Sanctuary (Family Justice Book 3)

by Halliday, Suzanne

  Meghan knew the dress. It was an absolute favorite and not just because she looked hot in it. The dark green back and white front of the square-neck dress with the cap sleeves clung to her like a second skin and made her curves a blessing. It was, in a word, perfect.

  “So that’s settled.” Ma chuckled. “And here’s the anklet. Right where you left it on the dresser. Now hurry, child. You don’t want to keep Father Ed waiting.”

  Bounding up the steps to the O’Brien front door, Alex struggled with his flapping tie and tried to smooth his unruly hair. He and the guys had been hanging most of the day with Meghan’s brothers and a couple of their buddies. After a whirlwind tour of Meghan’s childhood haunts, they ended up at the Fireman’s Hall to check things out for the evening ahead. The place had been completely transformed into a badass cowboy honky-tonk, and Dev hadn’t been kidding about the gargantuan size of the drum kit they’d rounded up.

  Unable to resist, they started drinking and fucking around—mapping out exactly what they wanted. He’d dropped a substantial wad of cash on a bunch of guys to handle the sound and lights while Mike and Deval ran the videographer through what to expect. Finn? That little fucker was all but carrying Parker’s damn coat. Talk about a man-crush. Shit. The younger guy hung on Sullivan’s every word.

  And now, here he was, scrambling to make himself presentable and hopefully arrive anywhere near on time as he came to fetch his bride for their wedding rehearsal. Breathing into his hand just before ringing the doorbell, he was relieved not to smell like a brewery. Those damn O’Brien boys had iron stomachs. He’d never seen anyone put away as much beer as they did.

  When the door swung open and Maggie O’Brien greeted him with a warm smile, he knew that he was looking into the future and seeing what his Irish goddess would look like in thirty years. The woman was an older, and just as beautiful, green –eyed and curvaceous version of her daughter. He and Paddy had more in common than maybe they realized.

  “Alex,” she gushed. “My, don’t you look dashing tonight.”

  Um, okay, although dashing was a stretch. Wearing black jeans and dress boots, he had on a plain white button-down shirt and a sports coat. The tie he added as an afterthought right about the time he admitted that without Meghan to pick out his clothes, he was a hapless mess.

  “Good evening, Maggie,” he said as he brushed her cheek with a polite kiss. “And you, of course, take my breath away.”

  She smacked him playfully on the chest, exactly the way her daughter did, and blushed. “Oh, you!”

  Stepping into the front hallway, he heard voices coming from the back of the house. “Your parents are here. We’re all riding together with the Sullivans plus your two uncles. I believe Stephanie decided to travel with the ladies.”

  “Is Meghan ready?”

  As he asked the question, she motioned to him to shush with a finger to her mouth. Tiptoeing to the parlor door, she went to pull it shut. Curious, he looked over her shoulder and stopped dead. Meghan was there in a familiar looking dress only with some sort of shawl thrown about her shoulders. She spoke quietly to someone, gracefully crossed herself, folded her hands, and sank to her knees.

  What the fucking fuck was going on?

  As the door silently shut, Maggie put her arm through his and hugged tight. “She’s giving her confession to your uncle. Best we don’t interrupt.”

  Seriously? Since when did Meghan go to confession and what exactly did she imagine she needed to confess? The woman didn’t have a truly bitchy bone in her body. Everyone adored her, and he’d rarely, if ever, heard her say anything snarky that required confessing.

  “Faith means a lot to my daughter,” she added. Okay, well, that he knew, and it was something he’d been giving a lot of thought to.

  As they wandered into the family room where his parents, along with Calder, Uncle Matt, and Aunt Wendy were gathered, he straightened instantly and had to stop from offering a salute when Patrick O’Brien stood and joined his wife. The man still gave him a case of the shits. Despite their regular conversations, he wasn’t entirely sure that Meghan’s beloved father liked him all that much.

  “I was just telling Alex how much Meggie’s faith affects her life.”

  Offering a polite handshake, he speared Alex with a look. “Don’t care for the fact that you’ve got my daughter squirreled away in some corner of the desert where finding a neighborhood parish is impossible.”

