Page 51

Elliot Crane

Down in the lobby with Val.

We got breakfast.

Seth Mays

Be there soon.

“Mom will fucking kill you,” Hart was saying as I walked into the room.

Elliot looked mulish. “I’m not doing it for her,” he retorted.

“She’s still gonna kill you,” Hart told him.

“Why is she gonna kill him?” I whispered to Raj, who was the closest—and safest—person in the room.

“Because if you get married before you go back to Wisconsin, she won’t be at the wedding,” he replied, his voice low.

“If I what ?” My voice rose a bit higher than I’d intended.

Both Hart and Elliot looked over at me, and I felt my whole neck turn red.

Hart rolled his lavender eyes. “You didn’t even ask him , shithead?”

“Remind me again,” Elliot retorted, eyes narrowed, “how your proposal went the first time?”

Hart’s ears turned an alarming shade of magenta. “Fuck you, you asshole.”

Elliot bared his teeth.

“Children,” Raj interrupted. “No biting.”

“He started it,” Elliot complained.

“He usually does,” Raj replied calmly, and I could sense amusement radiating off his body. “But we have had quite enough biting and clawing for the foreseeable future.”

It bought me the time to figure out what was going on.

Because I had agreed to take Elliot’s name, which, now that I thought about it in the light of day, probably had been agreeing to get married, since that was usually how that worked.

Once I’d managed to process that, it was a bit less alarming that that’s what they’d been talking about.

“I didn’t know you meant literally right now ,” I said to Elliot, who had been trying to look everywhere but at me.

“Oh,” he said, then swallowed. “I mean?—”

“Now is fine,” I hastened to add. “If Noah can make it.” Ideally, I’d like to invite Quincy, too. And Hart and Taavi, obviously. But Noah was the most important person.

Noah and Lulu had left yesterday, so I’d have to get them to come back.

“You could at least go to Richmond,” Hart pointed out, glancing at me, although he was clearly talking to Elliot. “ You might not know many people, but Seth here does.” And that’s where Noah and Lulu had been headed—back home. And Quincy and Taavi were there, too, for that matter.

Elliot looked at me.

“I—I don’t want to get married here here,” I said, emotion making the words hard to say.

I didn’t ever want to come within fifty miles of the hell-hole where I’d grown up ever again.

Or Staunton, which wasn’t exactly fair, because Staunton is actually a cute little city with some interesting things in it—artisan shops and an old-style Shakespeare theatre.

But I really didn’t want to come anywhere near it again, either, for at least a decade or ten.

Elliot immediately came to me, taking my hands. “I’m sorry,” he half-whispered. “I thought?—”

“I do,” I interrupted. “I do want to marry you—just not here .”

“Do you want to wait?” he asked me his hazel eyes studying my face.

I shook my head. I didn’t. I knew I wanted to spend the rest of my life with Elliot, so what point was there in waiting? “But I’d like to do it in Richmond,” I told him.

He lifted my hands to his lips, pressing a few kisses to my fingers. “Anything you want,” he murmured against my skin.

“You,” I told him, and he smiled.

Hart made a gagging noise. We both ignored him.

It was four days later when we pulled into the Richmond City Courthouse parking ramp, me wearing a new suit that Noah had insisted on buying, and Elliot wearing black dress slacks and a ribbon shirt that Henry—who had used a spare set of keys to Elliot’s truck and driven down for the occasion (also giving us a way to get back and bring the animals with us)—had brought with him.

Elliot had been ridiculously pleased that Henry managed to make it—Henry was not only a long-time close Crane family friend, but also a Menominee Nation elder, and part of why he’d come down was to give approval on behalf of the Nation.

Even though Elliot hadn’t said anything else about it, I got the impression that he’d had been slightly worried that the tribe wouldn’t approve of me—a Southern white boy who had barely lived in Shawano a year, much less spent any significant time learning about the Nation.

But Henry approved of me, and he’d brought with him the ribbon shirt and a few other traditional pieces used by the Mamaceqtaw—a beaded pendant and a thin ribbon tied to an eagle feather.

Elliot explained that at some point in the future, we’d be expected to exchange vows for his people, as well—which was more than fine with me.

It would mark me as a member of the community, through Elliot.

And it was something to which he could invite Judy and Marsh Hart, which was the only reason Judy Hart was going to forgive him for not having a big wedding, according to Hart.

