The Last Single Garrett

“The cook will make them,” Tristyn assured her.

“How do you know?”

“Because he’s made them for my niece before.”

“I want pizza,” Emily reminded them all.

Tristyn pointed to the section of the menu that listed the various options and toppings, but Emily wanted only cheese.

“Pep-ro-ni,” Hanna said.

“You said you wanted spaghetti,” Josh reminded her.

His youngest niece shook her head. “P’za.”

“Pizza with pepperoni?” he asked, seeking clarification.

She nodded, and then said, “I has to go potty.”

“You just went when we were at the store,” he reminded her.

“I has to go agin,” she insisted.

He looked at Tristyn, who sighed. “This is the real reason you offered to buy me dinner, isn’t it? So that you could escape bathroom duty.”

“Well, I can’t take her into the men’s room, and there’s no way I’m walking into the women’s,” he pointed out.

“I hafta go, too,” Emily said.

“Charlotte?” Tristyn prompted.

She shook her head.

“Why don’t you come, anyway, to wash up before dinner?” Tristyn suggested.

So she herded the three girls off to the ladies’ room, leaving Josh alone at a table for five. Thankfully, he knew what everyone wanted, so when Sydney passed by the table again, he was able to place their order.

Charlotte and Hanna returned first, and Josh was settling his youngest niece into the booster seat again when Tristyn’s sister Jordyn came over. Jordyn was married to Marco Palermo, whose grandparents had started serving pasta in the original downtown location of Valentino’s almost fifty years earlier. Recently, Marco had spearheaded the expansion of their business with Valentino’s II. He and his wife had also recently expanded their family with the addition of twin boys, who were now about nine months old.

“Gemma told me that Josh Slater had come in with four gorgeous females, which I thought was a little excessive—even for you.” Jordyn winked at him before turning her focus to the girls.

“These are my nieces Charlotte and Hanna,” he told her. “Emily must still be in the bathroom.”

“She stuck her hands up under the faucet and sprayed water all over her shirt,” Charlotte explained. “Tristyn’s drying it off under the hand dryer.”

Jordyn’s brows lifted as she turned back to Josh. “My sister Tristyn?”

“She’s the only Tristyn I know,” he acknowledged.

“She was supposed to have a date with Rafe tonight.” Then she shook her head. “Apparently her plans changed.”

“That might be my fault,” he acknowledged. “She saw that I was overwhelmed by the prospect of cooking another meal for three fussy kids and obviously took pity on me.”

“We’re not fussy,” Charlotte interjected. “We just like what we like and don’t like what we don’t.”

“Which is exactly what their mother used to say when she refused to eat what was put on the table,” he acknowledged.

“How long have you been staying with Uncle Josh?” Jordyn asked Charlotte.

“We got here yesterday, and we’re supposed to stay for the whole summer,” she said, her glum tone clearly indicating her displeasure.

Josh wasn’t overjoyed, either, but he couldn’t see a way out of the situation for any of them. “My sister’s in Spain on business for the next eight to ten weeks.”

“The whole summer with Uncle Josh,” Jordyn mused. “That should be...interesting.”

“For all of us, I’m sure,” he remarked drily.

But Charlotte was shaking her head. “He doesn’t have any cool stuff and I had to sleep with Emily.”

“In my bed,” he pointed out. “While I slept on the sofa.”

Jordyn chuckled softly. “Oh, yes, it will be an interesting summer.”

“How are Henry and Liam?” he asked.

“If I had my phone handy, I’d bore you with a thousand pictures,” she said, her deep green eyes—so similar to her sister’s—suddenly going soft and dreamy. “They are the lights of my life.”

“Along with your darling and devoted husband,” Marco said from behind her.

Jordyn grinned as she glanced over her shoulder. “Along with my darling and devoted husband,” she dutifully intoned.

The aforementioned spouse slid an arm across her shoulders. “You said you wanted to have a quick word with Gemma while I went to the kitchen to grab a tray of lasagna for the potluck tomorrow, and when I came out of the kitchen, you were gone.”

“Gemma told me that Josh was here, so I came over to say hi. And now I’ve met his nieces Charlotte and Hanna—and this must be Emily,” she said, as his third niece and Tristyn made their way back to the table.

“And now we really have to go,” Marco urged. “We’ve already been away longer than we planned and your mom has a ton of things to do before the picnic tomorrow, none of which she is getting done with Henry and Liam underfoot.”

“You’re right, we have to go,” she agreed. But she gave her sister a quick hug before she turned to Josh again. “Are you taking the girls to the parade tomorrow?”

“I hadn’t really thought about it,” he admitted. But if he had, he would have answered with a resounding no. He’d barely been able to keep track of them in an electronics store; he didn’t want to imagine the nightmare of trying to keep them together in the midst of the crowds that gathered to celebrate the Fourth of July.

“What parade?” Charlotte asked.

“The Independence Parade is part of Charisma’s ‘Food, Fun & Fireworks’ celebration,” Jordyn explained.

“I wanna see the fireworks,” Charlotte told Josh.

“I wanna see the fun,” Emily chimed in.

“I wanna see some food,” Tristyn interjected. “Tonight. I’m starving.”

