“That’s Tomorrow Tori’s problem,” I announce to the room full of judgmental objects before pivoting on my foot and going out the front door. The house came with the most adorable porch, complete with a swing. Settling onto it, I drape the blanket over my feet and sip my wine, looking out at the quiet neighbourhood, feeling peace settle into my bones.
This is exactly where I’m meant to be. Moving here was absolutely the fresh start Cooper and I needed. The start of something amazing.
Chapter five
Sawyer
“Beatle!” I lift my glass to toast my brother Jude as he maneuvers around the tables in Hastings Bar, his girlfriend Lily on his arm. His grimace is not unexpected. For the life of me, I cannot understand why my brothers don’t appreciate the unique nicknames I give them. I puteffortinto thinking up those nicknames, and they choose to be aggravated instead of impressed.
Rude.
Lily sits down across from me, leaning over to give my baby sister, who’s sitting next to me, a hug. She and Kat are best friends, which makes Lily like a second sister. Good thing Jude doesn’t see her that way or their relationship would be majorly weird. Granted, she was the physical therapist assigned to help him rehab from an injury that ended his NHL career, so maybe they made it weird all on their own.
“How’s my peanut?” Lily asks, rubbing Kat’s stomach. Yeah, I’m about to be an uncle in a few months since Hunter knocked up my baby sister before they were even married. Fine, it was only a couple of months before they were married, but still.
“Keeping me up all night, pushing on my bladder.” Kat’s face twists into a pseudo frown. We all know she’s not really upset at the parasite growing inside of her, but we indulge her complaints.
“As soon as Sawyer the second is born, I’ll be sure to take him aside and remind him to apologize. He’ll listen to his favourite uncle.”
I take a sip of my beer and wait.
Three. Two. One.
“There’s not a chance in hell my kid is going to be named Sawyer the second.”
“Do you honestly think a newborn baby will understand a word you say?”
“Who said you’ll be the favourite?”
There it is. Nothing I like better than riling up all of my siblings. And with everyone except my oldest brother Max and his fiancée Heidi present for tonight’s beer and wings, I’ve got a captive audience. I spread my hands wide magnanimously.
“As the only Donnelly that’s not tied down, it stands to reason I’ll have the most time to dedicate to our newest family member. Thereby cementing my position as favourite uncle. And what the hell is wrong with the name Sawyer?”
Hunter, Kat’s husband and father of the as-yet-unnamed baby, sets a fresh pitcher of beer down and a lemonade in front of Kat before sitting down himself and pushing the hair off his forehead. “What did I miss?”
“Sawyer being Sawyer, Jude being grumpy, and me trying to be a voice of reason,” Kat answers helpfully. And okay, accurately.
Camilla, my twin brother Beckett’s wife, who threatened bodily harm when I first tried calling her by her full name instead of Cam, leans over with a smirk. “Listen. I already share a name with the café, I don’t mind sharing a name with my niece or nephew, and Cam could work for a boy or a girl.”
Everyone groans at that, because Cam laying claim to Camille’s café, which was named long before she moved to town, is a joke only she and Beck find funny at this point.
Beckett slugs me in the arm just as I open my mouth to give Cam heck. Instead, I glower at him. “Ow, dude.”
He just cocks his head to the side. Goddamn it, having a twin who knows what you’re thinking most of the time is seriously annoying.
The conversation moves on to Jude’s hockey team and their playoff chances this year. The very fact they made it to the second round says a lot about his skills as a coach, and we’re all gunning for them to win. I let the talk swirl around me, my eyes moving around the darkened space of Hastings Bar. This place has seen a lot from us Donnellys over the years. Dates, boys nights, family nights like tonight, and okay, fine, in years past, me on the prowl for a body to warm my bed.
The only problem is, Dogwood Cove isn’t that big of a town. Meaning that I made my way through any eligible bed buddies a long time ago. And now, as I look at my siblings and how fucking happy they seem, wrapped around their significant others, getting sex on the reg, I’m annoyed because I’m a little jealous. Of the sex, of course, nothing else. But as soon as I even start thinking of sex, a beautiful blonde face upturned in ecstasy crosses my mind. I shake my head to clear it, the same way I have to every time I think of Tori.
No idea why I keep thinking of her. I mean, I’m the guy who has always said relationships are bullshit. The brother who stupidly tried to convince more than one of his siblingsnotto tie themselves down.
So what the fuck am I doing, sitting here alone, moping because I don’t have a girl by my side, and thinking of a one-night stand? It’s not like I want a girlfriend. Hell, no. But I’m also not loving this odd man out feeling.
“Oh hey, did you guys know Ethan finally rented out the old Quinlan house? Mila said she dropped off some muffins the other morning. It’s a single mom; I think her son is around Violet’s age, maybe a little older from what I’ve heard.”
Kat’s mention of our cousin Leo’s kid brings a smile to my face. Vi’s a riot. She was so shy when she and Leo first moved here, but over the last couple of years, she’s really come out of her shell. Now, at six and a half, she’s got all of us wrapped around her little fingers.
“We should see if the mom wants to come to book club,” Lily injects, a mischievous glint in her eye. All of the guys chuckle. Except me.
