Chapter 12

J ustine smiled as Tyler loaded their last bag into the car, a giddiness washing through her, but behind it was a feeling of foreboding doom. Tyler slipped over to her, sliding his hand onto her neck, his thumb brushing against her cheek and that feeling faded, leaving just the utter joy that'd been inside her the last week since they'd gotten married.

Being home, having to hide once more, was harder than before and neither of them wanted to put it off another minute. Tyler cleared his schedule for the next two weeks and they were headed down to Daniel's cabin on the Oregon coast after confirming they wouldn't be needing it and there was adequate wi-fi for her to be able to connect to the team if anything came up that needed her, as well as for her to continue her therapy sessions.

They were helping immensely, but that might simply be because atop of it was the fact that Tyler was hers, all hers and nothing could come between them. Not even the backlash from their families.

"Don't worry, babydoll. Everything will be okay," he said as they went back inside for the last of their things, pulling a soft smile from her and she nodded, trusting that it would be no matter the feelings trying to weigh her down.

Ten minutes later, a knock sounded on the door and Tyler went over, letting Sheriff Davies into the space. Justine couldn't help but laugh a bit at the expression that crossed his face seeing her inside the house.

"You said you wanted to see me," the man said, his gaze flowing between the two of them curiously, especially when Tyler slipped over to her side. "Is everything alright? Can't say I was expecting to see you here Justine," he added when Tyler nodded.

"She lives here now," Tyler said, sending the man's brows skyward, the look in his eyes likely the least shocked that they'd find today. "Justine and I got married last Thursday up in Vancouver."

"Sorry but I'm going to need a minute here," the sheriff replied, and Justine snuggled into Tyler's hold, grinning at all of the thoughts and expressions that ran across his face. "Okay, this is probably more of a shock than Isabelle being missing was and I'm guessing that situation led to the two of you getting together but isn't this a bit fast? Especially when you add in all the issues between your families?"

"No, not when we were originally going to do this ten years ago," Justine admitted, and Tyler filled him in on the basic need to knows.

"Well that makes a lot more sense than the two of you deciding to stop being enemies and getting married all in a week," Sheriff Davies said before his brows furled a bit again as he studied them. "So, what exactly did you want to see me about? There haven't been any calls about a major battle anywhere in or around town, so I take it your families don't know you're together let alone married yet."

"That's actually what we wanted to talk about, well, warn you about maybe," Tyler said dropping a kiss onto Justine's temple as a bit of tension crept back into her body. "We're done hiding this and intend to tell our families…"

"Today," Justine finished for him. "Since the church is technically located outside of the city limits, we thought we'd give you a head's up so you can potentially ward off any major issues."

"You're going to tell everyone at church today?" he said, and they nodded pulling a whistle from him as he shook his head. "Well that's certainly not something I had on my bingo card of things likely to happen this century but thank you for the warning. I planned to be there already so that's not an issue and a few of my other deputies likely should be in attendance as well. I'll have some cars on standby and if you don't mind, coordinate with Chief Klein so there's additional coverage in town."

"We figured you'd need to work with him or at least give him a head's up to keep an eye on things around town in the coming weeks. We know this isn't a lot of warning, but we didn't want the risk of it getting back to our families and finding them on our doorstep," Justine said pulling an understanding nod from him. "We know it might ignite an uproar that will affect more than just us, and that's the last thing we'd ever want, but we're tired of living a lie. It's all I've done the last few years and now, being back, being here with Tyler, we just want the chance to live our lives—together."

"I understand Justine, especially with what your job entailed. I wouldn't want you to have to continue to sneak around to be together when you're both consenting adults. We'll make sure you're able to go about your days peacefully. Although, I have to ask. Are you going to continue to work with the FBI? I can't imagine how that would work living here," he said, and she drug in a short breath before answering him.

"No, while I love being able to help people, I need a change. I technically was on medical leave and not vacation when I got here due to my last assignment and things that'd happened. Mainly the fact that I was compromised and the group I was investigating burnt down my house thinking I was in it," she admitted, telling a very condensed version of what happened. "Hopefully they'll never figure out that I'm actually still alive or who I really am, but it's something we also need to be prepared for as a possibility."

"Well, thankfully strangers are noticed around here pretty easily and while your families might not like each other, they do love the two of you separately and would likely inform you if they saw someone strange lurking around. I can assign someone to patrol the area a bit more regularly for the next few days if that helps as well."

