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“Hey, it was only five. If you didn’t count them, I tried to get at least twenty past you and failed.”
“Whatever.” Caleb pouts. “Let’s just get to the showers. I must wash the stench of defeat off me before I hurl.”
“And I thought I was hard on myself,” I utter, watching Caleb curse under his breath.
“He’ll be fine. Bet you twenty bucks that he’ll be right as rain, back to his usual douche self before we even get back to my place.” Jack chuckles.
And just as he predicted, Caleb returns to his cheerful demeanor the minute we get to Jack’s.
“Hey, Erin,” I greet after finding Jack’s wife in the kitchen with baby Fiona at her hip and her two-year-old toddler, Cara, coloring on the floor at her sides.
“Hi, handsome. So glad you came. I made your favorite—spaghetti carbonara.”
“With strips of bacon?”
“You know it. Grab a seat.”
“Thanks,” I reply, making myself comfortable by sitting on the stool around the kitchen island, grateful to her remembering my weakness for pasta of any kind.
Jack proceeds to kiss his wife and baby girl, and then he picks up Cara from the floor to show her some love, too.
“Is this for me?” he coos when Cara shows him the picture she was drawing. “It’s so pretty, but not as pretty as you, princess.”
His little girl smiles shyly, nuzzling her head to her father’s chest in embarrassment.
Jack then walks over to the fridge and adds Cara’s drawing next to the other works of art already on display.
I’ve never been an envious man, but it’s kind of hard not to be a little jealous of Jack.
He has it all—a wife who adores him, two of the sweetest baby girls you’ve ever met, and a promising hockey career.
“Dude, is that me?!” Caleb asks, pointing at the drawing and realizing that Cara drew him with a huge head and a tiny body while her dad is perfectly sized. “Seriously, baby girl, if you had to draw a big head on me, that’s not the head you should have made bigger.”
“Hey!!!” Both Jack and Erin scold him in unison.
But then again, Jack does have Caleb for a brother, so I guess the scales even out.
“Oh, don’t get your panties in a bunch.” Caleb laughs, pressing a kiss on his niece’s cheek before taking the seat beside me.
“So, you’ve been busy,” he jokes, nudging his shoulder with mine.
“What do you mean?” I counter, confused.
With Caleb, you never know what’s coming.
“I’m talking about you finally getting some.” He wiggles his eyebrows.
“Can one of you please translate?” I ask for Erin or Jack’s help.
“Sorry, handsome. You’re on your own. I’ve given up trying to understandDouche,” Erin teases as she slides a plate of carbonara in front of me.
“Hardy har.” Caleb fake laughs at his sister-in-law’s light teasing. “Spill it, Nate. Tell us all about the hottie you’ve been seen around town with.”
“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” I say a little too defensively, wondering if he could be referring to Lottie.
“Oh, yeah?” he says before taking out his phone and scrolling through whatever bullshit site Caleb likes to entertain himself with. “Then who’s that?”
He hands me the phone, and lo and behold, it’s a picture of me and Lottie grocery shopping together.
