Page 57 of Never Say Yes To Your Brother's Best Friend

I didn’t go to the funeral. I just couldn’t. Not when I was eaten alive by guilt, but also because if I didn’t, then I could imagine Jace as he was the last time I saw him. I knew the funeral would be formal, stiff, and painful. I knew it would be layered in grief. I knew it wouldn’t be anything even close to what he would have wanted.

“Yes!” Aspen’s cheeks are wet when she looks back at me. Soaking wet. Her tears are flowing, soaking her face, but still, she gives me the smallest smile. “I’ve wanted that, Mom. He would like that so much. His mom would approve, and I know there will be a huge turnout. We can show all the funny videos from when he was younger, talk about the books he loved andthe sports he played, and tell the jokes he could never get enough of. And all his friends can share what he meant to them. You’re right. He was so much more than just a soldier.”

She’s been trying to get me to believe the same thing.

But I wasn’t. For the longest time, I was just living a lost life as a civilian, but on the inside, I was still every bit of the soldier I’d always been.

“Are you coming, Rick?”

I loop my arms around Aspen’s tiny frame and lock my fingers behind her back. Yes, I can let this happen. I can let it happen slowly. I can let it seep into me. This hope, these people, the goodness and the love. I can do this. It’s not going to kill me. Rather, it’s going to save me.

“I’ll be there,” I promise. And then, because that’s still not enough, I add, “I’ll be righthere.”

Chapter seventeen

Aspen

Epilogue

It’s amazing what love can do for a person.

Rick sleeps through the night. I always thought he didn’t sleep because he didn’t want to dream or have nightmares, but he doesn’t, and I don’t think he ever did. He was just so well trained that he couldn’t make his body cooperate. I also don’t think he ever felt properly safe, and having an expensive security system and a huge, fairly impenetrable house had nothing to do with it.

Once he first started to open up, there was no stopping him. Rick is marvelously kind. He’s one of the most brilliant people I know, and he’s generous. He still cares very much about this country, even if he’s not serving it officially, and he cares aboutthe wider world too. He loves being a part of our family. Nothing is more important to him.

I once claimed him because he needed to be claimed. He needed to know he belonged to someone, that he mattered and was a part of their heart. Ever since that day, though, he’s been claiming me in little ways, and now we belong to each other.

After we did finally confess to my parents that we got married and then got an annulment, they made us promise to save a real marriage for when we were absolutely certain. Love can be just as strong without a ring. There are always vows and promises involved when you truly want to be with someone. So, we waited. We waited, and we made it official last year, two and a half years after we got the annulment.

“Patrick McDonald, what do you think you’re doing?” I blink sleepily into yellow, watery sunlight. At least the sun is up before Rick. Or maybe not. He has a habit of rising at ungodly early hours, but that means he goes to bed early, too, and I’m not going to complain about that. Often, we don’t get to sleep until late.

He tugs on a fresh T-shirt and shakes out a pair of jeans from the dresser drawer. He’s so neat with his folding, and I swear nothing ever has even a fold line in it when he’s done with it. I hang most of my clothes, but I’ve seen the marvel of nature that is his shirts and pants and even his boxers and socks.

“Your dad’s fishes. I need to make sure they’re okay.”

I smile softly at him while blinking my poor, tired eyes. It must be five in the morning. The sun gets up early in June. I pat the empty spot on the bed and run my palm over the creased sheets. They’re still warm. “Sweetheart, I think they can wait an hour. Dad doesn’t even get up until seven or seven-thirty. It’s like, what? Five now? They can wait a few hours.”

“I promised I’d take care of them while they’re gone.”

My parents are in Scotland for a month, taking a honeymoon sort of trip that they never took when they were younger because they didn’t have the money. Back then, when my dad met my mom, not expecting to find love again, he was helping to support Jace and his mom, so he didn’t have a lot of extra cash. My parents also both worked, and it was hard for them to take any amount of extended time off. Then, I came along a few years later, and theyreallydidn’t have any time or extra cash to go away for an extended vacation.

Rick made it possible for them to retire. Last year, he finally got his grandpa’s finances sorted out. He was able to sell the house in San Jose, which he had been renting out until he could get it free and clear. Then, in the interim, we bought the house down the street from my parents because he did have some cash on hand. And we fixed it up. After he really came into his money, no one wanted to move.Yet. We’ll get there someday. We just haven’t picked a place or a country, and no one needs a mansion. We might even buy a big house with a basement suite and have my parents live there, with us on the top floor, or switch it around if they want, but nothing has been decided yet.

We truly fell in love with Atlanta, but maybe that’s because we fell in love with each other in Atlanta. We might have been falling before that, but the real deal happened after we got here. We got married just a few months ago, in April, in Atlanta. The city won’t hold us forever, but it will hold a great big part of my heart for the rest of my life. Rick’s too. Atlanta is also the place where we found out we were starting our own family. We’ve been trying for months, and three weeks ago, I got the very early first positive test.

It’s still so early, but I’m definitely pregnant, even if I don’t feel tired or sick yet. Even if that never happens for me, in a few months, there’s going to be a tiny little bump, and that bump will grow, and then our son or daughter will make their way intoa world that I hope will be wonderful like the one I grew up in. For them, it’s going to be a world completely different from how Rick was raised. Our child will be loved. He or she will be wanted beyond measure. Our child will be adored and have family, always.

Rick was so scared when we first started trying for a baby. I went off birth control over six months ago. We talked about it. He said he’d be a shit father, not ever having had one of his own, but it only took a few days to convince him that he’d be the best father in the world. My dad was probably the most responsible for that because after he told Rick that he did indeed have a father now, Rick came to me and said it was never too late to learn. He said he’d do everything in his power to be a good dad. He was so shy when he confessed to me that, secretly, some part of him always wanted children.

I push the sheets off and slip to the edge of the bed. Instead of getting out, I pull my T-shirt over my head and wriggle out of my shorts. “Now, can I convince you to stay in bed for another hour?”

Rick can’t hide how his pupils become enormous. “That’s devious, Mrs. McDonald. That’s cheating. Those poor fish. They’re going to be neglected. They were already neglected. I can’t let them return to that state.”

They’re rescue fish. My dad didn’t end up having an ant or a worm farm, but he did run across a coworker who was genuinely distressed about what to do with a tank full of fish that his son no longer wanted to look after. Dad offered to take them, and so started the rescue fish mission. He now has ten tanks, all set up in the basement, and it’s been a real source of joy for him. For Rick too, honestly. They sometimes spend hours in the basement together, talking about life, cleaning tanks, and learning about how to give those fish the best life they can have.

“The fish will be fine for another half an hour if I can’t convince you to stay the whole hour. But if you give me enough time to shower with you, I can go over with you, and while you feed them, I’ll make us blueberry pancakes.”

“Your parents cleaned out their fridge,” Rick points out.

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