"That won't be necessary right now," Tyler said dropping a kiss onto the top of her head, his hands running up and down her arms calming her worries down once more. "We plan on heading out on a honeymoon right after we tell everyone. Figured it'd be for the best to be out of easy access while they're processing things. We'll be using Daniel Thatcher's cabin so they're also not likely to figure out where we are."

"Daniel? As in Angela's ex-husband she left town with a week before the two of you were supposed to get married, Daniel?" he questioned, and they nodded.

"They were our witnesses and it's no longer ex-husband. They're remarried already," Justine added pulling chuckles from him as he looked between them.

"We were only getting married to shut people up. Me with my mother because I never wanted to marry anyone for real other than Justine, and her with some of the men around town that constantly hit on her regardless of if they were single or not."

"So combined with Justine being back in town, you weren't upset the wedding was called off I take it?"

"Not at all. I was already trying to convince Justine to make our relationship real again at that point, so that wedding was never going to happen. Angela simply called it off before I did," Tyler said, and he nodded in understanding.

"Well, I'm sure you won't hear much of it when you tell everyone but congratulations. I sincerely wish you both the best. And if you're interested in continuing to help people, I think both the chief and I could use someone with your skills in tracking down information online, helping find kids that go missing around the area. I'll understand if you want to avoid everything with online predators, but if you're interested, we could probably manage to find a way to pay you something in the city and county budgets," the sheriff added before he headed out and Justine smiled a bit thinking it over.

"Do you think that's something you'd want to do?" Tyler asked as they settled in to wait until just before the service would start to head over to the church so no one would see them in the same vehicle.

"Yeah, it might be. Not totally sure if I'm near ready to dive back into that world but maybe we'll see how things look when my leave is officially up. Between the insurance payout from my place and my savings, I don't have to worry about finances for a while. When I was undercover, everything was either paid for by the bureau or using money I earned at my secondary jobs, so what I brought in didn't go for much beyond my house payment."

"If you'd rather look for a new house…" he began to offer and Justine lifted up, giving him a long, lingering kiss, smiling brightly his way.

"And not be able to see our spot in the distance when there's no fog out? I love the house, Tyler, it's perfect. For us now and even if we have a couple kids, it'll still be perfect," she added sending a flash of desire through his gaze that made her grin. "We can do some more practicing later and talk about when we want to move from practice to trying, yeah?"

"Absolutely babydoll," he agreed, holding her close until it was time to go and even then, he held her hand, his thumb running over her wedding band she was definitely tired of having to remove whenever she left the house. His gleamed as he pulled the car into the church parking lot and her eyes slid around the area, taking note of the deputy sheriff's car idling on the far side of it. "Looks like we'll have help if we need to make a quick getaway."

"Hopefully we won't have to," she mused but they both knew she was just dreaming. Their families would flip learning the truth.

They waited until the doors closed to get out and headed into the vestibule, the sanctuary doors closed as the strains of music ended and they heard the pastor begin his normal welcome. Tyler gave her hand a squeeze when he got to the part of asking if there was anything anyone would like to share, and she slipped into the back of the sanctuary with him sucking in a deep breath as a few heads turned their way the moment they heard the doors open.

"Actually there's something we'd like to share," Tyler said, bringing nearly every head around to look at them and there were several gasps and exclamations seeing them standing there together but that was nothing to those that took note of her hand in his.

"And we'd love to hear it," Pastor Adams said making Justine bite her tongue to stop from laughing because his expression spoke volumes. The man had been pastor there since before they were born, spent countless hours counseling the families to choose to peacefully coexist, so she was sure he was holding his breath as to whatever it was they had to say.

"I'll preface this by saying to those that aren't family, we're sorry to pull you into the middle of this but it seemed to be the best place to do this so neither side could claim favoritism," Tyler said pulling a few chuckles from them. "As I'm sure you all know, our families have been participating in a feud that began long before our existences were ever a thought, and I don't know if anyone even knows why or how it began nearly two centuries ago. It's something that has ruled our lives for far too long. Something that cost me ten years with the only girl I ever loved," he added glancing down at her and the gasps in the room, shouts of their names seemed almost distant when the adoration in her eyes wrapped her up in the sweetest emotions.

"Tyler James!" someone said loudly breaking the little spell between them and he glanced up the aisle towards his mother who was standing along with his father, while her mother held back her father from getting up from their pew.