  “Now, Paddy,” Mrs. O’Brien scolded. “Be nice. It’s not Alex’s fault there isn’t a church on every corner. And besides, you know Meggie makes her own church wherever she goes.”

  Alex remembered finding Meghan at one of those special spots the morning they had the argument about her leaving. He’d seen her rosary but knew better than to draw attention to it.

  “Yeah, about that,” he told her parents. “I’ve been talking to Drae and looking into having a property on the outskirts of the Villa restored as a chapel. Mission style. Not very big but enough for Family Justice. Now that we have a second generation to guide …” He shrugged, but the thought in his head was far from nonchalant. “I figured we should, at least, explore the possibilities.”

  If he handed Meghan’s dad a million dollars, he couldn’t possibly look any more pleased than he did at that moment. Holy shit. By voicing just one of the crazy ideas he running around in his head, he might very well have just tapped into Paddy’s reserve of good will. Apparently, having a priest for an uncle wasn’t enough, but an adobe chapel out in the middle of nowhere got him a huge smile and a fatherly slap on the back.

  “Better get ‘er done real quick like,” Meghan’s dad quipped in an exaggerated redneck drawl. “Not gonna be even a little surprised if y’all come back from your honeymoon with a baby on board.”

  “Did I hear you say there’s a baby on board?” his father yelped. Springing from his seat like he’d been shot from a gun, he grabbed Alex by the arm and pulled him front and center. Standing in the midst of every adult authority figure that could ever shrink his balls with just a look, he felt like the dumb kid picked as the target in dodgeball.

  “Did you get that sweet girl pregnant, Alexander?” Parker’s mother asked in a shocked voice that sounded suspiciously like she was having fun at his expense.

  “What? No.” He shook his head in vehement denial and tried not to look at Meghan’s parents. “No,” he declared again for good measure.

  Calder, that fucker, chuckled at his discomfort. “We had the safe sex talk, didn’t we? No glove, no love, right?”

  If he could strangle the man and get away with it, he would.

  “Relax, everyone,” Maggie drawled. “She’s most definitely not pregnant,” she said with an eyebrow raised at him. “And from what I hear, and I get my information straight from the Leprechaun’s mouth, they’re behaving before the wedding. No hanky-panky at all. Isn’t that right, Major?”

  “Aw, jeez,” he groaned as a hot flush of embarrassment climbed up his chest and onto his face. “What’s the matter with everyone? Is nothing private anymore?”

  Every man in the room looked at him and nodded with what he figured was new respect. The women? Shit. Even his mother had that swoony expression women break out because hey, bitches liked romance. Right?

  LOST IN THOUGHT, Meghan hadn’t anything to say during the car ride to the church. Nor did she say much as Uncle Eduardo ran them through the ins and outs of the marriage ceremony. Mostly, she was deep inside her head, thinking about all the things she’d learned.

  Turning out to be the least priestly of any man of the cloth she’d ever met, Alex’s uncle gave her an earful during their private time together. Irreverent at times, impressively wise, and possessing a keen sense of humor, Father Ed, as he liked people to call him, was a carbon copy of his brother, Cristián.

  Big, like Alex, dark-haired, and ruggedly handsome, it struck Meghan that she was seeing the future when she looked at Cris, Alex, and Ed. Not only would her husband be a handsome dev
il as he aged, but their sons would have a damn good chance of looking like his father, uncle, and grandfather.

  Uncle Ed also had a lot to say about Alex as a young man and how proud the family was when he dropped everything to enlist. And then he filled in the blanks. About how his family saw him change as the burdens he’d shouldered during the war took him to dark places where no one willingly went. And about the toll almost losing him had on the ones who loved him and the long road he took to get back on his feet. She was never going to hear those stories and not be affected. Seeing his mother lose it over Meghan’s wedding dress had almost been too much. The emotional outburst drove home that they’d survived a time when losing him was a real possibility. A possibility that made weddings and brides in his future a lot of wishful thinking.