“I starvin’, too,” Hanna said, clearly not wanting to be left out of the conversation.

“And Sydney’s on her way with your food right now,” Marco said, gently nudging his wife away from the table.

“See you at the park tomorrow,” Jordyn called back over her shoulder, though Josh wasn’t sure if she was talking to him or—more likely—her sister.

* * *

Charlotte polished off her chicken fingers and ate most of the fries on her plate; Emily ate two slices of the individual cheese pizza she’d wanted; and Hanna ate one slice of her pepperoni pizza—but only after picking off all the pepperoni—and half of Tristyn’s garlic bread. Josh offered her some of the spaghetti that came with his chicken parmesan, which was what she’d originally wanted, but she wrinkled her nose and shook her head.

He was waiting for the check when Tristyn noticed that Hanna had fallen asleep at the table.

“Because she didn’t have her nap at two o’clock,” Charlotte said matter-of-factly. “And now she’s going to be awake until midnight.”

“How was I supposed to know that she should have a nap at two o’clock?” he wondered.

“It’s in the book,” his eldest niece informed him.

“And when did I have time to read the book?” he asked.

Charlotte just shrugged.

“The book?” Tristyn said.

“Is actually a binder,” he told her. “Filled with about four hundred pages of instructions from my sister on what her daughters like and don’t like, dosages for medications, if required, and apparently nap times.”

“Only Hanna has a nap,” Charlotte said. “Emily and me are too big for naps.”

He looked at his youngest niece, her head flopped back against the chair. “What do you think the odds are of me getting her home and into bed without waking her up?” he asked Tristyn.

“Not anything that I’d wager on,” she told him.

But when they got back to his condo, she guided Charlotte and Emily into the elevator while he carried Hanna. He laid her carefully on the narrow cot his sister had brought along with all their other paraphernalia, then helped Tristyn supervise while Emily and Charlotte had their baths and got ready for bed. By the time their teeth were brushed, it was almost eight o’clock—and he was ready for bed, too.

And then, as soon as the other girls were tucked in, Hanna woke up, and he got to go through the whole routine again with her. But being ready for bed didn’t mean that she was ready to sleep. In fact, she seemed completely revived after her “nap” and ready to play.

“I’m thinking Charlotte was right,” Tristyn told him. “She’s going to be awake now until midnight.”

“Lucky me.” He sighed. “And the other two will probably be awake at the crack of dawn, like they were this morning.”

“You should take them to the parade tomorrow,” she said.

“Why?”

“Because I think they’ll enjoy it, and you know the whole Garrett clan will be at the park to help you keep an eye on them afterward.”

“I almost forgot tomorrow was the Fourth of July,” he admitted.

“It follows the third every year,” she pointed out.

He laughed softly. “That’s assuming I knew today was the third. I’m not even sure what day of the week it is.”

“Monday,” she said, heading toward the door.

“Thanks for all of your help,” he said.

“You’re welcome.”

“I hope canceling your date tonight wasn’t a problem.”

She shook her head. “I’ll see him tomorrow.”

That revelation surprised him. “You guys must be pretty serious if you’re introducing Rafe to your family,” he commented.

“He’s already met my family,” she said, then she frowned. “Wait a minute—I never told you his name.”

“Your sister mentioned it.”

“What else did she mention?”

He shrugged. “She didn’t tell me how long you’ve been dating him...or if you’re sleeping with him.”

Tristyn rolled her eyes. “You really don’t understand the concept of boundaries, do you?”

“I’m guessing that’s a ‘no,’” Josh continued. “If your relationship was at that stage, you wouldn’t have bailed on him tonight.”

She frowned. “What kind of logic is that?”

“The undisputable kind. Because if you were sleeping with him—and he was able to satisfy you in the bedroom—you wouldn’t have let anything interfere with your plans to be with him,” he said.

“Of course, the other possibility is that you are sleeping with him but he’s lousy in bed.” Then he shook his head. “But no, I can’t imagine you would still be with a man who wasn’t able to meet your needs.”

“You do realize this whole conversation could be categorized as sexual harassment,” she noted.

“Are you feeling harassed?”

No, she was feeling...aroused, she realized uneasily.

Which, she was certain, had absolutely nothing to do with Josh but was simply a result of the topic of their conversation—and the fact that she hadn’t had sex in almost two years. A sexual hiatus that she’d considered ending tonight.

She wondered what it said about her relationship with Rafe that she hadn’t hesitated to break their plans—that she had, perhaps, even been a little relieved to have an excuse not to take that next step right now. She liked Rafe—she really did. He was handsome and sweet and kind, and she always had a good time with him. But for some inexplicable reason, she wasn’t eager to get naked with him.

Or maybe the reason wasn’t inexplicable at all.

Maybe the reason was standing right in front of her.

She pushed that unwarranted and unwelcome thought to the back of her mind. “I’m going home now,” she told Josh.

“And if you were sleeping with him,” he continued, as if she hadn’t spoken, “you’d probably be stopping by his place on your way home to—”

“Good night, Josh.” And with those final words, she opened the door and made her escape.

Unfortunately, it wasn’t as easy to escape her own thoughts and feelings. Because the truth was, simply being in the same room with Josh stirred her up far more than being in Rafe’s arms ever did.

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