3. Luka
Luka
I am sitting in the living room at my parent's house when Gio and Layla come running in.
"Zio Luka!"
"Hey, Little Man." I hit my knuckles against his.
"Look what Nonna gave us!" Gio flops down next to me, and Layla crawls onto my lap.
I put my nose to the top of her head and breathe in her smell.
I am not sure why I always do it, but since we brought her home, anytime I smell her hair, it makes me feel so much better.
After a bad practice or game, the first thing I do is head to Lacey's to see my girl.
"Hey, Sweetheart," I murmur against her head and she turns to look at me.
"Hi Zio Luka." She has started to open up to me. She is still uncertain around Liam and Cross, but she loves me and Callum.
I look at Gio. "What did you guys get, Little Man?"
He holds up the most enormous candy cane I have ever seen. "Your Nonna gave that to you?" I raise my eyebrow at him. I have never seen my Zia Marianne give candy.
"No, Zio Jer gave it to us. He said it was a gift from Zia Marianne." Layla says and I start laughing. That sounds exactly like my Zio.
"Nonno said that Nonna would really like it if we had it." Gio unwraps the candy cane and shoves it into his mouth.
"Do you think she would want you to wait until after dinner?" I ask and Gio's eyes go wide.
"Wait until after dinner for what?" My Zia Marianne walks into the room, and Gio gives a big smile, the candy cane hanging out of his mouth.
"Nonna! Thank you for the candy! We love it." He points from himself to Layla.
"Oh." I watch my Zia. Wondering if she is going to yank the candy cane out of his mouth like she would have us when we were his age.
Shit, she would still pull it out of my mouth now.
"You are welcome, sweet boy." She ruffles his hair and turns to Layla.
"Do you want your candy cane opened, too, Layla?
" I look at her in shock. I am sure my mouth is hanging open.
What in the world happened to this lady?
Since she became a Nonna, Gio can get away with anything.
"No, thank you, Zia." Layla lays her head against my shoulder as Gio goes into the other room with his Nonna.
"You tired, Sweetheart?" I run my fingers through her hair.
"Not really." Her tiny voice barely reaches my ears.
"Something going on?" I pause my hand; my whole hand covers the back of her head.
"You ever have someone that didn't want to be your friend?" She tilts her head to look at me.
Before tonight, I would have told her no. But after Adrianna told me that she just wanted to finish selling the house, it made me think she told me she didn't want to be my friend.
"I have." I tilt my head to meet her gaze. "Someone giving you a hard time, Sweetheart?"
"A girl in my dance class. I want to be her friend, but she told me if my parents didn't want me, there has to be something wrong with me, and she doesn't want to be my friend."
I have to stop myself from tightening my grip on her and asking for the little bitch's name. "You know that isn't true, right?"
She raises her little shoulders and looks down at her hands on her lap.
I grip her chin and tilt her eyes back to mine.
"That isn't true, Sweetheart. You have something better.
Parents don't get to pick their kids. You not only have two people who would choose you over anything else, but you also have a whole family that would fight the world for you.
You know that? You are so special that Lacey, Callum, all your Zio's and Zia's, your Nonna and Nonno; they would kill for you, Sweetheart.
All you have to do is ask." I know she doesn't understand that I mean that literally.
She doesn't understand that we have already done that for her.
Taking her piece of shit Father out of the picture so she can have a loving life.
"Okay, Zio. I believe you." She leans up and places a kiss on my cheek. "I am going to play with Gio." She jumps off my lap, yelling for Gio.
After dinner, we all exchanged gifts and tuck the kids into bed.
We are all in the game room. It's the one place we go to when we are at my parent's house.
I remember us hiding here as kids. It's crazy to see us all gathered in here tonight.
Most with their significant others while their kids are up in the beds.
"What is wrong with you tonight?" Mia slides up next to me.
"What you mean, Sis?" I wrap my arm around her shoulder and pull her close to me.
"Why are you touching her? Don't touch her." Liam walks up and pulls her away from me.
"Stop being ridiculous, Liam." She swats his hands away and steps back toward me. "You look sad tonight. Is everything okay with the team?" She turns from me to Jake. Who looks at her and smiles.
"The problem isn't the team, Mia. It's probably because, for the first time ever, Luka was told no." He laughs and hits my shoulder.
"It's not because of that, Man. It's because someone is being mean to Layla at dance class." I don't need my family up in my business, so I throw my niece under the bus.
"Who the hell is being mean to my girl?" Callum pushes off the wall like he is going to beat some kid's ass.
"I don't know, some girl that told her she wouldn't be a good friend because she doesn't have any parents.
She is good now. She knows she doesn't need that bitch in her life.
" I tell him and watch him turn to Lacey.
She looks pissed. He takes her elbow and pulls her towards him, he whispers something to her and she nods to him.
"Okay, back to who told you no. I need to know who this was so I can go shake their hand." CeCe hops next to me, pulling on my arm. When I shake my head at her, she turns to Jake and smiles.
"Jakey, who told Luka no?" She pulled out her sugary, sweet voice while she looked at my best friend.
"You freak me out when you talk like that, CeCe. Please don't do it again, and I will tell you anything you want to know." Jake looks scared of my little cousin. I hear Romeo chuckle and I roll my eyes. My damn cousin is insane.
"The woman that showed us your old apartment today.
Coleman sent her because he was with his girls.
" You can almost hear the eye rolls coming from my family.
We all know Coleman's wife is a cheating bitch.