  Curling into the comfort of Alex’s big body, she wrapped her arms through one of his and laid her head upon his shoulder.

  And a couple of sighs later …

  Alex did many things really well. At times, people paid him to think, and other times, they just wanted to listen. He ran a hugely successful security and consulting business with a growing payroll. But when it came to understanding the moods of a woman, he was standing in a line of confused shmorons, generations long, just like him who had no fucking idea how to handle the situation.

  Meghan being quiet was one thing. He was used to it. If she wanted to share, she would. And until then, he could pretty much go shit in his hat. The distracted sighs and limited eye contact on a day she should be smiling and happy, however, was something he wasn’t okay with and couldn’t ignore.

  A sound stopped his thought process. “Is that your stomach growling?”

  She nodded her head.

  And? He waited. Still no conversation. This time, he sighed.

  “Well, lucky for you, we’re on our way to dinner.”

  Nothing. Fuck. Offering even more of his arm for her to snuggle into, Alex stared out the window of the car but saw nothing. Until she gave him a clue, he was flying without a parachute.

  Relief washed through him when she finally murmured something that he didn’t catch. With her face buried in his shoulder, it was hard to make out her words.

  “Say again?”

  “I said are you loved enough?”

  What an odd thing to ask. “What’s this all about, Meghan? You know I love you and I …”

  She sighed and talked over his words. “No. I don’t mean that. I love you. You love me. ”

  “Then what? Explain.”

  He was disappointed when she let go of him and sat back. Craving contact, he put his hand on her knee when she crossed her legs.

  “Are you loved? Enough? Or is there some tiny pocket of yearning you deny because you love me?”

  “Meghan,” he groaned. “I swear to god I don’t know what you’re getting at.” Taking the hand closest to him, he raised it to his lips and placed a soft kiss on her knuckles. He still didn’t have a clue what she was wrestling with. “The only thing I yearn for is you.”

  “At the end of the day, you know I adore you, Major. But … is it enough? I couldn’t live with myself if there were even one empty place inside you.”

  Ohhhh. He was starting to understand. “Baby,” he murmured. “What I feel for you is so big it scares me sometimes. There’s no room inside me for an empty space. And if one did appear, I know you’ll always be there to love me enough.”

  “Everyone is counting on me to make sure you’re happy.” Her eyes when they sought his were filled with doubt.

  Jesus.

  “It’s the same for me, you know.”

  “Really?” She sounded so … hopeful.

  “Yeah. Before I met you, I didn’t know if love was in the cards for me. Not the kind of love I see in my parents. And Parker’s parents. Mostly, I figured I was defective or something because it never even occurred to me that love had anything to do with the women I knew.”

  She gave him some standard Irish side-eye shade and pursed her very kissable lips. There was no pretending he was inexperienced when they met. That was all her. But good lord. The slightest mention of other women and she was ripping the closet apart searching for his box of hidden ammunition.

  “And then you left me, and for the first time, there was a big, empty cavern of nothing inside. A space that could only ever be filled by an Irish wench with wicked green eyes who knew more about love than anyone.”

  “Excuse me, Major. I did not leave you.” The hint of teasing in her voice settled his nerves. “As I recall, you behaved like an insufferable dick. Embarrassed me in front of everyone and then none-too-politely showed me the door.”

  Alex chuckled. He had been a dick, and boy, had he ever learned a lesson as a result.

  In a very prim and proper voice, she let him know just how big a dick he’d been. “I left because I loved you. I left because you needed to get there on your own. I left because staying would have killed me. If I couldn’t bring as much joy and love to your life as you brought to mine …what was the use?”

  He opened his mouth and said the only words he ever needed to say. “Yours.”

  She finally smiled. Feathering her fingers on his cheek, she murmured, “Mine.”

  The car was slowing down. Time to get the party started for real. With a growl and a leer, he told her, “And don’t you forget it.”

  “Oh, shut up,” she purred as they drew up to the curb.

  Goddammit, but he loved this woman. “And on that note my wild Irish Fuck Goddess. The new tally protocol? Still working on it but last night I downloaded plans for a padded spanking bench. Bindings and all.”

