Page 90 of The Foul Out

Me: Don’t be dramatic. We just need a hardware store.

Cam: Any hardware store or a specific one?

Clearly, I’d traumatized Cam with my last errand.

Me: Whichever is closest.

Cam: I’m sure I can find a Lowes.

Cam: Side note, our life has gotten so weird.

I rolled my eyes.

“Ready?” I asked Sam as I zipped up his coat.

“Yup. What’s our mission?” he asked as we headed down the hall to the elevator.

I pulled the metal ball out of my pocket and held it out. “To replace this and install it so Mom isn’t stressed.”

“Do you know how to fix that thing?” As he stared at it, he frowned in a way that made his brow furrow just like his mother’s.

“Nope. Not a clue. But I’ll figure it out. Plus, we’ll have Cam’s help.”

“Mommy says I can’t call him Cam.” He pushed the down button and stepped back while we waited for the elevator.

“How about Uncle Cam, then?”

“Is he my family?” Sam fixed his golden eyes on my face.

There was a chance I’d screw this up, but I went with my gut.

“Family can be a lot of things. Sometimes it’s blood relatives, and sometimes it’s a group of people who love you and who can be counted on when you need them. And Cam falls into that category.” That was the thing about having great friends like I had. My friends loved me as much as I loved them, and they cared about what I cared about. And the Wallace family currently topped my list.

“Then I think it’s okay to call him uncle.”

“Yeah, I think so too.”

Cam was at the curb when we stepped out onto the sidewalk.

“Hey, Uncle Cam.” Sam climbed in and plopped into the booster seat I kept in my car constantly now.

Cam turned, and though his brows were arched in surprised, the smile on his face said he didn’t mind the title. “Hey, man. I heard we need to make a Lowes run.”

“Yeah, I guess. We need to make Mommy happy.” Sam clicked his seat belt.

“I figured that was the case.” Cam reached out a hand toward me, and I flinched away.

“Give me a hard time, but don’t touch the hair, dude,” I warned, leaning toward the window. He thought it was funny as hell that I hated for my hair to look shitty. But my hair was a thing for the entire world. And if someone got a shitty picture of me, it would end up everywhere for days on end. And I didn’t need that hassle.

He laughed but turned his attention back to the road as he pulled off the curb. I dropped the doorknob onto the console beside him. “This.”

A deep chuckle started in his chest, then rumbled up his throat. “Good luck.”

With a grin, I shrugged. I’d figure it out.

And I did. It only took twenty minutes and the help of a guy in blue to find the right knob and get a rundown of how to install it. As luck would have it, Piper had broken something that was easy to fix, so we were headed to the register in record time. But just as we approached, Sam yanked on my arm.

“Look.” He pointed to a display of boxes. “Gingerbread houses!”

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