“He needs someone to take care of Paisley. Like a nanny.”
“No.” I laugh into a sip of wine. “Absolutely not.”
Molly leans over the table to flick my brother’s ear. “Erik, did you volunteer her for something?”
“No.” He avoids another flick, swatting at her hand. “Only told him I would ask.”
“I’m not a nanny,” I say more seriously, as my brother shifts his attention to me.
“No, but you sign.”
I huff. “So do you. Why don’t you do it?”
“You’re a teacher,” he says, as if I don’t know. “You work with kids her age all day long.”
“I thought I was supposed to come here to relax and hang out for the summer.”
He holds his hands up in innocence. “It was just an idea. It’s been really hard on them, their lives being turned upside down. And I know he’s got a reputation, but his parents died. That changes a person.”
I bite the inside of my cheek. I don’t doubt that Camden is grieving hard and struggling with guardianship of his sister, but life is not constant amusement and gratification, as he has always seemed to believe it is. He has to grow up at some point.
And my lingering ire at all the insults he’s thrown my way get the better of me. “He’s a dick.”
Erik shrugs. “Maybe, but he needs help.”
I roll my eyes. “I’m not interested in helping assholes.”
“What about my best friend?”
I refuse to answer my brother, instead choosing to turn away from him.
He doesn’t let it go. “And you know that’s not really who he is.”
My traitorous sister-in-law agrees. “Underneath all that asshole exterior, he’s a nice guy.”
My jaw flaps open. “You think this is a good idea?”
She wags her finger. “I didn’t say that. But I do think you two got off on the wrong foot all those years ago.”
“Yeah? And the arrest is more proof of what a nice guy he is?”
“It was for drag racing, not assault,” Erik says defensively. “Other players have done much worse.”
It’s a pathetic defense of toxic masculinity to sayat least it wasn’t assault, and I count off his other offenses on my fingers. “No? What about the drinking and partying? All the girls? That time he pushed the referee? Or when he trashed your locker room after the championship game that he lost foryoulast year because he couldn’t wait one goddamn second to celebrate so he could realize he was on the one-yard line and not in the end zone? No one is more arrogant than he is.”
Erik stays silent, only shaking his head.
So I continue. “He’s a joke. He takes nothing seriously, and you expect me to swoop in and save his ass because he has to be an adult for once in his life? No. No thank you.”
“Don’t talk about him like that,” Erik snaps, but I’m not done.
“You know all the shit he’s said about me? To my face? That I’m uptight and need to get laid, that I’d be prettier if I smiled. He actually said that to me, Erik, and maybe you don’t care about that. But I do. I don’t work with people like that.”
Erik leans away from me, sucking air through his teeth, and I hate that sound. Like nails on a chalkboard. “As if you haven’t said shit back to him? This isn’t all one-sided.”
Molly takes our argument as her cue to leave and swiftly removes Kai from his seat, muttering something about giving him a bath while I silently fume.
Because, of course, I’ve said things to him. He’s a real-life Gaston. Rude, conceited, and I’m positive he’s never read a book without pictures in his life. He needs to be brought down a peg or two.
