It worked for him too.

He turned away and recommenced eating.

“You on call this weekend?” Ethan asked his bowl.

“Nope,” Merry told his bowl.

“Waffle morning tomorrow?” Ethan asked.

I held my breath.

Merry’s gaze slid to me.

I nodded once.

His attention went back to his bowl before he answered, “Yup.”

“Cool,” Ethan grunted.

I watched and listened, my eyes feeling funny. They were stinging, but not because they were dry.

Merry straightened from the counter. “You finish that, bud. We gotta hit the road, yeah?”

“Yeah,” Ethan replied, scooping the last bite out of his bowl.

Merry headed my way.

I started to pull my shit together.

Since I was standing at his sink but was busy pulling my shit together, I didn’t move even as he got in my space, right in my space, looking down at me as he reached around and put the bowl in the sink.

I heard the bowl hit as his face dipped to mine.

“Dig dude food, brown eyes,” he said.

“You give me an egg-goo kiss, I’m gonna barf,” I replied.

He burst out laughing, but lucky for me, he stepped back before he did it.

I watched, enjoying every second.

Merry gave me a grin before he turned and strode through the living room, muttering, “Best go brush my teeth.”

Ethan jumped off his stool, declaring, “I’m gonna do that too.”

I blinked, then stared at my son.

He brushed his teeth by his own choice…never. Like I had to ride him to take a shower, I had to get on his ass to brush his teeth.

It seemed having Merry around wasn’t only good for orgasms and getting a variety of different kinds of warm and squishy.

It was good for a vast number of other things.

Fifteen minutes later, after getting a toothpaste-flavored good-bye kiss from my man and two different style waves from both my guys, they were gone.

I turned to the sink and cleaned up dude food.

* * * * *

Friday Evening

I walked into J&J’s for my shift and knew I was in for it.

This was because Colt was on his stool. Cal was standing by it. Mike was sitting on the stool next to where Cal was standing. Ryker was hanging close to Cal and Colt.

And Benny Bianchi was standing, leaned into the bar next to Mike.

Benny Bianchi was Joe Callahan’s cousin.

They might be cousins, but they were tight so they were more like brothers, and them being family couldn’t be missed.

Cal was sheer male beauty, marred by the hardness and heartbreak of the life he’d endured and the scars on his face. Though, both of these made him even hotter than he probably was back in the day before all that had happened.

Benny was just sheer male beauty. Very male. Very beautiful.

Like a movie star.

But better because he was real.

He was also taken, married to my girl Frankie, who’d lived in the ’burg for a spell, and when she’d lived there, we’d become friends.

She’d moved back to Chicago to be with Benny, who lived up there and owned a pizzeria.

His pizzeria was the bomb. I knew this because, since Frankie had moved away, I’d taken Ethan up there for several weekends, stayed with them, and discovered this fact.

Ben worked the pizzeria; Frankie had a sweet job where she made a shit-ton of money.

She also had the job of popping out babies for Benny. In their time together, which had not been much, they’d already had one and she was heavily pregnant now.

I knew this before I walked into the bar because she’d called me six months ago to tell me.

I knew this right then because the only good part of my current scenario was that she was also there, around the curve of the bar, in a girl huddle with Vi and Dusty. All three of them were on the outside of the bar, Feb and Dee were on the inside.

The chicks would take my back.

But the reason I knew I was in for it was because in all the years I had it bad for Merry, the only person who called me on it was Benny.

In fact, he’d done it the first night I’d met him.

He, Frankie, and me had gone out to have drinks. Merry had showed. Benny had sussed things out. They took me home, Benny walked me to my door, and he’d laid it out.

He was cool about it. He wasn’t a dick when he told me to soften up, and if I did, I’d open up enough to let a guy in, that guy being Merry.

I hadn’t taken his advice.

In the end, I didn’t need to. Merry and I finally got there, and looking back, even though Benny’s advice was solid and he’d given that advice to me a couple of years ago, years some might consider were wasted, I believed in my heart it had to happen this way.

Merry needed that time to travel his path how he needed to travel it.

I was just crazy-lucky it led to me.

But I knew, walking in the bar that night, that Benny knew I’d scored Merry.

And he had a dick, so no doubt he was going to give me shit about it.

“Do not say a fuckin’ word,” I warned the instant I got close to the gang.

His handsome, white smile got huge as his hand came up to his broad chest. “Me?”

“Just shut it,” I ordered.

“Cher!” Frankie cried, just having seen me.

She popped off her stool and rushed to me.

I stopped glaring at her husband and smiled at her, moving her way.

Frankie was one of those bitches who had the ultimate power—she could look all class showing skin, and for her, the tighter the dress, the higher the heel, the better.

She obviously didn’t change when she was pregnant. Great figure, big, beautiful belly, all encased in a long-sleeved, skintight dress that showed cleavage and had a skirt that hit her three inches up from her knees. And on her feet, six-inch platform stilettos.

She looked amazing.

We hugged.

“Cher hugging. Already, gettin’ laid regular is makin’ her a girl,” Colt remarked.

I let Frankie go and turned on Colt.

“I hug bitches I haven’t seen in months. Get over it.” I gave both Benny and Frankie a look. “And you guys have shit timing. Ethan’s birthday party isn’t until next weekend.”

“We know,” Frankie said. “We brought him a present. But I’ve still got that work thing I told you about happening next weekend, so we had to come down and celebrate Vi and Cal’s news this weekend. And anyway, we had to come to cut the crazy since Vinnie and Theresa are here too. The good news with that is that they’re lookin’ after the kids. A night out with my man, reconnecting with our posse in the ’burg, there is no bad news.”

Vinnie and Theresa were Benny’s parents. The whole family was Italian (or, in Frankie’s case, her being a mutt, only the dominant parts of her were Italian), so they could find a reason to celebrate the sun rising.

Even so, Vi was my girl and I had no idea what news they were celebrating.

But I could guess.

I looked her way and guessed.

“Are you knocked up again?”

Vi smiled and shrugged.

I did not give her shit for not telling me. I understood she was giving me time with Merry.

And anyway, this wasn’t big news. The bitch was always pregnant.

I looked to Cal. “Jesus. How many do you need?”

“One more after this,” he stated.

“No more after this,” Vi snapped.

Cal looked to his woman and grinned.

Vi looked to the ceiling.

Merry had told me his sister was also pregnant.

It was like it was contagious.

I turned my attention to Dusty. “You knocked up?”

“Not yet,” she said.

They were trying.

I figured Mike had the mojo the rest of them had, which meant he only had to look at his woman, think dirty thoughts, and she’d be carrying his kid. Thus, I figured that joyous news would be celebrated next week.

I looked to Feb.

“I love my little Jack, but I got a four-year-old, a dog, a cat, a bar, and an alpha male on my hands. I think I’m good,” she decreed.