and James. Talking and laughing, happily oblivious.
He could share this burden with them. No need to struggle with it alone. His siblings would stand by his side and help him through.
“There you are. We’re on our way to the Red Chicken to shoot some pool. You game?” James asked.
“I’m very busy.”
Both his brothers frowned. He’d cut way back on work since meeting Christy, and they knew it.
“You need help?” James offered.
“No. It’s just a lot of paperwork.” Which could totally wait. As could all the upcoming consultations he was going to take on. Anything to get away.
“Why the long face?” Max asked. “Has it already started to sink in what it means to go to a Star Trek convention? Having second thoughts?”
That damn convention was the least of his worries now. “Too busy to take Christy there.”
Max turned to James. “I told you he’d chicken out.”
“Not chickening out. Just busy. I’ll give her the tickets so that she can go. After all, isn’t the first anniversary paper?”
His brothers looked at each other, their eyebrows lifted.
“So let me get this straight,” James said. “You plan to give your future wife plane tickets so she can fly away to Vegas to spend Valentine’s with friends while you stay here?”
Put like that, it sounded bad.
Max seemed to think so too. “I foresee your future wife becoming your future ex-fiancé in no time. As soon as you present her with the flight tickets.” Then to James, “I knew he was going to fuck it up. Now you understand what I meant with a bulletproof plan for Valentine’s?”
James nodded grimly. “The first wedding anniversary is paper, true, but you can’t give that present in advance. You need to have married her and stayed married for a year. Your prospects of doing that are bleak.”
“No shit. You owe me two hundred bucks,” Max said to James, and turned to Cole. “I bet a hundred you wouldn’t go to Vegas and another hundred you wouldn’t fool Christy into marrying you anytime this century. Looks like I win.”
“Don’t you have somewhere else to be?” Cole asked, aggravated. “Besides bugging me, that is?”
James shook his head. “Actually, no. Elle is visiting with Tate.”
“And I left Annie at Sweets and Tweets, helping with all the Valentine’s prep. She’s banned me from the shop. Well, the shop plus a radius of a hundred yards.”
In spite of the turmoil inside him, that got Cole’s attention. “Banned you? Why?”
“This bozo here passed by and tried to help several days ago,” James offered while Max looked chagrined. “Between the rush of Valentine’s and the public he attracts, it was mayhem.”
Figured.
Max muttered something in response, James laughed, and there they went, bantering and poking at each other. Cole watched his brothers’ back and forth as if from afar. A foreign movie without subtitles. The words not computing.
If it were up to him, he would burn down the whole unit. He didn’t want anything from there, but his brothers had a right to make that decision for themselves.
“Cole, you listening?”
James and Max were staring at him.
“What?”
“Sure you don’t want to come shoot some pool with us?”
“Another day.”
He would be shitty company. Shittier than usual.
As James and Max headed for the door, Cole found himself calling out to them. “Guys.”
They turned toward him. “Yes?”
Cole hesitated for a long second, then shook his head. Now wasn’t a good time. Both his brothers were about to become fathers. Max was getting ready for his trip to Florida, and he was worried enough with all the accidents that seemed to follow Annie wherever she went. And Tate’s pregnancy had turned complicated in the last trimester. Cole didn’t want to add to James’s plate.
Misery might have loved company, but he’d rather keep the burden all to himself, Max and James didn’t deserve to have to deal with that shit.
“Nothing. Have fun.”
He couldn’t care less if all their mother’s stuff went up for auction. He just felt sorry for the poor moron who’d spend a cent on whatever pile of crap she’d been holding on to. There was going to be nothing in that locker but pain and despair.
Suddenly a soundtrack familiar from his teenage years blared through the office.
“Oh fuck. Is that…?”
“Magnum P.I.,” Max said, nodding as he dug his cell from his pocket. “Annie has a thing for Magnum. Or for Higgins, not sure.”
Cole shook his head. Man.
James chuckled. “Between the surfer dude here and Magnum there, you guys shouldn’t be allowed to go out in public with your phones