Love Realized (7 page)

“I'm so glad you like it, buddy. I couldn’t think of anything better than a Lego Guy cake for you.”

“Look this way you two,” Logan said from behind the camera.

Both of them looked to the camera and smiled for Logan. He peeked out from behind the camera to smile at both of them and said, “Perfect.” Their eyes locked, and she could see nothing but affection for them in his eyes. How could he have that look in his eyes for her when the proof of his indiscretions was somewhere around five feet in any given direction at this very moment?

“Your turn,” she said to Logan as she stood up and went to retrieve the camera from him.

Morgan decided to speak up at that moment and say, “Both of you get in there with Dylan. Sean, go take a picture of the three of them. I would totally do it, but somebody went and knocked me up making it more of a challenge for me to get up right now.” A few people chuckled at her, and Sean made his way over to them. For a second she wanted to smack her sister-in-law for making it possible for Logan to touch her, but how the heck would Morgan know what was going on. Gillian had kept all of the skeletons in her closet under control and away from everyone in her life. It wasn’t Morgan’s fault. Her inner desire to inflict pain on her sister-in-law was interrupted by her brother.

“What the hell do you mean
someone
? We know darn well who did that!” Sean grumbled at his adorable wife while he got up and did as he was instructed. He continued to grumble under his breath, “Don’t make me give a damn demonstration as to who did that to you.”

Her brother was yet another one of those alpha males who she was always surrounded by and absolutely loved the relationship he had with his wife. It made her smile at their antics.

Logan assumed his position next to Gillian and flung his arm around her shoulders while Dylan stood in front of them. It was almost like he’d caught what he had been after all afternoon and wasn’t letting go. Logan’s grip was strong as he held onto her and he didn’t let go as soon as the picture was done being taken either. Once Dylan moved back toward the cake, Logan managed to pull Gillian into a full embrace and buried his face in her neck, holding her close. Of course, being surrounded by everyone, she couldn’t just push away from him. That was a great excuse to hug him back. But it was a natural reflex anyway because she loved to hold her husband. It wasn’t hard to do, by any means, even though he was a pain in the ass and was the source of her current heartache. He was one of her best friends.

She felt Logan’s warm breath on her neck as he held her and then he kissed her cheek. “I love you,” he said to her just as he leaned in and kissed her gently on the lips. “Thank you for giving me him,” he whispered in a hoarse voice that she recognized as one full of emotion as he motioned his head toward Dylan. Gillian pulled back to look at him and saw all of the emotion in his eyes. He looked scared and sad. To others it probably looked like he was choked up over sentiment, but Gillian knew better. She understood he needed some comfort from her, and being the sap that she was, she was going to give it to him. Reaching up, she placed her hand on his cheek. “It was my pleasure.” He visibly relaxed a bit, but didn’t let her go, and therein lies the problem. She needed to get the hell out of his grip, or she wouldn’t get her time and space to figure things out. He had terrible powers over her, and she always caved to him. It was irritating as hell.

“Who wants cake?” she announced and used it as a perfect reason to encourage him to let go, though he was obviously reluctant. Gillian moved to get the cake cut and her family moved in to help dish up the ice cream and serve the birthday desert to everyone. Now she just had to get through the presents, and she could get the fuck out of there. The mental reminder gave her a little more strength to continue.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Jake stood back and watched Gillian continue to put that fake smile on her face while watching her son open his presents. Even though there were some real smiles mixed in there while she enjoyed Dylan’s enthusiasm, they were mostly forced. He felt like a stalker or some kind of creep for watching her all night, but he couldn’t help it. It was almost as if she was a second away from completely falling to pieces over something. Or someone, that is. He glanced over at said ‘someone’ and saw that he, too, was watching Gillian, instead of his son. And Jason seemed to be hovering over Logan all night. He shook his head trying to piece together the mystery and figure out what the fuck was going on.

An arm coming up around his shoulders and a warm kiss on the cheek snapped him out of his musings. “Hey handsome, how goes it?”

