“Yup, Harper is working late. What about you? Where is your lady love?”

“Over there.” Bennett pointed to a booth in the corner where Mel, Grace, and Beth were all giggling over their glasses of wine. “She’s having a girl’s night. Beth needed to get out, Mel is taking advantage of her last few late nights before school starts again, and Grace is enjoying an evening while Jax is on baby duty. I get to drive them all home when they’ve had enough. I think they are working on their second bottle now.”

“Almost finished with it, too.” Finn nodded as he slid a beer down in front of Liam. “Should make for an interesting night when you get home with your wife.”

“It should.” Bennett grinned hugely.

Liam couldn’t wait for the day that he could say that: home to his wife.

Soon and very soon, at least he hoped. Prayed. He’d gotten more than just Paul’s approval in regards to asking Harper to marry him. After dinner, he’d been helping Delilah dry the dishes at the sink when he’d asked her as well.

She’d reached over and grabbed his hand, much like she had earlier in the evening. “Paul already told me about what the two of you discussed.” She’d grinned up at him. “You have my blessing, too, Liam.”

Now he just needed to figure out how to ask Harper. He wanted it to be special…memorable.

“What was your big gesture?” he blurted out, turning to Bennett next to him.

“What?” Bennett’s eyebrows pulled together over his eyes.

“With Mel. The big gesture to get her to marry you?”

“Oh.” Dawning recognition overtook his face. “You’re going to ask Harper.”

“Yeah, and it should go without saying that this conversation is embargoed.”

“Obviously.” Bennett nodded.

“Dammit.” Finn’s hand hit the counter, making Liam jump. “Shep is probably going to win the bet. He had his money on the end of August as to when you were going to propose.”

“You guys made a bet?” Liam asked.

“Yeah.” Tripp nodded. “I forget how many of us were in the pool, but the winner gets over four hundred dollars at this point. Your brother and sister are in on it. Abby too.”

“Seriously? When did this happen?”

“Fourth of July,” Bennett answered before he took a sip of his beer. “So you wanted to know about grand gestures?”

“Yeah.”

“I didn’t really have one in asking Mel to marry me. I kind of messed up a couple things at the end there, spectacularly so, and pushed her away. When I realized she was it for me? That she was the home I’d been looking for? Well, all I knew was I had to get her back. She was the future that I wanted, so I proposed and hoped to God that she forgave me.”

“I see that she did.”

“Yeah, I’m one lucky son-of-a-bitch.” Bennett’s eyes moved over to his wife again, and the undying adoration for her was beyond clear.

“His grand gesture was before he even figured out that he was in love with her,” Tripp interjected.

“How in the world does that work?”

“I helped her with a project at the school. Building bookcases for the library with her students.”

“Jax was the same way with Grace. He built her a house,” Tripp said. “A house that a lot of us helped out with in the making. Took months to do, too. A lot of planning. And for most of it Jax wasn’t even dating her.”

Bennett laughed. “He was running in the opposite direction actually. The guy was a little stubborn in the beginning. Refused to accept reality.”

“A little bit like you?” Liam looked at Bennett.

“A little bit like me.”

Well, that most definitely hadn’t been a problem for Liam. He knew exactly what he wanted.

“What about Shep?” Liam asked.

“He was going to give it all up. Move to New York to be with Hannah. Turned out she didn’t want to go back to New York as much as she wanted to stay here with him. The inn was the home she wanted.”

“And Brendan?”

“Ahh, Brendan is a special case.” Bennett shifted on the stool, resting his elbows on the bar. “He was pretty much all in the second he met Paige. It was more a bunch of little gestures like getting her a job and asking her to move in. She wasn’t set on staying here until Brendan made her feel like she’d found home again.”

“I have a question.” Finn raised his eyebrows high over his thick black-framed glasses. “Where is home going to be for the two of you? You and Harper going to settle down here, or is she going to move up to Nashville?”

“Nashville isn’t really home to me, and I wouldn’t want to take Harper out of hers. I think staying here is the better option. So as to where we are going to settle down? Well I hope it’s here.”

“You hope?” Tripp was now raising his eyebrows, too.

“We haven’t exactly talked about it in depth.”

“Maybe you should.” Bennett frowned. “Time is ticking, my friend. That baby of yours is going to be here before you know it.”

“Tell me about it.”

“I have a question, too.” Tripp leaned forward. Bennett was sitting in between them so he was trying to get a better view. “How is it that you are asking about big, grand gestures? Isn’t there a song currently on the radio that’s about Harper?”

“Yeah. If that isn’t big and grand enough, then he and I are screwed when it comes to finally settling down.” Finn nodded at Tripp.

“I think a case could already be made for us being screwed in settling down,” Tripp said as he finished the last of his beer. “Pretty sure it’s the bachelor life for me.”

“At least you won’t be alone now,” Finn said, and grabbed the empty glass before he got a clean one and poured Tripp another beer. “You’ve got Duke to keep you company.”

“Duke?”

“As in The Duke. And that dog is a menace.” He glared at Finn. “A small bear is more like it. There is no way in hell I’m getting my deposit back when I move, either. He chewed through a door. A door.”

Finn grinned as he passed Tripp the fresh beer. “Hey, I told you he needed space to move around. Frankie is doing just fine settling into my house. She hasn’t chewed through any doors.”

“Yeah, well you got the puppy that wasn’t a neurotic basket case.”

Finn turned to Liam in way of explanation. “Tripp found two puppies a couple of months ago. They were abandoned at the fire station. He adopted the male. I adopted the female. He’s having some difficulties.”

“Apparently,” Liam agreed.

“At least he’s doing better than he was.” Tripp took a sip of his beer before he set it back down on the bar. “When I brought him home he was scared of everything. Would run and hide at the drop of a hat. It’s a small wonder the thunderstorms didn’t give him a heart attack.”

“Yeah, well give him a yard and he will be doing even better,” Finn said.

“I’m working on it. House hunting isn’t going very well. I’m going again tomorrow.”

“See, Tripp, you are capable of the big grand gesture. It’s just for a dog as opposed to a woman.”

“Here’s a big grand gesture, asshole,” Tripp grumbled, and flipped Finn off.

“Maybe you should go with him.” Bennett turned to Liam. “You want to settle down here. So show Harper that you’re all in. Show her what you want. Show her that you’re ready for this.”

“I am.” He had been from the start.

“Okay.” Bennett nodded. “Then prove it.”

*  *  *

Liam spent the majority of the next day going from house to house with Tripp and Tammy, the real estate agent he’d hired. They looked all over town at more properties than he could even remember. Some out in the middle of nowhere that were surrounded by acres of land and cattle, with the closest neighbor miles away. Others were more centrally located, some nicer neighborhoods that were slowly growing and had more of a family feel. And there were a number of homes on the water, some scattered across the coast and others on Whiskey River.

Harper had made comments before about how much she loved living on the beach, so those were the ones that he paid especially close attention to. And when they walked into the last place he knew he’d found the one.