Michael held out his arms. “Like they can start without me!”

Bryce waved as they kept going, and I bobbed my head to the music, seeing the bottle of bourbon change hands from Micah to Rory, both of them whispering between themselves and laughing.

“You know they might start without you if she wisens up,” I told him. “Remember when we kidnapped her mom, stole all her money, and burned down her house? That was good times.”

“What the fuck?” Rory spat out. “You’re not serious.”

But Michael scoffed, defending himself. “Damon suffocated her with chloroform, threw her over his shoulder like a sack of flour, and took her to sea!”

“We were bonding,” D retorted. “You’re just jealous.”

“I’m just glad your ‘bonding’ didn’t go under the clothes before you knew she was your sister,” I fired back. “Can you imagine?”

Damon hooked my neck, yanking me down, and I laughed as we play-fought for a moment.

“I’m starting to feel like we need to grab this girl and Emory and run,” Micah mumbled to Rory.

I pushed Damon off and straightened, fixing my suit.

“We love the hell out of her,” I assured my guys. “We’d die for her and each other. Erika Fane is a lucky woman.”

“Yes, she is,” Kai agreed. Then he looked at Michael. “You okay?”

We all glanced at Michael, a light sheen of sweat on his forehead and his breathing heavy.

“My heart’s jackhammering,” he panted, letting out a nervous chuckle, “like that day we walked into her math class and I saw her for the first time in months.”

Kai grinned, squeezing his shoulder. “That’s a good feeling.”

Fuck, yeah, it is. It’s an even better feeling when you know she feels the same way.

God, I missed Emmy already. She was all over me night before last, and it was like a new world opened up, and I could see decades of that ahead of us.

I knew she was the one for me.

Descending the hill, we headed into the village, Misha passing Damon the rest of his half-empty beer, and Damon happily swallowing the rest.

I loved watching their interactions the past couple of days. Misha was the only child now after Annie passed. Neither one of them had a brother, and if Misha’s dad married Damon’s estranged mother, they would be technically related.

They got in each other’s faces a lot over the years, but a bond was forming. I guess the older you get, the more you realize how much you need others. It would be nice for Damon to have a brother.

People crowded the streets ahead, “Light Up the Sky” blasting from Sticks and no cars getting through as restaurants and the tavern swarmed with patrons. Vendors sold the best catered food on the streets, Graymor Cristane picking up the whole tab for everyone tonight.

People looked our way, seeing us coming, and we tossed our drinks into the trash bin, heading into the fray.

“Will!” Simon came up, grabbed my hand in a shake and my neck in a hug.

“Hey,” I greeted, hugging him back.

“Congratulations,” someone said to Michael.

“Thank you.”

Food trucks lined the curbs, dealing dinner and drinks, bottles of champagne popped in every direction, and music played, the entire village lit up by just the gas lamps lining the sidewalks.

This was going to be an unconventional ceremony, I’d heard. They didn’t want a lot of pomp. Just a good time and their town around them.

Making our way through the people, old friends and new residents, I spotted the current basketball team in their school jackets all piled on the roof and hood of a Hummer, the one in the front tipping his chin at me when I made eye contact. The captain, I assumed.

Kind of cute of them. Being here for this like we were every year for McClanahan. Someone was teaching the kids right.

The entire park was cleared, not a soul on the grass except the chairs placed for our immediate family as we made our way up to the gazebo. Misha veered off to join Ryen sitting in the second row, and Micah and Rory took the two seats reserved for them. Damon and Kai looked for their women, but I only spotted Ivarsen with Christiane, Matthew Grayson sitting next to her, and Madden in Katsu Mori’s arms as he sat next to his wife.

Michael’s parents sat in the first row, his mother smiling ear to ear and blowing him a kiss as his father looked on, a coy smile on his face as if he was just biding his time.

Fucking hell.

But Michael knew what I was thinking and pulled me forward again. “Later,” he said. “Not tonight.”

“I know.”

He and his dad had never gotten along. I didn’t doubt Michael’s loyalty and commitment to see this through to its end.

But that didn’t mean I wasn’t itching for it.

I did a quick scan of the crowd again. Where the hell was Emmy? I hadn’t seen Winter or Banks, either, so hopefully that didn’t mean anything.

We climbed the steps to the gazebo, and I looked around at the open roof, noticing crystals hanging from the leaves of the trees overhead.

The black, wrought iron circle stretched about fifteen feet in diameter as vines wound around the railings and beams, up to the roof that connected to a point. But where panels should’ve gone to keep out the sun and rain, it was open instead, the panels missing, so you could see up into the trees.

An officiant stood in the middle, a middle-aged judge with short brown hair and wine-colored lipstick.

I leaned over to Damon. “Who built this gazebo?”

But he just shrugged, not looking at me.

He didn’t know? He’d been here the whole time. How could this go up without him knowing where it came from?

Michael moved to the center, in front of the judge as he fastened his tie, and we joined him, flanking his side and waiting for Rika and her entourage.

I couldn’t wait to see Emmy. Rika always thought of everything, so I knew she’d handled a dress, but I kind of hoped they’d had fun, too. I wanted her to like my friends. They were family, and they were important to me.

“So, you gonna be a Crist?” Kai teased Michael. “Or a Fane?”

“Shut up,” Michael snipped.

Kai and Damon snorted, laughing to themselves. What was that about?

But before I could catch up on the joke, the music died away, the crowd’s chatter quieting a little, and we all looked around, the hair on my arms rising.

It was time.

“Michael,” Kai whispered.

I looked to Kai, all of us following his gaze out toward the street and the start of the pathway leading up to the gazebo.

She stood there, and my throat swelled with a lump, and for some fucking reason, I was about to burst wide open.

Shit.

Rika looked up at Michael, dressed in her red gown, bold and on fire as she gazed up at him and he drifted to the edge of the stairs, looking down at her twenty-five yards away.

She’d turned into a beautiful woman. The skin of her bare shoulders glowed in the lamp light, her long blonde hair cascading down her back in loose curls, and her red gown, layers of silk spilling over her waist and down her legs, making her look like the force she was. Gold embroidery decorated her bodice and fat, long gold earrings nearly reached her shoulders.

The crowd stood around her but left the path ahead clear.