Ghost Dance (Tulsa Thunderbirds Book 3) (42 page)

I’d fallen in love with her somewhere along the line. I couldn’t be exactly sure of when or where it had happened. I only knew that when I woke up with her in my arms, I couldn’t think of anywhere I’d rather be, and when I was on the road with the team, I was more miserable than I could remember being in my life. And that was saying something, since I’d known more than my fair share of misery over the years.

As far as I was concerned, everything in our relationship was going as well as could be expected.

Today had me nervous, though. It was a Saturday afternoon in the middle of March, and instead of me taking her out on a date,
she
had invited
me
to spend the day with her brother and his family. Her parents had come for a visit, and it was going to be a full house.

I wanted to make the right impression on her family, especially her brother and father because I knew their opinions meant the world to her, and because I
really
wanted for us to be a couple. I needed it, so as far as I was concerned, I needed the approval of these two men in her life, especially since I doubted I’d ever earn Wade Miller’s approval. I didn’t want us to be together just for now, either, but forever. The more time I spent with London, the more I was sure that we were right for each other, and it wasn’t just because she was having my baby. We could be explosive, but only because we were two passionate people who didn’t always see eye to eye.

We agreed when it mattered, which was the important thing.

That said, I wasn’t sure how these men in her family would react to me being in her life, let alone at a family get-together. I was the son of a bitch who’d gotten London pregnant during a snowstorm. Not exactly putting my best foot forward with a papa and an older brother, I wouldn’t imagine.

I picked her up at eleven. We’d decided to take my car since she still wasn’t overly comfortable with the different modification system in her new car, and she wouldn’t let me pay for the same system she’d had before. I had every intention of wearing her down on that score before too much longer, using the argument that she was carrying my baby. I needed to be sure they were both safe, and that would be easier to achieve if she had equipment she was comfortable operating. I bent down and kissed her when she opened the door, lingering over the taste of her, but not so long that her neighbors would get annoyed with our public display if they were watching out their windows.

“You planning to kiss me like that in front of my daddy?” she asked.

“Does he have gun?”

She laughed and wheeled over to get into my car.

It was a nice day, so two of the kids were playing outside in the front when we pulled up and parked in the driveway. One of them—a little girl with brown curls—raced to open London’s door before I’d even cut the engine.

“Can we pop a wheelie?” she demanded, full of exuberance that made me like her immediately. Maybe becoming a father was making me softer around kids. That and spending as much time with Harper as I had in recent months. I’d never been around children much before her, so I’d always been a bit standoffish, not knowing what to do with them.

“Let me get my chair, and we’ll try to do a few before your mommy sees and tries to stop us,” London said, reaching into the back to start the assembly process.

I stayed out of their way, standing off to the side, as London put the girl on her lap and rolled down into the street. She picked up some speed and then shifted her weight backward, bringing the front wheels up off the ground. The little girl giggled. It sounded a lot like the way Harper giggled when I tickled her toes with my beard.

I was so engrossed with watching them that I didn’t notice when a man walked up to stand beside me. “It’s good to hear them laughing, isn’t it?” he said, and I tried not to jump and show my surprise.

“Yes, it’s good,” I said slowly.

He held out a hand. “David Hawke. I’m London’s father.

“Dmitri Nazarenko,” I said, shaking his hand.

He had a grip much like my father’s had been, strong and weathered, like a man achieved from a life full of hard work. He gave me a thorough once-over, but then he smiled at me. “Come on inside and meet the rest of the family. London’ll bring Erin in once they’ve had a bit more fun.”

Maybe this wouldn’t be as bad as I’d feared.

SIERRA HAD BEEN
giving me the stink eye since the moment I’d come through the door with Erin on my lap. She hated the fact that her kids adored me. She hated that I could do things with those kids that she couldn’t.

Even worse than the way she was treating me, though, I’d noticed that she was giving Dima the same look. It was like she was bound and determined to hate him, simply because he had anything to do with me. Maybe she thought me bringing home a big, Russian hockey player would steal even more of her thunder. I didn’t know what it was about me that got her goat, but it made me mad.

I could deal with her dislike and jealousy of me, but it left me feeling stabby when it came to Dima. She had my hackles up, and I doubted I’d calm down about it any time soon. Not the best way to spend a family day, particularly when it was Dima’s introduction to them. These were the people he would have to deal with for the rest of his life, and I’d hoped they could make a good impression on him. Sierra was doing her best to accomplish the opposite.

At the moment, Dima was holding Baby Finn, who was just as entranced with Dima’s beard as Harper always was. Finn kept reaching up and patting Dima on the chin or the cheek, and Dima would wiggle his face until Finn started giggling.

“He’s good with babies,” Dad said, sitting down next to me and passing over one of the two huge glasses of sweet iced tea he’d just brought in from the kitchen.

