Everyone laughed. Then Theo said, “I’m glad I don’t have to think about that. My biggest worry is how to get the twins to sleep at the same time.”
“I’m gonna tell you something, but you’ve got to keep it down. No cheering.” Nick made the statement. “Noah knows, but I haven’t told anyone else.”
“Okay, what is it?” Michael asked.
“Laurant’s pregnant.”
Everyone took turns congratulating him. Then Michael said, “That’s great . . . isn’t it?”
“Yes,” Nick said, smiling. “She had a hard time with the last pregnancy, and she knows I’ll worry, so she hasn’t told me yet.” He laughed then and said, “I’m not sure she’s ever going to tell me.”
“How did you find out?” Dylan asked.
“I’m an FBI agent. I’m trained to find the truth.”
“So, who told you?” Theo asked.
“I heard her on the phone. She was telling her brother, Father Tom. She thinks I’ll overreact and try to coddle her.”
“Will you?” Dylan asked.
He smiled. “Yes.”
“I thought you were gonna say something like, ‘FBI agents don’t overreact,’?” Michael said.
“What about you, Michael?” Theo asked.
“What? Overreact?”
“You know what I’m asking. Are you going into the FBI? I could use you in my office. You’d make a great federal attorney,” Theo said.
“Screw the attorneys,” Alec said. “FBI. Great benefits.”
“Such as?”
“Sometimes you don’t have to wear a suit, and they give you those cool jackets with big FBI letters on the back.” Nick grinned as though he had just sealed the deal.
“That’ll clinch it, all right,” Noah drawled.
“I took the exam,” Michael announced.
“And?” Nick pressed.
“Did all the interviews.”
“So? Are you or aren’t you?”
Michael smiled but didn’t answer. Although he had made his decision, he wasn’t ready to talk about it. His brothers understood what it meant to fight evil. They all fought it in their own way, but there were experiences he would never be able to share with them. Only his brothers in combat would ever know about those.
All his life he had followed a set path. His focus was razor-sharp. First college, then law school.
After taking the bar exam he had several offers. Any of them would have set him up for life, and yet his sense of duty led him in a different direction. Others might have thought he was being idealistic, but he couldn’t shake the notion that he had an obligation to contribute to a country that had given him so many blessings, and so he enlisted in the Navy and applied to become a SEAL.
The training was brutal, but it was exactly what he needed for what awaited him: villages turned to rubble, families torn apart with no hope of being reunited, death and destruction everywhere. The missions he was sent on showed him a side of humanity that enraged him and at the same time almost
tore his heart out. He had learned to do his job without emotion, and yet it was his last mission that threatened to destroy his soul.
His full-time military life was behind him now, but he would never get the scenes of that day out of his head. In the hospital he’d had a lot of time to think about his future, and he decided that the FBI was a good fit for him.
Theo pulled him out of his dark thoughts. “Leave him alone,” he ordered the other brothers.
“He’ll tell us he’s going to work in my office when he’s ready. He’s not gonna waste his law degree.”
“I do have an announcement, a serious announcement,” Michael said.
“Yeah? What’s that?” Alec asked.
“Under no circumstances are any of you to give Isabel your car keys.”
Everyone, including Dylan, laughed.
“What’s so funny?” Michael asked.
“Dylan told us about your drive here,” Noah explained.
“She wants to rent a car in Scotland,” Dylan announced.
“God help the Scots,” Nick said. “Maybe someone should warn them.”
“She should be all right,” Michael said. “They drive on the left side of the road over there, don’t they? Isabel already does that, so there won’t be any learning curve.”
After they stopped laughing, Noah said, “She can’t be that bad.”
“Go for a ride with her and find out,” Michael suggested.
Changing the subject, Nick asked, “Has anyone talked to our parents? When are they getting home? I’m assuming they’ll want to be here for their party.”
“Early tomorrow,” Dylan answered. “Not sure when the cousins will get here.”
“Which cousins?” Theo asked.
“The MacAlisters.”
A collective groan rolled through the sunroom.
“There goes my liver,” Nick said.
Dylan shrugged. “It’s a fact that any one of them can drink all of us under the table.”
“How many are coming?” Theo asked.
“Just four. Sebastian, Gavin, Hunter, and Gabriel.”
“Better lock up your women,” Michael warned.
“Our women?” Alec laughed.
“If one of them goes after Laurant, I’ll have to shoot him,” Nick said.
Noah shook his head. “That will just piss him off.”
At that moment Jordan appeared in the doorway. “Isabel is ready to go back to the hotel. Who wants to drive her?”
Everyone was quiet as all heads turned to Michael.
“No way!” he protested.
“You got her here. You can take her back,” Nick said. “Besides, you’re the only one of us who hasn’t had a drink, so you’re the designated driver.”
Reluctantly, Michael had to give in.
Thankfully, Isabel’s reaction to him had cooled down a little, but she still wasn’t inclined to forgive him just yet. As Michael walked her to the car, she veered away and headed to the driver’s side.
Seeing his life flash before his eyes, Michael rushed after her and took hold of her shoulders, turning her around and steering her to the other side. He deposited her in the passenger seat before letting go.
Disaster averted, he closed her door and went around to the driver’s seat. Her crossed arms and the fiery glint in her eyes as she stared straight ahead told him it was going to be a silent ride back to the Hamilton, and yet he heard her mutter something under her breath. It was a whisper, but he heard it all the same.
“Dumbass.”
NINE
MICHAEL WAS EASY TO RILE. ALL ISABEL HAD TO DO WAS OFFER TO DRIVE AGAIN.
“Not funny, Isabel,” was becoming his mantra.
“I wasn’t trying to be funny,” she argued. It was a lie, but she was sticking to it.
She couldn’t get another word in for a good ten minutes while he vented.
As soon as he wound down, she said, “You’re in a mood, aren’t you? And by the way, when we left the house, I was simply offering to drive by walking over to the driver’s side of the car. You could have said, ‘No, thank you,’ but instead you dragged me to the passenger side—”
“I did not drag you.”
Ignoring the interruption she continued, “—and proceeded to lecture me while working yourself into a lather reciting the rules of the road. What did you do? Memorize the driver’s manual? And yes,” she continued before he could interrupt again, “I do know a rolling stop isn’t a stop, and I also know that yield doesn’t mean I get to squeeze into the lane no matter how many cars are in my way.”