Page 5 of Falling Back to You

“Anytime.” Myles glanced at me in the rearview, probably analyzing my less-than-chipper mood. Grumpiness was more Greyson’s wheelhouse, but I was off-kilter this morning.

“What’s wrong?” he asked.

“Nothing.” Couldn’t a guy have an off day once in a while? Greyson spoke in monosyllables half the time, and no one bothered him about it.

Myles huffed but let it go. Once we hit the gym for training, no doubt he’d corner me and drag it out. He had an uncanny way of getting information. Usually it involved a game of Super Mario Kart where he tricked you into spilling your guts. But if he was desperate enough, he had been known to resort to underhanded methods. Like spotting you on the weight machine where you couldn’t run away from him because you were lifting the equivalent of two full-grown giant Pacific octopuses over your head.

Ask me how I knew.

Juliet pivoted in the passenger seat, her hand resting on her rounded stomach. I’d have another nephew by Christmas. “We need to talk.”

This morning just kept getting better and better.

“Whatever you think I did, I didn’t do it. Or whatever I didn’t do, I did.” I slid the plate of pancakes onto the console. “Have some carbs.”

She smacked my shoulder but grabbed one of the forks I’d brought. “Bribery is a federal offense.”

“So is accepting the bribe,” I retorted.

“You gonna close the door?” Myles groused, but his lips twitched under his dark beard.

He’d been around the craziness of the Satterfield siblings for over twenty years. Actually, it was mostly the Cal and Juliet Show he had to referee. Jules and I got along fine, but we were the biggest squabblers of the clan. Probably because we were the youngest. But also, I was a self-proclaimed pest, and she . . . could kill a man seven different ways with a fork. Figuratively. She was stabby but not that stabby. Still, it was a good thing Myles was my best friend and her husband. He could keep both of us alive and out of jail.

Juliet leaned across the console and kissed his cheek, her smile soft. “You know arguing is how we show affection, right?”

I closed my door and groaned. “Is it too late to retract my acceptance of a ride? I’m not in the mood for mushiness.”

Myles ignored me, his default reaction when I griped about his PDA. He rolled down his window and waved to Khia, who stood with Ruby waving on the front porch of my farmhouse. It was really too big for two people, but I’d bought it on a whim years ago. Noelle and I had dreamed of living in a house like that. Some dreams never died.

“Grey said he’d finish your truck this afternoon.” Myles interrupted my train of thought, pulling out of the driveway. “He’ll drive it to the game.”

Myles and Juliet carpooled because my sister was part of the Chargers’ legal counsel, and Myles was our goalie.

Me? I valued the quiet half hour to clear my head and focus, but with my truck out of commission, I’d been hitching a ride. Something I was sorely regretting now. I didn’t begrudge them their happiness, but that didn’t mean I wanted a front-row seat to my best friend lip-locking with my sister either.

There were some things a man didn’t need to see.

“What do we have to talk about?” I asked once we left Serenity Springs and hit the highway north to Caldwell.

Juliet sighed against the quiet background music of The Backstreet Boys—Myles’s choice—playing over the speakers. “The nanny dilemma.”

“Okay.” I drew out the word, confused.

Juliet had offered to spearhead the process for finding Khia a nanny after Mama’s accident. I trusted my sister to vet the applicants, then consult me on the ones who passed her Hunger Games–level interrogation. So far, none of them had made it.

If I weren’t so concerned about Khia’s safety, I’d probably feel bad for them. Because the only thing more frightening than Juliet Satterfield Delavan on a good day was Juliet, seven months pregnant.

“All of the applicants are very interested in you—not Khia. It’s brought all the jersey chasers out of the woodwork.” Juliet shoved a forkful of pancakes into her mouth.

Myles huffed.

My sentiments exactly. While casual flings might be part of the hockey lifestyle for some guys, I’d done my time and regretted my mistakes. And now that I had a little girl, I definitely wasn’t entertaining that. It’s your past. It’s forgiven. “Seriously?”

Juliet grunted, chewing faster because she never talked with food in her mouth. “Why would I stoke your ego? You’ve got a big enough head without my help.”

I smiled out of habit because she expected it, but it felt all wrong. Brittle. Carved out of stone. My love life was often the brunt of a joke from my siblings, not maliciously, but in the sense that I was the last unmarried sibling of the family. Better put—no-longer-married sibling. I’d had no desire to date since Izzy died four and a half years ago, and not for my siblings’ lack of trying to tactfully set me up.

Juliet frowned at my silence, fork midair. “Hey, you okay?”