Chapter Forty
Sunday Dinner
Crew
“You’re nervous,” Emmie observes as we sit in the driveway of the Marshall house, neither of us moving to get out of the truck.
“I’m not nervous.”
“Your hands are doing the thing.”
I look down. She’s right. I’m tapping my fingers against my thigh in groups of four. I force myself to stop.
“They already like you,” she reminds me. “They liked you before. This is just… a continuation.”
“We broke up. And now we’re back together. They’re going to have questions.”
“My mom’s going to have questions. My dad will grunt approvingly and offer you a beer. Gavin will glare at you for approximately fifteen minutes and then get over it.” She squeezes my hand. “It’s going to be fine.”
“You don’t know that.”
“I know my family.” She leans over and kisses my cheek. “Now come on. If we sit out here any longer, my mom’s going to come outside, and that’ll be worse.”
We walk up the path to the front door, and before Emmie can even reach for the handle, it flies open.
“They’re here!” Linda Marshall stands in the doorway, arms already outstretched. “Robert! Gavin! They’re here!”
She pulls Emmie into a hug first, then turns to me with an expression of pure delight.
“Crew.” She says my name like it’s a gift. “Get in here. You look thin. Have you been eating? Emmie, have you been feeding this man?”
“He eats plenty, Mom.”
“He looks thin.” Linda ushers us inside, one hand on my back like she’s worried I might escape. “I made extra mashed potatoes. And two pies. Robert said two pies were excessive, but I said, ‘Robert, our daughter is bringing her boyfriend back, and I will make as many pies as I want.’”
“You didn’t have to—”
“Hush.” She pats my cheek with alarming affection. “You’re family. Family gets pie.”
The word lands somewhere in my chest and stays there. Family.
Dinner is chaos. The good kind—the kind I’ve only ever witnessed from the outside. Dishes being passed in every direction. Three conversations happening at once.
Robert sits at the head of the table, presiding over the madness with quiet amusement. Gavin is across from me, his expression hovering somewhere between suspicious and resigned. Linda is next to Emmie, asking approximately forty-seven questions per minute.
“So you’re back together,” Gavin says during a lull. It’s not quite a question.
“We are,” I confirm.
“For how long this time?”
“Gavin,” Emmie warns.
“What? I’m just asking. You broke up. Now you’re not broken up. I want to make sure this is—” He gestures vaguely. “Stable.”
“It’s stable,” I say.
“How do I know that?”
“Because I love her.” The words come out easier than I expected. “And I’m not going anywhere.”
The table goes quiet.
Linda’s hand flies to her chest. “Oh Emmie.”
“Mom—”
“Robert, did you hear that? He said he loves her. He said it right here at the dinner table, in front of the roast beef and everything.”
“I heard, Linda.”
“This is the most romantic thing that’s ever happened in this house.”
Robert lifts one eyebrow but doesn’t disagree.
Linda is fanning herself with her napkin.
“Well, I think it’s wonderful. Just wonderful.
” Linda beams at me with the intensity of a thousand suns.
“You know, I always knew you two would work it out. I said to Robert, I said, ‘That boy looks at our daughter like she hung the moon. They’ll figure it out.’ Didn’t I say that, Robert? ”
“You said that.”
“I did. I said exactly that.” She reaches over and pats my hand. “Welcome back to the family, Crew. Not that you ever really left.”
My throat is tight. I manage a nod.
Under the table, Emmie’s hand finds my knee and squeezes.
Robert asks about work, and I give him the sanitized version—no active cases discussed, just general updates.
Gavin interrogates me about the cabin after Emmie mentions the place I bought in Broken Bow; he wants to know if I installed the plumbing myself and seems grudgingly impressed when I say yes.
And then Linda goes in for the kill. “So.” She sets down her fork with an air of determination. “When are you giving me grandbabies?”
“Mom!” Emmie chokes on her wine.
“What? It’s a reasonable question. You’re twenty-seven, you’re in love, you have a man who can do plumbing—”
“That’s not a qualification for fatherhood.”
“It’s a qualification for homeownership, which is step one.” Linda ticks off on her fingers. “Step two is marriage. Step three is babies. I’m just asking about the timeline.”
“There’s no timeline,” Emmie manages, turning slightly pink.
“There should be a timeline. I’m not getting any younger, Emmie. I want to be a fun grandma, not an old grandma.”
“You’re fifty-eight.”
“Exactly! The clock is ticking!”
I glance at Emmie, who looks like she wants the floor to swallow her whole. Robert is suddenly very interested in his mashed potatoes. Gavin is smirking into his beer.
“We haven’t discussed timelines,” I offer carefully.
“But you want children?” Linda pivots to me with laser focus. “You see yourself as a father someday?”
“I—” I think about my conversation with Dr. Reyes. About wanting things. About deserving them. “Yeah. Someday. I do.”
Linda’s entire face transforms into something radiant. “Robert, did you hear that?”
“I’m sitting right here, Linda.”
“He wants babies!”
“He said someday,” Robert manages.
“Someday is soon enough for me.” She clasps her hands together. “Oh, this is wonderful. You two are going to make the most beautiful children. With your eyes—” She points at me. “And her smile—” She points at Emmie. “They’ll be absolutely gorgeous.”
“Mom, can we please talk about literally anything else?”
