Page 6 of Falling for the Forward

“What’s your idea, then?” Charlotte demands of Olivia.

“We should eat something with vegetables.”

“Chinese food has vegetables.”

“Well, it’s not healthy. We should eat something like Suki makes.”

“I want cheesy soup,” Hallie says to me.

One of the meals Suki made us last week was broccoli cheese soup, salad and bread, and it was great. All three girls had seconds. I wonder if I could convince Suki to come here and cook dinner on the weekends. With Chad, the girls’ deadbeat dad, making rumblings about challenging me for custody of them, I need to do everything I can to make it clear in court that my home is more stable. Home-cooked meals can only help.

“I’ll order from the Italian place,” I say, settling it. “They have pizza, pasta, sandwiches, salads. Everyone can get whatever they want.”

“Do they have Chinese food?” Charlotte asks.

Olivia rolls her eyes. “Of course not, you idiot. It’sItalian.”

“Don’t call names.” Hallie scolds Olivia from her seat at the table.

“Yeah.” Charlotte gives Olivia a dirty look. “Don’t call names.”

“What are you going to do about her hair?” Olivia asks me.

I pretend to be focused on my drawing for a couple of seconds because I don’t know what to say. But I have to sound like the authority figure. What the hell would Rachel do?

All three of them are looking at me expectantly. When I can’t stall anymore, I say, “There’s nothing I can do. She has to just grow it out.”

Olivia balks. “You could get her a wig.”

“I’m not wearing a wig!” Charlotte wails.

“At least it looks like normal hair.”

I pick up my phone and get up from the table. I’m counting the minutes until I get to go to practice in the morning. The guys can put me in goal with no pads if they want and I’ll happily take body shots. It would be better than mediating disputes between these bickering girls.

“Where are you going, Uncle Carter?” Hallie asks me.

I don’t even look back as I say, “To the bathroom.”

CHAPTER THREE

Suki

I’m reachingout to ring Carter’s doorbell for the third time in a row Monday morning when he whips the front door open, glowering.

“Um, hey,” I say weakly, my brows hitting my hairline as I take him in.

He’s only wearing a white towel wrapped around his waist, water glistening on his muscular chest like he just walked off the set of an ad for a manly body wash. His chest hair is just a tiny bit darker than his short brown hair, which is also dripping. And his abs are...not at all disappointing.

“Come on in,” he says, stepping aside. “It’s a shit show in here. Olivia tried to cook breakfast while I was in the shower and it set off the smoke alarm.”

My heart rate kicks up with concern. “Oh God, did something catch on fire?”

He shakes his head. “No, I think it was just smoke. But when Hallie yelled outside my bathroom door that the fire alarm wasgoing off, I tracked water all over the floors running down here to make sure everyone was okay.”

The proof is in the wet footprints on the wood stairs of the open stairway, continuing across the living room and into the open kitchen. There’s still a cloud of smoke in the kitchen and from the smell of the air, it was bacon that Olivia burned.

“Olivia didn’t wait for you to make breakfast,” Hallie says to me in a tattletale tone.

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