Page 30 of Hearts on the Table
“Eli, we gotta leave Tam—Uncle Sammy alone. He has a friend over.” The boy shrieked when she reached to pull him away. Sam’s face twisted. His big hand dwarfed the toddler’s back where he patted it.
“No, stay.” Maybe my ovaries weren’t ready to relinquish the image of Sam cradling a small child in his tree trunk arms. Or maybe I was greedy to collect new pieces of him, even if that meant squeezing them out of his family members.
“No, I really,reallydon’t want to intrude. Come on, E, we can do bubbles at our house.”
“I’d actually appreciate it. Sam’s given me tons of stories about his brothers. Haven’t heard one about him, yet.”
She paused, cocking her head at Sam before trudging up the final two stairs.
“You’ve been holding out on her, Tammy. I’m Jasmine, Conner’s wife.” She offered her hand before collapsing into one of the patio chairs.
“I figured. I’m Lainey.”
“I figured.”
Sam murmured something as he set a green can of seltzer in front of her. It sounded like a warning, which she promptly ignored. She popped the top. “Let’s start with the college years.”
???
Eli loved bubbles. Sam set up a machine that kept a constant stream of them blowing, and if the solution ran out before we could refill it, Eli’s screams became so loud they could quake the bricks of Sam’s house and his neighbors’. Even with six gallons of the stuff in the weatherproof cabinet on Sam’s deck, I worried we’d run out.
We kept a close eye on the bubble levels as we chatted. Sam mostly played with Eli, or sat quietly and listened to Jasmine’sincreasingly outrageous stories of the three brothers. She’d been with Connor since high school, so she had more than enough material to satisfy my curiosity and fill in some blanks about my attending. Sam provided a spattering of commentary.
The time Will crashed his car and Sam helped him get it fixed before their mother came home (“He crashed it again three weeks later, idiot.”). When Connor had gotten pre-wedding jitters and Sam had attended six weeks of ballroom dance classes with him in secret (“He wouldn’t let me lead.”).
When they’d all chipped in to pay off the mortgage on their mother’s home. He hadn’t added much to that one.
Jasmine herself was delightful. A financial analyst at a major firm in town, she had her sights on a big promotion after the baby was born. Another boy, she lamented a few times, smiling. Yoga and Pilates interested her more than her husband’s circuit gym. She expressed her thoughts openly and showered her son with love without letting him run around completely unchecked. I loved her.
At some point in the evening, she whipped out her phone, claiming the guacamole was making her crave Mexican food. Conner magically appeared twenty minutes later with three massive takeout bags full of tacos.
Sam’s fingers on my forearm stopped me when I got up to leave them to it. The four of them—Eli included—convinced me to stay for dinner. I shivered at the feeling of those fingertips dragging across my shoulder, Sam’s eyes asking wordlessly if I wanted another beer.
Crowded around the table, tubs of queso and taco wrappers strewn around, I felt more and more like I really had fallen into Wonderland. Underneath the smell of grease and jalapenos, the scent of gardenias wafted from where they grew against Sam’s fence. The breeze cooled as the sun sank. Porch lights flickered on around us. We talked about the gym, how insane it was tobe a heart surgeon, that new Netflix show that was getting good reviews, and Will’s ridiculous dating escapades.
Jasmine and I shook our heads and rolled our eyes at each other when Sam and Connor argued over who would take the bags of trash out to the curb. Sam won when he pointed out that someone had to carry Eli home, since he was nodding off in Jasmine’s arms.
“Please come back. I like you so much.” Jas surprised me into a hug before they departed across the yard.
I laughed, tucking a strand of hair behind my ear. “You don’t like the other girls Sam brings home?”
“Lainey.” Jas slid her hands to my shoulders. Jiggled. “There are no other girls, girl. You get what I’m saying?”
I did. I flicked through my phone apps, calling a rideshare while she waddled across the lawn, catcalling Conner. That done, I gathered the few remaining bottles and empty water glasses from the table.
“I can take care of those.” Sam plucked them out of my hands before I could insist.
“You’re very polite,” I accused, watching him set the glasses in the sink and toss the bottles in a recycling bin. He recycled. I wasn’t sure why that was hot, but it was.
“My mother’s doing.”
“I had fun tonight. I like your brothers. And Jasmine.”
“She’s great.”
“Hmm.” At some point, he’d folded the sleeves of his button down to his elbows. Watching him load the dishwasher was tendon porn. I had to rip my eyes away when I felt his gaze on me, lest he catch me mentally undressing him.
“What.”
