“Can’t,” Z said with a strange, twisted smile.
“I told him I’d sign off on it for you,” my mum said from where she stood in the doorway, dwarfed by Axe-Man and Boner on either side of her.
My mouth fell open. “Seriously?”
“I, um, I went to Ben’s office to get special dispensation for a license when Zeus asked me about it and, well, your grandfather is waiting outside to see you and, if you want, perform the ceremony.”
I blinked at her. “What? Grandfather approves?”
“He said something about God having different paths for everyone and then something about some princesses needing dragons to protect them instead of Prince Charmings to save them.”
Despite my shock, I laughed because that was totally something my grandpa would say.
Phillipa smiled shakily. “I don’t fully understand how you ended up this way or why this lifestyle appeals to you so much but it would be clear to a deaf, dumb and blind person that that man loves you more than anything so, if you really want to, I’ll sign off on it. He’s been a better guardian to you than I’ve been anyways,” she admitted with a self-deprecating smile.
“Damn straight,” Harleigh Rose muttered.
King elbowed her in the gut. “Shut up.”
“Hey, I got shot too, you know? You should be nicer to me,” she told him, fisting her hands on her hips and tossing her hair.
“Shot in the fuckin’ calf, H.R., and it was barely a nick. Stop milkin’ it.”
She glared at him. “Thanks for the sympathy, bro.”
“Children,” Cress chided on a wary sigh. “You’re ruining a perfectly romantic scene with your bickering.”
King laughed and slung an arm around his woman. “Right, sorry, Dad keep goin’, you’re on a real roll ’ere.”
“Glad you approve,” Zeus said dryly over his shoulder before he turned back to me and said, “Well, you ready to commit yourself to the dark side?”
I stared at the man that had been mine in one way or another for over a decade. The man that had raised me more than my parents had, who was my father and my best friend and my lover all tied into one complicated but beautiful knot.
I beamed at him. “Bring it on.”
Five months later.
“Mrs. Garro, I’m happy to be the one to tell you that you are officially in remission.”
I blinked hard at Dr. Radcliffe but Zeus was already up out of his chair and pulling me into his arms to crush me in a hug.
“Seriously?” I squeaked as Zeus squeezed the breath out of me.
Dr. Radcliffe laughed delightedly. “Seriously, Louise. I’m so happy to be able to give you the good news.”
“Not happier than fuckin’ me,” Zeus practically shouted.
I laughed even as I said, “I think I’m in shock.”
“Why? You’ve been doing really well since the incident in January,” he said, referring to the fire that had so brutalized my lungs. “The chemo worked beautifully on the cancer and we’ll obviously keep an eye on your lungs, but this has been a while coming.”
He was right. I’d been feeling like myself again since April but I hadn’t wanted to get my hopes up too high even though each checkup, I’d received good news about my prognosis.
Zeus’s hopes had been high and stayed high the entire time.
And now, he was so happy he looked like an overgrown kid on Christmas morning.
I watched him as he talked to Dr. Radcliffe about follow-up appointments and what I was and was still not allowed to do.
His hair had grown out in the last six and a half months since he’d shaved it for me and it was a wavy, kinking mass to just below his jaw. The gold was coming out in it again now that summer was here and his perpetual tan had caramelized to an even darker tan. He was even bigger now than he had been at the beginning of the year, so broad and quilted with muscle he was a physical threat just standing there. I’d needed to get back into the swing of exercising after the chemo ended and Zeus had taken it upon himself to work out with me each morning before I went to school and he went to work. Most of the time, especially at first, we’d just ended up fucking on the exercise equipment but the rewards of our new early morning routine were especially obvious in him. I’d mapped the growing muscles like a mountain explorer with my teeth, lips and tongue with wifely delight.
My fascination with him only grew deeper each day I spent by his side.
He turned back to look at me as he spoke to the doctor, reaching for my hand to tug me to his side. Even though I was well, and it’d been months since the incident, Zeus never liked to be in a room I was in without being able to touch me.