She cleared her throat. “Here.” She glanced over at Cole. “I feel a little out of place with such interesting names.”
“You haven’t even met Bartleby yet,” Cole said, breaking into a grin—it transformed his hard features into something more approachable than the rugged cowboy that he’d turned into. He’d been in a mood since being forced to watch West’s kids. She could understand, in a way, since he’d symbolically been excluded from the “big kid’s” table at his exalted age of thirty-one. Again, she hid her laugh. As an only child, she’d always be the baby too.
“Bartleby’s a horse,” Charlie explained. “So, is Sleipnir.”
She couldn’t keep her lips from tilting up this time. “You named an animal Sleipnir?” she asked Charlie. It sounded like a squished tomato.
“No, Uncle Cole did!” He ratted him out with his usual innocence. “He’s uh–uh a paint, and he’s fast!”
She fixed Cole with an amused look. “Looks like the creative name giving runs in the family.”
“It’s from a Norse mythology,” he said with a roll of his blue Slade eyes. “He’s Odin’s steed… a Norse god.”
Made sense, since Cole looked like one. He was a total Hemsworth with his scruffy day’s growth on his chiseled jaw. West’s brother was a hotty like he was. Not only that, but she was taken aback by his depth. It definitely ran in the family. She couldn’t believe that he didn’t have a girlfriend. She’d fix that for him.
“R2-D2?” Charlie was back to his fantasy roll call. “R2-D2, are you here?”
There was no answer. Eva could see Pip getting ready to threaten the principal’s office again.
“Cheep,” Cole called out, saving the truant bird blinking over his arm. “Cheep. I’m here.”
She let out a laugh, touched that Cole would play along. So cute! He might not go easy on her, but he was a softie for his nephews. None of her guy friends would have that kind of patience.
Pip’s stern look softened. “Okay, R2-D2’th here,” he announced through his missing teeth. “He’th here.”
“Cole,” Charlie asked the room. “Are you here?” He pretended to read an order slip that he’d found from the side table.
Cole leaned back against the boarded wall of the stall. “Here,” he answered.
“All right, that’s everybody,” Charlie said, still consulting the slip like it held his lesson plan. “Sit, sit,” he commanded Lizardman. The squirmy labradoodle was trying to climb into his lap.
A message chirped from Eva’s phone. She eagerly read West’s response to her text: “You like my kids, huh?”
“Love them!”
Well… shewould’vetexted that, but she didn’t want to sound desperate. He’d taken about five minutes to write back, so she’d have to set a timer before she replied. It was just how it was done.
“Okay, Cole,” Charlie said. “What is five times five times twenty-three?”
“Uh…” Cole closed his eyes while he processed the figures. “Twenty-five times twenty-three, it’s like five hundred…”
“Wait!” Eva found the calculator app on her phone. She usually used it for tips. “I’ve got it.”
“No calculators!” Charlie decreed.
“No calculators? What? Why not?” she asked. “I can’t remember any math after third grade, so…”
“Five hundred seventy-five,” Cole said.
She turned sharply. “That’s not it!” She checked her phone, letting Ballerina escape her hands. Immediately Lizardman pounced and the two wrestled in the hay while she discovered that Cole had guessed the number right. No way! Hehadto have cheated.
“Lizardman! Ballerina!” Charles lectured them gruffly.
Pip grabbed Lizardman’s collar and made his usual lisped threats. “Printhipalth offith now!” But Lizardman and Ballerina were having the time of their lives. Both of them rolled around like the playful little puppies that they were. Pip stumbled backwards from their wriggling bodies and stomped his foot. “Do you hear me?”
The two looked like best friends as far as she could see. “Awww, puppy love,” she whispered. She turned to Cole, deciding she’d find this for him too. “You’d like my friends.”
“Wait… did you think of me because you said puppy love?” he whispered back. Obviously he kept his complaints low because no one wanted to be kicked out of class. Standing up to roleplay getting into trouble at the principal’s office would take too much effort. “You still think I’m the baby,” he accused.