Page 38 of Cocky Player

My parents were beloved in North Carolina due to the winning team they produced and owned…but most likely despised by their neighbors who had to live around them.Who could blame them?

I stepped into the back yard and had a sudden rush of the last time I was there, the night I saw Connor again.It took me a moment to brush the thought out of my mind and head toward where my dad and Aiden were, as predicted, sitting near the covered outdoor bar area, drinking beer, and what else besides ESPN on the outdoor television.

“There’s my princess!”my dad boomed, pushing to his feet.He wrapped me in a hug ten times fiercer than my mom’s.He smelled like beer and his Old Spice cologne, something he never changed despite the money he made.He was a simple man, always would be, and his predictability was one of my favorite qualities in him.That and his hugs and kindness and pretty much everything else about him.

What can I say?My dad was the best man I’ve ever met.

“Hey, Dad.Cops called yet?”

“One time.It only happened the one time.”He squeezed me one more time and let me go, only to find myself wrapped in Aiden’s arms too as he kissed the top of my head.

“How’s my best baby sister doing?”

“Not so much a baby anymore.”I twisted my leg to the side and kicked the back of his thigh.

“Always will be, Brenna.”He tugged me forward and I shrieked as he fisted his hand and proceeded to scrub the top of my head with his knuckles.

“Oh my God, you creep!Grow up, why don’t you.”I grabbed at his wrists and kicked out at his legs but he was quick, years of giving me and the rest of us noogies so often he’d mastered the ability to move out of our kicks and punches.

“Good luck with that,” Becca laughed.She tugged me away from Aiden and shoved his chest.“Go away.”She pointed toward the bar he’d left to come harass me.

“No,” Aiden huffed and leaned in, kissing his wife.Her annoyance was a ruse as she pretended to ignore him lingering and turned to me.“I blame your mom for catering to him so much.He’s a perpetual twelve-year-old.”

She was kidding even if there was truth to her statement.Becca loved my mom almost as much as I did.She’d been a part of our family since they started dating when they were eighteen, exactly half of their lifetimes ago.Since I was thirteen years younger than both Aiden and Becca, she’d been in my life since I was five.I hardly had a memory that didn’t include her.

“Ugh.Aren’t all men, though?”

She gave me a side-eyed look and wiggled her brows.“Why, sweetie.You have some firsthand knowledge of that now?”

My cheeks erupted in a violent heat and I stumbled over my words.“No.No of course not, it’s just … you know…boys are gross.”Ugh.Boys are gross?

They might have been…but men like Connor were anything but.

“Right,” she whispered in my ear and hugged me.“We’ll be talking later, you know that right?”

“Nothing to talk about unless you want to hear about the tattoo guy Gina went home with last week.”

“Oh, I love me some Gina stories.Is she corrupting you yet?Please tell me yes.You have to live a little, you know?Now’s your time.”Becca had always been my cheerleader, my encourager in a happy, much less insane sense than Gina.

Too bad for both Becca and me she married the world’s largest overprotective jerk.

“Her life is fine,” Aiden grumbled, “and I don’t want to know anything about men in her life or boys being gross.”

“Dad!”Beckett, their five-year-old, yelled from the pool.

We all turned only to cover our mouths with our hands, my laugh immediately bubbling behind mine.“Oh wow.That’s totally your kid.”

The towhead blond was butt naked, standing at the edge of the pool with one hand cupping the front of him, the other hand at his back.He danced back and forth and shouted, “I have to take a crap!”

Becca and I lost it, bending over and laughing so hard I clasped my knees.Across the patio, Sam and Eva busted out into hysterics, Rachel collapsed into my brother Tanner’s lap and Aiden cursed.

“No cops tonight huh, Dad?”

“One gosh darn time and you won’t let me live that down.”He took a swig of his beer and walked away, patting me on my shoulder and kissing my temple as he headed inside.Probably to make out with my mom in peace.“Good to have you home, darlin’.”

After Aiden ushered Beckett into the pool’s changing area to use the restroom, everything went back to normal, not like anything had paused at the five-year-old either cursing or shouting.I went and gave my love to Tanner and his wife Rachel.Then I snuggled up with my baby nephew, Tomas, pushed his hands away and pretended to nibble his fingers when he grabbed my boobs and spent a typical afternoon with my family.

Succeeding in, at least for a few hours, forgetting about Connor and I running into Shannon at the Farmer’s Market and what that could possibly mean for us.

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