Awk-Weird (Ice Knights, #2)(14)
“Seven months,” Cole said, the correction coming out more from habit than active thought.
Petrov shook his head. “Not that you’re counting.”
He didn’t mean to. He just did. There were certain things he’d learned that he could count on in life as being always the same. The size of a hockey puck. The width of the goal. Marti. Three of the most important constants in his life.
“We’re gonna get back together,” he said, daring the other men to say another damn word about it.
If they noticed his fuck-you glare, they didn’t react.
“Why? Because the idea of change freaks you out or because you actually want to be with Marti?” Petrov asked.
Cole crossed his arms over his chest and settled back against the cushion of the lounge chair, enjoying the sun if not the lack of warmth January provided. “I don’t have a problem with change.”
He did. He knew he did. Coach Peppers and anyone who reviewed the tape for the new plays would be very attuned to the fact that he did. He used the same moves, in the same order, in every game. Still, he wasn’t going to give the first-line center the satisfaction.
“Really?” Petrov got up and moved the lounge chair he’d been sitting on so it faced away from the pool. “Then leave the chair like this for the rest of the week.”
“That’s just dumb.” Cole fought the urge to go over and force him to turn it back around. “Chairs that are around a pool are meant to be facing the pool.”
“You have four other chairs for that,” Christensen said, joining in by turning his away, too. “Sit in one of those if you want to look at the pool you only use in the mornings on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays like you had to clock a limited-number-of-turns pass every time you used it.”
He glared at the other men who made up the scoring side of the Ice Knights’ first line. “Assholes.”
They didn’t bother to deny it. They just laughed, big, loud sounds that nearly blocked the telltale thunk of his bungee-cord supposedly-raccoon-proof lock hitting the side of his garbage can.
He was out of his chair and sprinting toward the back of the garage where the trash and recycling cans were lined up. He got there right in time to see the raccoon who had balls the size of a Zamboni to show up in the middle of the day to raid his garbage, balancing precariously on the edge of the can and reach inside for the remains of last night’s stress baking. The little fucker took one look at Cole, shoved a huge helping of homemade honey rolls into his mouth, and took off. The move knocked over the trash can and sent debris spilling out.
“Trash panda,” he yelled as it scurried away into the wooded area behind his house.
Christensen locked a hand around his arm, stopping him from giving chase. “They’re nocturnal, man. He probably has rabies.”
“No, he’s just evil,” Cole said. “He figured out that I empty the inside trash cans every day before lunch, so he goes and grabs his while it’s still fresh. I got that stupid lock so he couldn’t get in there.”
“And he popped that lock like me back in my joyriding days,” Petrov said with a chuckle as he looked at the unclipped fastener for the lock. “Maybe you need to experiment with taking your trash out at different times, and then the raccoon will leave you alone when you stop leaving him daily lunch.”
It made sense. It was also a change. Cole flipped Petrov off for both reasons.
“I cannot wait to see how fatherhood fucks with that precious routine of yours,” Petrov said.
“It won’t.”
Both men looked at him as if he’d been beaned in the head with a slap shot. Then they looked at each other and busted out laughing.
“Shut up and help me fix this,” Cole grumbled as he went to work cleaning up the raccoon’s mess.
What saved Christensen’s and Petrov’s lives at that moment was that they did help. Sure, they continued to break out into giggles like teenage girls at a slumber party—at least according to what he’d seen in the movies; he had never been to a slumber party—but they helped, all while keeping their mouths mostly shut as he told them exactly how minimal any changes to his routine were going to be.
“It’s a baby, not Godzilla,” he grumbled to himself.
And as the words came out of his mouth, he ignored the little voice inside his head telling him that he was an idiot because having a baby was going to change a lot. The question was, how much?
Chapter Five
Two weddings and a funeral meant that by the time Tess locked the front door to Forever in Bloom, walked to the unassuming white door set off to the side of the building, and climbed the stairs up to her apartment above the shop, she was so ready for a nap, she was practically snoring as she moved. The pregnancy books she downloaded said she might be a little more tired during the first trimester. In the past week, she’d discovered it was more like she’d been turned into a sleep zombie. By seven every night, she was drooling on her couch for at least a thirty-minute nap that was followed by a full night’s sleep when she finally curled up into bed at eleven.
Tonight, she might just skip the nap and go straight to bed-for-the-night part. However, Kahn had other ideas. He started pouncing on her feet as soon as she walked through the door, a four-pound ball of kamikaze energy. It had been such a nutso day, she had left him upstairs with the forty million cat toys she’d gotten him for Christmas. Of course, he just played in the box the fake mini-tree had come in, which explained why it was still sitting on her coffee table even though it was almost mid-January. All the ornaments were scattered around the floor, no doubt the victim of a vicious kitten beatdown.