By the time we get to Gramps’s house, Ronan has secured the band for tonight. It’s not a stretch since they were already booked for the entire weekend event. I fire off a message to Daphne and before we even get to the front door she’s already agreed to take pictures, but she’s adamant that she doesn’t need to be paid. I’m not sure Ronan will let her get away with that, but Daphne has always been exceedingly generous, so he might have to find another way to compensate her, like free beer and food. He knocks before he lets himself in with the key. The low drone of the TV filters through to the foyer.

“Gramps?”

“Ronan? What’re ya doin’ here at this time in the morning?”

“I have some exciting news,” he calls out.

“I’m in the living room watching The Price Is Right!”

Ronan holds up a finger and drops his voice. “Give me a sec. Sometimes he likes to lounge around in his underpants and it’s not a pretty sight.”

“Standing by.”

He peeks around the corner and then gives me a thumbs-up so I follow him into the living room.

Gramps’s gaze bounces from Ronan to me and back again. “Oh, praise the lord!” He makes the sign of the cross. “Ya heard me prayers, Dottie. It’s finally happening.” A massive grin breaks across his face. “Yer gettin’ married!”

“Uh.” Ronan and I exchange questioning glances. “No, Gramps, we’re not getting married.”

Gramps’s face falls. “Yer not?”

“We’ve only been dating for a couple of months.”

“When ya know, ya know, though.” Gramps’s eyes round again and then narrow. “Ya better not have knocked Blaire up or I’ll whup yer ass, boy.”

“Okay, first of all, you will not whup anyone’s ass, let alone mine, and secondly, no, I did not knock Blaire up.”

“Oh.” He slumps back in his chair. “Well, whatever the news is, it can’t be that great, now can it?”

“You were ready to give me an ass whupping for knocking Blaire up two seconds ago and now you’re disappointed I didn’t?” Ronan sounds amused.

“I figure if you knocked her up, then you’d have to do the noble thing and marry her.”

“Well, I might if it wasn’t the twenty-first century. People have kids without getting married all the time.” He turns to me. “Not that I don’t want to get married or have kids. I just wouldn’t expect you to suddenly want to tie the knot should I happen to knock you up accidentally.”

“That’s reasonable.”

“Do you want to get married and have kids?”

“Now? No. But down the line I wouldn’t be opposed, when the timing feels right. We can talk about this later, though. Like months from now, even.” I put a hand on his arm and incline my head toward Henry, who is smiling gleefully.

“Oh, right, yeah.” Ronan clears his throat. “Remember that YouTuber I was telling you about?”

“The lady with the really long eyelashes who makes all the videos that aren’t the dirty kind?”

I fight a laugh.

“That’s the one,” Ronan confirms. “So she came through Seattle a couple of weeks back.”

“That’s right, I remember.”

“And she stopped by The Knight Cap.”

“She’s not using my bar to make dirty videos.”

“Gramps, we already established she doesn’t make dirty videos. She named The Knight Cap the Best Bar in the Pacific Northwest. It’s going to be featured on her YouTube channel, and she’s partnered with Food and Drink and The Seattle Morning Show, so they’ll be featuring us, too. We did it, Gramps! We got the bar back on its feet, and this is going to keep it standing.”

Henry folds down the footrest on his La-Z-Boy and slowly pushes to a standing position. He hobbles over and pulls Ronan into a hug. “I’m so proud of ya.” He smacks him on the back a couple of times before he grabs him by the arms, eyes watery, smile wavering. “Dottie would be too if she was here. I know she’s looking down on you from heaven with a big smile on her face. She always believed in you.”

“I know she did.”

He pats Ronan’s chest and turns to me, pulling me in for a hug. “You’re the one who lit a fire under his ass, so I hope he’s told you how much he appreciates you.”

I hug him back, choked up about the whole thing, especially since I know Ronan’s story and Henry’s, and how much this bar means to him and this family.

Ronan tells Henry that he’s planning to throw a party tonight, and he would love it if he would be able to come to the bar for dinner at the very least to celebrate.

“Are you kidding me? I’m coming right now. You kids hold on a few minutes while I get ready.” His slippers make a whoosh-whoosh sound as he shuffles down the hall.

“I can’t believe he thought I knocked you up.”

I can’t believe he thought Ronan asked me to marry him. “I like that he got all righteous about it.”

“Yeah, well, I think fifty percent of the reason he couldn’t wait to marry my grandma was so he could finally get into her pants, because back in the sixties that was how things went.”

I roll my eyes. “That’s how you think things went. It wasn’t any different than it is now. Teenagers had sex back then just like they do now, only now it’s easier to get contraception and kids actually know that standing up after sex doesn’t prevent pregnancy.”

“Okay, we need to stop talking about sex and teenagers and pregnancy, because it’s sending mixed messages below the waist and I’m having some conflict over that.”

I glance down at his crotch. “Are you aroused?”

“Not fully.” He’s amusingly defensive.

I poke the front of his pants. “You have a semi?”

“You said ‘sex’ twice and ‘contraception,’ and some parts of me don’t realize it doesn’t mean right now.”

“You’re ridiculous.”

“I’m excited, about a lot of things, not the least of which is my girlfriend spending the night with me. Tell me you can get Callie to open for you tomorrow. I really want you to celebrate this win with me because it never would have happened without you.”