“You think you don’t, but you have to,” Jack insisted. “We both do, but we smile and nod and pretend none of it digs into us, but if we can’t be honest with each other, what’s left? Riley, talk to me.”

“I don’t know what to say. What do you want me to say?”

“What if I die today?”

“Jesus Christ, Jack,” Riley said immediately. His chest tightened. “Are you ill?” God, the thought of Jack not being here, of losing him, of being alone? That left him wanting to fall to his knees and sob like a child.

“No, Riley. No.” He released his hold and Riley stumbled a little. He hadn’t realized how much he’d been relying on Jack holding him up. A bit like real life, then.

“I don’t want to think about you not being here,” Riley defended.

“Think about the twins.”

“The twins?”

“You’re not their legal guardian.” He stepped back and away. “What will happen to them if I die? And Hayley and Max!” Jack added vehemently. “What if you get in a car accident, what if you’d died in Mexico? What happens to them?”

Riley stepped closer to Jack and gripped one arm hard. This wasn’t Jack provoking him, this was like seeing right inside Jack’s soul, and it scared him. “Dad has the kids tied up so hard to the last letter of the law.”

“But, you don’t get it. Shit, Eden has more of a blood connection to Hayley than I do as her pappa. Josh and Beth to the twins. As for Max, fuck knows.”

Seeing Jack’s anxiety was feeding his own. This wasn’t Jack standing in front of him, it was a man who was utterly scared for the future and who for once couldn’t let Riley be the one with the issues. This was raw honesty and terror, and something inside Riley snapped.

“They’ll always have us,” Riley said. “We’re named as guardians on every legal piece of paper.”

“And the house, and our money, what happens to that, who does it go to? Riley, wake up. It’s backing the school, and this new house, and education, and it’s split equally between the children. But would that stand up in a court of law?”

Riley shook his head. His own temper was building. Not at Jack, but at the situation, at the fact his innocent love for another man meant their children might not have security.

“I hate it,” he spat. “Okay? I hate that this is a thing.”

“Me too,” Jack said just as heated. “So are we going to sit still and let this happen, or are we going to fight?”

Riley stepped up close to Jack, until they were inches apart. Riley cradled Jack’s face and stared right into his eyes. “Hell, yes.”

They walked back out of the barn, past everyone, and found Jim where they’d left him. He didn’t look like he was worried, merely looked up from a pile of legal precedents he’d pulled together, and smiled.

“Okay?” he asked.

Riley returned to his seat, Jack next to him. “So, Dad, if we decide we want to fight this adoption issue starting now, what do we need to do?”

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

September 19 was apparently going to be a typical Texas late-summer day: warm, but not one of the mega-hot days. Jack was awake at five, and out at the fence with coffee by five twenty. He’d left Riley buried under the covers with a kiss to his husband’s hand, the only part of him visible. Eden would be here later, but he didn’t imagine there would be much to do. Between meetings with lawyers and organizing today, the last few weeks had flown by so fast.

Eden was the wedding planner extraordinaire; Sean had the interview appearing in two weeks with planned wedding photos to accompany it. Everything was a go. They would be exchanging vows of sorts, and this was a marriage blessing rather than a full wedding ceremony, but at the heart of it, Jack felt like he was getting married all over again.

“Ready for the wedding of the century?” Riley asked from behind him.

Jack turned to face his husband, leaning back on the fence and smiling. Riley looked like he’d been dragged through a hedge backward. His blond hair stuck up, adorably cute, and his jeans sat low on his hips without a belt. He was bare-chested, and there was definite stubble burn around his left nipple.

“As ready as I’ll ever be.”

“I brought more coffee,” Riley handed him a mug, which Jack took eagerly. He could never get enough coffee in his system to start his day.

“Why are you up?”

“I was cold after you left,” Riley said with a smirk.

“You stole all the covers. How could you be the one who was cold?”

Riley stood next to him, resting a foot on the lowest rail and his coffee at the top. “You snored, I had to cover my ears.” This familiar, teasing discussion was easy.

“Het-boy, I do not snore.”

“You sure do, cowboy.”

“Not sure why you want to marry me again, then,” Jack said.

Riley huffed a laugh, then turned to face Jack with a serious expression on his face. “The minute you leave the bed, I know you’ve gone and I don’t like it.”

Jack pressed a soft kiss to Riley’s lips. “Good morning,” he whispered. They hugged and separated to look at each other. Riley had a goofy expression on his face, and Jack knew he probably looked exactly the same. Something about today was special. Perfect.

Love was in the air.

“I have something to show you,” Riley said. He rummaged in the pocket of his jeans and pulled out his cell phone. “This came up when we were asleep. Seems the network’s got wind of the wedding in more ways than one.”

He handed the phone to Jack, who took it much like he would a ticking bomb. He didn’t want to see hate, or bigots, or anything that would ruin his day. He scrolled the article to the top.

“A real Texas wedding,” he read out. “Today is the wedding celebration of Riley and Jack Campbell-Hayes. A spokesman for the couple confirmed what we already know. Officially married some years back, these Texas boys wanted to show their love for each other in something wholly, truly Texas. Here at KLIF we want to wish the two of them the very best.”

Jack finished reading and scrolled to some of the comments. There were already over a hundred well wishes. Some crap, but he ignored that.

“You know what this means,” Riley began.

“No? What?”

“One, we’re getting all the publicity we need for the adoption case, two, we’re gonna need security.”

“I’ll get on that,” Jack said. Security had been the one thing Eden had said Jack could have control of. After all, no one knew the ranch like he did.

“And three, we need to make this wedding more Texan,” Riley finished. He turned his back to the fence and looked at the huge, startlingly white marquee festooned in the same blue they had chosen from so many. Riley hooked his thumbs in his belt, and tilted his head in contemplation.

Jack copied his stance and rested a heel behind him on the bottom rail of the fence.

“We’re having barbecue,” Jack pointed out.

“One thing, Jack. What is there here that makes this a Texas wedding.”

Jack considered the question and closed his eyes briefly. With them shut, he could still see the house in his mind—every window, each corner. He could see the old barbecue and imagine his mom watching them from the window where she always stood to keep an eye on her children. He could scent the air, envision the sky.

“We don’t need to add anything else,” he said as he opened his eyes. He pressed the heel of his hand to his chest, right over his heart, then pressed it against Riley’s. “Texas is in our hearts and in the soil we stand on, and in the sky above us. It’s in our family and our home, and that is what matters.”

“Jesus, Jack, if your vows are anything like that, I’m screwed.”

Jack chuckled. “A cowboy poet, that’s me.”

“Don’t do that,” Riley said. He moved to stand between Jack’s legs. “Don’t talk like you don’t have the words inside you, when I know you do.”