“Excuse me?” he demanded and then glared at each unmarried Rock Chick in turn (these would be Stella, Sadie and Ally). “Which one of you didn’t tell me first?”
“Honey bunch, just cool your jets and sit down.” It was Daisy now doing the bossing.
She’d also come up behind him in order to shove him into one of Indy’s armchairs, an armchair that Jet hastily exited so he could aim his ass at it.
This he did.
But he did it speaking.
Or, as was his way, declaring.
“I think it’s been downright ratified that I’m the official Rock Chick Wedding Planner. And we’ve now had four nuptials, so not a single one of you is uninformed about the fact that every second of planning is essential to providing a matrimonial experience à la Tod that is all it can be.” He waved a hand in the air. “Now, I’ll allow that I might not be the first officially unofficial Rock Chick who’s called when one of the Hot Bunch pops the question. And I’ll put out there right now, if it’s during hanky-panky, as Roxie got her proposal, I don’t want to be the first to get the call post said hanky-panky. But I damn well better be the second one, post-coital notwithstanding,” Tod informed the three Chicklets in question (those being Stella, Sadie and Ally).
“Uh . . . you’re not the official wedding planner of this one,” Jules told him.
Tod’s eyes narrowed.
Okay, so the tangerine and chocolate wedding he suggested for Indy and Lee was perhaps a bit avant-garde for this group. You had to have a certain kind of chutzpah to pull off such a feat as tangerine and chocolate. And although these women had that in spades, it wasn’t the right kind to pull off the sublime experience of the boldest tangerine and the richest chocolate.
But he hadn’t missed a step in the planning and execution of Indy’s, Jet’s, Roxie’s and Ava’s weddings (Jules was up the duff when she and Vance got hitched so she went the Justice of the Peace route, to his eternal mortification, he could have killed a shotgun wedding—though he’d never tell her that).
“And tell me precisely how I’ve fallen from grace,” Tod demanded.
“I think that’s my cue.”
This was said in a deep voice that Tod would never admit out loud to anyone, especially the Rock Chicks, most especially the Hot Bunch, and most most especially his loverman, Stevie (though he suspected Stevie knew, as Tod knew it did the same to Stevie), gave him a thrill down his spine every time he heard it.
Lee was walking down the stairs and it wasn’t simply because the bannister was a half wall that hid his hands that Tod didn’t notice he was carrying anything in them.
Yes, Tod’s crazy, annoying, hilarious and beloved Rock Chicklet Indy had won herself a magnificent prize when she landed that man.
However, when his six-foot-two, broad-shouldered, loose-hipped, dark-headed, square-jawed frame rounded the bannister at the bottom of the stairs, Tod saw he was carrying a bottle of champagne in one hand, the stems of two upended flutes in his other.
This was highly unusual and the highly unusual part of it was that he’d need ten times that amount of bubbly and many more flutes for this crowd.
Lee came right to Tod.
“You’ll need these where you’re goin’,” he stated, lifting both hands to indicate what was in them.
“Where am I going?” Tod breathed, staring up into chocolate-brown eyes, because, really, the Hot Bunch wasn’t called the Hot Bunch for nothing.
And Liam Nightingale was the leader of the pack.
Lee stepped away and Tod jumped in his seat when he barked, “Yo!”
Tod tore his eyes away from Indy’s hunk-’a-burnin’ love as the front door opened and he saw Ava’s hunk-’a-burnin’ love, Luke Stark standing there.
Honestly, it was good these girls had caught these men. If they hadn’t, such things as a car exploding in front of their house (Tod and Stevie lived in the opposite side of the duplex to Indy and Lee) ruining Stevie’s carefully hewn legacy of a fabulous front lawn would be unforgiveable.
But if Tod and his Stevie got to partake of this kind of eye candy on a normal basis, there was a lot that was forgivable.
A whole lot.
Luckily they did get to partake on a more than normal basis.
For instance, right now.
Stevie and Tod had had many conversations trying to rate them from hottest to not-as-hottest. These conversations were debated passionately. Hell, just two nights ago they’d settled on Lee, Luke, Hank, Mace, Eddie, Vance, Ren and Hector.
But when Hector’s head could suddenly be seen around the jamb of the front door, Tod instantly shot him to the top spot.
“Get up, Tod. It’s time to get this show on the road,” Lee ordered, and Tod looked back to him (and settled him back on the top spot the instant he did).
“What’s happening?” Tod asked.
“Get up, honey,” Indy coaxed, her voice soft, and at this unusual tone, Tod twisted his neck to look behind him where she was standing.
Her beautiful face was soft too and her eyes were moist.
Tod’s heart started racing.
His Indy girl never cried.
Never.
“What’s happening?” he repeated in a whisper.
“Up, sugar,” Daisy said, now grabbing his hand and pulling him out of the chair she’d pushed him into.
The Rock Chicks surrounded him, all with varying but similar expressions to Indy’s, all with eyes pinned on Tod.
“Will someone—?” he started.
“Just go,” Roxie stated, her hands on him, as were others, pushing him toward the front door.
Hector had disappeared. Luke got out of the way. Lee handed him the champagne and flutes before he was shoved into the small foyer and toward the open doorway.
He saw Vance holding open the security door.
As he walked onto the front porch, he saw Hank and Eddie standing together in the yard, Hector approaching them.
He also saw Ren and Mace standing at the wrought-iron gate at the front of the yard that led to the sidewalk.
And then he stopped seeing Hot Bunch boys.
Instead, he saw the Hot Bunch boy.
His Stevie.
His Stevie standing, facing Tod, in the back of a horse-drawn carriage that had twinkling fairy lights all around its edges.
It was then Tod needed the Rock Chicks in order to stay upright and moving as they guided him to the carriage.
And his Stevie.
They stopped him at the side and Tod gazed up at his partner, his lover, his best friend, his everything-and-had-been-since-time-began-because-they’d-been-destined-for-each-other-since-the-earth-started-rotating-around-the-sun.
“What’s happening?” he whispered to Stevie.
Stevie smiled down at Tod, his beautiful brown eyes sparkling.
Then he answered, “Thought we’d take a carriage ride and drink some champagne after you agree to marry me.”
Tod sucked in a breath.
Stevie wasn’t finished.
“That’ll give us the opportunity to have some time alone together before the Rock Chicks’ engagement party which starts in . . .” he looked at his watch then back at Tod, “forty-five minutes.”
Tod was stuck back in time.
When Stevie said no more, he forced out, “Married?”
“We made our vows, we had our commitment ceremony,” Stevie replied gently. “Now we’re just making it official.”
“Married,” Tod whispered reverently, not tearing his eyes from his man.