“I thought it was just us and the kids,” Ned said glumly. He was hardly in the mood for another festive party with all the happily married couples in their lives.

“That’s what I thought, too. They must’ve invited the whole gang.”

“Great.”

Ned held her elbow as they went up the stairs to the deck, where the gathered group tossed something at them and yelled, “Surprise.” He held up his arm to protect his face from whatever was flying at him. Rose petals rained down upon them.

“Surprise?” Francine said. She turned to him. “It’s not your birthday or mine.”

Mac and Maddie approached them, holding glasses of champagne and wearing broad smiles. “It’s not your birthday,” Maddie said, kissing them both. “Welcome to your wedding.”

Ned figured he’d heard her wrong until things began to happen all around him.

Frank McCarthy stepped forward with a marriage license for him and Francine to sign. Maddie and Tiffany signed as their witnesses.

Next came flowers for both of them, as well as Maddie and Mac and Tiffany and Blaine. Ashleigh, Thomas and Hailey finished out the wedding party he would’ve chosen for himself.

“I don’t understand,” Ned finally said when he could get a word in edgewise.

“You wanted to get married and couldn’t find a date,” Big Mac said, “so Mac and Maddie found one for you.” Big Mac put his tree-trunk arm around Ned. “All you gotta do, old pal, is stand there and get married.”

He was going to cry, goddamn it. Right in front of everyone. He was going to actually cry. Here, standing before him, ready to stand up with him and Francine, was the family he’d always wanted but never had. He spared a glance for Francine and discovered she was already crying.

To hell with it, he decided as he stopped trying to fight his way through the emotional wallop. “’Tis a heck of a thing ya’ve done here,” he said to Mac and Maddie. “Thank you.”

“So you’re happy about it?” Maddie said. “I told Mac if you were mad, it was all his idea.”

“It was all my idea.”

Maddie patted his face indulgently. “Yes, dear.”

“Well, it was.”

“I’m very happy bout it,” Ned said gruffly as he sniffed. “Never been happier bout anything.”

“I knew you would be,” Mac said with a big smirk for his wife.

Frank rubbed his hands together. “What do you say, Ned? Francine? Shall we do this? It’s been a full week since I married Laura and Owen. I’m starting to get twitchy for another wedding.”

“I ain’t got a ring fer her,” Ned said, feeling suddenly panicked. They were really going to do this. “I need a ring. She deserves a ring.”