me how it was supposed to be done. But I’ve discovered that was just the beginning of what I’d come to feel for you. I love you so much. I love our family and our friends and our house and our life here. I love everything about it, but you, you’re the best part because you’re mine. No matter what else happens during the day, when it’s over, there’s this. I live for this.”
“I live for this, too, you and our kids. I love you all so much. But you… You think I showed you how the love stuff is done, but you’re the one showing me. Every day. I still think about that day in town when I might’ve let you go by on your bike and missed the best thing to ever happen to me.”
“Thank goodness you never look before you leap.”
“Thank goodness is right.”
“When it all gets to be too much for you, hold on to me.”
“What do you think I’m doing right now?”
Her eyes closed as she released a contented sigh. “Don’t let go.”
“Never.”
On the way back to the island on his final trip of the day, Seamus received a cell phone call from Carolina. He didn’t usually have his phone on when he was at the helm, but knowing she was hurt—and home alone with his mum… He’d kept the phone close at hand all day.
“Seamus!”
The connection was a bad one, and all he could hear was her voice, some sniffling and crackling on the line before it went dead. He tried twice to call her back to no avail.
By the time he tore out of the parking lot on the way home, he was a bloody wreck, wondering what in the name of Sam Hill had gone wrong. If his mother had said something offensive to her, so help him, he was going to have it out with his mum.
He’d worked up quite a head of steam when he pulled into the driveway and came to a skidding stop. He was out of the truck and into the house so fast he nearly knocked over his mum as she bustled around the kitchen making dinner.
“You missed quite a day,” she said.
“Caro… Is she okay?”
“Go see for yourself.”
He bolted for the bedroom, where she was sitting up in bed, bright-eyed and smiling. Seeing her looking happy and healthy was such a relief that he stopped short in the doorway to collect himself.
“Well, come here, will you?” She held out a gauze-covered hand to him.
Not wanting to hurt her hand with the power of the emotions running through him, he went around her outstretched arm and sat gingerly on the side of the bed. “What the hell is going on?”
She rested her hand on his leg. “We’re grandparents! Janey had the baby.”
“Wait, what? Isn’t it too soon?”
Carolina tearfully told him the story of Janey’s emergency C-section and the dramatic arrival of P.J. Cantrell as she showed him the pictures Joe had sent her. “They named him after Pete,” she said softly. “Isn’t that wonderful?”
“Aye, it ’tis, love. A wonderful tribute indeed.” He leaned forward and kissed her.
She curled her hand around his neck and held him there, looking into his eyes.
“You’re the sexiest granny I’ve ever met,” he whispered.
Laughing, she said, “Sure I am. All scratched and gouged and bloody. Sexy.”
“Always. Congratulations, Carolina. Your son has made you very proud today.”
“So very proud. I just wish I could be there with them.”
“The second you feel up to traveling, love, I’ll get you there. I’ll get you to your boy and his family.”
“Our family. Yours and mine.”
Damn if his heart didn’t stop beating for a second when she said that. “Aye?”
“Aye.”
He pulled back from her so he could see her better. “What’re you saying, Caro?”
“You asked me to marry you some time ago, and I wasn’t able to give you the answer you wanted, but now…”
“What about now?” Filled with irrational hope, he barely dared to breathe as he waited to hear what she had to say.
“I was worried about what Joe would say about us, and he seems to have come around to the idea. I was worried about what your mother would think, but we had a good talk today. She said she’s sad that you’ll never be a father, but when I told her you’d be a hands-on grandfather to Joe and Janey’s baby… You will be, right?”
He swallowed a huge lump in his throat. “God, yes. I can’t wait to meet the little guy and spoil him rotten.”
“She and I agreed you’ll be an excellent grandfather. What would you like him to call you?”
Clearing his throat, he said, “My sisters’ kids call my father Da.”
“Grammy and Da,” she said, trying it on for size. “What do you think?”
Nodding, he said, “Works for me.”
“It’d probably make things easier to explain to P.J. if his Grammy and Da were married, don’t you think?”
“I suppose it would set the right example for the boy,” he said, loving the glimmer of humor in her beautiful eyes as she led him to wh
ere he’d wanted to be all along.
“So…”
“Oh, no way. This one’s all on you. I’ve asked and asked and been turned down over and over and over again. A man’s fragile ego can only take so much rejection.”
“All right, then.” As he watched her screw up her courage to ask a question that was a sure thing, he had never loved her more. “Seamus Padric O’Grady, would you please, for the love of God and all that’s holy, marry me and make an honest woman—”
He kissed her hard and long and deep.
“—out of me?”
“Yes, love. ’Twould be my honor to marry you and make an honest woman out of you, as long as it’s still okay for me to sneak up on you in the middle of the day and have you on the kitchen table once in a while.”
Her face flushed with color as it always did when he talked dirty to her. “We might be able to work something out where the kitchen table is concerned.”
“I love you, Caro. I love you, I love Joe and Janey, and I’ll love P.J. as if he were my own flesh and blood.”
“I know you will. Why do you think I asked you to be his grandpa?” She held out her arms to him, and he moved slowly and carefully to rest his head against her chest.
When she wrapped her arms around him, he let out a deep sigh of contentment.
“Thanks for waiting for me to work it all out in my mind.”
“You’re certainly worth all the pain and agony you put me through.”
She tugged hard on a handful of his hair.
“Aw, love, you don’t want a bald, old grandpa chasing you around the kitchen table, now do you?”
“I just want you chasing me around the kitchen table.”
“You got it. Once a day and twice on Sunday, but only if you’re good.”
Her laughter filled his heart to overflowing as one word cycled through his mind again and again: finally, finally, finally.
Ned dropped Tiffany and Blaine at her house and tooted the horn as he took off in the Rolls Royce. Arm in arm they started down the long driveway that led to the house.
“He’s going to get a ticket if he drives like that on my island.”
Tiffany had her high-heeled sandals looped around her fingers and her bridal bouquet—returned by Grace after she caught it—hanging from the same hand. “His new son-in-law will square it away for him.”