Page 105 of But For You

“I’m sorry I⁠—”

“Why would you be sorry? Don’t be sorry yet.”

I took a breath.

“I’ll let you know what happens.”

“When?”

“When I get back from New York.”

“So, you’re going?”

“I am,” he husked, and it was a good sound because I’d never heard it from him before.

Since I had no more advice to give, I shut the hell up and let him hang up on me.

“J?” Sam was concerned when I reappeared in the living room.

“Sorry. I had to talk to Aaron.”

“Oh? And how are he and Duncan getting along?”

“I have no idea.”

Sam nodded and then pointed at me. “If that ends in gunfire, it’s all on you.”

“Really? You think that’s a nice thing to say?”

“I’m just saying, cop, playboy… how did that make sense in your head?”

Nothing ever made sense in my head—that was the problem.

Sam had canceled fishing with Chaz and Pat, but since making him go to the movies was cruel and unusual punishment, I had him take care of Gentry instead. Regina was originally going to do it, so it worked out great. I met the others—Dylan and her two kids; Harper and his mother, Jessica; Tess and her father, Gordon; my buddy Evan and his two boys, Bryce and Seth—at the movies right after eleven the next morning. It was a production with that many kids—I had three, and there were nine in all—to get everyone seated with popcorn and a drink and napkins. Halfway through the movie, Hannah had to pee, but it was fine, as there were more than enough parents to keep a watchful eye on Kola and Robert while I was gone.

Afterward, we took the kids out for lunch and then to a playground close to Dylan’s house. It was nice, all of us sitting and talking. I had not seen Evan in a couple of months, and it was good to catch up. Gordon and Jessica seemed to be hitting it off—they were both in education—so I was sort of pleased with myself. I liked my friends being friends.

I told Dylan about Aaron and Duncan because I knew she could keep a secret.

“You are the love god,” Dylan teased me.

“Yep, I still got it.”

Later, I asked Evan about Loudon—his partner, his husband, the man he’d always said he would never find and whom he had been married to for the past six years. They had been made for each other. Evan was sort of a high-strung worrier, and Loudon was calm and grounded. I had seen them in action many a time, and sometimes, Evan’s obsessive personality was a good thing—it kept the ball from getting dropped. Other times, Loudon reminded him that stopping to breathe and refocus was the thing to do. It was nice to see that their boys, Bryce and Seth, had facets of both. Like Sam and me, Evan and Loudon had adopted—Bryce from Spain and Seth from South Africa.

As Dylan went to see why Mabel and Micah were hanging upside down from the monkey bars while Seth counted underneath them, Evan leaned forward and put a hand on my knee. I quickly covered it with my own.

“What’s up?” I asked him.

“Hey, um, Loudon and I have been talking, and we both agreed that if—heaven forbid—anything ever happened to us, we want you and Sam to take the boys.”

I panned slowly to see his face.

“Okay?”

It was a shock.

“Are you sure? I mean, Loudon always says how much he worries about Sam’s job, and⁠—”