Chapter Five
CHAPTER FIVE
CARTER
I had to get Ava out of there. Madison explaining what love is? Fuck me, that could explain what happens when I’m around her. And she was kneeling down, her face perfectly at cock level. Fuck, I’m going to need another solo trip to the bathroom. It’s like I’m fucking fifteen again. I’ve gotten closely reacquainted with my vanity and shower. But the last six months, I’ve kept my guard up. Helped her to become part of the friend group and the town and shot down rumors when I could without raising too much suspicion.
We’ve also become friendly if not real friends. I’ve driven her home a few times when the cookouts have gone too late, or the girls have found the extra bottle of wine or booze. Every time creates a new challenge with my willpower and honestly, I’m fucking tired. Tired of hiding my attraction to her, of hiding the truth from our friends, from not letting Ava go full matchmaker on her.
“Daddy, are we going to the cookout now?” Ava asks from the backseat.
“Sure are, baby girl.”
We went home for a couple of hours that passed agonizingly slow, with Ava asking every five minutes if it was time to leave. I need to get a life. Seriously, there has to be something after a major league player retires. But what is it?
We pull up to Davis’s house, Ava singing happy nonsense in the backseat. She’s really blossomed over the last few months. Today was the first time I’d heard her ask about her mommy or finding a new mommy in a few weeks.
As we round the back of the house and go through the gate, I see the women all sitting around the table, the men hovering, but not sitting.
“Are you still liking the job?” Trish asks Madison.
“I love it. The kids are just great.”
Davis waves to me as I join the fray and Ava runs off to the playset where Davis and Trish’s son Aaron and my nephew, Duncan, are climbing. Ava never misses an opportunity to hang out with the boys.
“You know, Harper is going to be old enough for a job before we know it. Think you could get her with the little ones?” Trish asks.
“Harper? Your sister Harper? The little feminist I met last week?” Madison smiles. “I think if you all keep having babies, there will be a position to fill.”
“Two is good.” Lottie bites her lip. “Yeah, two is definitely good. Especially if they’re going to be as big as the second one was.”
Everyone looks at Tiny, who shrugs. “Can’t help you fell in love with six-foot-five of all this, Princess.”
“I don’t know. There might be more on the way,” Trish replies, not looking at anyone.
“Oh my God, Patricia! Are you pregnant?” Elle asks for all of us.
After a prolonged silence, Lottie starts bouncing in her seat. “Oh my God, oh my God, oh my God,”
Trish kills the mood when she replies, “I refuse to test until Ginny is here.”
“Call her now! Get her ass up here! It’s time for a visit anyway,” Elle exclaims.
“She’ll be here in a couple of weeks.”
Lottie shakes her head. “No. That’s too far away. Uh-huh. You FaceTime her. If you have to pee on a stick with her, you do it with her on the phone.”
“Ugh. I can’t with you guys!”
Davis, who disappeared before the possible baby talk to grab a few beers from the house, smirks at Trish as he hands me one. “So, did they guess?”
“They’re trying to,” she pouts.
“And you told them you won’t test until my sister is here to hold your hand while you pee?”
“Yep. Gotta problem with that?”
“Nope. Not at all. If that’s who you want to hold hands with while you pee on a stick, that’s what will happen. I have nothing to say in the matter at all.”
“Smart man,” she deadpans.
“He’s just afraid you’re going to withhold sex, isn’t he?” Lottie stage whispers.
“You got that fucking right,” Davis laughs.
Time to steer this conversation in a different direction. “Might want to be careful on the language, Davis. Let those words slip and you never know who’s going to overhear.”
“That was not my fault.” Madison shoots me a glare.
“That was a really bad attempt at a cover-up, Mads.”
“What happened?” Lottie asks, concerned.
“I almost dropped an “F” bomb in front of Ava today.” Madison rolls her eyes. “I covered it up with a different word.”
“Bullshit,” I laugh. “You said two different words!”
“I did not! I said fudge!”
“No, I believe you said fuck-udge.”
Lottie rolls her eyes. “Isn’t the first time Ava’s heard that, is it, big brother?”
“She was really quick to point out that daddy says fuck, wasn’t she?”
“I don’t know what you mean. I’m a saint. I would never cuss in front of my child.”
“Daddy, you’re full of shit!” my four-year-old angel yells from five feet away.
“Ava Marie!”
“Yes?” She blinks at me with innocence all over her face.
“We don’t use that language in front of other people.”
“Oops.”
“So it’s my fault she knows the word fuck?” Madison asks when Ava runs back to the other kids.
“Weren’t we talking about someone being pregnant?” I ask.
“Yeah, and the fact that she refuses to pee on a stick until my sister is here, which I’m so totally okay with.” Davis blinks.
“She’s got your wrapped, doesn’t she?” I laugh.
“Yes, yes I do.” Trish smiles.
“Got a problem with it, or are you just jealous?” Trish grins.
