Page 30 of Cade

Jackson finds his voice first. “I was prepared to be as mad as Wyatt is, but fuck if I can. I’m a little hurt, but I understand your reasoning. I will still be happy to walk you down the aisle for the ceremony you’re planning. Hell, I’ll even help pay for most of it.” He stands up and moves over to Hanna. She stands up, and he pulls her into her arms. I watch her shoulders move, and I know she’s crying. Jackson rubs her back. I look over at Anna, and she gestures toward the living room. As much as I want to stay and be here to comfort Hanna, I think she needs this moment with her dad. The rest of us quietly makeour way to the living room. As soon as we’re in the living room, Anna engulfs me in a hug.

“If I had any doubts about your love for my girl, you just took them away. Thank you for loving her and for seeing her in a way we all overlooked.”

Hanna

I stand there crying in Dad’s arms for a while. When my tears slow, I turn my head so my cheek rests on his chest. “Is Pops going to ever talk to me again? He doesn’t even know why we did it.”

Dad hugs me again and sighs. “He’s hurt. He’s been thinking a lot lately about walking you down the aisle, and you know he tends to react before hearing the whole story. I don’t see him talking to you tonight. Your mom and I will try to talk to him enough so he’ll listen to you. He’ll come around. You’re our princess. He’s still having trouble with the fact that we’re no longer the most important men in your life.”

I look up at him and shake my head. “You and Pops will always be two of the most important men in my life.” Dad sighs again and shakes his head.

“Yeah, but not in the way we were when you were four and had a tea party with us, or were six and skinned your knee and needed us to fix it and make it better for you. Cade is the man who helps you the most and is the first one you turn to now, as it should be. He’s a good man. You’ve got a man who I have no doubt will be by your side for the rest of your life. That’s all good, but it doesn’t change the fact that me and your pops are both taking a bit to adjust and mourn the fact that we’ve moved into another phase of life. I’m pretty sure more grandkids is the fix for it.”

I chuckle at him. “That will happen all in good time.”

We just finished dinner when Pops came in, ate dinner, and went back out to his shop. I know better than to go to his shop and try to talk to him. He has to come around in his own time.Doesn’t mean it doesn’t break my heart to think he thinks I made the decision to hurt him or that we did it without thinking about our family at all. I thought he knew me better than that.

I go out to the front to let Tucker outside. He goes and does his business and comes back to the porch, lying down next to me with his head in my lap. Looking out at the night, I can’t see it anymore, but I’m sure the stars are out, and my memory of what the moon looks like fills my mind. I snuggle Tucker and sing the first song that comes to my mind. Of course it’s one that Pops has sung to me more times than I can count.

“When your back’s against the wall…”I sing quietly as I pet Tucker, feeling his love as he gets in my lap, knowing I need him close. “…have a little faith in me.”I sit out on the porch with Tucker for a while. I hear the screen door open and look up. I’m surprised to see Mike walk out.

He sits down in the chair across from me and looks out at the trees. “You know I love Cade and Emma, and being their dad has been one of the greatest gifts of my life. Cade and I get along great, and we love to spend time together doing a million different things. None of that is in question, just like I know both your dad and your pops have a similar relationship with your brothers.” He takes a sip of his beer as he leans back to continue.

“However, I can tell you from the day Emma was born, it was different with her than with Cade. I didn’t love one morethan the other. It’s just different. A father’s relationship with his daughter…that’s something precious and different from any other relationship a man has. My Emma…she’s held a special spot in my heart from that very first time her tiny little hand wrapped around my finger.” I must give him a look like I’m waiting for him to get to his point because he smiles at me.

“I say all this because I know we don’t know each other that well, but I think I can speak for Wyatt when I say, give him a little time. He’s gonna come around. He loves you beyond measure, and that love makes us a little nuts sometimes.”

“Sometimes?”

