Page 83 of An Unexpected Everything
“Well, if you insist.” Then Dorian dipped Amy into a deep kiss, and I rolled my eyes.
“Don’t worry, bro, you’ll be able to do this once the cast and boot come off.”
“You know, we could probably find a way to break his leg. Just to annoy him,” Bella said with a laugh.
“Oh, I can probably make that happen,” Kyler drawled as he walked into the room.
“Kyler. You’re back.” Bella left me and ran across the room to go hug her brother. Kyler had been able to come to Cage Lake and check on us after the attack but had been forced to go on tour once again. I knew Kyler hadn’t been happy about it, but we had all understood. Life had to go on. Hell, I was still working at my shop, and we all had jobs to do. Kyler’s just took him out of the country.
“I couldn’t miss the Cage family dinner.” He had cleared his throat. “And I brought a guest.”
I raised a brow, expecting a date, and froze when I realized it was Constance.
“Mom,” Bella breathed before she hugged her mother tightly. The other siblings came over to hug their mother, and I met Hudson’s gaze.
When Constance had heard about the attack, she had dropped everything and returned to the small town she swore she would never go back to. And she had sat by her daughter’s side until they had run out of room with all of the Cages there.
I knew the family still had a long road to go in acceptance, but in the end, there was really only one person to blame.
Their father, the original Cage.
But he was gone, and this family was rising from the ashes. One complicated connection at a time.
While everybody moved around to start serving themselves for dinner, having a thousand different discussions at once, Hudson came to my side.
“You ready to get that boot off?” he asked, gesturing toward my leg.
“Still have a little while to go. I probably would have healed quicker, but I’d put too much weight on it.”
“I’m just glad that Dorian and I were showing up to annoy the hell out of you.” He shook his head. “I would like to think that you guys would’ve been okay on your own, but I’m glad we were there.”
I swallowed hard, doing my best not to let the worst case scenarios slide through my mind for the umpteenth time. There was no use dwelling on what I couldn’t change. After all, we had a hell of a lot more to think of and focus on when it came to our families and future. And that’s all I wanted to deal with for the moment.
The group of us took two different rooms in order to fit all of us for dinner, and I found myself beside Bella and Emily. Cale and Sophia were across from us, both of them whispering to each other and looking so damn in love it was a little sickening.
“How are you feeling?” Bella asked as she gripped my hand.
I threaded my fingers with hers and leaned down to kiss her temple. “I’m good. It just always surprises me that I’m here. With all of you.”
“This isn’t what our life was even a year ago. But I don’t think I would know what to do with myself without all of these annoying brothers.”
“I heard that,” Dorian said as he went back to his conversation with Flynn.
“Are you sure you’re okay coming up to Cage Lake? We can find a way to make it work here.”
Bella gave me an odd look before reaching forward to push my hair back from my face. “I love that small town. I love those people, and I love the fact that your siblings are going to have a home to come back to. And it’s not like I will ever run out of siblings to come and visit and stay with.”
“That is true, you will always have us to deal with,” Flynn said with a sly wink.
“I really did get outnumbered quite quickly.”
“And I was the one outnumbered by Caldwells up in the mountains. So you’re just going to have to deal with it.”
“You two are adorable,” Constance put in.
I smiled at Bella’s mom before leaning down and capturing Bella’s lips again. “I love you. Just in case I haven’t said it recently.”
“You said it like ten minutes ago, but I don’t mind hearing it too,” Emily said with a laugh.