“Oh, I’m jealous. Definitely jealous.”
Elle, not even trying to hide it, looks at Madison when she says, “You know, I could hook you up with someone.”
“Why are you looking at me when you say that?” Madison asks.
Turning her gaze to me, she replies to Madison, “I could hook you up as well.”
“You’re creeping me out, Elle. Why are you looking at me like that?”
“Oh my God, she’s trying to hook the two of you up. You both need to get laid. You should just lay each other. Problem solved.” Lottie tosses her hands in the air and slaps them on the table.
“I don’t—” we say simultaneously, both getting cut off by my sister.
“Don’t bullshit. You’re both giving desperation these days.”
“Can we change the subject now? Please?” Madison almost begs.
“I don’t know, I’m kind of enjoying this,” Ranger adds.
“Careful, or I’ll start spilling your secrets.” Elle grins at him.
“I don’t have any secrets.”
“Fuck that. You have all the secrets, asshole.” Davis shakes his head.
“I don’t know what she’s talking about.”
“I could always tell him how much you like…” Elle’s mouth is covered by Ranger’s hand.
“Momma?” Aaron comes up to Trish, tugging on her arm. “What’s fudging?”
Trish shoots all of us daggers before turning back to her son. “It’s someone who really likes chocolate.”
“I like chocolate! I’m a fudger!”
Ava, in all her helpfulness, replies to Aaron. “You know Miss Madi meant fucker.”
I’m going to get kicked out of the group. We’re going to be banned from all future events. Ava and I will die alone in my dad’s house because she can’t stop saying fuck. Fuck me.
“Fucker!” Aaron yells.
“No!” Trish calls back. “Fudge!”
“Fudge, fucker, fudge, fucker, fudge, fucker.”
“I’m going to kill you all.”
“That can’t be blamed on me,” Davis tries, but his smile looks guilty to me.
“Maybe not, but the asshole that he said last week and the shit he’s been dropping for the last month and oh, yeah, the dammit he let loose at the doctor the other day when he got a shot? That’s all you buddy.”
“Yep, definitely enjoying this.” Ranger chuckles into his beer.
“Will you still be enjoying this if I told you I was pregnant?” Elle bats her eyes at him.
“Don’t fuck with me like that.”
“Who says I’m fucking with you?”
“Okay.” Lottie claps her hands. “Subject change—again.”
“Yes please. We’ve hit everything about fudging and fucking and babies and hook-ups. Can we move on?” Tiny asks.
“Let’s talk about the baseball team at the high school,” Davis offers.
“Have you asked Uncle Carter if he’s going to be the coach yet?” Lucas yells from the back door. His younger brother, Owen, sister, Harper, and my niece, Natalie, stand behind him.
“Not yet. Would you give me a goddamn minute?”
“Got damn. Got damn!” Aaron starts jumping around the yard.
“Fuck my life,” Trish sighs, shaking her head.
Duncan decides to throw his cursing skills out there, too. “Fudge, fuck, damn.”
“You realize none of us are ever getting laid again, right?” Tiny hangs his head.
Madison starts laughing. It sounds like bells tinkling. It’s a nice sound. “Oh, you all think you’re the only parents I’ve met who had a kid drop a bad word? Hate to burst your bubble, but you’re not.”
“That does make me feel marginally better.” Davis actually looks relieved.
“Me too.” Trish smiles at her.
“What’s Lucas want to know?” I ask Davis, looking back at the kid still standing in the doorway.
“They’re looking for a baseball coach at the high school.”
“But aren’t you the baseball coach?” I ask.
“He sucks!” Lucas yells. Davis flips him off.
“I am a wonderful coach. Lucas just doesn’t like that he has to listen to me on the field. Then he gets upset when I yell at him for not listening.”
“Hey, Lucas,” I call over my shoulder to the kid.
“Yes, Mr. Bailey?”
“Okay, first, I can’t be Uncle Carter and Mr. Bailey in the same sitting, alright? Second, you gonna get pissed off at me if I yell at you when you’re on the field?”
“No. It means you’re paying attention to me.”
“I swear, that little asshole,” Davis mutters to everyone’s laughter.
“Does he think I won’t call him an asshole on the field?” I squint at the door.
“Daddy cusses a lot on the ball field,” Ava grins.
“And I think it’s time for the kids to go inside. With their big Uncle Lucas. Who is going to do it without complaint if he wants me to think about this seriously,” I say loud enough for the kid to hear me.
“Aw, man,” Lucas whines. “Come on, kids.”
“That was easy. Too easy.” I frown at the door as all the kids go in.
“Only because you’re the Golden God of Baseball. Idol to all,” Davis taunts.
“You jealous?”
“I might not be The Carter Bailey, but at least I’m getting laid.”
“Fuck you, man,” I laugh.
“Yeah, this is some good shit,” Ranger laughs with me.
“Let the boys talk, dear,” Elle pats his face, making everyone else crack up.