Forever Lucy (Lucy & Harris 5)

“Ouch, Lu. Okay, okay,” he said with a deep chuckle, then cleared his throat after swallowing hard. I knew this was difficult for my dad, but he was taking it in stride for me, and it made me love the man who had raised me from the time I was six years old even more. “Seriously, though. We all knew this day was coming. From the time they were kids, we all figured these two would break my heart and spend the rest of their lives together. But today, my heart isn’t broken. It’s fuller than ever. I’m not losing a daughter. I’ve only gained another son.”

His hand tightened on Harris’s shoulder, and I watched as the two men who were my entire world locked gazes. I witnessed the mutual love and respect they had for each other shining back. Tears stung my eyes, and I turned so I was hugging them both as a chorus of “Here, here” and collective feminine “Aww” sounded behind me.

After only a few short seconds, Dad stepped back and shook Harris’s hand. “I could only ever have let her go to you, boy.”

Harris swallowed hard. “I know, sir. Thank you, sir. I promise you, I won’t let you—or Lucy—down.”

As soon as the two men were apart, the others took that as their cue to start coming over to congratulate us. Everyone who had been at my birthday party and witnessed Harris proposing to me was front and center, and I was hugged tightly by all the badass rockers who looked scary and mean to the outside world but melted at my feet if I were to bat my lashes and ask them for the moon.

The Demons all converged on me, while the OtherWorld members flanked Harris and congratulated us. These men, they had all practically raised the two of us, and we thought of them as uncles. After a few minutes, they seemed to switch positions, and while I was being hugged by Wroth Niall, Shane and Nik were muttering something to Harris that I couldn’t hear.

I turned to face them both as soon as the big rocker had me on my feet again, and I put my hands on my hips. “What are you two doing?”

Nik gave me a sheepish look, but Shane only shrugged as he dropped a heavy hand on Harris’s shoulder and squeezed, hard. “Just telling your fiancé here what will happen if he ever breaks your heart.”

I pushed between him and Harris, dislodging his hand from my fiancé’s shoulder. Harris’s hand touched my waist, but I didn’t melt into him yet. “You don’t ever have to worry about that, mister. Now stop trying to intimidate people and go find your wife before I tell her you’re being an ass.”

He pouted his bottom lip out at me. “Now that’s just mean, Lulu.”

My heart softened at the affectionate old nickname he’d called me when I was a little girl, but I still punched his arm. “Play nice, Shane Stevenson.”

With a wink, he dropped a kiss on the top of my head and turned away. “Remember what we said, kid.”

“You don’t have to worry about that,” Harris called after him. “If I we

re you, I’d worry about the two little monsters over there sitting so close to your daughter.”

As expected, that had Shane’s gaze zooming around the room until he found Violet. She was sitting at a table with both of my brothers. As I watched, Luca entwined his fingers with hers and set their joined hands on top of the table. Violet barely seemed to notice as she kept talking to Lyric, but I saw the happy smile teasing at her lips.

I hid my grin as the Demon switched directions and headed toward his daughter. As soon as Luca noticed Shane heading for them, he stiffened and sat up a little straighter, but he didn’t release his hold on his best friend’s hand.

“Shit,” Axton Cage muttered with a chuckle. “Boy’s got some balls. Never seen a daddy so protective of his little girl. Fuck, I’m not even that bad when it comes to Shaw.”

Nik snorted. “Dude, you practically foam at the mouth when any boy so much as smiles at your daughter. Jags said something to her this morning, and your wife made you leave the room before you could start bashing him.”

Axton shrugged. “Your boy is too much like you, man. Don’t want him getting any ideas.”

“He’s a kid, not a hormone-wrecked teenager,” Nik defended. “You gotta chill out.”

“I think you should all relax a little,” I told them, my gaze skimming over all the men before me with daughters, but I paused on Wroth. He had one of the youngest daughters in the group, and so far, he had been pretty calm when it came to his little Dorie. That was bound to change as she got older. The beautiful little girl looked too much like her mother for him to be calm when it came to boys. “Your daughters are all beautiful, intelligent girls. They’ll be able to handle themselves when it comes to picking the right guys for them.”

Devlin slung his arm over his son’s shoulder, and I sucked in a shallow breath at the sight of them so close together. The drummer’s hair fell over his shoulder with only a couple of streaks of gray through the dark locks. That, along with a few lines around his eyes and mouth, was the only thing that really told a person who didn’t know that Devlin was the older of the two. They looked more like brothers than father and son, and if you saw them at a distance, you would easily confuse them for twins, they looked so much alike. Down to those damn dimples that were popping in both their handsome faces as they joked with the other men.

“All I know is that Trinity is a tomboy, and I like it that way,” he told his bandmates and the Demons still standing with the group. “But if I had to choose one of these boys to love my daughter as much as my son loves Lucy, I would pick Lyric over there.”

At the mention of my youngest brother, I glanced back over to where Shane had crouched down in front of the twins and Violet. Luca’s jaw was clenched, and he was still holding on to Violet’s hand. Or, more accurately, Violet was holding on to his hand and was stubbornly refusing to release it. But Shane’s attention was on Lyric, who had distracted the raging Demon, and the two seemed to be having a serious conversation about something that had relaxed Shane’s face a little.

“Hey now,” Liam protested. “My Piper has already called dibs on him.”

“She can call dibs all she wants, but we all know he’s gonna fall in love with Shaw,” Axton argued.

I lifted both my hands, stopping them all before they started fighting over my little brother. “Hey, let’s not marry my baby bro off to anyone for the time being. Let’s let them be kids and allow fate to do her job.”

“Who’s marrying my son off?” Mom’s voice asked from behind me as she joined our group. Her hand touched my waist, and I hugged her side before she turned her eyes first to Dad then the rest of the rockers. “Who is Ric marrying?”

Dad nodded his head to the others. “These three are calling dibs on him marrying their daughters. I say just make them sister wives and be done with it.”

That had the three rockers cursing under their breaths and shooting Dad nasty looks, but Mom snorted and rolled her eyes at them all.