Page 53 of Return By Fire

“Paid for my wedding? No. I’m humble enough to accept the fact you all pay just a wee bit more so we can vacation in places like this, but that? That was just for us.”

“Do you have any pictures?” Kody asks.

“Actually, I do. Hold on.” Jed pulls out his phone and turns it around.

“Great photo,” Brad remarks.

“Maris looks stunning,” Nick mumbles into his glass.

“That’s Dean’s sister and nephew?” Kody asks, raising all the hair on my skin.

Christ, what photo is Jed showing them?

Surprisingly, it’s Jennings’s comment that eases me. “It’s a fantastic shot with the sunset blurring everything but just the outline of your faces.”

“Thanks. We’re waiting on the rest from the photographer.”

Lie. We have all the digital copies. We’re just deciding which ones to have printed. Jennings goes on, “I’d love to see ones when you’re all facing forward instead of just that glimpse of your profile.”

I bet you would, Jacktard.

“Still, the love between the two of you is practically tangible,” he says, somewhat wistfully.

“You have no idea how much love was present that day, Jennings,” Jed declares.

Hearing how much these men love Jed, I appreciate the emotional upheaval Kara had in Bonaire. She was trying to give him, us, this.

God, there’s no easy answer. Is there?

Jed’s thoughtful. His eyes spear through the screen as if he knows just where I’m standing. “So, I’m the second of us to bite the bullet. Who is going to fall next?”

The single men immediately begin protesting. They immediately begin flinging insults at Jed, who takes them on the chin. “Always knew you were deranged,” to “Too many flamingoes, man,” and my favorite—again, damn it from Jennings, “Is the sex with Dean that good you’re convinced the rest of us need to take the plunge?”

That’s when the jester shows the Jacks why he’s the most important card in any deck of cards. It’s because he’s wild. He can be your best friend or your enemy. He can protect or deceive you. But he’s never a joke. He’s the strength that holds the pack together.

And he can slip in anywhere.

“Don’t tell me you don’t have regrets about past relationships?

“I regret our loss. He or she would have been graduating just about now, and this reunion would have taken place in Alaska,” Brad murmurs softly. Pain swirls in empathy at the knowledge that Brad and his wife lost a baby so early in their relationship.

“I regret not asking the woman instead of the sky for what I want,” Kody volunteers.

“I regret running away. Maybe if I hadn’t, so many things would have been different. What about you, Jennings?” Nick drawls before he lifts a glass to toast the other man.

Jennings contemplates his glass before throwing the entire contents back. “I regret not picking up the phone. There was one call I regret not answering. It... haunts me. Does that satisfy you, Jed?”

“Nothing will satisfy me until you’re all as happy as I am.”

They all “aww” and coo at Jed. He stands and shakes his empty beer bottle. “But if you’re asking if your answers pass my inner truth detector, they do. In fact, I’ll even get you bastards a refill.”

Empty glasses are lifted and passed to my husband. I make quick work slipping out of the house so I’m not seen. But Jed suggested this when I wondered if we should figure out a time for me to meet his friends. Especially after a recent conversation I had with Kevin.

One where he finally asked me if I thought his father was a good man.

The next time, I can answer my nephew with a yes, having been exposed to John Jennings in person as well as Jed’s stories.

I just can’t provide the answers about why he’s not with his mother. Only Kara can do that.

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