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Mom and Dad were talking to Ellodie’s parents, and Hollis was trying to get her kid away from Quinn to allow Shayne—her best friend—to hold the baby.
Atlas was talking in a corner with Sage, who was waving her hands in the air and arguing with him about something.
Probably her new job at the police station, if I had to guess.
“I got you a wedding present,” Ellodie said as she held her hand out to me, something large and silver barely concealed by her palm.
I opened my hand, and she dropped a watch into my outstretched fingers.
I took it, then gasped when I saw what it was. “You found it!”
“A Submariner Rolex, circa 1992,” she confirmed. “I’m not sure the significance of the date, and it took me for-fucking-ever to find, but I got it. I was returning a, erm, missing watch of the ER director’s. I might or might not have kept it until he was willing to fix the security in the ER. When he did it, I thought I’d return it via a good Samaritan kind of thing. But while I was at the jeweler, I saw that. I remembered you talking about it with your brothers while I was hurt and grabbed it from the jeweler after he called the ER director to tell him he found his watch.”
I took my old watch off and then slipped the new one onto my wrist, excitement thrumming through my veins.
“This is fantastic,” I breathed. “Where did you find it?”
“Well, as you know, I had a lot of time on my hands for a few months.” She patted the chair next to her. “Now, what did you get me?”
I laughed. “I got you something that doesn’t seem as cool now. But it’s at home.”
“I can’t wait to see it.” She sighed, then leaned her head against my shoulder. “When do we get to go home?”
“When the party is over, Ellodie Solaire.”
“Ellodie Carter!” multiple Carter boys called.
Ellodie nuzzled my throat. “Hey, Quaid?”
I looked down into her eyes and said, “Hey, Ellodie?”
“How do you feel about installing new locks so we can have some alone time?”
“It won’t work,” Auden called out. “We know how to pick locks.”
I chuckled, pulling her in under my arm, and said, “He’s right. They’re like leeches.”
“We grow on you, though,” Garrett called. “Now, who has more beer? We’re out.”
“If we’re out, you’re all alcoholics,” Ellodie muttered.
Auden placed his cold beer bottle against her feet, causing her to squeal and pull away.
“We’re not alcoholics, Ell,” Dad said as he came up beside us and patted her head. “We’re just celebrating life. Now, can we cut the fuckin’ cake already?”
Ellodie sighed before whispering, “Let’s cut the cake for the grumpy old man.”
“I heard that.”
Our children are going to change the world. We just have to survive raising them, first.
—Text from Ellodie to Quaid
ELLODIE
“Did you see this?” I asked as I showed him the article.
“That Dr. Brewn had his leg chopped off by a shiv in prison?” Quaid asked idly as he searched through Amazon for a new screen protector.
