Page 38 of Goaltender Interference

“Me too!” Maura said, scrambling to her feet. “And it’sourroom, Evie.”

They were gone with a thunder of small feet on the stairs and for a moment, Jesse looked at Connor’s soft expression as he stared after them and something in his chest twisted.

Connoradoredhis kids.

“The girls have new rooms?” Jesse asked, turning away and plopping into a chair.

Nolan glanced up from his phone. “Yeah, Dad kicked Evie upstairs to Maura’s room so you’d have a place to stay.”

“I didn’t kick Evie out!” Connor protested. He took a seat at the other end of the sofa from his son. “Jesse, you could have slept in the basement—there’s a room down there—but I talked to the girls about it. Maura was fine with moving in with Evie and Evie was good with it too. Maura was always coming down to the second floor to sleep in Evie’s room anyway.”

“Why didn’t you put me up on the third floor with you?” Jesse asked, shooting Connor a sly look.

Connor glared back. “BecauseMaura gets nightmares sometimes and I want her on the third floor for when she needed me.”

“Oh.” Whoops. Jesse had only been trying to flirt but now he felt a touch guilty about the question and that he’d put everyone out so much. “How’d you get the room swaps done so fast?”

“My mother. And the decorator who did this house after I bought it last year. They worked together to get it all done.”

“Huh. Ithoughtthis place didn’t look like you,” Jesse said thoughtfully.

Connor glanced around and shrugged. “What’s wrong with it?”

“Nothing! I like it! But it doesn’t seem like you,” Jesse pressed.

“Hey, I’m gonna go to Kyler’s house for a bit!” Nolan said, already pulling on shoes. Shit, the kid was sneaky. He kinda moved like a cat.

“You couldask, you know,” Connor remarked drily, getting to his feet again.

Nolan grinned up. “Dad, can I go to Kyler’s?”

“Sure. Just be home by two-thirty, okay? We’ll head over to your grandparents’ house then.”

“It’s like a five-minute walk,” Nolan protested. “I thought we didn’t have to be there until three?”

“Yeah, well, it takes a while to get us all out the door,” Connor said. “And we’ve got him to worry about now.”

He jerked his head toward Jesse.

“It’s true,” Jesse said with a shrug. “I’m the biggest problem child of them all.”

Nolan laughed, then hopped to his feet and was out the door.

“Well, that was my kids,” Connor said with a sigh. He picked up a discarded suitcase and set it at the bottom of the steps. “Welcome to the O’Shea House of Insanity.”

Jesse smiled. Honestly, the chaos and clutter of three kids made the picture-perfect designer look of the place feel like it actuallywasa home.

Like a place where he’d fit right in.

CHAPTER TEN

“Biscuit is a Welsh pony. He’s thirteen-point-one hands tall and he’s black,” Evie said as she skipped along the sidewalk, hand-in-hand with Jesse.

Connor smothered a smile.

She’d latched onto Jesse immediately and seemed determined to talk his ear off. He was being surprisingly patient about it.

“Is Biscuit named after a puck?” Jesse asked.

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