He smiled and turned toward Allie while swinging his arm up and over her head to drape it across her shoulders. He pulled her into his side and hugged her back. “Hey yourself, I thought this weekend was a no go for you?”

“Yeah, I wasn’t supposed to make it down but something just told me I needed to be here.” She looked in Gillian’s direction and sighed. “I'm really glad I did.”

“I'm glad you did, too. She looked like a cat in room full of rocking chairs ‘til you showed up. Do you have any idea what the hell is going on with them? I mean, we can assume, but I'm hoping that it isn’t what I think it is.”

“No, but whatever the hell it is, it sounds major so I'm sure you aren’t too far off base. Your brother apparently knows it all though.”

“Yeah, so it appears,” he continued as they both looked over to where Jason was standing, which continued to be in close proximity of Logan. “I can’t figure it out, it’s almost like he’s Logan’s bodyguard.”

Allie snorted. “Well I don’t like it one little bit that your bro knows and we don’t. Clearly whatever the hell my brother did was bad. It looks as if Jason is trying to keep Logan away from Gillian, though.”

Jake conceded the point. “That makes sense. When I went into their bedroom I found Jason standing next to Gillian with his arm around her while Logan was kneeling in front of her. He was holding her hands, almost like he was begging her for something.”

“Forgiveness would be my guess.” As they stood there musing over what they thought could be the problem, people started to get up to say good night. One by one the partygoers started to collect their kids and thank their hosts for inviting them. Gillian, of course, had pasted on her sweet, and totally fake, smile again. It wasn’t as if she looked that way to others—Jake just happened to know what that fake one looked like.
You really need to knock off the creepy dissection of her smiles man … It’s cause to revoke your man card!

“Hey who is that over there?” Allie asked, pulling him out of his creepy smile dissection, and nodded her head in the direction of a family that got there at the same time he did.

“I think their names are Jody and Adam, but I'm not sure. I do know the guy works with Gillian.”

“Well why does the chick seem to be ogling my brother? She has barely taken her eyes off of him since I got here.”

Interesting observation
, he thought as he shrugged his shoulders. He hadn’t noticed. But of course that was because he was watching Gillian.

“Well anyway, I need your help.” And with that statement, Allie had his full attention.

“Shoot.”

“Gillian says that she needs to get out of here tonight, that she doesn’t want to stay, but that she doesn’t think Logan will make it easy for her.” Jake nodded and she continued, “I'm supposed to help her do just that. She made it sound like she was going to try and leave on her own, but that is
soooo
not happening. I'm going to take her to a hotel since she is clearly trying to avoid Logan. I’ve already got a room reserved, cause I got an app for that.” She smiled and winked at Jake, making him laugh and shake his head at her. She was such a character, so much fun to be around. He was suddenly so glad that she was here for their friend. Gillian had his support, but he knew that Allie was the key to getting her to smile. Allie continued, “I need to go get her some necessities from the house … got any ideas on how to get Logan’s eyes off of his wife??”

Jake shook his head at Allie as he looked toward Gillian. “Think on it. I'm gonna go get her an overnight bag.”

“Why can’t she just go in to use the bathroom and not come back out?”

“If he screwed up as big I am assuming he did, then I'm sure he will follow her.” Allie pushed off the wall they were standing against and made her way into the house. As Jake watched Allie disappear into the house, he realized that there were really only a few things that Logan could have done to hurt Gillian like that—the most common being that he cheated on her. Just thinking that he would do something like that to Gillian brought a sour taste to his mouth. He knew exactly what it felt like to be on the receiving end of that action. His need to seek out Gillian to offer comfort became overwhelming. But just then, he spied his son and Dylan making their way toward him, talking back and forth to each other as if they were working on a plan. Clearly, they wanted something. It amused him to watch them intensely plotting like it was something serious when all they probably wanted was to spend the night somewhere. He watched as they walked closer to him and then looked up at him in unison. “All right guys, out with it, what do you want?”

