Page 4 of Risky Game

Dare accepted. “All right, pirate. How about you give Aunt Ruby a few minutes to get into proper pirate gear and you go hunt me down a sword so we can steal some jewels?”

“Jewels?”

I ruffled the mop of hair on his head he got from his mom. “You got it. I’ll be back, okay?”

“Kay. Mommy says sissy is sleepin’, though, so we hafta be quiet.”

“I can be quiet. Can you?”

“Sure!” he shouted.

I pressed my lips together to keep from laughing. Luke was never quiet.

“Sneak into that castle right there.” I pointed to his house. “Hunt me down a sword, and if you can find one, meet me back by the front door in a few minutes. But you need to listen to your mommy, okay? And be super quiet. Like a ninja.”

“But I a pirate.”

“Pirates are sneaky and silent, too. Can you do that?”

His lips pushed out, and he nodded. Then, in the loudest whisper, declared with confidence, “I can do that.”

I waited while he snuck toward the house, tiptoeing on his sneaker-clad feet, and when he was at the front door, I headed toward my brother and wife’s guest apartment above the garage.

There, I dropped my purse on the couch, grabbed a bottle of water from the fridge, and in less than the five minutes I’d promised, I slipped out of my heels and Kelly green summer dress I’d worn to interviews and was back into my preferred summer attire of black athletic Lululemon shorts and a racerback tank to beat the wretched Nashville heat.

By the time I came back outside, pulling my dark hair into a ponytail to keep it off my neck and shoulders and turning into a sweat pile in forty seconds flat, Luke was waiting for me on the front porch. No swords. No eye patch, and he’d changed out of his khaki shorts and sneakers to now wearing only swim trunks.

“Will you swim with me, Aunny Ruby?”

Considering Luke changed his activities and desires with the snap of his fingers, I’d planned ahead and already had my bikini on beneath my outfit. “What happened to the pirate gear?”

“Sword is in sissy’s room.”

Ah. “Sure thing. Let me check with your mom first, okay?”

“She said yes if you said yes.”

Of course she did. Molly was the sweetest, most wholesome and gentle woman I could have ever envisioned waltzing into my brother’s life. They’d met when he was a kicker at Oregon State. Not the most glamorous of football positions, but he was also the first one to take a beating if his team lost the game and he’d missed a kick. That hadn’t changed since he’d gone pro and now played for the Nashville Steel, but I’d long since stopped following every single game of my brother’s career. Not because I didn’t love him, but because for him, it was a job he loved, not something that defined him.

His family, both me and the one he created with Molly, defined him.

“All right. Let’s go find her then.” I held out my hand and he plopped his sticky fingers, probably from a peanut butter and jelly sandwich from lunch, into mine. And we headed into their home.

Molly was in the kitchen, hair pulled up. She probably hadn’t yet showered. Purple half-moons rimmed her lower eyes, and she was wearing cut-off flannel shorts and an oversized T-shirt. Probably a shirt that was Jassen’s back in college due to how faded it was.

“Still not feeling well?” I asked as she munched on a Saltine cracker with a can of ginger ale in front of her.

“Are you suggesting I look like I’m half dead?”

“Kinda?” She was too sweet to lie to.

Molly laughed and chucked the cracker at me. “I don’t get it. I never got sick with Luke and only had an aversion to chicken when I was pregnant with Brittney, but this little one is sucking the life right out of me.” Her hand went to her small, barely distended bump, and she rubbed it as if she felt the need to apologize for saying something unkind about the baby inside of her.

“What do you need help with?”

With a three-year-old, a one-year-old, and Molly being ten weeks pregnant and my brother’s season starting soon, my life had hit rock bottom at the exact perfect time for my brother and sister-in-law. They’d all but begged me to move in with them while I worked on getting my finances back together. Since they were the only family I had, I’d agreed, but taking their guest apartment above the garage was the only help I’d been willing to take.

Jassen and I fought about it for weeks. The envelopes of cash shoved beneath my door finally stopped when I stomped into his house one night, stack of hundreds in one hand and a lighter in the other. I held them both above the kitchen sink and threatened to light them all on fire if he gave me any more money.

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