"For the last nearly fifteen years I've been in love with her, spent two and a half years loving her in every way she let me while we snuck around behind all of your backs," Tyler said with a smile that made her fight to not giggle gleefully seeing the looks her siblings threw her at that news. "This ridiculous feud stole her from me because two grown men couldn't behave like adults, wanted to tear down the other for whatever slight they felt was committed or to push aside the things they couldn't control," he added towards his father pulling a dark grunt from the man.

"We knew the only chance at having the life we wanted was to leave here, go away together, love each other as much as possible while we waited for the ‘grown-ups' in our lives to start acting like them. But then, two of you decided that just vague push and shoves wasn't enough, and you were hellbent on destroying one another. Which led to us having vastly different ideas of what was best, and ultimately, to Justine leaving here without telling me she was, and I spent ten years missing the one person that I wanted to do nothing but love. So when she came home two and a half months ago, I knew I couldn't let her go. Not again. Not for any of you," he said pointedly towards his family as he pulled her closer to him. "And thankfully this time, the love between us won out over worrying about anyone else's feelings or needs, and last week, we went up to Vancouver and did what we'd originally planned to do ten years ago…"

"We got married," Justine said, smiling despite the shouts it brought about from their families.

"We have no desire to hear any of your negative responses to that news. In fact, if we hear anything negative or derogatory about it or the other family, be it via call, text, or email, we will block you until such a time comes that you can respect our decision to be with the person we love most," Tyler warned, as he traced her face gently with his knuckle. "Now, as I said before, we're sorry for hijacking your service Pastor, but we knew this information needed to come out in a neutral location all at once. We know there is going to be a lot of questions and comments regarding our decision to get married, let alone that we're together to start, but, I am taking my wife on a honeymoon to enjoy some time with just her without all of your interference."

"We hope by the time we get home you'll all be willing to discuss things civilly, and if there are any issues while we're away, know that the sheriff and police departments are already aware of this news, and they won't put up with trouble from anyone. We will respond to polite messages while we're away, but we do not intend to answer calls. If something urgent comes up, text us and we'll get back with you," Justine suggested.

"Which means hopefully at least one person in the family hasn't been blocked if that happens," Tyler tagged on making her grin. "Enjoy the rest of your service," he added towards Pastor Adams who was sitting on the edge of the stage in front of the pulpit shaking his head at the grumbles and exclamations coming from everyone before they turned to head out the door.

Footsteps hurried after them, but they were already down the front steps before her father made it out the door, the sheriff on his heels.

"Justine Elena Crawford!" he shouted after them and she turned, giving him a smile.

"I love you Dad, but Tyler's the man I love and if you want me in your life, you're going to have to accept that," she told him before slipping into the car as Tyler held the door open for her.

He leaned over once he was inside it, giving her a quick kiss as Sheriff Davies stood with a hand on both of their father's chests as they shouted after them and at one another.

"Do we turn off our phones or just put them on silent?" Tyler asked when they both began to go off as they pulled out onto the road.

"Let's just put them on silent. I'll keep an eye on them, make sure nothing comes through saying our dads tried to kill each other and are at the hospital," she suggested, and he turned off the ringer on his after taking it out of his pocket to pass over to her.

She turned off the ringer on hers, glancing through the messages from everyone that'd already come through on hers before moving over to Tyler's to make sure no one had said something awful enough they didn't want to deal with them right now. A laugh bubbled up seeing the message from the twins.

"What's so funny?" he asked, and she turned the screen for him to see the photo they'd sent of the two of them giving the phone a ‘stern glare' and his brow rose. "And what did they say?"

"Let's see, Hailey said you're a rat for getting married without her there to see it happen, and Isabelle said…you better not have been picking on me meanly in high school after we were together or she'll kick your butt," she told him and he nodded, leaning over to give her a quick kiss before turning his attention back onto the thankfully straight highway out of the area.

"I wouldn't say it was meanly would you, babydoll? I think most of it was more foreplay than anything," he mused, and she laughed lifting a brow at him making him chuckle. "What?"

"You think telling your sister that we were having bantering foreplay during high school won't have her asking more questions, or asking why you're so hard on the guys they date then?" Justine asked making his eyes darken a hint. "Didn't think so."

"Well, the difference is, you were always mine while most of the guys that come around are asshole little boys that just want some fun. I might have wanted lots of fun with you, past and present, but it was always with love behind it."

"I know and it's the same with me," she said, resting her head back to enjoy the long drive with him.

