Billy chuckled.

"I've got a bit of a sweet tooth myself you know. If your wife likes these candies I might have to buy a few. More than a few actually. If they are any good, I have a whole host of kids who could use a good pick me up now and again. Charlie. Rebecca's not here, so can you just write down Candy Shop?"

Charlie sighed and shook his head, taking out his notepad and writing it down. His list was significantly smaller than Rebecca's was, but it was still a few places.

"So the place we are going to is about a half hour drive from here, not too bad, but a decent way out."

He paused a moment.

"I didn't bring anything to drink, but I do have a cigar with your name on it if you want it."

"You know, that doesn't sound half bad right now."  Gavin got into the backseat and rolled down his window a bit to let in the morning air and the smoke out.

"That was one hell of a show you put on last night."  he said with a smirk and nodded his thanks to Billy as he handed him the cigar.  Gavin actually took a moment to examine it, appreciating it as he usually did the cigars that Billy gave to him. 

"The venison was great.  The competition at the tournament wasn't half-bad either.  Did it all go the way you were hoping it would?"

Billy nodded.

"Exactly as I had hoped honestly. Everyone seemed to have a good time, the girls all went home with some cash in their pockets and a spring in their step. Security didn't have to force anyone out. I can't imagine it having been a better night."

He patter Gavin on the shoulder.

"Not to mention being able to end the night together. Whether it's poker, dice, or just a fire, you and I should do that more often."

Gavin looked at Billy.  For a moment his blue gaze lingered on him before he spoke, "You know, I think we'd be friends even if you weren't dating my daughter."  

He clipped the end of his cigar and spoke down towards his actions than to Billy's face, but the words were meant for him clearly, "I suppose we might have met at some sort of gambling event or other, but you laugh easier than a lot of the other Dons.  If I were twenty years younger we probably would raise some real hell together."

He chuckled and shook his head looking back up to Billy.

"So yeah, it's not a bad way to end the night, even for an old man like me who probably should have been in bed a few hours earlier than I was."  He smirked, clearly not bothered by making jokes at his own expense.

"Did you know I was only about three years older than you are now when I asked Salvatore the same question you asked me last night?"  He arched an eyebrow.  

"I liked Salvatore pretty well too.  Everyone feared that sadistic fuck... but I always felt like I understood him, at least until he took out Chicago.  And even then I told myself that I should be in a rush to judge him.  There were probably things that an enforcer wouldn't understand, things he knew about that had killed him to act upon.  I knew he loved Marie.  I told myself that I could never do that to Bella and so whatever had happened, it was a great tragedy.  I was certain the man I'd sparred with, the man I'd drank with, the man who used the same guns as me and had come up like me as nothing but a mook to be one of the most powerful men in all the world... that he just couldn't have done something so inconceivable without a good reason."

Gavin's gaze was distant a moment.

"I can remember sitting there with him in his office.  My intentions laid out in front of him... beside one-hundred-million reasons for him not to refuse me and one of the clearest diamonds on earth.  I knew he might kill me, I just didn't care.  I had one goal and I knew that he knew where my head was.  I knew that he understood, with or without his consent, I'd make Bella my bride.  I'd come to him for one reason only... not because Bella wanted it or because his ego demanded it... I came to him because I liked him."

He looked to Billy.

"I spent all night trying to figure out your puzzle and the stupid thing is, it only occurs to me now that you're no different than me.  You didn't ask because you need my blessing - I know that.  I sure as hell know Aurora didn't tell you to come to me.  And ... I'd never ask if of you, so, you're talking to me about this because you genuinely like me." 

He held up the cigar as proof of that. 

"It's not like I didn't know it.  Hell, I'd say we're good friend you and I... but forgive me for being distracted from that fact by the thought that my little girl is grown enough to be thinking about weddings and children."

He shook his head.

"How soon do you intend to ask her?"

Billy shrugged.

"I figured she would want to be done with school. I gotta get this gift finished. There's a lot to come before that, but with everything I know in this life, and with everything I've learned from your daughter, sometimes you just grab the bull by the horns and you ride until you get tossed off."

He took a puff of his own cigar, it was not as good a blend as he had gotten used to making, but the dry air inside the tight cabinet it was kept in genuinely helped the thing along.

"I don't honestly think either one of us are ready for the question to be out in the open yet. I didn't it was time to ask you yet either. But in this line of work? Well, tomorrow you might be gone, and then what would I have done?"

Billy looked out the window himself then.

"It will happen when it happens, but I can promise you it won't be planned well. I'm never going to think I've done enough to deserve her, so I'm never going to be fully there. But one of these days your daughter is going to push me past the finish line. She's going to do something brilliant, and awe inspiring, and make me want nothing else in the world but to hold her. And that's probably when it'll happen."

He lowered his head a bit and looked down at his hands.

"I gotta find a good jeweler to fix up a ring for her though. Lord knows my hands aren't good for much more than beating men to death."

