Free Forever Promised by Amy Lane

approaching what Jon had given Deacon in the course of their friendship, Deacon would consider himself a good man.
    That’s why he’d let Jon go without even a whimper. A friend—a true friend—didn’t hold a brother back from greatness. It would have been a betrayal, and Deacon didn’t know how to do those.
    Crick sighed and backed away at the mention of Amy, his bad leg making shuffling sounds through the hay on the floor of the stall. Perversely, Deacon missed having him there, warming the space at his back, but it wasn’t like Deacon had been accepting his comfort anyway.
    “Benny’s built different than Amy—”
    “That’s a justification,” Deacon said, his voice tight. “She’s got a man of her own now. If she’s going to put her body through that, shouldn’t it be for her own babies?”
    He smiled a little, thinking of what beautiful babies they would make. Drew’s calm steadiness, Benny’s passion and compassion—those children would have the clear gaze of the angels, he was sure of it.
    “He wants to give us this too.”
    Deacon breathed in sharply. “Yeah, I know, and seriously, what in the holy mother of hell—” Flower snorted, and he lowered his voice so she wouldn’t think he was mad at her. “Why would he do that?” he muttered, mostly to himself. “Why?” Deacon turned to Crick, upset enough to give up the illusion of space he’d created. “He’s going after his certificate, did you know that?”
    “Animal health technician?” Crick asked, and Deacon nodded.
    “He can commute from here. They can live in the cottage if he gets a chance to go for the full veterinary medicine degree. I mean, we can help all we want, but Drew has plans. And he plans to be with your sister. And I don’t understand why he’s going to put all of that off when I think he loves her just… just head over fucking heels, Carrick! He’s been looking at her with his heart in his throat since before you got back—”
    “She was only sixteen!”
    Deacon had a moment of irritated humor. “Yeah, and so were you when you first moved to The Pulpit, and you swear on your life you were in love!”
    Crick grunted. It was the same age difference, Crick knew it. “Well,” he conceded sulkily, “I wish them luck. But before they go on and live their lives together, they want to give us something—”
    “This is not a puppy!” Deacon snapped, not sure why people couldn’t see this.
    “No, it’s not!” Crick snapped back. He dragged his game hand through his hair again and narrowed his wide-set brown eyes. God, his eyelashes hadn’t gotten any thinner or any blonder, and Carrick James still seemed like he could see Deacon’s soul through Deacon’s body when he turned that look on full blast.
    So Deacon studied his boots instead.
    “Then why—”
    “It’s not a puppy, Deacon, it’s a baby, and it’s going to have the best parts of me in it, and, God willing, the best parts of you! Please….” Crick took a deep breath and ventured into Deacon’s vision, his tore-up jeans and boots first, followed by his knees, and by the time Deacon was forced to raise his chin and look up to avoid gazing at his crotch (which wasn’t a bad destination, really), Crick was there, his pretty face anxious and tired and struggling so hard for patience, Deacon wanted to hold him just for that.
    The Crick of seven years ago wouldn’t have been patient. Not even a little. Especially when he didn’t understand.
    “Please, Deacon. Can’t you even think about it?”
    “We could adopt,” Deacon said shortly, nodding. “People do it all the time. We could adopt. Shane’s got connections, we could fill out paperwork, we could—”
    Crick snorted. “Yeah. I know. We could. And don’t think I hadn’t been planning on all that already!”
    Deacon blinked, surprised as all hell. “You had? When—”
    “Well, I was planning to bring it up after Jon left.” Crick stalked over to hay bales set up between the