I winked. “You have no idea. One of his teammates has a little girl who had colic. They couldn’t ever get her to calm down unless he came over. He’d rock her and tell her stories in Russian, and she would rip out his beard hairs one at a time, and she’d finally calm down. Tallie and Tori call him the baby whisperer.”

“Might come in handy.”

“Yeah.” I leaned back, a warmth spreading throughout my body and culminating in a smile. “It definitely could.”

Sierra was watching the two of them like a hawk, though, never letting Dima out of her sight.

He picked Finn up in the air and let him drop a few inches, catching him and holding him close. Finn cackled harder than ever.

“That’s enough,” Sierra said, stomping over and snatching her son out of Dima’s arms. “He’s a
baby
. You can’t toss him around like that.”

Never mind the fact that I’d seen Gray do that very thing with all four of his kids when they were Finn’s age, countless times. What did she think Dima was going to do? Drop the baby? I didn’t have a clue what she was thinking, but I’d never been more upset with her than I was in this moment.

Dima started apologizing even though he hadn’t done a darned thing wrong, but Finn had started crying after being pulled away from him so suddenly, so Sierra stalked off without even listening.

“Why does she have to be so blatantly rude to him?” I hissed at my father.

“I don’t think she knows any other way of being. It’s just something we’re going to have to deal with because your brother married her.”

“Well,
we
didn’t marry her. I don’t see why we should have to face the consequences of his bad taste.”

“That’s how it goes. You don’t get to choose your in-laws.”

I let out a
hmph
ing sound at that. If Dima and I got married, I wouldn’t have any in-laws, unless you counted Svetka and Sergei—and I did—but they were fabulous. They could very well factor into my decision if he asked me to marry him, not that I was going to tell him that. It would play in his favor, anyway, so there was no need to let him get worked up over it.

“Your mother tells me you had an ultrasound last week?” Dad said, leaning in and effectively redirecting my thoughts away from Sierra and her poor treatment of the man I had come to love.

“Is that a hint that you want to see it?”

“Grandpas always want to see the ultrasound. Get used to that.”

I dug into my purse and found the envelope holding the printout. Dima had one, too, that he’d taken up to practice the next day and shown to all his teammates who would humor him, but I hadn’t shown many people yet. Mainly just Terri and a couple of the counselors at work. For the most part, I was keeping it to myself. I wouldn’t keep it from my father, though. Especially not when he’d flat out asked to see it.

I passed it over to him, and he slipped the picture out of the envelope, holding it up so the afternoon sunlight streaming through the windows would light it up for him.

Mom looked up from across the room. “Is that the ultrasound?” Then she and Gray came over to take a look, too. Within moments, the three older kids had all crowded around to see the black-and-white fuzzy image. Everyone had gathered around my dad except for Dima, Finn, and Sierra. Dima winked at me, watching the way the family crowded together. But then Sierra walked in from the kitchen with Finn still fussing in her arms. He reached for Dima as soon as he saw him, but she wouldn’t let him go.

“Oh, good grief,” she said. “It’s just an ultrasound. You can’t even tell what sex the baby’s going to be yet. You can’t tell
anything
yet. It’s nothing to get excited about. Just one more way London is trying to get all the attention on her.”

I was about to tell her to shut up and act like a decent human being, even though she clearly wasn’t one, and it looked like Gray, for once, was gearing up to do the same thing, but Dima beat us both to the punch.

“Attention? London doesn’t want attention. This is family.” He stood there looking at her like she was a crazy woman—or
woo-woo bonkers
, as he’d taken to saying lately. Considering what family meant to him, there wasn’t a doubt in my mind of the weight his words carried.

Dad reached over and squeezed my hand. When I looked at him, he winked at me, nodding. That was his sign of approval. He liked Dima. Something in my chest swelled.

“Oh, please,” Sierra said, rolling her eyes. “You clearly don’t know her very well yet, so if you’re smart, you’ll get out while you still can. Sadly, I’ve already married in and have to deal with her all the time. And now she’s going to shove her kid to the front of the line so it can get more attention than mine do, too. She treats the rest of us like we’re second-class citizens in this family.”

“Only one treats people like they’re not good enough is you,” Dima said, getting all growly and fierce, the way he did when the two of us argued over something.

It was probably bad that the only thought in my mind while he fought with her was that he was even hotter when he was mad and I wanted to take him home so he could look at me in private with those angry eyes.

Sierra scoffed, gearing up for another round, but Gray cut her off before she could wind up.

“Would you just let it go already?” he shouted. “I’ve been telling you for years that you’re projecting your own issues onto her unfairly. But it’s never been more apparent than now.”

“My own issues?”

“It’s the same as you’ve always been with your own sister. You can’t stand that she came along after you and was the baby, so she always got more attention than you did. Stop beating London up because you feel inadequate. Just let it go.”