After numerous pictures of the cake, the brides, and the brides smashing the cake into each other’s faces, I finally had a plate in my hand with one piece of tiramisu and one piece of java.
I was sitting down at the table, about to dig in, when Cade sat beside me and slid the plate away from me and in front of him.
“You got me a piece? Thanks, darlin’,” he said, and I swear, he was seconds away from getting a fork in the hand.
“You know you’ve lost your mind,” I replied, bringing the plate firmly back in front of me. “I love you, Cade, but you gotta get your own damn cake.”
Cade burst out laughing just as I brought the first, moist, delicious bite to my mouth and wrapped my lips around the fork.
Heaven.
My heart was in my throat and my hands were sweating as we left our bags at check-in and took our boarding passes to pass through the TSA checkpoint of the airport.
Elin and Elena were cool as could be, each with their carry-on items in the backpacks securely on their backs. They were excited about the flight and eager to get to Hawaii.
I, on the other hand, was a nervous wreck. I was an okay flyer, but I’d rather be safe and secure on the ground. Although, that wasn’t the reason for my nerves. I couldn’t shake the feeling that something was going to go wrong in Hawaii.
Either his family was going to hate me, or one of the kids were going to get hurt. Maybe I was going to be a victim of a shark attack … I didn’t know. All I knew, was that my gut was telling me that bad shit was coming.
I tried to talk to Cade about it, but I didn’t want him to think I was trying to back out of meeting his family, so I bit my tongue and said, “Never mind,” when he asked me what was up. I decided to just chalk it up to nerves and hope the pit in my stomach dissipated on its own.
“Are you sure Rufus and CB are going to be okay?” I asked, worried that a puppy was too much to lay on Bea and Shannon. She was a handful and needed constant attention. She was still peeing and pooping constantly. We never seemed to have enough puppy pads.
“They’ll be fine.”
“What about Carmen? Do you think she’ll can handle watching my firm, in addition to working at the paper and blogging?”
“Lila, she’s a capable woman,” Cade assured me.
I knew he was right, I just couldn’t stop thinking of everything that could possibly go wrong.
Cade kissed me soundly on the lips, probably to shut me up, then moved forward to hand our boarding passes and identification to the TSA agent. When we were cleared, we got into the next line in order to pass our bags through security.
“Take off your jackets, belts, and shoes, and place them in the bins. Take everything out of your pockets, and place them in the bins. Laptops need to be out and in their own bins. No liquids over 3.4 ounces.”
I listened to the TSA rules with one ear open as I took off my shoes and put my carry-on bag on the conveyer belt.
Because I was with the kids, we were ushered through a metal detector, rather than going through the large body scanning device. We were on the other side, getting our stuff off of the belt and I was getting my shoes on, when an TSA agent pointed at Cade’s faded leather bag and asked whose it was.
“Mine,” Cade called as he put his belt and chains back on.
“Come over here, please,” the agent called, and I watched as Cade walked over to the back table.
Hoping he
wasn’t carrying a knife or something, I told the kids to take a seat on the bench and went over to where Cade and the TSA agent were standing over his bag.
“This is over 3.4 ounces, sir, so you’ll have to throw it away.”
I turned my attention to the TSA agent and what he was holding in his hands, then absolutely died when I saw a giant bottle of lube in his hand.
“What the hell is that?” I asked Cade under my breath.
“Lube,” Cade replied, totally unaffected by my tone.
“Who needs that much lube?” I asked, hoping like hell my cheeks weren’t as red as they felt, because they felt like they were on fire.
“I got it at Costco,” Cade answered, and I kid you not, it looked like he was fighting a grin.