Chapter 34 #2
I give him a sly smile. “Nah, it was more of a very strong dislike.”
“Brat,” he growls, digging his fingers into my sides and tickling me until we’re both laughing hysterically, and then Cooper fuses his lips to mine and kisses the breath out of me, and suddenly breakfast doesn’t seem so important anymore.
“Everyone better be decent!” Noah’s voice and the pounding on Cooper’s door has us tearing our mouths apart as I jump in surprise.
I don’t have time to do anything except for yank Cooper’s shirt down over my thighs as best I can before the door explodes open and what looks like Cooper’s entire family comes pouring in.
Elliot’s dog tears across the living room with a yip, and the once quiet apartment is suddenly filled with the noise of nine people talking at once.
“Shit,” Cooper mumbles, letting his head fall to my shoulder. “I’d apologize for my family’s near pathological need to invade everyone’s privacy, but, well, this is us.”
Kissing the side of his head, I laugh a little. “I like it. And hey, it could be worse. You could have been making breakfast and then they would have found out you can actually cook without you being able to do a big reveal.”
Cooper huffs out a laugh, lifting his head to kiss me.
“Kiss the girl later, Coop!” Pam orders, walking straight to the couch and pulling me up into a tight hug.
“Jo told us you had a not so pleasant run-in with your parents last night,” she says quietly, leaning back with her hands on my shoulders.
“I would apologize for barging in here like this but, well, I’m not sorry.
” She shrugs and smiles. “I was worried about you, and I wanted to come check in. I figured we might as well all have breakfast together. Are you doing okay, honey?”
“Pammy, I told you there was no reason to be concerned. Our Cooper knew just what to do. Didn’t he?” Cece studies my face and seems to approve of whatever she finds, because she smiles and nods. “He sure did,” she murmurs, answering her own question. “Love looks good on you, Evan, dear.”
“Love?” Jo must have supersonic hearing because her head whips around from where she stands, Jordan’s arm slung around her shoulder, arrowing in on me with a wide grin. “Are we in love?”
“Oh my god, of course they are,” Hannah says, coming over to link her arm through mine. “Look at her face. She’s freaking glowing.”
“I mean, that was some kiss we walked in on.” Amelia bumps her shoulder with mine, smirking at me. “Nice shirt.”
I snort out a laugh. “We weren’t expecting company.”
Jo walks up and links her arm with Pam’s, still grinning. “Rule number one of being a part of this family. You never expect company. Company just arrives and gets all into your business, usually with food.”
“Get used to it, Rhodes.” Cooper sidles up behind me and slides his arms around my waist, lacing his fingers together over my stomach and pressing a kiss to my neck. The Wyles women all beam at us, five heart eye emojis personified. “You live here now.”
The room goes silent at Cooper’s pronouncement, nine sets of eyes swinging in our direction. When I feel Cooper’s smile against my neck, I know he did it on purpose.
“Seriously?” Jo squeals, breaking the silence and bouncing on her toes the way she does when she’s excited. “You’re moving in?”
I shrug, leaning back against Cooper. “We’re having a baby. It seemed logical.” I go for nonchalant, but I feel my smile spread and know I don’t quite get there.
“Fuck yeah, we are!” Noah breaks into our little circle, wrapping his arms around Cooper, sandwiching me between them.
“Don’t squish my baby,” Cooper says, shoving Noah back, but Noah just grins at him.
“You’re having a baby, Coop.”
“You sure as shit are.” Jordan comes over and swings an arm around Cooper’s shoulders, ruffling his hair like he’s a toddler and leaning down to kiss my cheek.
Elliot does the same and then wraps a hand around the back of Cooper’s neck, squeezing. “I’m happy for you guys. For all of us. When’s moving day?”
I shrug again. “Oh, I don’t kno—”
“Today.” Cooper interrupts me, his voice firm, like he’s leaving no room for argument. “After breakfast, we’re moving her stuff in. All of us. But not you,” he says, leaning down and pressing a kiss to my head.