“Fine, fine.” Linda waves a hand. “We don’t have to talk about babies.” A pause. “But you are being safe, right? Unless you’re not being safe on purpose, which is also fine—”
“Mom.”
“I’m just saying, if you wanted to speed up the timeline, I would be very supportive—”
“We’re being safe!” Emmie’s face is approximately the color of the cranberry sauce. “Good grief, Mom, we are not discussing our birth control at the dinner table.”
“Why not? Sex is natural. It’s beautiful. It’s how we got you, you know.”
“I don’t need to be reminded.”
Linda smiles, looking wistful. “Your father and I had a very healthy—”
“OKAY.” Gavin stands abruptly, his chair scraping back. “I’m going to get more beer. Anyone else need more beer?”
He flees to the kitchen. I consider following him.
Linda, undeterred, turns back to me. “All I’m saying is, when the time comes, you two shouldn’t wait too long. Emmie’s got good childbearing hips—”
“Mom, I swear to God—”
“It’s a compliment! Robert, tell her it’s a compliment.”
“It’s a compliment,” Robert says dutifully, though he’s clearly trying not to laugh.
“See? Your father agrees.” Linda picks up her wine glass. “I just want you to be happy, sweetheart. Both of you. And if happy includes a few grandchildren for me to spoil, well—” She shrugs. “I won’t complain a drop.”
Emmie drops her head into her hands. “This is a nightmare.”
“This is family dinner,” Robert corrects. “There’s a difference. Barely.”
I look around the table—at Linda’s shameless enthusiasm, Robert’s quiet amusement, Gavin returning with an armful of beer bottles and a traumatized expression. He begins distributing the beer and hands me two bottles.
This is chaos. This is loud and messy and completely without boundaries.
I love it.
“I appreciate the support, Mrs. Marshall,” I say.
“Linda. You call me Linda. Or Mom, if you’re feeling brave.”
“Mom,” Emmie warns.
“What? He’s going to be family officially someday. Might as well start now.” She winks at me. “No pressure.”
“No pressure at all,” I agree, and for some reason, I mean it.
I haven’t called anyone Mom since I was seven and my mother died.
It might take me a while to warm up to the idea.
But I do like it. The idea of having someone mothering me again, especially if that someone is Linda Marshall, with her big heart and her complete lack of a filter.
After dinner, I help Robert with the dishes while the others migrate to the living room. It’s quiet in the kitchen—just the clink of plates and the running water.
“Sorry about Linda,” he says after a while. “She gets excited.”
“I noticed.”
“She’s been talking about grandbabies since Emmie turned twenty-five. You get used to it.” He hands me a pot to dry. “For what it’s worth, I’m glad you two worked it out. Whatever happened before—that’s your business. What matters is where you go from here.”
“Yes, sir.”
“And Crew?” He turns to look at me, and there’s something serious in his expression. “I meant what I said before. You hurt my daughter, I’ll hurt you. But I also meant the other part.”
“What other part?”
“That you’re welcome here. That you’re part of this family now, for as long as you want to be.” He claps me on the shoulder. “So don’t screw it up.”
“I won’t, sir.”
“Good.” He turns back to the dishes. “And stop calling me sir. It’s Robert. Or Dad, if you ever get there.”
My chest does something complicated.
“Robert,” I manage.
“That’s better.”
We finish the dishes in comfortable silence, and when I rejoin Emmie in the living room, she looks up at me with a question in her eyes.
“Everything okay?”
“Yeah.” I settle onto the couch beside her, and Linda immediately starts showing us photos of the neighbor’s new baby, hinting heavily that she’d like one of her own to photograph. “Everything’s good.”
Emmie leans into my side. “Told you it would be fine.”
“Your mother asked about our birth control method,” I lean in, whispering near her ear with a bemused smirk.
Emmie fights a smile. “That’s her love language.”
I lift one eyebrow. “Invasive questions about our reproductive choices?”
“Aggressive investment in our future happiness.” She grins up at me. “Same thing.”
I shake my head, but I’m smiling.
This family is insane.
Yet somehow, I want to be part of it forever.
Later, as we’re leaving, Linda pulls me into a hug that lasts approximately three minutes.
“You take care of my girl,” she whispers.
“I will.”
“And come back soon. Don’t be a stranger. You’re always welcome here, Crew. Always.”
“Thank you, Linda.”
She pulls back, eyes suspiciously bright. “Now get out of here before I start crying. Robert, they’re leaving!”
“I can see that, Linda.”
“Well, say goodbye!”
Robert appears and shakes my hand, his grip firm and warm. Gavin does the same, though his comes with a look that says I’m watching you.
And then we’re in the truck, pulling out of the driveway, Linda waving enthusiastically from the porch.
“So,” Emmie says. “That was family dinner.”
“That was family dinner.”
“Still want to be part of this circus?”
I glance at her—at her smile, her messy hair, the way she’s looking at me like I’m exactly where I belong.
“Yeah,” I say. “I really do.”
She reaches over and takes my hand.
“Good. Because I don’t think my mom would let you leave at this point. You’re stuck with us, Jensen.”
“Worse fates.”
“Much worse.”
I pull her hand to my lips and kiss her knuckles, and we drive home through the darkening streets, the chaos of the Marshall family fading behind us but never really gone.
Because that’s what family is, I’m learning.
Messy. Loud. Impossible to escape.
And worth every second.