We’d left the goats and chickens in the care of Helen and Ray Hill until after the wedding.

We’d have to buy a better trailer than the falling-apart thing in my parents’ barn in order to cart them halfway across the country, anyway.

I felt a little guilty about not asking Helen and Ray to come, but Elliot pointed out that they couldn’t just up and leave the alpaca farm with no notice.

Elliot and I were staying with Noah and Lulu at Lulu’s house, and all four of us had clambered into Lulu’s Suburban—which, according to Noah, was often used to transport entire drag show casts and had the remnants of glitter to prove it—and drove downtown.

Lulu successfully maneuvered the giant SUV into the narrow courthouse parking ramp, and I noticed that Elliot’s truck was already there—which meant Henry was, too.

Henry, Hart, Taavi, Dan Maza, Quincy, and a man who must have been Aaron, Quincy’s boyfriend, were all standing outside the courthouse when the four of us walked up.

Well, they walked, and I hobbled—I’d graduated from two crutches down to one, although I was still sporting a massive metal brace.

Quincy let out a shriek and ran over, hugging me.

I hugged her back, ignoring the pain in my ribs and the spike that went through my now-braced knee when I got knocked off balance, although, between the two of us, we managed to right ourselves.

But pain or no pain, I was happy she was there, a little surprised at how much I’d missed her.

I’d have to remember to call her more often.

“Thanks for being here,” I said into the top of her head.

“I wouldn’t miss it for the world ,” she told me.

“Want to come out to Wisconsin for the other half?” I asked her spontaneously.

“Absolutely!” She squeezed me again, then stepped back to admire my suit.

It was probably the first one I’d ever owned that actually fit me, although I’d chosen not to wear the jacket—just the pants and vest. They were a dove grey, and I had on a light yellow shirt with them.

The shiny black metal knee brace and silver crutch kind of ruined the effect, but if I didn’t want to fall on my face, I needed to wear it.

Elliot’s open-collar red shirt had ribbons sewn across the chest in black, white, yellow, and red, with loose ribbons in the same colors hanging down on the sides and running along the sleeves.

He wore a tied beaded belt and pendant, and beaded earrings hung from his ears.

Henry was similarly attired—although his shirt was grey and slacks blue—and he held the ribbon with the eagle feather in one hand.

“Uncle Taavi!” a voice called, and we turned to see Jackson Turner-Manning, a goat-legged baby in his arms, trotting toward us along the sidewalk. Behind him, Mason—carrying an orc baby with a bow in her hair—and Ward made up the rest of our party.

Hart, for all his crochety sourness, immediately reached out to take the small orc—whose name was Grace—from Mason while Taavi tossed the tiny faun—Zane—into the air, eliciting shrieks of glee. Grace immediately reached out and grabbed one of Hart’s ears, causing him to wince, but he let her do it.

“Jesus, that’s way too adorable,” Elliot muttered, the expression on his face something between fondness and horror.

“You want one?” I asked him, wondering how I’d feel if his answer was yes .

“Hell no. I have goats and chickens now. They’re enough like babies for me.”

I laughed, a little relieved. I’m pretty sure I’d make a terrible father. “And Sassafras.”

“The cat is all you,” he told me. I was good with that. Cat-parenting I could handle.

The judge had no idea what to do with us. I suppose it isn’t every day that four shifters, two orcs, an elf, a faun, and a demographic smorgasbord of humans walk, limp, and roll into the courtroom for a wedding. Especially one that an older Indigenous man interrupted to chant partway through.

But fifteen minutes after we walked in, we were done, the license signed, and everything legal.

When we’d driven down to Virginia, I’d been full of dread, wanting anything else but what was happening.

And I hadn’t been wrong—it had been pretty fucking awful.

But it was ending with me marrying the love of my life, and I honestly would go through all of it again just to be standing there at the end of it, married to Elliot Crane.

I took a moment to look at him, laughing, the sun glinting off the mirrored gold of his sunglasses and painting his coppery skin with light.

He wasn’t objectively beautiful, but he was gorgeous and sexy as hell.

I’d known from the moment I saw him that there was something special about him.

That I wanted him. That if he’d let me, I could love him.

And even though he hadn’t, I’d fallen in love with him anyway.

Fortunately for me, he’d decided to love me back.

To choose me.

To marry me.

