“They’re just scared,” he said. “I know, because I was really intimidated by girls when I was younger. Heck, I stillam. It’s not that boys don’t like you, Rosie, it’s that theydo, and they’re afraid that you’ll thinkthey’rethe idiots.”
Cole nodded, and he pulled away from the curb once Harry had driven the moving truck past them. “I know Spencer liked you.”
“Oh, Spencer’s an idiot,” Rosie said with a scoff.
Boston tipped his head back and laughed again. “That’s exactly why boys are afraid of you, Rosie. They know you’re going to see right through them to who they truly are. It’s going to take someone special to capture your heart.”
“Is that who this guy is?” Cole asked, looking at his sister out of the side of his eye. “What’s his name, anyway?”
“I am not telling you,” Rosie said. “The last boy I told you about, you marched up to him the very next day and scared him off.”
“So has something started between you two?” he asked.
“Well, I’m going to be fifteen before Valentine’s Day,” Rosie said. “And Daddy and Momma said I could go to the dance this year. So yeah, we’ve already talked about him taking me.”
Cole nodded, his jaw tight, but Boston beamed at Rosie. “That’s great,” he said. “You should go out with a lot of boys, Rosie—as many as you can. Then you’ll get to know what kind of guy you like.”
She twisted to look at him again, and Boston simply gave her his best smile. “Don’t worry about your momma and daddy either,” he said. “You’re a good girl, and they know it.”
To his utter surprise, she sniffled and turned around, and Rosie had never been known to be quiet, but Boston could barely hear her as she said, “Thank you, Boston.”
He looked out the window, feeling like he finally belonged in this family. It might only last for a moment, but for right now, Boston sure liked being a Young.
CHAPTER
SEVENTEEN
“Thank you so much,” Joey said as she leaned in to hug Rosie. “Really, thank you.” She’d said it fifteen hundred times in the last five minutes as her cousins had all prepared to leave Adam’s new house.
All of his furniture had been put together and positioned in the places he wanted. Some of his boxes had been unpacked, mostly in the kitchen and bathrooms, and he could do his clothes to fill his master closet and his linens and his shoes by himself.
“Thanks for having us,” Rosie said. “We’re headed to Bryce’s now to help feed the horses. I can’t wait to meet their new baby when she comes.” She grinned from ear to ear, turned, and left the house. Joey watched her jog after her brother, and then she brought Adam’s front door closed and twisted the deadbolt, locking herself inside with him.
She sighed, because it had been a very busy day already,and the clock had barely struck one. Her legs ached, and while Joey worked two pretty physical jobs in the kitchen, she somehow felt more tired now than she did after working both of those.
Adam had thanked everyone as a group and retreated to the couch while Joey continued individual conversations with her cousins. Now she sank down next to him, a hefty sigh pulling out of her mouth. “It’s done,” she said, and she actually laid down with her head in his lap.
He stroked her hair back, his touch gentle and soft and wonderful. “Thank you so much for arranging for them to come help.”
She turned and looked up at him. “Of course, and I didn’t even have to tell any of the uncles.”
It’d been a few hours since she’d been caught calling Adam “baby,” and her stomach vibrated as if the garlic knots she’d eaten for lunch had taken up arms and were about to revolt.
“You’re going to have to tell them, though,” Adam said, raising his eyebrows. “When are you going to do that?”
Joey groaned as she sat up and moved back to his side. “Have I told you about our family text?” she asked, knowing full well that she hadn’t.
“No, ma’am,” he murmured.
“Well, it’s a beast of its own,” she said. “It’s hard to describe until you’re actually on it. So let me show you.”
She tapped and swiped to get her phone open, and then she moved to the group messaging app, where she actually did have plenty of multi-person conversations. For example,she’d made a group chat with the people she’d asked to come help Adam move that morning.
On her phone, she’d named the whole Young family group chat “The Big Shebang,” and she tilted her phone toward Adam. “Every aunt, every uncle, every person over the age of fourteen,” she said. “That’s the rule we came up with. There’s like sixty of us.”
“Sixty?” Adam’s eyebrows went up. “That can’t be true.”
“Oh, it’s true,” Joey said with a chuckle. “Leigh’s brother and his wife are on here, and so are Ev’s brothers and their wives, even though they’re not Youngs. It’s definitely over sixty. In fact, I think Liesl added it up once and it was sixty-one, and that doesn’t include Denzel and Michelle, Kassie and Reggie, or Shawn and Enid. Oh, and let’s not forget Abby’s brother and his wife—Wade and Cheryl. You should see us when we get together for a party.”
