"You did what?" Rachel's irate, her face reflecting her rage by the deep shade of crimson red it's become. She's normally not very easy to rouse, but she's in rare form today. Her laid-back personality is nowhere to be found. The vein bulging in her forehead makes me want to giggle-she looks like a Klingon-but I choke back the urge. Glancing at my watch, I wonder how long this persecution will continue. I get she's angry. I get it; they're all angry. But the fact of the matter is I'm thirty-six years old. Before this weekend, I've never married, and never seriously considered marrying. At my age, you don't need to date someone for three years to know whether you're compatible. I'm firm in my ways. I've lived alone for years, so I know; people are either a fit or they're not. Rachel doesn't grasp that concept at twenty-eight with more boyfriends in her history than I can begin to count. She kicks them out as quickly as they come, with a never-ending supply waiting in line. That's

They crowd in the house. Finally, everyone's cheerful and back to themselves, which in turn, makes me content. I love everyone here dearly. The Coopers have been like family since Dax and Cam started dating. They all became overwhelmingly protective of Cam's crew: me, Sutton, Charlie, and Rachel. The Wright brothers were a bonus courtesy of Cam and Dax. Julie Wright is the receptionist at the bank Cam used to work for before her attack, and the youngest of the Wrights. Their parents and the Cooper's parents have been thick as thieves for nearly forty years, lived across the street from each other the same amount of time, and had children at coinciding intervals-four in each family. Julie is the only one of the group who's not here tonight and also the only girl. Watching this brood in my home, I find humor in the run down, each brother having a partner from the other family, well except Dax. His partner passed away several years ago in a horrible car accident no one speaks about. Bu

There's something magical about waking up with her pressed to my side, nestled into my body. I'm sure most couples feel this when they first marry, but as far as I know, I'm the luckiest man to walk the face of the earth. Never in my wildest dreams did I think a girl like Piper would love a man like me. Don't get me wrong, I'm not a bad guy. We're just really different. Maybe that's what makes it work so well. Piper's beautiful but not in a model way. She's not tall, she's not overly thin, she doesn't dress like she stepped off the catwalk-nothing like the women I dated before her. Her thick hair is the color of burnt toast. It drops a little beyond her shoulders with hints of cherry red that catch my eye whenever the sunlight hits it. Her eyes are a beautiful deep brown, almost like chocolate. They're so dark and rich. The color sets off her flawless, creamy complexion. The poor girl doesn't tan no matter how much time she spends in the sun, and she dresses for comfort, in a cute w

"Piper?" I can't find a damn thing in this house. I always thought having more space would make things easier, but my wife and I have very different ideas of where things should go. I lost every one of those arguments when we moved here. She stayed up all night unpacking after I went to bed, and, by default, got to establish the locations of items in the new house."Yeah?" she calls to me from across the house before appearing in the doorway to the master bedroom."Where's the aspirin?" My head is pounding and the frustration I'm feeling toward having to search for it is only exacerbating the problem.Walking toward me, she says, "Does your head still hurt? How long has this been going on now? Two days?" She continues past me to the closet at the end of the hall. "This makes day three, and yes, it still hurts."She hands me the bottle. "Do you think you should see a doctor?"Tapping two pills into my palm, I hand the bottle back to her. The rattling of the pills inside the

I shouldn't have lied to her, but I don't want her worrying. One of us doing that's enough. She has plenty on her plate without thinking about how I feel. The truth is my head has continued to pound and has become a blinding migraine. I've never had a migraine before but based on what I just read on the Internet, I have to assume this is one. Sensitivity to light is an understatement; it's more like piercing daggers in my eyes over and over. If I throw up one more time, I may find my stomach in the toilet, but I refuse to bail on my clients. I won't allow Piper to carry any more of the financial load than she already does. If I'm not working with people, then I'm not earning any money. If I have idle time here, there's no paycheck.I'm on staff, so I get a free membership as does Piper. That includes unlimited classes. I don't use them, but she does. I also get health insurance, a huge plus because most gyms don't offer those types of benefits to their employees, but Core does. Th