He saw me staring and walked over, holding out a hand—the left, a silver ring shining on his ring finger—to take mine. He reached up, grabbing the side of my face to kiss me.

By the time he let me go, my neck and face were on fire, and not just because it was Richmond in August. It was mostly because of the hooting and catcalls that hadn’t all come from our friends because we’d just been making out on the sidewalk outside the courthouse.

“We should go,” I half-whispered against his lips.

“Mmhmm.” He kissed me again. “The sooner we go to this party, the sooner we can leave it?”

“Something like that, yeah,” I replied, the flush in my cheeks only getting hotter.

Mason and Ward hosted the party—both because they had the most space, and also because then the kids could be put to bed when their bedtime rolled around. The amount of food was staggering —Mason and Taavi and Hart had clearly gone all out.

I was sitting in Mason’s garden, which, although smaller and less impressive than Gregory Crane’s, was still really impressive for one in a tiny Richmond back yard, so that I could have my feet up.

I was pretty sure Ward and Mason didn’t own all of the mismatched garden and beach chairs cluttering up the grassy parts of the yard, and the whole thing was bathed in the warm glow of citronella tiki torches that were miraculously keeping most of the mosquitoes at bay.

That, and Jackson, who was apparently practicing his magical control by occasionally sniping mosquitoes with death magic. Or so Ward had told me proudly.

I wasn’t entirely certain how to feel about that. On the one hand, I’m not a fan of mosquitoes—I don’t think anybody is—but on the other, that meant that there was a teenager shooting little jets of death magic through the air.

Ward laughed at what must have been a rather conflicted expression on my face.

“Don’t worry,” he told me, patting my arm—his wheelchair was parked next to my wooden lounge chair.

“There’s not enough strength in any of those to do more than kill a few random bacteria and maybe a skin cell or ten if he misses.

” His grey eyes sparkled in the flickering torch light. “But he’s not missing.”

“Does he do this a lot?” I asked.

“Given that Grace will throw an absolute tantrum if she gets bit—yeah, he does.” His features regarded both his adopted orc daughter and nephew with fondness.

“Hey!” Quincy came over and plopped down in the empty lawn chair—this one fabric stretched over a metal frame that looked like it belonged in the 1970s—on my other side.

“I had no idea that Hart was a baker ,” she told me, her wide eyes serious.

She was clearly very tipsy. “This cake is amazing .” She had what I was pretty sure was her third or fourth piece of cake.

The cake was good, although I had no idea how Hart had somehow even found the time to make a wedding cake in the last few days.

I was suspicious that he hadn’t slept much, given how elaborate it was.

The cake was layers of chocolate and vanilla cake, with vegan champagne buttercream frosting and blackberry filling.

The top had been decorated with icing roses and piles of fresh blackberries.

Mason had also put a single blackberry in every glass of champagne.

“You should have more cake,” Quincy told me, very seriously. “It’s so good.”

“I’ve got him covered,” came Elliot’s amused voice from behind me. He did, in fact, have a generous slice of cake—with a few more berries—on a plate that he handed me. “If we don’t eat it all, Val will be mortally offended.”

I felt my eyebrows go up. “Seriously?”

“You’ve met Ma, right?” he asked, and I couldn’t help chuckling. He wasn’t wrong—Judy Hart absolutely got hurt feelings if you didn’t finish your dinner and have both seconds and thirds.

I took the plate from Elliot, still smiling. “More cake it is, then.”

It was almost two in the morning by the time I lay spread-eagled and panting on the hotel bed Elliot had insisted we get for the night, sweaty and thoroughly sated.

Elliot lay next to me on his side, running a finger across one of the still-fresh-and-tender scars on my chest. “How does it feel?” he asked me.

I looked down at the scar. “A little sore, but fine?” I’m sure I sounded as confused as I felt.

“Not the scar, baby,” he said gently, a smile playing around his lips. “Being Seth Crane.”

I grinned at him. “Like coming home.”

He laughed, then kissed me. “Are you saying you want to stay here?”

“God, no. I want to go back to Shawano. I just—You’re my home,” I told him, feeling my neck heat a little.

He smiled at me, the lopsided expression tender. Then his fingers slid into the sweat-dampened hair on the back of my neck, pulling us tighter together. “I love you, Seth Crane,” he said softly.

“I loved you first,” I told him, and then I kissed him, pulling his lips against mine.