Ryan had done a much better job in his role as best man to his big brother.
Sam had managed to hold it together through most of the ceremony, but when Elliot and Cruz had kissed, he’d been a goner and as soon as I'd had the chance, I’d hurried to where Sam had been sitting so I could draw him into my arms and remind him that Cruz and Elliot would only be a few houses down from us and that we would see them more often now that they were married than we had when they’d still been dating.
He'd assured me they were happy tears, and I’d believed him, but I'd also known that it was hard for him to say goodbye to that part of his life… the one he’d shared with the other man who still held a piece of his heart.
While Mac hadn't been able to be there in person to watch his son get married, he'd been there in spirit. It had been Cruz’s idea to have a huge picture of Mac just a handful of feet from where the two men said their vows. I'd helped Sam pick out the picture when he'd finally found the strength to go into the attic and pull out all of the pictures of Mac that he'd hidden away years earlier when he hadn't been ready to say goodbye. I'd loved getting to know both Mac and Sam through all the stories Sam shared of the man who'd never officially gotten to call Sam his husband, but whose ring Sam still wore around his neck. I hadn't pressed Sam to take the ring off his finger. That had been his decision. But when he'd asked me if it would bother me if he wore the ring around his neck on a chain, I'd responded by being the one who'd fastened that chain for him.
While Cruz and Elliot could've held their reception anywhere, they’d chosen to have it at the house so Ryan would feel more comfortable in his own environment. The little boy had been struggling to recover from what Bishop had done, which I harbored a lot of guilt over and probably always would. This time around, Ryan's recovery wasn't anywhere near as quick as it had been before, but we were starting to see little bits and pieces of the old Ryan return. Not surprisingly, he was terrified to be away from his father for any length of time.
In the weeks following the attack, Sam had spent every night sleeping in Ryan's bed with him while I'd ended up sleeping on the floor. The only time Ryan had felt comfortable not having Sam there had been when Elliot and Cruz would come over to relieve us for a night. Even then, Sam hadn't been able to relax and we’d usually spent most of the evening lying awake on Sam's bed waiting for the moment when Ryan would need one or both of us.
I'd worried that Ryan would associate me with the events of that evening, but if he had, he hadn't ever shown it. He wasn't afraid of me and hadn't seemed to make any kind of connection between me and Bishop. Sam had explained that the bad man was dead, but Ryan was still plagued with nightmares that he would return.
Help had come in a surprising form and from an unexpected source.
About two months after Bishop's attack, Declan Barretti had shown up on Sam's doorstep. The poor man had been beside himself with nerves, and I hadn't really blamed him. We hadn't been in contact with Declan and his family since the night Sam had gone to Declan looking for help in tracking me down. Declan had heard about the events and their impact on Ryan from Ronan and he'd shown up on Sam's doorstep with an idea.
That idea's name had been Calliope.
While the lab mix had originally been a rescue dog, she'd undergone extensive training to be a service dog. Declan and his husbands had founded the organization that rescued shelter dogs and trained them as service animals after Ren had gained so much from his relationship with his own service dog.
When Declan had shown up with Calliope, Sam had struggled with accepting the gift of the dog, especially after learning that several members of the police department had chipped in their own money to pay for the rest of Calliope’s training. While Declan or Sam could have easily afforded the cost themselves, the department that had once turned its back on Mac had wanted to show their support for Mac’s family. Sam had struggled with a whole host of emotions, but when it had come down to it, he’d wanted what was best for his son.
The second Ryan had seen Calliope, it'd been a match made in heaven. Not only had the dog been gentle and sweet with Ryan, she’d made him feel safe. The dog had ultimately taken Sam's place as a security blanket of sorts for Ryan. Sam and I had been able to take turns sleeping on the floor in Ryan's room for several weeks after Calliope’s arrival. It had just been in the past week that Ryan had been able to sleep through the night without one of us being in his room. He did better during the day, but only when he had either Calliope or one of us with him.
Things had changed on that front with the Barrettis’ help too. The family was notoriously large and between Declan's relatives and members of the men's families who made up Ronan's team, there was a passel of kids for Ryan to interact with. While the little boy hadn't been ready to go back to school, he’d been okay with children coming over to his house to play. Those children had just kept coming. All different ages, all different personalities. They’d played games with Ryan, watched movies, eaten junk food and basically done what they did best.
Be kids.
It'd all helped to bring some normalcy back into Ryan's life. It'd become an eye-opener for me and Sam as well. Neither of us were particularly good at accepting help, but we’d gotten it in spades. Not just with Ryan, either. Yes, it had started off that way with many of the Barrettis and Ronan's guys offering to babysit so Sam and I could take a break, but things had gradually started to shift.
A few days earlier, Mia Barretti, who was married to Vin Barretti, a co-owner of Barretti Security Group, had begun talking gardening shop with Sam. They'd ended up elbows deep in dirt as they'd weeded some of Sam's flowerbeds that had been neglected over the winter. Several of Mia’s kids had played with Ryan in the backyard as Vin and I had watched while chatting over a beer. By the time the couple and their passel of children had left, they'd wrangled us into coming over for dinner at their house just as soon as Ryan was comfortable with it. Once the little boy had heard about the menagerie the couple had, he’d been all in.
I myself had easily given up my life of bachelorhood. I hadn't even once been tempted to look in the rearview mirror upon the life I'd left behind. If anyone was having doubts, it was Sam, and that was only because he seemed certain that I would buckle under the pressure of being responsible for a special-needs child.
Ryan's mobility issues meant that he needed a lot of hands-on care, something I hadn't really understood when I’d first started seeing Sam. But as the weeks had gone on, I'd marveled over the fact that Sam had cared so well for his son on his own. Nothing about the job was easy, but it was rewarding all the same. Ryan's trust was everything as far as I was concerned. I loved listening to him talk about dinosaurs and learning all the different expressions and sounds that were his way of communicating with us. I'd never considered myself father material, but the more I watched first Sam and Ryan interact, and then later Ryan play with other kids, I'd started to wonder if maybe it was something I'd been too dismissive of.
"Are you talking about Father of the Bride?" Sam asked.
"That's the one," I said. While Sam wasn't a huge fan of scary movies, it turned out he loved romantic ones. It didn't matter how small the romance was, he was all in if it had even the tiniest romantic subplot in it. Since I hadn’t watched many movies growing up, most of them were all new to me. Not that it would've mattered, because I took more pleasure in watching Sam's reaction to the films than anything else.