“Jude Marshall!”
“Really, Jude?” Lucy asks as Claire shakes her head.
I look to Coach, but he’s just laughing. “Man, she’s gonna kill you.”
“Your funeral.” Somehow Markus is able to comment around stuffing his mouth as I sit back and watch the show.
As I expected, Baylor’s eyes narrow, her face turning red as she declares, “My job as a woman is to murder you, Jude Sinclair.”
“And I won’t stop her,” Jayden adds.
“Neither will I,” Claire says and Jude just shrugs his shoulders.
“Bring it. I’ll take you out like I did last time.”
That has Baylor’s eyes blazing even more. “It was a cheap shot, and you know it.”
“You took her legs out,” Coach hollers. “On a breakaway!”
“Like a pussy,” Jayden declares with a nod.
“I had to stop her.” Jude shrugs like it was a given, but it was a dirty play. And when Baylor punched him square in the jaw, man, that was probably my favorite thing ever to watch.
That girl is twenty shades of nuts on that ice.
“Whatever. I’ll kill you dead, Sinclair,” she sneers and Mom throws her hands up.
“Enough. It’s over. Baby talk done. I’ll shelve it for another time.”
“It’s gonna be a while. No babies here,” Jude says.
“Or here. Make sure to dust that shelf, since no one is bringing it back up,” Jayden adds.
“Definitely not here. Say hello to your one and only baby doll.” Lucy cups Angie’s face. Angie sends a big, toothless grin to my mom and she smiles.
“And she’s more than enough, aren’t you, stinker?”
“Yup,” Angie cheers then as my mom’s smile grows. I know that her initial request wasn’t directed at me, but I decide to throw in too.
“Sorry, Mom. I can’t give you a baby either. No woman,” I tease and she smiles.
“Thank God. The world isn’t ready for another Jace Sinclair.” She pats my hand lightly and I scoff.
“For sure, man. That would be a spoiled, whiny-ass baby,” is Jude’s opinion.
“Annoying as hell too,” Lucy decides.
“Ugly as hell,” Jayden says with a shake of his head, which throws everyone into fits of laughter.
“Whatever, dude. You’re just jealous I’m hotter than you!”
But no one pays me any mind, and soon I’m laughing too as I look around the table at the people I love. I know I need to go soon; I need to set up and get ready for tonight, but as my gaze goes from person to person surrounding me, I decide I want to be nowhere else but here. Why would I want to change this insanity when they are my reason for smiling? No one can come close to my family. But as soon as that thought comes, a pair of turquoise green eyes appears in my head and then I’m really smiling.
Not sure what that’s all about, but I wan
t to find out.
And that means no matter how much I don’t want to leave, I have to.