I don't know why he stays with her. "He invited her and her friend to come tonight and she shot him down.
It was the greatest thing I have ever witnessed. "
"You have literally been to playoffs, and her telling me no was the greatest thing you have ever witnessed?" I look at my friend.
"Yep." He deadpans.
"Was she pretty?" Lacey asks.
"She was," Jake answers before I can.
"She was more than pretty. She was the most beautiful person I have ever seen." I smack him upside his head. "Also, don't look at her again."
"Holy shit," Sam says with her eyes wide. "He did it." She points to me.
"Did what Little Orsa?" Cross looks to her.
"He found his person." My Ma answers for Sam and Sam nods her head in agreement.
"What? What the heck are you two going on about?" I walk over and grab a water bottle out of the mini-fridge. I try not to drink too much while we are in season. I toss one to Jake, who almost misses it.
"You, you found your person. If you want to kill anyone that looks at her, talks to her, or touches her, she is your person." Sam says and sits down next to my Ma.
"That makes no sense." I chug the water and look around at my family. All the girls nod in agreement, and the guys watch them like they are all wrong. I am going with the guys on this one.
"Have you ever been mad at Jake for looking at any other girl?
" Ce asks, and I have to think about it for a minute.
I am sure all my family thinks that Jake and I are having a different girl every day of the week.
Little do they know that Jake had some crazy shit happen with a chick after last year and he decided to take a break.
Being his alt captain and wanting to make sure my head was 100% into hockey, I decided to take a break with him.
But before that, I would have never cared if we looked or talked to the same girl.
"I am going to take your silence as a no," Ce says. "Our point is made. So what are you going to do about it?"
"I asked Coleman for her phone number and he told me he couldn't give me that information." I lift a shoulder and my brothers laugh at me.
"He told you that?" Liam can hardly talk with how hard he is laughing. "He can give you anything you want; you are a Rizzoli. He chose not to give it to you. Probably because she told him not to."
"Give me her info and I will get everything for you." Callum pulls out his phone.
Lacey slaps his hand. "You can't just butt into her personal life like that. If she wanted him to have it, she would have given it to him."
"You are just going to have to win her the old-fashioned way." Cross pipes up.
"What way is that, Cross? The same way you and Liam got Sam and Mia? Stalking?" I am so over this conversation.
"Exactly," Cross says and taps his temple. "You got to win her over. You have to woo her."
"Woo her?" I think my cousin has gone crazy.
"We will help you, Luka." Mia pats my arm, and I feel like this is a very bad idea.
Thirty minutes later, the girls surround me and tell me the most ridiculous things to do to win Adrianna's heart. I am not going to do any of them.
"Why don't you invite her to a hockey game. She can sit with us toward the ice and get the best view. She will love that." Mia bounces with excitement over her idea.
"She doesn't watch hockey," I say, and I watch the shock work over the women's faces.
"She doesn't watch hockey?" CeCe parrots my words and looks toward Jake like I am lying.
"Nope. Had no clue who we were when we met her." Jake says as he shoves a Christmas cookie into his mouth.
"You know those are for Santa, right?" I shake my head at my best friend.
"I am Santa." Jake pats his belly like he has any fat on it.
"I kind of like that she doesn't know hockey," Sam says, raising a finger at me before I tell her how absolutely horrible it is that anyone goes through this life without knowing hockey.
"Because then you will know if she likes you because you are Luka and not because you are Rizzoli, the hockey player. "
I never thought of it that way. I have always been Rizzoli, the hockey player.
I have never had a girl pay attention to me who didn't want what hockey could give her.
The name, recognition, money. That is all they ever want.
Most of the time, they want it without having to put much into the relationship.
It has gotten old. That's probably why I was so quick to put women on the back burner for my career.
Will Adrianna be worth taking my eye off of hockey?
I am not sure, but my heart is telling me to try.
"Why don't you wait until after Christmas and try reaching out to her, Bambino?
" My Ma pats my knee and stands. "I am grabbing your Pops and heading to bed.
I am sure the kids will be up early for Santa.
Everyone's room is set up already." She points to Jake.
"Jake, you are staying and your room is already set up.
I don't want to hear you argue about it.
You will not be celebrating Christmas alone; I know your parents couldn't make it to town.
" She places a kiss on the top of my head and leaves the room.
"Your parents couldn't come to town?" CeCe turns to Jake, knowing it's a bunch of crap.
CeCe and Romeo have gotten close to Jake since Gio has made him a makeshift Uncle.
"Is that code for they are worthless pieces of shit that decided their trip to some business partner's party was more important than spending Christmas with their only child? "
"Mia Vita, that's enough. Let's go check on Gio and head to bed. It's his first Christmas with us and you know he will be up soon." Romeo places his hand on CeCe's back.
"Fine, just know we love you, Jakey." She turns and storms out of the room.
"Love you guys, too." Jake waves to Romeo.
"You will be here in the morning, right, Jake? We have something we want to tell everyone." Mia stands up and Liam wraps his arms around her.
"Yeah, I will be here." Jake and I walk toward the door. "I need to see what other things you guys come up with for our boy Luka."
The next morning, the kids went crazy over the gifts they received from everyone. Jake stayed true to his word and was there in the morning to hear Liam and Mia announce that she was pregnant with twins.
"I think this next year is going to be our best yet, Rizzoli." He whispers in my ear while the kids open their gifts.
"I think you might be right, Webster."
All I can think about is how I am going to win over my girl.