I turn, narrowing my eyes at him. “And what exactly am I supposed to do while everyone else moves my shit?”
Cooper splays his hand over my belly possessively. “Read a book. Write your next great fanfic. Relax. Order us all around. Literally anything except lift heavy things. Precious cargo in there and all that.”
“Listen to him honey,” Cece says, patting my hand. “Once that baby is born, all you’ll be doing is lugging stuff around. Take advantage of it while you can.”
Cooper frowns at Cece. “No, she won’t. If stuff needs to be lugged around, I’ll do it. She’s growing a whole entire baby. My baby. Mine and hers. She lifts nothing, ever.”
His arms tighten around me, and his tone is affronted, as if the mere idea of me lifting anything is insulting to his very being.
It’s so fucking cute that I don’t even bother to remind him that I’m fine, I’m not made of glass, and I’ve been lifting heavy things since long before he ever walked into my life.
“Good boy,” Pam says, nodding at Cooper. “I sure raised you right. I’m one hell of a mom.”
All four Wyles brothers snort out a laugh in unison, and Pam gives them a glare. “Just for that, you’re all making breakfast.”
“But it’s not even midnight breakfast,” Noah complains. “Why do we have to do it?”
“Bad move, man,” Elliot mutters, as Pam pins Noah with the kind of mom glare that I think must be, like, inserted into your DNA when you have a baby or something. I wonder if I’ll get it. I think I like the idea of having that kind of glare in my lawyer arsenal. Imagine the possibilities.
“Seriously stupid,” Jordan whispers, eying Pam like she’s a volcano ready to explode.
“Are you actually saying no to me?” Pam asks cooly. “You’re really standing here and telling your mother, your grandmother, your wife, and your sisters that you don’t feel like making them breakfast? Like, that’s what’s happening right now?”
“No,” Noah mumbles. Hannah stifles a laugh as he shrinks back with the force of Pam’s glare and heads to the kitchen, stomping a little bit like a petulant toddler.
“That’s what I thought,” Pam says, with a satisfied nod as the rest of us laugh.
Elliot and Jordan follow Noah to the kitchen, but Cooper leans down, his mouth hovering close to my ear. “You okay, Rhodes?”
“She’s fine,” Cece says, waving him away. “Go help your brothers.” Cece’s eyes are full of amusement, and suddenly I’m one hundred percent sure she knows all about Cooper’s little kitchen deception.
“Don’t help them,” Pam shoots back. “Dishes,” she says, pointing at Cooper. “Drinks. Condiments. Things that won’t burn or break.”
Cooper chuckles, dropping a kiss on my cheek and heading into the kitchen.
Rob steps in and wraps me in a hug. “I know you had a hard night last night, but I want you to know that you have family here. Always and no matter what.”
I close my eyes against the wave of emotion, at my sudden thought that this might be the first dad hug I’ve ever had. “Thank you,” I whisper.
“Thank you for making my boy so happy. He needed you.”
Stepping back, he gives me a smile and squeezes my hand before he joins the guys in the kitchen, and I take a long, slow breath, trying to get my shit together.
“He speaks for all of us,” Pam says, sitting on the couch and pulling me down next to her. Amelia, Jo, and Hannah pile on too, and Cece takes the chair across from us. “You’re a part of this family now. I don’t need any details to know that your parents upset you, and that upsets me.”
I huff out a laugh, leaning back against the couch. “It’s nothing new. It’s always been that way. They weren’t exactly…thrilled that I waited until last night to tell them I was pregnant. They’re never thrilled with anything I do,” I mumble, staring down at my hands.
“How does that make you feel?” Cece asks the question in a way that makes me think she already knows the answer.
I’m surprised to realize the answer comes easily. “Sad,” I say immediately. “But I’m also okay, I think. More than I ever have been before.”
Pam smiles, taking my hand. “Love will do that to you.”
I nod, glancing up when Cooper walks behind the couch, handing me a mug of what looks like a pumpkin spice latte and kissing my head before walking back into the kitchen.
