Easy (Chicago Blaze 6)

“I’m in Halloween,” Jonah says, eyes wide. “Can you believe that? When you open the kitchen cabinets, ghosts pop out at you. Can you say creepy.”

“We got Valentine’s Day,” Alexei says, winking at Graysen.

She shakes her head and her cheeks flush pink.

“I’m in New Year’s Eve,” Kit says. “The bedspread is blue with red sequins sewn all over and there are cans of Silly String placed throughout the room.”

“Might be fun later,” Alexei quips.

My mom gives him a stern look and he turns his face down, not able to hold her gaze. Clearing his throat, he says, “Sorry. I meant like…just for him. Obviously, since he’s staying all alone.”

The corners of Mom’s lips quirk up and she breaks into a wide smile, making everyone laugh.

“I know how you boys are,” she says. “Just make sure you have condoms, that’s all I’m saying.”

Anton gives me an amused look. “Sound advice. And on that note, are we ready to kick off the festivities, guys?”

Mia and Graysen say their goodbyes to Anton and Alexei, and seeing Anton holding his wife close while he says something in her ear hits me hard. That was me and Allie once upon a time. We never tired of saying how much we loved each other. No matter how long our separate days at school had been, we wanted to fall asleep on the phone with each other.

Jonah drove everyone who was visiting up to Greentree Falls in his Escalade, and we all pile in it to drive to Bruiser’s, a downtown steakhouse my mom recommended. As soon as we walk inside, a couple guys recognize us and ask us to take photos with them, which leads to more attention, and it takes us fifteen minutes before we’re actually sitting at our table.

“You get a lot of that here?” Alexei asks me as we sit down.

I shrug. “Mostly from people who already know me or have heard of me.”

Jonah says, “I was in Florida last week and not one person recognized me. I liked it at first, but then it started to feel strange.”

“Hockey’s huge in Wisconsin,” I remind him.

A man rushes through the front door, looking around the restaurant until his eyes land on us. He makes a beeline for our table.

“I’m sorry for interrupting, but I’m Gary Denton, the owner of Bruiser’s. I heard you guys were here and I wanted to thank you in person for coming by.”

We all shake his hand and take some more photos. He’s a super nice guy, and after he leaves our table, he heads in the direction of Bruiser’s kitchen.

“Think he’s telling his staff not to fuck up our food?” Anton asks, arching a brow.

“Hope so,” Kit says. “I’m fucking starving.”

“You sound like Knox,” Alexei says, doing his impression of our team enforcer. “I’m fucking ravenous, goddammit. I could eat the ass out of a rat.”

“Is he in Kauai?” I ask, laughing.

“Yep,” Alexei says. “Those fuckers did a charter fishing trip yesterday; you wouldn’t believe some of the fish they caught. I’ll show you pics later.”

Anton raises his glass. “To the cool cats hanging out in Greentree Falls instead of that shithole Kauai, and to Easy turning thirty.”

We all sip from our beers, except Alexei, who is drinking water. As a recovering alcoholic, we don’t like to make him uncomfortable, but he’s adamant that he doesn’t mind if we drink.

After a dinner that rivals any Chicago steakhouse for less than half the price, we head to a sports bar called The Dugout.

“Look at this shit,” Alexei says, gesturing to a framed case with one of the sweaters I wore during our high school team’s last championship season inside. “It’s like they think you’re a big deal or something.”

“Bigger than you, man. In more ways than one.”

He balks and says, “I was gonna make you do two shots as soon as we got here, but for that, you’re doing three. All Fireball.”

I groan. “Fuck no, dude.”

“Fuck yeah.”

Alexei goes to the bar, where two women immediately sandwich him on either side and vie for his attention. He mostly ignores them, just giving polite nods, as he waits for the bartender to pour him six shots of Fireball.

Anton shoots his brother a look as he gets back to the table and starts passing out the shot glasses to me, Anton, Kit and Jonah.

“What, the rest of us can’t get anything better than this shit, either?” he asks.

“Just drink it, pussy.”

We all do the first shot together, and then I do the other two quickly to get them out of the way. But the other guys start buying me drinks, too, and I’m tipsy after less than an hour in the bar.

There’s now a small crowd gathered around the high-top table we’re sitting at, mostly female.

“I’m married,” Anton tells a blond in a pair of denim cutoffs so short her ass cheeks are hanging out. “You want to talk to this guy; it’s his birthday and he’s single.”