Mike laughs. “Okay, often is more like it. I have to admit, when Emma told me she was in love with Amy, I didn’t respond very well. Now it had nothing to do with the fact that she was a lesbian. Not really. I was upset because my initial thought was that I wouldn’t get to see her pregnant and become a mom, and I was worried that people would treat her differently because of who she loved. I might have blown my top, and to everyone else, they thought I had a problem with her orientation, but in my head that wasn’t the case. It took Cara giving me a verbal lashing to realize how I’d come off. Luckily, I was able to repair things with my Emma, and we’re good now, but I’m still not that proud of my initial reaction. Just give him a little time. I’m pretty surehe’ll come around. Just know you’ve got me and Cara in your corner now too.” I think my in-laws are pretty great.

**********

Hanna

It’s been two days, and Pops has barely said more than a couple of words to me. He’s not leaving the room when I come in, and he’s not fully ignoring me. But he’s just not engaging with me at all. I think I’m going to attempt to get him to talk to me. I know Dad got frustrated and told him this morning why I made the decision I did. I know he also told him I still want both of them to walk me down the aisle. He hasn’t approached me, but he’s not talking much to anyone this morning. Which, if you know my pops, you’d know that’s not him. He’s usually quite the talker.

This morning he said little when Zane came over and told Cade he had to call Ethan. Apparently shit went down yesterday after practice. Turns out Ethan doesn’t give empty threats when he tells someone in his organization to get their shit together. He must not have liked what he saw because yesterday after practice he came into the clubhouse and announced that Zack had been traded. He wasn’t out of the Union, but he wasn’t traded to any of the local teams. When Ethan threatens a trade, he means it.He just sent Zack to the Palmetto Punishers in South Carolina. It means no one on the team will play against him unless it's in a tournament or something, but he’s gone. I could tell by both Zane and Cade’s expressions that they weren’t broken up about it at all. Sounds like it’s gonna be a good move for the team. I don’t know who the Axemen got in return because, I’ll be honest, I quit listening at that point and zoned out in thought.

What does get my attention is when Ethan was still on the phone, and Logan came barreling into the house. “I think I figured out who is sending that creepy-ass shit to your house!” He scurries over to the dining room table and sets his laptop down. Asher comes into the house a few seconds later, glaring at Logan. He stops next to him and bends down to get close to his face.

“I know you’re excited to share the information, and I get it’s fucking important, but next time let me put the truck in park and let it stop moving before you hop out of it! You could’ve been hurt!”

Logan rolls his eyes and looks at his husband. “It was stopped. I’ve never hopped out of a moving vehicle and don’t plan to start. Calm down. Let me work. I’m fine.”

Asher grumbles but goes and sits down next to Pops and Dad. Logan looks at Cade, who’s got his phone out with Ethan still onspeakerphone. Cade gives Logan a chin lift. “What did you find? Who the hell is doing this?”

He shakes his head. “I don’t think it’s one person. I think it’s two. Or I guess, it’s more like it’s one person and they have an accomplice or helper.”

Ethan’s voice projects from the phone. “Keys from the Norse Rebels just sent me a message thinking the same thing. Why do you think it’s two people, and who are these two people?”

Logan types away on his laptop for a moment before he answers the question. “I think the accomplice or the helper was one of your teammates. Zack. I think he’s the one who got the letters to the clubhouse. None of those went through the actual mail, and on the days they were delivered to your locker, Cade, well, those were about the only days this Zack guy was ever early for practice or a game.” I can feel the anger coming off Cade, and I reach out and find his hand, needing to hold it right now.

Logan continues to share what he found. “Now, having said that, I don’t think he wrote the letters or sent the packages. In fact, I’m pretty sure he didn’t even know what the letters said and that he was just the delivery person.”

Zane asks what’s on the tip of my tongue. “How the hell do you know that?” Logan turns his laptop, and on it is cam footage from the field before the last game Cade played. It shows thesidelines and some of the guys talking. Logan points to Zack, Justice, and Anders, all standing, drinking water, and talking. “I can’t get the volume higher for you all to hear it, but when I isolated the sound as much as I could, it was this older guy telling both of them about what was found on your porch that day and about the letters that were in your locker and the type of shit they said. Watch Zack’s face.” I move closer to the monitor so I can see Zack’s face better, and a look of disgust and horror comes over his face.

Zane sighs. “Well, maybe the fucker has at least a little bit of a conscience after all. That or he just realized who he’s associated with is completely off their rocker and could come after him next.”