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Their eyes drifted to Gus. “What?” Gus asked.
“As the oldest brother, since you’re here for story time, did you want to spill some tea on yourbabybrother,” Brody asked.
“What the fuck does that mean?” Gus asked.
“It’s a thing the kids say,” Lachlan said.
“You need to stop dating girls who don’t know the theme song toFresh Prince of Bel-Air,” Gus said.
Lachlan laughed. “Oh, Gus. I don’t date.”
“I don’t know. Hunter was the same kind of trouble as all of you. You were...all kind of little assholes, now that you mention it.”
“You’ll be a wonderful father, Gus,” Brody said, his tone dry.
“I’m just being honest,” Gus said.
“Do you have any specific stories about Hunter?” Elsie asked.
“Why?” Gus said.
“Because,” Elsie said, “Hunter has always seemed wizened and older to me. But of course he doesn’t to you.”
“She’s looking for stories for the wedding. Which irritates the hell out of me,” Hunter said.
“Yeah. But you can’t do anything about it,” she said, smiling sweetly.
“Maybe not,” Hunter said.
“No. But I do remember when you were a little brat,” Brody said. “So I can malign you with firsthand knowledge.”
“Don’t worry, Elsie,” Tag said, grinning. “I owe Hunter for the best man speech he gave at my wedding. So, don’t you worry. We’ll show up with the goods.”
“I trust you,” Elsie said.
“This is a spectacle,” Gus said. “That’s why you should just get hitched with a couple days’ notice. That way nobody has time to give any speeches.”
“Oh, are you going to tell us how it is now, Gus?” Brody asked.
“I always tell you how it is. Because I’m the oldest.”
“Yeah. You try,” Lachlan said.
“You ought to listen,” Gus said. “Because I’m smart.”
“You know,” Hunter said. “A good point has been made here. Angus didn’t have a proper wedding. Where we could all plan to make speeches. So maybe we should tell his beautiful bride stories now.”
The brothers laughed, and raised their bottles of beer. And Alaina leaned in. “Oh, please do,” she said.
“Well, there was the time our cat had kittens up in the hayloft. And had them all wedged in a place where no one could get to them. And he was concerned that the little mites were going to have problems.”
It was a funny choice of word.Mites. She knew that Gus had probably called them that, which confirmed for her that he thought of her as a little angry kitten.
It made her stomach dip.
“Anyway, he went on a cat-rescuing mission,” Brody said. “And you have never seen a person scratched all that much to hell, trying to get those little critters out of that tight spot they were wedged in.”
“Yeah, that was probably his first set of scars,” Lachlan said.
