Page 11

Finally, we were all on the same page, Bryan and Chats said goodbye to the kids, and we headed outside. Once the boys were buckled in, I got into the driver seat and pulled away from the condo.

As I headed out to the main road, I said, “So you guys know hockey season is starting, right?”

“Yeah,” Zane said. “Dad told us.”

“Okay, well, did he tell you we’re going to do things a little differently this year?”

There was silence for a moment. Then Zach cautiously said, “We’ll be staying with the new nanny while you’re gone?”

Ah, so Bryan had filled them in. I tried to trust that he hadn’t dripped any poison in their ears; that for all we could fight like cats and dogs, he really did draw the line at parental alienation. His boyfriend… well. One could hope.

“Yes,” I said. “His name is Cam. He and I have been friends for a long, long time, and he’s going to be living with us now.”

“Oh,” Zane said.

Zach made a quiet grunt of acknowledgment.

Neither seemed particularly bothered by the whole thing.

My teammates had babysat them a few times, and they’d stayed with family members before, so they were accustomed to people other than Bryan or me watching them.

They weren’t prone to separation anxiety like some kids their age.

Hell, the first day we’d taken them to preschool, we’d been ready for them to cry and not want us to leave.

Instead, they’d taken one look at the other kids and all the toys, and immediately forgotten we existed.

Still, I worried, because that was the kind of dad I was.

“Is that okay?” I asked. “Do you guys feel okay being with someone else while I’m gone?”

“Yeah,” they both said.

“Okay. But you know you can text me or call me any time. I leave my phone with one of the trainers when I’m on the ice in case there’s an emergency, so you can always reach me.”

“We know,” Zach said in that God, Dad, we get it voice kids did so well.

“I’m just making sure. And Dad is always around, too, if you need something.”

“We know.”

“Cam is there for you too,” I assured them. “He’s there just like a babysitter, except he lives with us. Does that make sense?”

“Yes.” They sounded borderline annoyed now.

Come on, Dad, we’re not stupid . They weren’t stupid, but I always erred on the side of overkill when it came to making sure they felt safe.

Hopefully if a situation arose where they needed an adult, they could fall back on this conversation (and others) and know that they could rely on Bryan, Cam, or me.

They could probably even rely on Chats, but if I was out of town, so was he, so…

he didn’t need to be part of the conversation.

Out of the blue, Zach asked, “Is Cam your boyfriend?”

“What?” I laughed, which came out a little high. “No! No, he’s a friend.”

“Oh. When are you getting a boyfriend?”

“I…” I glanced in the rearview, where two curious faces gazed back. Facing the road again, I said, “I mean, I just haven’t—I haven’t met anyone yet.”

“But you’ve met Cam,” Zane insisted. “He lives with us now like Tim does.”

I pretended not to notice the flare of jealousy in my chest. I was not jealous of anyone living with or dating Bryan—Chats could have him—but yeah, there was still a part of me that bristled at their relationship.

Maybe because Chats kept throwing it in my face.

Or maybe because I still wasn’t convinced the relationship had commenced after our separation.

Whatever. None of that was anything the kids needed to know about.

“We’re just friends,” I told the boys. “Cam lives with us because it makes it easier for him to do his job. But we’re not boyfriends.”

God, I wish we were.

Wait, what?

Dude. Stop it.

“Do you think Dad’s going to marry Tim?” Zach’s question didn’t offer any hints one way or the other if he had any hopes about Bryan and Chats being in it for the long haul.

“Um.” I tapped my thumbs on the wheel. “I really don’t know. That’s probably something to ask them.”

“They won’t say.” Zane sounded affronted.

I hesitated, then cautiously asked, “Do you want them to get married?” I wasn’t fishing for gossip or dirt; I genuinely wanted to know where they landed with this, and if there were any red flags I should know about.

“I don’t know,” Zane said. “I guess?”

“Tim’s nice,” Zach supplied.

“That’s good,” I said with a nod. It was, too.

Both of my boys were like me in the sense that they tended to wear their emotions on their sleeves.

If there was something going on with Chats—if they were uncomfortable with him, or if he’d said or done something they didn’t like, or even if he was just too strict in his stepdad role—there would be tells.

Their body language, their tone, their answers; even if they weren’t telling me outright what the issue was, they would absolutely send up signals that something was wrong.

Chats had been in their lives since shortly after Bryan and I separated, and there hadn’t been any negative signals from the boys.

Nothing to indicate that Chats was a problem or that Bryan had told them to keep a secret from me.

