There was no other option.

Because she wasn’t going anywhere without him.

“We can move in in two weeks,” Jordie said, leaning back in the chair with Mena on his chest as he hung up the phone. “That’s the earliest.”

Kacey looked over from her phone and smiled. “Cool school. We need furniture.”

“Yeah, we’ll go shopping tomorrow if you want.”

“I don’t know, I’m pretty sure Lacey would flip if we took Mena anywhere,” she muttered as her phone went off. “Speaking of the devil, she asked if Mena was okay.”

Jordie laughed, looking down at the little bundle of cuteness. “You okay, Mena?” She cooed softly, her little brown eyes wide and aware, locked on him, and he nodded. “She said she’s good.”

Kacey giggled as she shook her head, typing Lacey back. “I’m so blessed to be with a man who speaks baby.”

He smiled. “It’s one of my many talents.”

“Yes, so many, yet you can’t beat me on the ice.”

He glared. “Now, we have yet to play before I have practice. Which will happen soon, ’cause your bragging is killing me.”

“Four and oh, baby,” she said, shrugging her shoulders in a pathetic dance as she grinned.

He rolled his eyes, annoyed. So what if she kept beating him? He was tired and she was fast with her long legs and stealthy ways. Again, it wasn’t like he could plaster her against the wall. Also, she was doing little tricks that no one could pull off in the NHL. She was a pain, but his pain, and he wouldn’t trade her in for anyone.

Ever since last week when he took her to therapy with him, things had been different. He felt like she was more confident in them, and that took one hell of a load off his shoulders. He already had so much up there, and he was thankful to have her anxiety gone. He understood he’d caused it, it was his fault, but it had been tearing him down slowly. He wanted her to look at him and only see love, not nervousness about them ending. Since his session, it had been just like he wanted, and because of that, they were now enjoying the house-buying process.

Moaning as her phone went off again, Kacey rolled her eyes. “She’s gonna drive us batty.”

He couldn’t agree more. Lacey had only left four hours ago and had texted them or called at least nine times since. He understood that she was freaking out a bit as it was her first time without her baby, but they were more than capable of caring for Mena Jane. They were her godparents; they had this.

Grinning, he looked over at her. “Hey, we should mess with her.”

She looked up. “Why do I feel like that’s a bad idea?”

He scoffed. “What’s the worst she could do?”

“Kill us if we hurt Mena Jane,” she reminded him and he laughed.

“I don’t want to hurt her, weirdo,” he said, getting up and holding Mena close. “I’m saying we should send her pictures of Mena doing things she shouldn’t be doing.”

“See that’s tiptoeing on the line between getting killed and making her laugh. She’s not in her right mind right now. I’m pretty sure Karson went just to make sure she didn’t kill that chick.”

Jordie shrugged. “Right, so we should send her some comic relief.”

Kacey eyed him and then slowly shrugged. “Okay, I’m intrigued.”

“Good, come on.”

And for the next hour, between laughing so hard and then laughing some more, they set Mena up in different scenarios. Mena was eating it up, having a blast, all smiles as they went all over the house doing things that Lacey wouldn’t even think to do. At one point they were in the car, Mena holding on to the steering wheel with a huge toothless grin on her face, while Jordie and Kacey acted as if they were screaming out in horror of her crashing the car. The caption read, “Who let the baby drive?” Then they had her with bras on her head, lace in her mouth, and the caption on the picture was, “Following in her mom’s footsteps.” After stuffing her in a helmet, they sent a picture to Karson that said, “Or maybe daddy’s footsteps?” When they handed her Kacey’s gold medal, she looked at it like it was the Holy Grail—which to Kacey it was—and Jordie quickly snapped the picture since Kacey had started twitching from the medal being out of the box. Sending it to Lacey, he said, “Or maybe her auntie’s?”

It went on like this for quite a while…that was, until Lacey called just as he was stuffing Mena in the fridge.

“Okay, it was all cute until you stuffed her in a pot and said, ‘Baby. It’s what’s for dinner,’” she complained and Jordie laughed as Kacey snickered, holding Mena close, kissing her head.

“It’s supposed to make you laugh,” he said. “No baby was hurt in the process of making Mommy laugh.”

She did laugh then and Jordie’s grin grew. “There’s what we wanted. You okay?”

She let out a long breath. “No, I fired her and we aren’t speaking. My dad came up to the shop, but I called the cops on him. I’m now in the process of hiring a new manager. So we probably won’t be home till Monday since Karson won’t leave me,” she said, saying the last bit louder for him.

“I don’t trust these people. I’d say close the shop, but I know you won’t,” Karson yelled and Jordie grimaced. They both sounded stressed. “Not that I think you should.”

“Yeah, I’m not, and it will be fine, no worries,” she said, but she sounded very worried. “Please don’t stuff my baby anywhere else.”