Shit.
I willneverbe enough for Waverly all on my own.
She needsmoremerely because she’s Waverly.
“Why do you have an ice sculpture?” Max asks.
“Dude.” I make thedon’t fuck with my superstitionsface.
He gives me back athis isn’t your superstition and I know itface. “This guy’s an ice sculptor and he’s holding you hostage?”
“Oh my god, Cooper, why didn’t you say so!” Tillie Jean throws herself at me. “We have to get you out of here. They have sharp instruments and they’ll start with your pinkies!”
“Would you please go away?” I mutter to her. “I havea thing, okay? I’ll tell you later.”
Much later.
Much, much later.
She snorts. “In three years? Nope. Not leaving. Your game’s shit, you’re refusing to go out to bars after the games with the younger guys like you used to, you’re disappearing every morning when you used to sleep in, going god knows where and doing god knows what, and we’re here to help. So let us help. What do you need?”
“Privacy.”
“Cooper—”
“I need fuckingprivacy, okay?”
I don’t snarl. I don’t get cranky.
Not my style.
But I’m snapping at my sister and scowling at my teammate and silently wishing scurvy on my grandfather and watching my brother pop his head in the door with a look that says he knows something’s wrong, I’m being a shit, and if I want donuts for breakfast from his bakery in the morning, I’m gonna have to spill my guts.
“Let him go, TJ,” Grady says.
“How many more of them are there?” Waverly’s guy asks me.
I lift a brow at Grady.
He’s the oldest of the three of us, and the one who’ll have the biggest heart attack if anyone’s arrested.
Or disappears.
“Aunt Glory and Aunt Bea and Ray and Jacob and Georgia,” Grady reports.
“Fuck,” I grumble.
Grady grins.
And it’s not a simple grin.
This is a classic Rock grin, full ofI’ll call them off, but you will PAY for this favor.
He lifts his walkie-talkie. “Code shit, team. I repeat, code shit.”
“What?” Annika’s voice echoes through the room, coming from at least three walkie-talkies. “I’ve had enough shit for one night. You know how hard it is to change a diaper in the dark?”
“Probably harder than pulling a controller off the wall,” Grady replies with a side glance at where my built-in speaker controller is hanging by a wire.