  Her shocked gasp and the giggle that followed was the perfect way to kick off their special evening.

  “Woot, woot!” Tori yelped as she and Alex came through the door. “They’re finally here, you guys!”

  Racing up to her for a quick hug, Meghan laughed and shook her head in exasperation when Tori declared loud enough for everyone to hear, “It took you so long, we figured you stopped for a bit of nookie on the way.”

  Nookie? Only Victoria would use such an uncommon word. The woman was interesting like that. And speaking of interesting, what the hell was Mrs. St. John wearing? Did she go to the church in that outfit? Holy shit, Meghan thought. Maybe I better start paying attention.

  “Are you trying out for the Spice Girls?” she drawled as her eyes took in Tori’s outfit. The candy apple red bustier was perfect for showing off what Tori called her bonus mommy boobs. The tight black skirt that clung to her petite figure actually went all the way to her knees. Sheer black stockings and a pair of killer heels completed the look. Or rather, her fluffed, teased, and styled hair, outrageous makeup, and what looked like a black leather choker wrapped the whole outrageous look in a huge, daring bow. The pieces started falling into place inside Meghan’s mind.

  “Fuck the Spice Girls,” she complained with a pout. “Boots, Ass, and Sass could kick their British asses any day.”

  Looking around, she became instantly present. The Fireman’s Hall? Crowded into a dining area, their entire wedding party, Alex’s family, her family, their extended Justice family, and a bunch of Deval’s firefighting buddies were milling about. She caught Angie’s eye, who gave her a beaming thumbs-up from across the room, and just like that, everything became clear.

  Desert Angel was in the house. So was the Ass in their little lady’s band of sisters. That was when she noticed that the sliding partition breaking the big hall into smaller spaces was in use. On this side, dinner was clearly happening. She couldn’t wait to see what was being kept from view on the other side.

  Drinks flowed, conversations got lively, and dinner was fantastic, thanks to some of the best firehouse catering imaginable, allowing Meghan to easily downshift into wedding mode. This was their time to celebrate. To share with friends and family and make memories to warm their hearts in the years ahead.

  After eating way too much, she’d been kidnapped and dragged into t
he ladies’ room as Alex watched with a shit-eating grin, shrugging when she begged for assistance. At that moment, she realized how much planning went into this unusual gathering.

  In the bathroom, Angie opened a big satchel, which appeared out of thin air, and laid out makeup, a blow dryer, a bunch of brushes, a pack of nipple covers, and when she upended the bag, a bottle of lube.

  “Oh, sorry,” Desert Angel sputtered, quickly snatching the bottle and tossing it in her purse.

  Lacey stomped her foot and put her hands on her waist. She was trying to look stern, but the stage outfit and her distinctive, glossy ponytail quite comically ruined the effort. “Really, Angie? Lube? Sheesh. We’re not even hammered yet.”

  Before she knew it, the small bathroom was teeming with people. She realized everyone and their neighbor’s best friend had a part to play in the evening’s planned festivities.

  Even her mother was there, primping in front of the mirrors over the sinks. Mrs. Marquez was busy helping Wendy Sullivan slide on a pair of boots. White, go-go boots. For real.

  Stephanie was flitting around helping everyone. This gaggle of females crammed into a small space all getting ready for god knows what must be a lot like one of the pageants she worked on. As the pageant queen huddled in the corner of a stall door, her hands moving with speed and efficiency over Brody’s girlfriend. Meghan smiled. Really big. She was glad they’d sucked Heather into this craziness. If Brody brought her with when he came back to Arizona, she’d already have a spot ready and waiting for her.

  Looking around, she made note of who was there and once again, her heart sank that Sophie was nowhere in sight. That whole thing seemed more and more like a lost cause.

  When everyone was ready, they turned their collective attention to her. Feeling like a deer in the headlights quickly passed as they gathered round and started preparing her for what was next. When they were finished, her soon-to-be mother-in-law tied the discarded shawl around her hips like a sexy sarong, making Meghan wonder what the fuck was going on.