A/N: Back to the fluff.
May 22, 2031
Logan isn't sure what sent Veronica on the re-decorating spree, but it doesn't actually matter. Yeah, twenty-four years is a long time to take getting comfortable with frivolous spending, but if she's finally embraced having money, he's got no arguments at all. Except for with the pool furniture.
Okay, not even the pool furniture itself; it's fine. The deck chairs rock, which is awesome, and a chaise lounge is pretty much a chaise lounge, especially at this price point where everything's solid and well made and adjusts in about a thousand ways. No, really, his issue is more with the cushions that Veronica chose.
"But they're so soft and comfy," his wife is currently arguing from her position stretched out along one of the lounges in question. She's wearing a bikini, and he knows that choice was made solely in the interest of winning this argument. "I checked out at least a dozen different ones, Logan. These are gorgeous, and comfortable, and they're a smart design."
She bangs the back of her head repeatedly against the cushioned chaise, and he can't help but watch the corresponding jiggle of her breasts...which Godammit, she knows.
"Look at this, Logan. Head and neck support built right in, but not so much that you can't lay on your stomach. That means no more having to go find one of those stupid throw pillows when you want to nap. You know they're always stashed somewhere obscure and usually on the other side of the pool whenever you need them. And even once you've got one, trying to squish or roll it into a good shape to put it under your head is a major pain because they're so big."
He manages to raise his eyes to her face, and the way she is looking at him, I own you, buddy, this isn't even a challenge, makes him laugh. She's right, of course, and he's man enough to admit it. But his actual argument rises in his mind again as his attention is caught by a couple of newcomers to poolside.
Colby Casablancas, Dick and Mac's daughter, two months shy of fifteen, comes through the gate, which is being held open by Logan and Veronica's just turned fifteen year old son, Danny. She is arguing something, Logan isn't even sure what, with Dick's vehemence, but Mac's rational intelligence. Danny isn't even arguing back, he's just watching her and nodding, smiling at her in an adoring way that is embarrassing to watch even at a distance, mostly because he's pretty sure Danny got that look from Logan himself.
Logan sighs, and wonders, not for the first time, why he didn't take Dick up on his offer of a dowry on the day Colby was born. For most of their lives, he'd thought the idea was silly, since Danny and Colby, along with Wallace and Jeannie's twins, Hank and Steven, had been an inseparable quartet from the first time they all got put down on a beach blanket together. But in the last couple of years, he's watched the look in Danny's eyes whenever Colby was around and hoped like crazy that she wasn't going to end up breaking his little boy's heart.
"I can't believe that I'm going to end up being related to Dick Casablancas." Veronica's quiet voice broke through his reverie.
"It's a little soon for that, don't you think?" Logan asks, although he's pleased that she seems to be thinking the same thing he is.
"Maybe, but they're both really googly-eyed. It's nauseating." She lifts a hand to him and he takes it, sitting beside her on the chaise. "He looks just like you."
"You're saying I'm nauseating?"
"A little." She shrieks a laugh as he starts to tickle her and they thrash around on the chaise for a moment before Colby's voice carries across the pool.
"Knock it off, you guys. Get a room."
Veronica laughs and settles down under Logan's arms. "She is her father's daughter." In a louder voice, she calls back, "It's our house. We do what we want," and laughs louder as the kids groan in disgust, but then Danny pokes Colby in the side and the shrieking starts on that side of the pool as he makes a run for it and she gives chase.
After a moment of watching Danny duck and weave as he evades capture, Veronica lays her palm against Logan's chest and gives him a pat.
"Okay, so what are you even complaining about?" She lifts her hand and begins to write her name on his pecs. "I haven't heard an actual argument yet to explain your issues with my choices."
"Keep that up and you're going to get one," he says and she squints at him in confusion, but when he tips his head south, and she sees the beginnings of a tent in his swim trunks, she gasps and starts to laugh.
"Oh my God, that's what all those throw pillows were for. I never understood why you and Duncan were constantly fondling pillows by the pool. It seemed so stupid."
"You have no idea how relieved I am that you never figured it out. There is almost nothing more embarrassing than—"
He was interrupted by a large splash and they looked over to find Colby running up to the pool, where Danny was now treading water. "What are you doing? You said we weren't swimming," she calls and Danny ducks under the water and swims away.
"And that's what you do when you don't have a throw pillow," Logan says knowingly, and Veronica blanches as she hides her face in his shoulder.
"Fine, get your pillows. Just make sure they match everything else."