“He makes everything easier. I didn’t know it could feel this way.
Easy and fun and like this is what I’ve always been looking for… I just didn’t realize it.”
Jo sniffles and laughs a little when we all look at her. “Sorry, I’m just really happy. You make Cooper happy, and I really love you, and I love love, I just love this whole family.”
“You love everything,” Hannah says, linking her arm through Jo’s and smiling at her sister.
Jo shrugs, flopping back against the couch. “Big sis tells no lies. But I also know what it feels like to have a shitty mom and to find a family of supremely unshitty people to love you exactly how you are. I’m just saying I get you, and I’m glad you’re here.”
“Same,” Amelia says, blowing Elliot a kiss when he sticks his head out of the kitchen and looks at her, almost like he can’t go more than a certain amount of time without laying eyes on his girl, and god, the romance of it all.
“Ten out of ten recommend finding your people and then living in the same house as them, frat house style but, like, the adult version.”
“Well, check, I guess,” I say, smiling, because after last night and this morning with Cooper, and being with these women I love so much right now, I realize that for the first time in my adult life—maybe even my entire life—I’m happy.
Really, truly, I’ve found my place and my people happy.
When Cooper leans out of the kitchen and catches my eye, winking and flashing me a grin, my entire body warms, like the coziest blanket in the entire world just fell right on my lap with a side of, I kind of want to jump his bones because, glasses, Jesus.
It’s a baffling and wildly appealing combination of emotions.
“That’s the way it’s supposed to feel,” Cece says, and my head shoots up, meeting her eyes. “It’s how you feel when it’s right and forever.”
“Jesus,” I mutter. “You’re spooky, Cece, you know that?”
She grins at me. “I do, in fact, know that.”
“I’m glad you’re okay,” Pam says, turning to me.
“But it’s okay if you’re not, and if that day ever comes, you come to me.
If you need a little mothering, I’m here.
If you just need a friend, I can do that too.
You’re one of my children now, and all my children get exactly what they need. I’ve been told I’m a pretty good mom.”
“Who told you that?” Jordan asks, handing Jo a mug of coffee and pressing a kiss to her lips.
Pam swats him on the back of the head. “Little shit. Just for that you’re on cleanup too.”
Jordan grins, dropping a kiss on her head. “Whatever you say, best mom ever.”
“Fucking right, I am,” Pam says, crossing her arms with a satisfied look on her face.
Our laughter is interrupted by a knock on the door. Jo grins, popping up to answer it, and two seconds later Chris and Rio are strolling into Cooper’s living room.
Surprised, I get up off the couch, which is a little more of an ordeal than it used to be because, thirty weeks pregnant, and throw myself at both of them, feeling comforted down to my toes at the feel of my brother’s strong arms around me. “What are you doing here?” I mumble into Chris’s shoulder.
Chris presses a kiss to my hair. “Your very bubbly friend tracked me down after you left last night and got my number. She texted me first thing this morning with this address and told us to get the fuck over here.”
“She was worried about you,” Rio whispers, running a hand over my hair. “I think you really found your people, Ev. I’m happy for you.”
I unwrap myself from them, turning to Jo. “Thank you,” is all I can manage through the tightness in my throat.
She smiles softly. “I thought you should have your whole family with you today.”
Cooper comes out of the kitchen and kisses me, then hugs Chris and Rio. Pam introduces herself and within thirty seconds she’s claimed Chris and Rio as her own, and orders us all to sit down for breakfast.
“You okay?” Cooper whispers, covering my hand with his on the table. Out of the corner of my eye, I see Pam smiling at us, and I can’t help but smile back.
“I’m good,” I say, leaning my head against his for a second. “It’s a really good day.”
Cooper turns his head, brushing his lips over my cheek. “When I’m with you, they’re all good days, Rhodes.”
I lean my head against his shoulder thinking that I may not know what the future holds, but for right now, everything is just about perfect.