I subtly checked in like this every now and then, just to ease my own worries, but… so far, so good.

Maybe their dad and I had divorced bitterly, and maybe his new boyfriend and I couldn’t get along, but as near as I could tell, they were both being good to the boys. That was enough for me.

After a while, Zach asked, “Is Cam nice?”

I smiled and glanced at them in the rearview. “I wouldn’t have hired him to take care of you two if he wasn’t.”

They were apparently happy with that answer, because they didn’t press for more about Cam.

So far, this was going well. They were unbothered by this new person coming into their lives. They didn’t seem nervous about meeting him.

And all the way home, I prayed this was a sign that I’d made the right decision.

Though the boys weren’t fazed at all by the prospect of meeting Cam the nanny, I was nervous as I brought them into the house.

Bryan’s doubts needled at me; I didn’t even know if he’d just been trying to make me second-guess myself or if he really was worried about Zach and Zane not getting along with Cam.

Whatever the case, it turned out none of us had anything to worry about.

As soon as I introduced them in the living room, the boys were alternating between grilling him about everything and excitedly wanting to show him their rooms and playroom.

I trailed behind as they led him upstairs and showed him everything. They dragged him to their closet full of board games and action figures. Showed him their soccer jerseys and gear as they chattered about the upcoming season. Brought him back downstairs to see the video game console.

“They can play that for an hour a day,” I said. “No more.”

Zane huffed and shot his brother a glare. “I told you we should’ve showed him when Dad wasn’t here.”

“Dad was going to tell him anyway,” Zach retorted. “He told him all the rules.”

Zane just rolled his eyes and grumbled something under his breath.

Cam glanced at me, eyebrows up and lips pressed together as if he were hiding his amusement. Oh, yeah, I hadn’t mentioned to him that the biggest challenge around kids was trying not to laugh, especially when we were supposed to be disciplining them or something.

I mean, how the fuck was I supposed to keep a straight face when I was saying things like, “we don’t tell Grandma her meatballs taste like boogers”?

Or “it’s not nice to pretend your plushies are farting on your brother”?

When people said parenting wasn’t for the weak, that wasn’t what I’d envisioned.

During my moment of distraction, Zane looked at Cam and asked, “How do you know our dad?”

“We went to school together.” Cam smiled fondly. “We met in…” He furrowed his brow and looked at me. “Was it fourth grade? Fifth?”

I rolled my eyes. “ Third , Cam.”

“Was it? I thought—oh. Oh, yeah, you were in Mrs. Vincent’s class too, weren’t you?”

“Unfortunately.”

“Hey! That’s how you met me!”

“Not that you remember.” I chuckled and said to the boys, “We knew each other in elementary school, but then we got to be good friends in junior high.”

“You didn’t like Mrs. Vincent?” Zane asked, apparently clocking my “unfortunately” comment.

I wrinkled my nose. “She was mean.”

“She was.” Cam turned to the boys. “I missed so many recesses because of her.”

Both boys recoiled in horror.

I snorted. “That was because you were always breaking the rules.” Puffing out my chest, I added, “ I never missed a recess in her class.”

Cam rolled his eyes, and I suspected he was struggling hard not to flip me off.

“But you still didn’t like her?” Zach asked.

“She was still mean,” I said. “She was just… way meaner to the kids who didn’t behave.”

Zach looked at Cam, eyes wide with interest. “What kind of stuff did you do?”

“Nothing you two should try on your teachers,” I warned, eying Cam.

“What?” He spread his hands, grinning like a jackass. “Do you really think I’d be a bad influence on your kids?”

“What’s a bad influence?” Zach asked.

“Oh my God,” I muttered. “Hey, why don’t we all get in the pool? It’s going to start getting cold soon, and you’ll be at school, so you won’t have as much time to swim.”

That distraction worked like a charm. Both boys immediately took off up the stairs, probably to get changed.

“Well played,” Cam said.

I rolled my eyes and elbowed him. “You’re such a brat.”

“Don’t act like you didn’t know.”

“For fuck’s sake.”

He snickered, then gestured outside. “So are we swimming too?”

The thought of seeing him in shorts and nothing else sobered me right up, and I gulped. “Uh… Do you want to?”

“Are you kidding me? I haven’t been swimming in ages, and your pool is gorgeous!”

I laughed, thankful he couldn’t actually hear my heart going wild. “All right, all right.” I gestured at the stairs. “Go get your swim trunks on.”