He gave a half-hearted chuckle.

"I know a guy.  I have him handle all my gems.  Does all Bella's best jewelry.  Did her wedding ring.  I can introduce you if you like?"  He lit his cigar.  Once it was going and he was able to speak again, he looked to Billy.

"She's still real young."  Gavin said.  "It's not that young people know less about love, or anything as dense as that, Aurora is probably the smartest person I know outside of my sister Tara.  I just... I remember how hard things were in the beginning with Bella and I.  Granted, her situation wasn't like most girl's situations..."

Gavin's eyes widened and he looked away.  Nodding with memories of the hell they both muddled through at the start of things.

"I appreciate you wanting my blessing,"  He looked back to Billy, "... feeling you should act while you could cause you're right, sometimes you just don't know what's going to happen tomorrow.  The thing is, I figured you knew how I felt when we made our pact."

He narrowed his icy eyes, "You bled for her.  You ripped a man apart for her ... I'm guessing your excursion with William might have even added to that blood pool you created in this family's name."

He held up his hand, "You don't need to get into it... whatever you did that day was your business.  Yours and Will's.  All I cared about that day was you remembering to bring yourself back to us.  I knew whatever happened between you and Rora was pretty bad... and I might have found myself in a similar situation once or twice with Bella back before we were married.  It's a dark place.  I was glad you had Will with you to face it instead of being boneheaded and going it alone like me."

He smirked.

"You told me that you'd do what you had to in order to protect this family and Billy,"  He shook his head, "I might not have said it in so many words but I figured you were one us from that night on.  Hell, I've slept easier knowing that if someone got lucky and took me and Bella out that you'd be there to help look after Will and Rora."

Billy nodded solemnly.

"Thank you Gavin. It means a lot. I don't have family of my own, and even when I did, they didn't care all that much."

Billy watched as the river crept up from behind the trees and followed the car along the right hand side, and then, as if from nowhere the road ended in a wrought Iron Gate the middle of which was adorned with a large red 'M'.

The gate stood along with a ten foot high brick wall that extended out into the river a bit to their right for security and then into the woods on the left further than one could easily see.

Beyond the gate was flat land.

Oscar got out of the car and pushed the gate open, waving the car through. He closed it then and got back in. As they drove up the driveway Billy pointed to their left. There was another, smaller body of water encroaching on the grounds from that direction.

"I'm putting it on a peninsula. Defensible as there's only one easy direction to come from. I'll have boats always ready for a quick escape of course should we ever need it. Most importantly, it's a really nice view of the Lake. And on the other side? Canada. Welcome to Point Huron Gavin. Course that's what the locals call it, when I finish the house Aurora and I can name it whatever we want."

He got out of the car then and stepped onto the land that had been staked out to hold his house. It was no small thing. It was designed with seven bedrooms, four bathrooms, a finished basement, it's own boat dock and boat house. Anything and everything Billy could think of. A billiard room, a library for Aurora, and one special room at the back of the house overlooking the lake that he wasn't going to tell anyone about until it was all finished. Suffice it to say the floor in that room alone had cost a fortune and will be a giant pain in the ass to make level.

"So this is my big surprise. I know it's not much right now Gavin, and there's no security here yet, but I'm getting that building build first, and that will be up by the gate. The guest house will be over there, in the more wooded area, and then this is where the main house will go. This is what I want to give Aurora when I ask her. This is where I want to ask her."

Gavin looked around nodding.  "Quite the vision you have here." 

He nodded as he imagined all that Billy detailed out.  "I can tell you, I sure as fuck had nothing as elaborate as all this in mind when Bella and I were starting out.  We spent the first seven years or so of Aurora's life in the loft.  We didn't even think of buying a home until Will was coming along."

He turned towards Billy, "You have my blessing to ask her.  And regardless of her answer... I hope you get what you're shooting for in life.  It's one hell of a way to live.  I wouldn't have imagined myself saying that at your age, but um... now that I'm on this end of things, I can tell you, there are much worse ways for things to go."

Gavin stepped away from what would be the house and back towards Billy.

"I assume you'd like me to keep this to myself, all of this, until you decide to ask her?  No letting things slip to Bella?"  

Billy shook his head.

"I won't ask that of you. I don't want you to keep any secrets on your marriage because of me. If Bella asks, you are welcome to tell her, but ask her, beg her on my behalf if you must, don't tell Aurora about the house at least. That much should remain a surprise. Please."

Billy hung his head then and took a deep breath.

"I want to make her happy and keep her safe Gavin. I think that's all I can hope for right now. You can be happy knowing that I've already got more than I could have asked for in you and your family letting me be a part of it. But I'll be damned if I stop fighting for all of what I want in life. If I'm half as lucky as you are, I'll be in your shoes one day. And if not, I still would have made out far better than my own parents did."

He made his way to Gavin then and before the man could speak he embraced him. To an outsider there may have appeared to be two bears overlooking the water pawing at one another.

"Thank you."