The Stone Family Heart - Taylor Hart Page 0,66
newly-married sister. She and Tim had looked so happy at their wedding. “No, you don’t. You’re too busy honeymooning with Tim.”
She laughed and smacked his shoulder, a blush washing over her. “Shut it.”
He laughed. His sister had always been so prim and proper. “Hey, I think it’s great. Make me a little nephew.”
Now her cheeks really caught on fire. “Did Tim tell you?”
Stopped short, Marshall gave her a sweeping glance, and his instincts told him what was going on. “No. What?”
There was no way his brother and his sister …
“We’re pregnant.” She covered her face, then burst into a huge smile.
“What?” Even though he’d suspected, he was still stunned. He swept her up, and they hugged again. For a couple years, he’d known that she and Jeff had tried hard to have kids. “Are you serious?”
“Who knew?” She laughed. His sister was radiant and more beautiful right now than he ever remembered her being. “I didn’t think we could, and we haven’t been doing anything to prevent it, and …” She smiled again, tearing up. “And voilà! It happened on its own.”
“Wow.”
She sucked in a long breath and nodded. “I’m only barely two months.”
“Same as Kensi.”
Her eyes became misty with tears. She smiled. “She told you?”
He nodded.
Kensi laughed. “I know. It’s so weird that it just happened like this, out of the blue.”
Marshall bit his tongue, cutting off his knee-jerk response of pointing out that it wasn’t like a stork would be dropping them off. They knew how this process had happened, but he didn’t want to upset how happy she was.
She hugged him again. “I’m so glad you’re home.”
That word again. He didn’t really like being in the same sentence as that word. “I’m here for a visit. To take care of this place.” It dawned on him now why Trey had been so insistent that Kensi couldn’t be the one to be in charge. “This is why Trey insisted I that come and you couldn’t handle it.”
A guilty expression washed over her face. “Yep,” she said, shrugging. “Who knew that my husband and my brother would be so protective and that I’d be okay with it?”
“Well, I’m glad I could help.”
She cocked an eyebrow at him. “How long are you grounded for?”
A topic he didn’t want to discuss. Nervous energy punched at his gut, and he tried to push it away. “Another two weeks, or … It just depends on how the psych test went.”
A light hand rested on his shoulder. “You okay?”
He shrugged the hand off and moved to pick up the binder. He didn’t want to discuss that. “Fine, thanks.” He put the binder by the counter, out of the way. “Okay, tell me what I need to know for when the guests get back.”
Kensi went through everything. “We have a college kid that watches the desk all day, in case someone comes to the door or the phone rings and to make sure that only the guests are coming and going during the day. That job can be tedious.”
“Oh, good.” Marshall hadn’t really thought about the details.
“Vince comes over at ten and leaves around seven. He’ll also help if the guests need something for the pool or the beach. He just sits at the front desk by the door, but sometimes he locks the door and sits in the main kitchen area.”
“Okay.” Marshall didn’t love the idea of this dude being there all the time, but he also didn’t want to be there every second. “Sounds good.”
“And the nighttime ritual is that you put on a movie at eight and pop popcorn and put out drinks. The guests can view the movie or not. Sometimes they just want to chitchat.”
Chitchat wasn’t his thing, but he nodded. “Got it.”
“It’s not hard, and if you want to go out one night, Tim and I don’t mind coming down and hanging out.” She smiled at him. “But I am tired a lot more, and Tim insists that I rest a lot.”
“I would agree. You rest. I’ll be good.”
“Okay,” Kensi said, heading for the back door. “I’m going to walk home and get dinner going. Call me if you need anything.”
“You bet.”
She opened the door, then turned back to him. “Marshall.”
“Yep.”
She smiled at him. “You’re going to be the best uncle ever.”
He grinned. Part of him was delighted that she’d said that, as her opinion meant a lot to him, but there was this other feeling. This nagging feeling. Would he only ever be an uncle? Was he okay