“I wasn’t taking your picture,” I lied. “I was taking Monster’s picture.”
Linnie looked over at Monster who was sprawled out on the gym floor behind her, panting lazily directly in front of the fan that Liner had turned on for him.
Monster was spoiled.
There was no doubt about it.
“Hey.” I looked up to find Liner with a phone to his ear.
My brows went up in question, and he mouthed, ‘Castiel.’
I nodded and took a seat on the closest weight bench, eyeing the large amount of weight that I’d been watching Liner bench press only minutes before.
There was so much weight on there that it was easily three times my size.
“You’re fucking kidding. When?” Liner said.
Linnie giggled and bent down to rub Monster’s ears.
“Really?” he asked. “Well, that’s just fuckin’ perfect.”
Seconds after that declaration, Liner pocketed his phone and looked at me with a grin. “Good news.”
I waited with a raised brow.
“Your money was released from the state. You’re officially a millionaire.” He paused. “You’re officially richer than I am.”
My mouth dropped open.
“You’re kidding.”
He shook his head. “Not even a little bit.”
“After yesterday’s news?” I gasped. “How does that happen?”
Yesterday’s news of Andy being charged and found guilty of the attempted murder of a police officer. There’d been, of course, other charges held against him, but the attempted murder of the police officer had been what had gotten him the next seventy-six years in a federal prison with a possibility of parole at sixty-two.
Things like that—both my sister dying and my brother finding his life ruined—didn’t happen.
Life didn’t work like that.
“It might’ve been helped along,” he admitted. “But, both of them were guilty, and they both got justice served to them although in different ways. We’ll just leave it at that.”
Suddenly, I had the urge to throw myself at him.
So I did.
“We’re free?” I asked.
His arms, sweat still dripping from them, closed around me.
I didn’t care in the least.
“Free,” he declared, grin wide.
Linnie laughed loudly at Monster, who’d rolled over and taken her with him.
We both looked down at the two on the ground, then back at each other.
“I love you, baby,” he rasped.
My eyes filled with tears. “I feel like I’m dreaming.”
He pinched me on the ass.
“You’re not.”
I pressed my lips against his and knew he was right.
I wasn’t dreaming.
This was my life now.
My awesome, great, beautiful life that I had him to thank for.
All because he believed in me when nobody else would.
I squeezed his neck. “By the way, I love you, too.”