Page 9 of The Brotherly Shove
“It’s a pleasure, Mrs. Adler,” I say as she grips my hand in a shake tighter than that of her husband's. I'm instantly impressed and intimidated.
“Call me Georgie, please.”
Phew. No pressure there. I'm just casually on a first name basis with the fuck-hot new team owner’s fuck-hot wife.
It should be illegal for two such beautiful people to exist in close proximity like this.
“Georgie, then,” I continue, nodding like an idiot. “I'm a big fan of your work. I'm obviously a football man, but your hockey romance series? It had me wanting to lace up my old skates and hit the ice. It's an honor to meet you. All of you. You’ve got a gorgeous family.”
“We did okay,” James says, simultaneously giving his wife an adoring look as he ruffles the hair of the boy trying to crawl up his leg.
“MR. BREAKER,” the kid shrieks, catapulting himself off his dad’s calf. “Guess what?”
“What?” I ask, enthusiastically as I squat back down to eye level with him. Fuck yeah, they want to talk to me. They think I’m cool. I’m so good with kids.
"We got two kittens!" He holds up two fingers and his sister shakes like a bobblehead on a dashboard.
"Two kittens?" I gasp, pretending like this is the coolest news in the world because I suppose to them, it is. Personally, I'm more of a dog person, but I'm not about to debate golden retrievers versus tabbies with a couple of loud four year olds.
"They're twins like us. They have white hair and black dots like a cow!" Taylor exclaims, and I make an impressed face.
"And Mr. Breaker, guess what else?" The shaggy haired boy says, poking my leg as if my attention had slipped away from him for a moment.
"What?!" I ask with even more excitement in my voice.
“Daddy put a baby in Mommy’s butt!” Little Ethan exclaims while bouncing up and down.
“WITH HIS PENIS!” Taylor yells, and I freeze in place, my knees locking out and thighs aching from this squatting position. I have no idea how to respond to that.
Yeah, maybe I’m not so good with the kids after all.
I look up, and poor Georgie Adler is burying her still-tomato-red face into her chuckling husband’s arm.
“What my charming children are trying to say,” James says, pulling his blushing wife even tighter to his side, “Is that they’ve recently found out that they are getting a new baby sibling, and they’re very excited. And also, clearly," he gestures between himself and Georgie, who is determined not to look at me, "our attempts at age-appropriate sex education are going really fucking well.” He punctuates the last sentence with a dramatic roll of his eyes.
“SWEAR JAR!” the twins scream, pointing up at their dad as he moves to place a palm on each of their heads and subtly shakes them.
“Yeah, yeah,” he says under his breath, “I’ll Venmo you, you little gremlins.”
Georgie, to her credit, gains her composure quickly and wrangles the kidlets as I stand back up.
“Bunny rabbits, do you want to get ahot dogwhile daddy has his meeting?” she asks the rascals, emphasizing the ‘hot dog’ in a way that makes them sound so exciting, a cadence only a good mom enticing children with something incredibly ordinary can achieve.
“HOT DOGS! HOT DOGS!” The tots start to chant as they skip off, Georgie Adler’s lips skimming her husbands as they head off in the other direction. I wait for James to turn his attention back to me, but instead, his gaze follows his wife and kids, eyes settling on the general area of his wife's ass before he shakes his head and looks at me.
“I—” he starts, and then shakes his head again. “You know what? No. I was about to apologize, but I’m not sorry. The day my wife doesn’t garner my full attention when she's in the room with me is the day I know I'm dead." He continues to watch as Georgie and his kids disappear down the hall, only bringing his gaze back up when he can no longer see them. "You two ready?" he asks, placing a hand on McRyan's shoulder. I'd actually forgotten the OC was standing there.
"We’ve got some important things to discuss, Lawson. If you don’t mind.” He gestures to his left, the hallway that holds the administration offices. I swallow hard and head in that direction while echoes of the twins and their hot dog chant fade into the background.
James opens the door to an office, that I assume belongs to him, considering the half unpacked boxes and knick knacks strewn about. The only things that look like they’re in the right place are a laptop and the framed photo strip of him and Georgie making faces and kissing on a photobooth on his desk.
There are five seats opposite the one behind the desk that James sit in, and three of them are already filled. In here with us is the team's head coach, Dan Elliot, our starting quarterback, Luke Cannon, and the second string QB, Tyree Kasper.
James gestures for me to sit and I do, taking the free seat between Kasper and where McRyan plopped down at the end of the row.
“Alright gentleman, I'd prefer to make this quick, if we can. I have a wife and kids I promised to spend the day with.” Adler says as he leans back and crosses one leg over the other. Coach Elliot stands and leans against the edge of the desk, staring me down.
I take a deep breath.