Love Undefeated (Unexpected #5) (10 page)

“Oh hey, Zander,” I greeted him with a smile. Sedona had placed the phone on top of the table so now he could see everything. “How’s it going?”

“Busy.” He looked tired. “While my wife is happily living a single life over there, I have two hyper kids with me.”

Sedona bristled. “You’ll be single if you keep making comments like that.” Taking out her iPad from the case, she continued, “Babe, can you call on the iPad?”

Zander nodded, “Okay.”

The connection on the phone was lost and in a few seconds the iPad’s screen lit up with an incoming call.

“Hold on, babe,” Zander said. We could only hear his voice, but he was nowhere to be found. When he reappeared on the screen, he had Nicholas, who wasn’t a baby anymore, in tow. If there was a vote on the cutest babies in the world, I’d place my vote on the two adorable creatures that Zander and Sedona’s DNA had created.

Nicholas was almost two years old, and at his young age you could tell he had his mommy’s eyes and his daddy’s bone structure. He was going to break a lot of women’s hearts.

Sedona touched the screen as Tanya and I sighed in awe.

“Say hi to mommy, buddy.” Zander lifted Nicholas so we could see his outfit. He was wearing a light blue t-shirt with the words, “My daddy will kick ur ass if u look at my mommy,” with matching navy shorts. He was way too cute for words.

“Who gave you that shirt?” Sedona laughed, “I know I didn’t pack that for you.”

“Who else?” Zander’s brows lifted, his chest shaking in laughter.

Tanya answered for us, “Dom.”

“Nope.” Zander shook his head, he adjusted Nicholas on his lap again since Nicholas looked like he was squirming.

“Did he eat?” Sedona sounded off, a hint of motherly worry in her voice.

“He just ate twenty minutes ago,” Zander replied, placing Nicholas’ head against his broad chest, and tapping lightly against his back. “I think he wants to take a shit.”

Tanya and I couldn’t help laughing. It was so cute to see Zander doing daddy duties. Life hadn’t been easy for Zander and Sedona, but they looked like they were making it work.

“Babe!” Sedona scolded, “Sofia might hear you.”

“Chill oh you of little faith,” Zander countered, a grin lighting his face. “Sofia won’t hear me say shit.”

I kept giggling. Eyeing Tanya, I could tell she was holding back from laughing. This was better than watching a comedy on TV.

“What do you actually say when Sofia’s around?” I asked, curious as to how Zander minded his manners when his daughter was around.

“I say ‘shooshee’,” Zander replied, this time his answer was coupled with a full-blown laugh.

Tanya, Sedona, and I couldn’t hold it in anymore. We laughed along with him. Nicholas looked like he was enjoying our company, even on the camera, because he was now comfortably settled on his father’s chest.

Zander leaned back against the leather couch. They were all at Xavier’s house since he could accommodate all of them at his place. One would think that the guys would be upset that Zander was bringing the kids, but Sedona had mentioned earlier while I was making the drinks that the guys didn’t mind. If the guys weren’t okay with it, they’d have left the kids with either Sedona’s dad or Zander’s parents. With our lives being extremely busy these days, trips like these rejuvenated us, gave us enough energy to face the world and all its problems again.

Thinking that they needed privacy, Tanya and I were about to excuse ourselves when Sedona stopped us.

“Where are you going?” Sedona asked, her face displaying confusion.

“We’re just gonna go outside,” I said, waving at Zander. “To give you some privacy.”

“Oh no…” Sedona negated, fixing her yellow blouse. “We don’t need privacy.”

Zander’s voice interrupted her, “Tonight she will.”

Sedona’s face turned red. “Babe, shhh.” To Tanya and I she said, “Please stay. I know Zander’s gonna go in a few too. Nicholas looks like he’s fallen asleep.”

Sitting back on the couch, I replied, “Okay.” I reached for a magazine on the table and started flipping through the pages.

Zander and Sedona’s conversation hummed in the background, Tanya was busy on her phone again, and my eyes were slowly drifting closed. The gentle breeze from the opened balcony door was lulling me to sleep.

My mind was getting lost in the exotic vacation destinations portrayed in the glossy pages of the magazine when a tiny voice sounded clear against the calm and stillness.

“Daddy, whass damn?”

Zander muttered, “Shooshee!”

Sedona’s voice was high and shrill when she said, “Sofia, where did you hear that?”

My eyes opened to watch how this scenario was going to unfold.

Sofia’s cherub face and her blue-green eyes looked huge on the screen. “Mommy!”

“Zander, please tell the guys to tone the language down,” Sedona said in a stern voice as she planted a kiss for Sofia on the screen. “Hi, baby girl, are you having fun?”

Sofia sat primly at Zander’s side and started speaking in short sentences, throwing in a few made-up phrases of her own in between. My heart tugged at the way she smiled and when she waved at me, my eyes misted a little. My angel would have been playing with Sofia right now.

Loud footsteps entered the room and Zander raised his arms to quiet them down.

“I’ll bring this little guy inside the room. I’ll talk to you later, babe. Have fun but not too much. Don’t forget about me… Remember you are the mother of my children,” Zander said, his face scrunching up, his attempt at looking serious.

