“Your mama.”

My brother looked right at Ivan beside me, his middle finger going back up to his forehead—for me of course—and said, “Ivan, if you accidentally trip and fall doing a lift with her, none of us would blame you. Really.”

The side of a thigh touched my knee, and a second later, so did the palm of a hand I knew very well. “I’ll keep that in mind. Maybe during an exhibition after worlds,” my partner offered.

And I couldn’t even be mad or butt-hurt.

Chapter 13

“You don’t have to come with me,” I told Ivan as we got out of his car, subconsciously rubbing at the weird tingle in my throat that had been bothering me all day. I blamed it on leaving my water bottle in the car and not having a chance to run back out to grab it, or else face the wrath of Nancy Lee.

He huffed, and I swore to God he rolled his eyes. “I already said I would.”

“I know that, smart-ass, but you can still back out. My sister or her husband can give me a ride later, if you want to leave,” I suggested, waiting for him on the path up to my sister’s house since the passenger side was closer to the curb.

Ivan shrugged and shook that black head of hair. “I’m not backing out. It’s just… how long did you say it would be? Three hours?”

“Four hours,” I corrected him.

He seemed to think about it as he came up beside me before tipping his head to the side, coming to whatever conclusion he had gotten to. “I’ve put up with you for four hours, this is just two kids, it can’t be that hard.”

Obviously this man had never babysat before if he thought it wasn’t that hard, but I wasn’t about to tell him that. I was kind of looking forward to seeing him deal with a toddler and a baby. “All right, don’t say I didn’t give you an out.”

Ivan scrunched up that perfect, symmetrical face as we stopped in front of the door. “Give me some credit, we’re only babysitting. It isn’t rocket science.”

I nudged him with my elbow right before reaching up and knocking on the door.

He elbowed me right back.

How the hell had we gotten to this point?

My damn car hadn’t started. Again. And my uncle hadn’t answered his phone when I’d called, and I couldn’t exactly afford to call a tow truck driver. There were plane tickets and hotel rooms I was trying to save up for, and groceries, insurance, an electric bill I paid as part of my “rent” and other random expenses I had every month. Right around the same time that I was debating who to call to come pick me up, came the obnoxious toooooooot that lasted maybe ten seconds and made me jump when it had first rang through the air, coming from a classy black car. Following the toot was a driver side window being rolled down and a very familiar face peering out from over the edge of the glass.

“Car trouble again?” Ivan asked from his spot behind the wheel with his sunglasses covering his eyes.

I sighed, then I nodded.

“You need a new one.”

I just looked at him. “Okay, I’ll get on that.”

He made a face right back. “Get in.”

“I’m not going home,” I told him.

Those black sunglasses were aimed right at me as his jaw did this tick thing. Then, “What? You got a hot date?”

“No, numbnuts. I’m babysitting tonight.”

The expression on his face instantly changed, but I didn’t think anything of it.

“I’m going to my sister’s,” I finished, reminding him about what Ruby and I had literally talked about in front of him a week ago.

Ivan shoved his glasses just above his eyes with the tip of his finger. “Get in then.”

“It’s further away than my mom’s.”

“How much further?” he asked slowly.

I told him what side of town, and watched as he made a face.

“How long are you supposed to babysit?”

“About four hours,” I said, hearing the hesitation in my voice, mainly because I wondered where the fuck he was supposed to be going that he was worried about how long it would take.

Then he made a thoughtful face and said, “Okay. One second.” He must have reached for his phone, because the next thing I knew, he was focusing on his lap and saying, “One more second.”

Who was he texting? And what was he texting?

I’d barely started to wonder what, when he glanced back up and said, “Okay. If it’s only four hours, I can drive you there and drop you off at home afterward.”

Wait. Afterward?

“You’re going to drive back and pick me up?” I asked with a frown.

He pinched his mouth in that way that used to drive me crazy because it looked like he thought I was an idiot. “No. That’s the other side of town from where I live, genius. I’ll babysit with you, and after that, I’ll drive you back home… as long as it’s only four hours. I need to be home after that.”

What did he have to be home for? Was someone waiting for him? Did he… have a girlfriend?

“You getting in?” he kept going.

It wasn’t any of my business. None.

Nope, none of my business.

If the swallow I took felt tight, I wasn’t going to overthink it. “You can just drop me off and one of them can take me home after.”

I didn’t have to see his eyeballs to know he was rolling them. “Shut up and get in. I can take you as long as it doesn’t run too late.”

He had a girlfriend, didn’t he?

“You don’t need to stay—” I started to say before he cut me off.

“Get in, Meatball,” he’d demanded, already rolling the window up.

And with a dirty look and a reminder that whatever he was doing afterward had nothing to do with me, I got in. And he drove us to my sister’s, which was where we were, with me waiting on the paved sidewalk, arguing with Ivan after we’d bickered over whether he drove slow or I drove fast.

He drove slow.

That was how I found myself in front of Ruby’s house with Ivan beside me.

“Coming!” I heard my sister call out from the other side of the door. All of a second later, the door opened and she was there, already beaming that great big smile that made me feel like I’d kill someone for her and eat their heart too. “Jas.” She hesitated only a second before taking a step forward and wrapping her arms around me.

I hugged her back, deciding to keep my mouth shut about the pause she had taken before touching me. Had I ever not wanted her to hug me? I couldn’t remember, and the possibility that I had once made her think twice about doing something like hug me, made my stomach tighten.

I could fix this. I could work on it.

Pulling back, I tipped my head toward Ivan at the same time her eyes strayed to him. “I brought reinforcements to take care of your gangsters.”

My sister’s face turned pink instantly, and she nodded tightly, her eyes shifting from me to him and back again. “Hi, Ivan,” she managed to squeeze out.

Ivan smiled gently. Then, because he held his hand out toward her, and when she did the same, he took it and gave it a soft shake. “Nice to see you again, Squirt.” He gave her a charming smile that made me uncomfortable for some reason. “You don’t mind if I call you that, do you?”

My sister blinked, and so did I. But I knew her reaction wasn’t because Ivan was handsome or anything like that. Her husband was smoking hot in a completely different but equal way as Ivan. And she was madly in love with him.

She was just shy.

And no one called her Squirt but family. At least as far I knew, not even Aaron called her that.

“I don’t mind,” she pretty much whispered, her eyes darting to me, and then back to him. “You’re almost family now, right?”

Almost family? I shoved the idea aside just as Ivan nudged me, and I elbowed him right back.

“Come in,” Ruby said, taking a step back. “We’re ready to go. We’re just doing dinner and going to a… eh, store afterward.” By store, I’d bet my kidney she meant a comic book store, but I knew she wasn’t admitting it because Ivan was right there. “We shouldn’t be gone long.”

I shrugged and stepped into the house I’d been in plenty of times over the last year since she’d moved back to Houston after spending the last four years living in Washington with her husband while he’d been in the army. He had rushed through a degree over the last few years, and gotten a job at a VA hospital doing…. Something with veterans. I was a shitty sister-in-law not to know what he did exactly. I really needed to ask Ruby. “It’s fine. Do whatever you want. I don’t have anything else to do besides go to sleep,” I told her, purposely not mentioning that Ivan had to bounce after four hours to go do whatever it was he needed to do.

“Hey, Jasmine,” a nice voice called out from down the hall a moment before the tall, blond man walked toward us.

“Hi, Aaron,” I said, rocking on my heels. “Aaron, you remember Ivan.”