“How do you know we want something, Dad?” Ryan asked, trying to sound like he was insulted that his father assumed he wanted something. Jake just laughed.

“Because you do. I know you two and can tell you were devising some plan to get something out of me.”

Dylan chimed in. “Can Ryan stay the night at my grandparents’ house and then go to Sea World with me tomorrow?
Pleeeaassseee
, Uncle Jake?” He gave Ryan a look as if to say
told you that you wanted something
, then asked, “Have your grandparents agreed to this already?”

“Yes, they said they assumed that Ryan was coming, too, because we’re always together,” Dylan said with a big smile on his face. Well that was true, it was a good assumption. “That’s fine with me but Ryan you need an overnight bag, and I will have to get some money for a ticket.”

Dylan started shaking his head. “He doesn’t need a ticket, Uncle Jake. My mom bought him an annual pass when we got ours. And I think he has some clothes here. My mom keeps his stuff in a basket in the laundry room after she cleans it.”

Jake smiled at him and his proud stance for solving what he thought was going to be a problem. “Of course she does.” He turned toward his son. “You know you can speak for yourself sometimes. Dylan doesn’t have to be the only one to talk.”

“I know Dad, but we figured that since it was his birthday you wouldn’t say no to him.”

“Hmm, good plan,” he said as he laughed at the two boys. “You, young man, need to thank your Aunt Gillian for doing everything she does for you. Dude, you have a basket of laundry here, and she got you a pass to Sea World; she didn’t have to do that.”

Ryan nodded his head vigorously as if his assent was all that his dad required in order to let him go with Dylan. “All right, go ahead and get some stuff together.” And with that, they both turned and ran toward the house as Allie was coming back out.

Allie put her hands up to both boys in a universal request for a high-five. Both boys of course obliged and simultaneously smacked hands and continued into the house. Jake just smiled and shook his head; it was certainly a move they had perfected with their Aunt Allie over the years. Even though she wasn’t around as much as they would all like, he loved how close the kids still were with her. He hoped that she would be coming home to stay sometime soon, but in the interim, the kids saw their aunt via Facetime. She was a great aunt and would regularly call just to chat with them, which was something he absolutely loved about her.

“All right, Little Bitch, let’s do this!” she said with enthusiasm while she rubbing her palms together like she was ready to tackle some major task. It would’ve been funny, except it just dawned on him what she called him.

“What the hell did you just call me?”

Allie smirked at him. “Little Bitch … It’s your sidekick name.” At his shocked and blank stare she continued, “Super Bitch is my superhero name, so I figured that my sidekick needed a name, too. So, Little Bitch seemed to fit.”

She said it to him like he was dense for needing an explanation. “Wait, why are you the superhero and I'm just a sidekick? Why can’t we both be superheroes?” he grumbled to her.
There is no way that I'm only a sidekick!

“Well what would your superhero name be then?” she inquired. He thought for a few moments, and then it came to him. A big smile came across his face while he looked at her and unabashedly said, “Super Dick, of course!”

After a few moments of silence passed between them, while they just stood there staring at each other, Jake could see Allie trying to contain her amusement at what he said, but she didn’t last long. Allie burst out laughing and grabbed onto his shoulder for support as she doubled over in front of him.
Was it really that funny?
She couldn’t stop laughing.
Okay,
guess so.

“Okay, why is it that funny?” he basically growled at her, growing annoyed. Allie stood and looked him square in the eye with a big smile on her face. “It’s funny because that name means one of three things.” She had to pause to catch her breath a little before continuing. She put up one finger to count the three things she planned to point out to him. “One, you
are
a dick.” Putting emphasis on the word
are,
she then paused another moment to take in another breath, because apparently she still hadn’t recovered from her laughing fit. Putting up a second finger, she continued, “Two, you
have
a super dick.” And finally, finger number three. “And then there’s number three, the one that most people will assume is most likely the case. That
you think you have
a super dick, but really don’t.”