Page 26 of Crossed Up

Luckily, said guests consist only of guys on the team and their families, so they were all really cool about the whole thing and politely didn’t ask questions.

Wren, however, almost cried out of guilt. I tried to reassure her, but it’s pretty hard when I feel just as guilty, if not more so. If my mom weren’t in Seattle visiting my younger brother, she’d be reading me the riot act.

“Hey man.” Rhodes slides into the deck chair next to me, sipping a juice box. I scoff, raising a questioning brow, to which he just shrugs. “What? I’m driving, and I’ve got precious cargo. Sue me for drinking fruit punch.”

I just shake my head with a chuckle. He’s always been a cheesy bastard, but his entire demeanor has changed since Wren made her way back into his life last year.

Some selfish part of me hoped they would want to have kids right away so I’d have friends in the parenting boat with me, but no dice. They’re happy being dog parents, and though I was a little bummed at first, I truly couldn’t be happier for them.

“So,” Rhodes starts quietly. “How are things going with Lyla anyway? You two seem a lot closer since the last time I saw you together.”

One other thing about my best friend? He’s as gossipy as an old woman after Sunday service.

“Lyla is incredible with Crew,” I say wistfully. “I know I wasn’t doing a bad job raising him before, but he’s an entirely different kid since she moved in. He’s doing regular schoolwork and is on a set schedule, which means he’s sleeping better and hasn’t been as emotional when I have to leave.”

He looks over to where Lyla is helping Crew eat a cupcake the size of his head and laughs. “He seems really taken with her.” From the corner of my eye, I see him studying my profile, but my gaze is so riveted on my son and his nanny that I can’t be bothered to return his stare. “But it seems like he’s not the only one.”

I fight a blush and sigh, scrubbing a palm over the back of my neck. “I asked her to come with me to New York this weekend… without Crew.”

Rhodes nods in understanding, but he doesn’t look surprised, so I’m pretty sure Wren already told him. It’s nice to talk to someone about this without worrying about how they’ll perceive it. “And is this a date? Is it just a fling? I mean, you’ve only known her a month, and just a couple weeks ago, you were worried because you didn’t know anything about her.”

Shrugging, I take another pull from my lukewarm beer and grimace, setting it to the side.

“I guess I still don’t know all that much about her. But it’s the little things that have sucked me in, like the way she wakes up early and sits with me while we drink our morning coffee and how it’s easier to talk to her than it has been with anybody else, maybe ever. Or the way she takes care of me, even when she doesn’t have to, either by making me special macro-friendly meals so I don’t have to eat reheated food every day or by asking me how I’m doing and caring about the answer.”

My gaze strays to where she’s chatting with a pretty redhead I think might be here from a local bakery. Crew stands at her side, still eating his massive cupcake, and my smile grows when Lyla pauses their conversation to wipe some frosting off his face with her thumb.

“When she’s working with Crew on his schoolwork, she scrunches up her nose in this adorable way that makes me want to squish her cheeks and kiss her all at once, and she has a crazy obsession with cherries that I think is absolutely precious. And her laugh? Good god, Rhodes. That woman laughs, and every molecule in my body stops to soak in the sound.”

I sigh heavily. “The truth is, she hasn’t done anything groundbreaking to draw me to her. It’s every little detail I’ve learned and all the things I haven’t that keep me helplessly in her orbit. The fact that it’s all wrapped up in such a gorgeous package definitely doesn’t hurt either.”

With each hurried word that falls out of my mouth, Rhodes’s smile grows bigger, eventually getting so wide it’s almost unsettling. I don’t think I’ve ever seen someone’s molars when they smiled before. He keeps on smiling and not saying anything for long enough that I start to squirm uncomfortably, and defensiveness has me straightening in my seat.

“What?” I grouse.

He barks out a laugh, and it seems like that breaks the dam. Soon enough, he’s forcing out words between bouts of laughter. “Fuck, Aidan. I owe Wren a hundred bucks.”

That wasn’t anywhere on the list of things I expected him to say. Raising a brow, I glance between him and Wren, who’s currently telling what looks to be a wild story to Lyla and the redhead.

“Wanna explain? Or should I just go jump off the dock? Because that seems like it would be about as helpful as you are right now.”

My best friend finally gets control of himself as his laughter subsides, and he shakes his head at me. “Wren also bet me you’d fall for her by the end of her first month as Crew’s nanny. I thought you’d hold out at least three.”

My jaw drops, but I shouldn’t be surprised. In our friend group, someone always has some inane bet going. Though I’ll admit it’s usually Wren and me betting about the stupid things we can get Rhodes to do.

“Y’all made a bet about Lyla, even knowing she was coming off of something traumatic?”

That thought fills me with indignation because nobody should be making bets about my girl.

Woah. My girl?

“The bet wasn’t about Lyla, you ass. Honestly, I wasn’t sure about this whole arrangement in the first place. You didn’t see her back when she first moved here, but she was as fragile as fine china. Every sound made her jump, and she didn’t go more than ten minutes without checking her surroundings or looking over her shoulder like she was expecting somebody to jump out at her.”

He takes a breath and scratches his elbow, casting a sideways look at the woman in question, who’s laughing at Crew as he drags her over to the face-painting station.

“I didn’t know her as well as Wren because men still made her extremely uncomfortable back then, but the difference between Lyla a year ago and Lyla now? It’s jarring. If working for you is what’s putting that look on her face? I think you should keep up whatever y’all are doing.”

His words simultaneously break my heart and light it up because I can picture Lyla then, alone and so scared of her own shadow she’d feel the need to constantly be on alert, but she’s not now.

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