The cabin was gorgeous, but she hadn't doubted it after seeing Daniel's place in Seattle. They'd stopped by on their way to Vancouver since Angela wanted to loan her the bracelet she'd worn for the wedding but forgot it at the house.

It was late afternoon when they got there, and they dropped their stuff off before going to get groceries not wanting to have to go out again the rest of the day beyond maybe taking a walk. Once they were back, all thoughts of a walk along the coast disappeared and they slipped into the bedroom spending most of the evening and all night in it wrapped up in each other.

The days slid from one into the next as they checked messages once or twice a day, blocking a few that sent threats or ‘hopes that they burned in hell together' from some of the more vocal members of their extended families. The only real outside contact she had beyond a few responses to her mom and sister's messages was with her therapist. Tyler responded mostly to the twins' questions, Grace, and his mom who unlike the twins wasn't so easily accepting of their relationship let alone marriage.

She was sitting at the kitchen island after her therapy session ended, watching Tyler cook their lunch. He'd gone down to fish while she talked with the therapist, giving her privacy although she told him it wasn't necessary. His smile said he'd be glad to do some fishing and that was one thing she hated. The only reason she ever went while they were in school was to spend time with him. Most of the time she just laid around on a blanket or with her head resting on his thigh reading while he did it.

He'd come in with a couple fish already cleaned and deboned, ready to cook and while she might not like to fish, eating it was another story entirely—especially the way Tyler cooked them. Her mouth watered at the thought of the savory herbs and butter with the flaky fish and a soft sigh slipped out.

"You okay, babydoll?" he asked, slipping up behind her and she nodded, resting her head back against his chest, tipping it back to look at him with a grin.

"Just dreaming about your delicious garlic butter and herbs fish recipe," she said glancing back to her computer when a call came through it. She answered the video request from Melissa, smiling at the surprise that spread across her face finding Tyler's arms wrapped around her, his muscle tank style shirt revealed more of his chest than it covered but she loved it. "What's up?"

"I think that should be our question. Living dangerous still are you?" Melissa asked as the rest of the team leaned in to get in the frame.

"Not exactly…just enjoying my honeymoon with my husband," she said drawing gasps from the group but none of them were angry sounding unlike at the church Sunday.

"I'm sorry, your husband?" Luke said and she nodded, holding up her hand to show off the band and Tyler lifted his as well with a smile, his head resting against hers. "Damn, when did you get married and where are you now because I'm sure you wouldn't be that relaxed knowing how many family members could find you unexpectedly at his place."

"Officially we got married two weeks ago today, in Vancouver to help avoid any chance of anyone discovering our plans ahead of time. Originally we didn't intend to tell everyone so soon, but we were tired of hiding after just a week so we told everyone at the church Sunday then came down to the Oregon coast, using a friend's place while they dealt with the news," she answered with ease.

"We won't be back until late next week, weekend maybe. I don't have any jobs I'm needed at until a week from Monday so we're playing it by ear until then. If it seems that we're still getting more angry rather than supportive messages then we'll take every moment of peace we can get before heading back," Tyler added, dropping a kiss onto her smiling lips before moving back to the stove to check on their food.

"So, was there a reason you called?" Justine asked as the group just nodded looking between them in surprise still.

"We thought you'd like to know that Wendell flipped on his brother to weasel out of all of the kidnapping counts. He didn't join his brother until he got out of jail and Harvey had come out here, so you were right. The first time we were after Harvey he was working alone. And the reason the coms didn't work on the property is because they had a signal jammer and only their walkie-talkie's worked on a specific frequency that was too low for the coms to work on," Melissa added making her feel better about that.

"Yeah, the younger Grimes brother is no criminal mastermind. He confessed that they put it up because one of the girls had a cell phone they didn't see but caught her trying to call someone, but also to mess with drones or things flying overhead because one of the reasons their electric bill was so high, is because they were cooking meth in the back of the barn. That's where he went that night, to sell their stash to have money to keep kidnapping and drugging girls," Luke said and the stench from the van made sense with all of the chemicals needed to cook meth.

"Since this is pretty much wrapped up now, we're heading back to D.C. but thought we'd see if you wanted to grab dinner before we go. We'll forgive you for not making it since you're a newlywed though," Melissa added and she smiled entirely as they hung up, comfort washing through her knowing other than Dynamite, there was nothing else she had to worry about now.

And on top of that she had Tyler and a delicious lunch to enjoy. Nothing could be better than that right this moment.