“You still got your toy handy?” I ask her.
Her hand dives beneath the pillow her head is on, and she pulls the case out and waves it in the air. “It’s never far away these days,” she says softly, and that’s my cue.
“You know what to do. Sweet dreams,” I tell her, trying not to smirk.
“They’ll be dirty,” she promises.
“Rory,you missed a good one Friday night.” Lexi’s throaty voice is laced with humor as she watches her sister for a reaction across the picnic table out back at the Grady cabin.
“I had the time of my life here with Miss Front Tooth,” Rory responds, jiggling the knee her baby is sitting on and making her giggle. “Let me tell you, it was ablastfor everyone.”
“A fucking hoot,” Wyatt agrees sarcastically.
“Show us that tooth, missy,” her grandfather coos from beside me. It’s hard not to get caught up in the cuteness of these gruff bastards fawning over the sweet little addition to the Grady family, but if you’d told me a few years back these two fuckers would end up like this, dad and grandpa, I wouldn’t have believed you.
Lexi, from my other side, reaches out across the table like she’s going to lift her lip. “Show us that tooth! Come on!”
Our niece giggles, revealing the hint of her lower front incisor in that gummy smile, and everyone at the table cheers, evenher dad. Rory pumps the baby’s arms up and down, like she’s celebrating, too, and she giggles even harder.
I try not to focus on the jealousy that surges inside me at the gooey look Wyatt shares with Aurora.
“Well, while I’m sure you were living it up with the teething situation—my literal worst nightmare, by the way—I recruited a new participant into girls’ night,” Lexi continues in her gives-no-fucks drawl.
“You know how I despise cliffhangers, Alexis,” Rory intones.
“All right, buzzkill. It was Amelia. And you should know she’s a fucking riot.”
I feel Lexi’s brown eyes slide onto me, the side of my face hot under her stare, but I keep eating my Gray’s Papaya hot dogs flown in from New York like they’re talking about nothing more than the weather.
If my heart is beating just a little bit faster, a touch louder than usual, no one else seems to notice.
“Yeah?” Rory takes a swig of her papaya drink and puts it down gently on the table before looking back at her sister. “How so?”
This is it, I think.This is where Lexi throws me under the bus and my short-lived peace with Wyatt explodes into cinders and ash.
Instead, Lexi just shrugs and takes a sip of her own drink. “She’s feisty. Our speed. A weirdo, but a funny one. Little bit twisted and dark when you least expect it.”
“Huh,” Rory replies. “What did you guys get up to?”
Wyatt takes his daughter back from his wife’s lap and begins entertaining her, bringing his scruffy face close to hers, cooing and making ridiculous noises at her that make her happy.
It’s hard to be jealous when I saw the man he was for more than a decade without Rory in his life. I don’t begrudge him hishappiness. He fucking deserves it. But why is he the only one who gets to find that?
Lexi’s voice brings me out of my head and back into the conversation at hand. “We went to Suds. Played some pool.”
Wyatt smirks at his wife and she makes a face at him I wish I hadn’t seen. Her stepfather, or Gramps as we call him now, huffs and looks off to the side.
“She can really handle her bourbon,” Lex continues.
“Bourbon?” Wyatt asks, a touch of respect in his voice.
“Yep. Even Dallas seemed impressed. He hooked her up with a bunch of shots on the house.”
Lexi looks at the man at the other end of the bench from her and sucks in a breath through her teeth. “Pretend you didn’t hear me say that, eh, Gramps?”
Me? My ears are ringing. Dallas? Took a liking to her?
“I can see that,” Wyatt muses after a second of considering it. “They’ve both got that dark something going for them, don’t they?” He looks at his wife for confirmation. “I’m not much of a romantic, but I think they’d be cute,” he says, and my stomach drops onto the wooden bench where my ass is.
