He’d gone to the trunk and swung his duffle over his shoulder and nabbed my bag. I carried the bags with the snacks in them, thinking I’d clean out the car later, after a tour of his house. I negotiated the gravel under my feet with some difficulty in my high-heeled wedges and found him around the side, bent to a border of rocks that edged some attractive, clipped shrubs. He flipped it over, did something to it with his thumb then opened it.

Fake rock where Maggie hid the key.

He put the rock back, grabbed my bag he’d set beside him and headed to the stairs.

I followed him.

We hit deck and I peered around the narrow wooden walkway at the side of the house seeing I was right. The one story elevation gave views over the tops of the trees to the town and the vista beyond and the walkway led to a wider deck at the front of the house.

Awesome.

I went to stand behind him at some wood-framed glass double doors the opposite of which I could see some wide, vertical blinds which were closed. Ty unlocked the door, pushed it in and shoved aside the blinds, entering and I pushed in close behind him.

The minute one foot hit floor over the threshold I heard a cacophony of cries including, “Welcome home!”, “Surprise!” and “Congratulations!”

Ty had gone solid in front of me and I automatically stepped to his side. When I did, I didn’t take in the interior of his house but instead all I could see were a bunch of people, a bunch of balloons, a bunch of streamers and two huge banners. One had stars printed on it around the words, “Welcome home” and the other one had a profusion of two facing doves with linking wedding bands at their beaks printed on it with the word, “Congratulations!”

This was all I took in before a tall, extremely well-built, freakishly attractive man wearing a shit-eating grin approached Ty, took his hand and shook it while moving in to give him a back-pounding man hug. At the same time a gorgeous blonde woman with legs nearly as long as mine came right up to me, pulled me into a tight hug and said in my ear, “So nice to meet you, Lexie. I’m Laurie. Welcome home.”

Welcome home.

A shiver slid over my skin, a shiver the likes I’d never felt but I knew instinctively it was not a bad one.

And thus it began. I was divested of my bags as Ty got hugs and handshakes, I got hugs and cheek kisses. I met Tate, the freakishly good-looking man, Laurie was his wife (of course), Maggie, a pretty, petite brunette, Wood, another freakishly good-looking man with black hair and a goatee, Bubba, a man nearly as huge as Ty (but not as solid) with light brown hair and a good ole boy smile, Krystal, a petite, busty woman in a tight tank top with flaming red hair and assessing eyes, Pop, an older man with a beer gut and a gray beard, Stella, a full on biker babe with dark hair highlighted with streaks of blonde, Deke, a blond mountain of a man who was as solid as Ty and even scarier, Jim-Billy, another older man wearing a beat up baseball cap and a broken smile, broken because he was missing a tooth, Ned and Betty, an upper middle-aged married couple who approached me together declaring they were a unit and they liked it that way, Jonas, a handsome boy being thus seeing as he was Tate’s son who was, I guessed, twelve, maybe thirteen and, rounding out the pack, Maggie and Wood’s two kids, a pretty little girl named Addison and a cute little boy named Noah.

After the introductions I realized we were in a kitchen, a big one and a modern one. Then I realized it seemed like a big one because it was, but also because the entire floor of the house was open plan the kitchen feeding into a huge living room that had floor to ceiling windows at the end with a view to a large, jutting front deck and the panorama beyond. There was a massive island on which were big bowls of chips, smaller bowls of dips, platters of fried chicken, bowls of coleslaw, mountains of mashed potatoes, gravy boats of gravy, stacks of baby blue paper plates decorated in white doves like on the banner, the wedding rings on the plates silver, matching napkins, cups filled with blue plastic cutlery, several small vases filled with flowers here and there and in the middle was a delicious-looking homemade cake that had a plastic, traditional wedding top bride and groom stuck in the middle of it.

I was led to the island sandwiched between Maggie and Laurie and I heard the door to the fridge open as there was chatter and laughter all around. The hiss of beer caps snapping off filled the air and I found one in my hand. My eyes went to Ty who was opposite the island from me and I watched Wood shove a beer into his hand while grinning.

Ty’s head started to turn in my direction but Laurie filled my vision before his eyes could meet mine.

“Tate was tasked with finding out when you were arriving home,” she told me. “Being a man and not understanding the delicate intricacies of party planning, he failed in this endeavor and we only had two hours.”

“Thank God we already bought all the decorations,” Maggie noted, moving in at Laurie’s side. “No way we’d have time to get to the mall and back again.” She grinned up at me. “You can find practically anything in Carnal but, gotta admit, the party supplies leave something to be desired.”

“This is, unfortunately, true. Carnal needs less biker shops and more party stores,” Laurie agreed then looked back at me. “Anyway, this means it’s fried chicken and the fixin’s from the grocery store but they do it really good. Jonas loves it. He can eat a family pack all by himself. And I gave Shambles an emergency cake order and he got it ready just in time.”

Shambles? I didn’t think I’d met a Shambles.

I wondered if that was someone there’s nickname but I didn’t get to ask because Maggie again spoke.

“We were going to get the bakery in town to make you a real wedding cake but that was if we had more than two hours, which we obviously didn’t, but we tried anyway and they said they couldn’t do it,” Maggie told me. “But they had a cake top so it looks kinda stupid but, stupid or not, it says what it needs to say.”

“Betty went to Holly and did the flowers,” Laurie added.

“Stella took charge of the kids and did the decorating,” Maggie went on.

Then suddenly I felt my left hand taken in a tight grip and lifted. I looked down to see the flaming-haired Krystal thumbing my wedding bands.

Then she jerked my hand up high in front of me, stating, “Pure Ty. Look at these f**kin’ rings.” She shook my hand at the two other women. “He hasn’t changed. No half-measures for that boy. Jesus. You could buy a house with these rings.”

That wasn’t exactly true (though they certainly would be a hefty down payment) but I didn’t get to inform her of this, again because of Maggie.