Excellent.

Now he had an excuse always to be the one to drive when he was already always going to be the one to drive, just before, he’d have to squabble with her before he did it.

“Then it’s good I’m driving. I’m busted up enough,” he said.

“Shut up, Danny,” she repeated, though with a smile in her voice.

He gave her that for a beat.

But then he had to give her something else.

“I had two good doses of your family today, Evie, and you made some big decisions on a day some huge shit went down. You seem cool. You seem like you’re good to just keep on keepin’ on. And that’s your MO. But in the now, you need to know that isn’t where you’re at anymore. You don’t gotta forge ahead because you have no choice. You got someone at your back. You got someone you can unload shit on. And you got someone who can help you process it. That’s me, and from what I saw today, it’s also your sister.”

Her hand was clenching and unclenching his thigh as he spoke.

And she did the sweetest thing she could do when he finished.

She didn’t lavish the gratitude or try to tough it out and make him believe she was okay.

She said, “You know, I think about it a lot, how we grew up. And I wonder what was worse. To be a nonentity, treated like she almost wasn’t even there, like Sidney. Or to be used, like me.”

“Not sure there’s a worse in that, baby. They’re both equally bad,” he murmured.

He knew she’d turned to face him when she asked, “Why don’t you like your sister’s fiancé?”

“Because she ceases to exist when the NFL is in season,” he told her. “I get digging football. I dig football. But I don’t lose sight of everything but the television schedule and my fantasy football league for six months out of the year. He refuses to do anything Monday or Thursday nights and all day Sunday. I get it. Enjoy what you like. But with him, there are no exceptions. So, when a good friend of hers got married on a Thursday ’cause folks are doin’ that kind of thing ’cause it’s cheaper, she had to go alone. And she was in the fucking wedding party.”

“Oh man,” she muttered. “That’s bad.”

She was right.

It was.

And that was only one example.

“Obviously my opinion, but my woman’s wearing a pretty dress and doin’ something that’s important, my ass is not in front of a TV. When the US beat Russia in hockey in 1980, that’s a game it’d suck to miss. But if you did, it wouldn’t be the end of the world. Thursday night football? No.”

“Are you in a fantasy football league?” she asked.

“Yeah,” he answered.

“Danny?” she called.

“Yeah?” he repeated.

“I’ve always wanted to play Dungeons and Dragons, the top on my bucket list is going to a Comic Con and by far the best TV show I ever saw was Stranger Things.”

“Dungeons and Dragons doesn’t seem like my gig, babe, but I’d try it if you wanted me to. Though if I don’t like it, I’ll share and bow out. I’ll take you to a Comic Con, got no problem with that. And Stranger Things is the shit.”

“I’m not a big football fan,” she admitted.

“I don’t care, though I am, but it isn’t my life.”

She hesitated a beat, and her voice was quiet when she asked, “You’d try Dungeons and Dragons?”

“I’m warning you, it’s probably not gonna be my thing. But yeah, I’ll try it.”

She didn’t say anything for a long time.

Then she said softly, “I think it’s going to be hard to get used to it. I’m not sure it was, like, a normal habit, just something I did. I think it was more like an addiction, something I needed. Helping them. Being that person they turned to. I got some kind of fix out of it, and in the beginning, it was a good high. Then, the more I gave, the more they took, and the high didn’t feel so good anymore. I want to say it’s already a relief, not having them in my life. But as dysfunctional as it is, instead, I already miss them.”

“They’re your family, baby,” he whispered.

“I need to stop being so judgey about Sid,” she muttered.

“Yeah,” he agreed.

They both fell silent and it also lasted a long time before she called, “Danny?”

“Right here, babe.”

“All that said, I think my new addiction is going to be pretty easy to get used to.”

He couldn’t let that go without touching her, so he moved a knee to the steering wheel to keep his truck steady while he squeezed her hand on his leg.

He only did it briefly, but she was Evie, so she gave him shit about it.

“You steer with your knee?”

“It was just for a sec.”

“You need to get over your aversion to my Prius.”

“I’ll work on it,” he lied.

“You’re not gonna work very hard, are you?”

“Nope,” he told the truth.

She giggled.

And there they were.

Mag let out a breath.

And drove the rest of the way to Evie’s friend’s house.

The woman was literally a little old woman.

Gray curly hair, face full of wrinkles and half his height.

Not even.

Gert stared up at him the minute she opened the door and then she declared, “Oh no. You are not gonna do.”

Mag pressed his lips together so he didn’t burst out laughing.

She looked to Evie and stated, “Evan, my girl, the pretty ones are always headache, heartache or both. I thought you knew that.”

“Gert, Danny made you chocolate chip cookies,” Evie told her, then held out the container with the cookies.

Gert cast it a suspicious glance. “From scratch?”

“Yes,” Evie answered.

“Not any of that tub of Toll House already-made stuff?” she pressed.

“None of that,” Evie promised. “They’re really good. Fluffy and soft. He makes them with Crisco.”

Oh shit.

The woman, still barring the door, looked up at him with disgust.

“Crisco?” she demanded.

“That’s how my mom makes ’em,” he said.

“Hmm,” she hummed, seeing as he’d pulled the mom card and no woman could say jack about what a mom taught her kid.

“Can we come in?” Evie asked.

Gert said nothing to that, but she shifted out of the door and opened it further.

Mag let Evie go before him (and he did not fail to note that Gert took the cookies from her as she passed) and then he was treated to Gert actually doing the fore- and middle fingers to her eyes then to him and back and repeat as he walked into her house.

He was again fighting laughter.

Tonight was going to be fun.

Entering the house put them right in a small living room that was filled with men, and Lottie.

And Boone wasted no time sidling up to him and muttering under his breath, “Beware, brother. She hates, like…all of us. All but Mo. And Lots. It’s good you’re here because no one’s talking but Lottie and Gert, and that’s because we’re all terrified of the old broad.”