“Oh jeez!” John’s voice hissed in the back. “Dude, we need to get your B-A-L-L-S back! You are so whipped it’s not even funny.” He’d spelled the word because tender ears were listening in.

Sedona replied, “Hey, John, I have a feeling that you’re going to be the next spelling bee champ.”

Zander was no longer in front of the screen, but Sofia stayed on her seat. She looked like she wanted to talk the whole day away with Sedona.

We saw denim-covered legs fill the camera. And when the camera was focused and adjusted, I saw the familiar stare of green-colored eyes winking back.

It was Xavier and now he had Sofia sitting on his lap. When Sofia reached up to touch his chin, he smiled even bigger. Xavier gave Sedona a quick nod. After our breakup, Sedona was cordial to Xavier because he was Zander’s friend, but every time she had the chance, she would harrumph and enumerate the pros of not having a relationship with him anymore. Often she would cite his inability to make commitments as the number one reason to stay far away from him. But she didn’t badmouth him in front of the children, because after all, Xavier was still one of her husband’s closest friends and godfather to Sofia. Xavier looked like he was looking for someone and when his eyes landed on mine, there was no denying the heat that covered his gaze.

Sedona, the genius that she was, her mind spinning at what Xavier’s expression was for, deduced and said, “Nalee, are you back on with Xavier?”

Tanya was slow to react, and when she did, all she could say was, “Shooshee!”

“Shooshee?” My mind reeled at Tanya’s loud wail. Was that a code for something?

I was beating John’s ass in
Halo: Reach
when Tanya texted him and the big guy bowed out. He’d asked Dom to take his place. While Dom was an up-and-coming martial arts fighter and he could kick and punch anyone out of the ring, he was a sucky video gamer. I’d realized that we were just wasting time so I offered to grab a few beers and we played air hockey instead.

Sofia pulled on my hair as Sedona and Tanya ganged up on Nalee.

I heard the raucous, the incessant rapid fire of questions to Nales. “What? When did this happen?” I think that was Tanya.

“Are you taking anything? Any herbal remedies? Any new meds?” For sure that was Sedona.

“Unka!” Sofia was the cutest little girl, the ruffle of curls making her more than adorable, but her voice sounded like her mom when she was mad at Zander. I’d need a hearing aid after this. When she pulled on my hair again, I had to ask, “What’s the deal with my hair and this girl?”

I didn’t realize I asked the question out loud until I heard John, who had placed his big smelly feet on top of the glass table. “She’s just amused that you have no hair.”

I’d gotten a trim four days ago, a number four, shorter than the usual so my head was pretty much free of the longer, almost curling hair at the ends. Nalee had off-handedly said I needed a haircut, so the next day I’d visited Dax, the guy who’s been in charge of my hair for more than a decade. I wasn’t self-conscious about hair or anything like that. I knew I’d rock any haircut even mohawks. I just didn’t want to end up looking like a fool especially since I was representing Lockheed Industries now.

Dom sat in front of us, oblivious to what was going on on the iPad’s screen. The three ladies were now huddled against each other, whispering. Something serious was going on.

John raised his jaw, his left hand raised in the air, “What’s going on with Charlie’s Angels?”

He’d often call Nalee, Tanya, and Sedona some sort of nickname depending on his frame of mind.

“They’re on a mission,” I replied, my right hand slowly removing Sofia’s tiny yet torturous finger grips on my hair.

“What mission?” Zander asked as he entered the room. Out of all of us, he was the only one wearing pajamas. The dude looked beat. I had no idea why he thought he could take care of his kids alone.

“I dunno.” Finally, Sofia’s hand was out of my hair. Now she was staring closely inside my nose. Oh no friggin’ way!

“Sofia, baby girl, come here. Leave Uncle Xavier alone,” Zander commanded, he must have seen his spawn examining the inside of my nostrils. Sofia climbed down from my lap and walked towards her dad. Just last year, she still waddled, now her steps were surefooted; she was growing up so fast right before our eyes.

“She has a fascination with hair,” Zander explained, his head shaking. “She would trim her dolls, gather up the hair, and then she would put the hair in her mouth.”

“Dude, that’s weird,” John commented, his hands filled with the giant hotdog from FatBoys. We’d stopped on the way from the airport. Today I was the chauffeur for my friends. Two trips from the airport. One with Zander, Sofia, and a crying Nicholas. Then two hours later, John and Dom. They’d arrived 20 minutes apart, John from Wisconsin and Dom from Maine. They were both vacationing with families before this trip.

“I know why she’s fascinated with hair,” Dom, who I thought wasn’t listening, chimed in.

Zander carried Sofia in his arms, leaned back, and tossed her a few inches in the air, Sofia squealed in delight. He looked extremely tired, but one thing I noticed was he’d never looked this happy in his life. When he looked at his little girl, there was no doubt that he would move the earth for her. A pang of envy spread through my chest. Shrugging it off, I said, “Why?”

Dom replied, “Because she knows her dad’s gonna be bald in a couple of years so she’s saving all the hair for him.”

Zander shook his head, rolling his eyes.“Whatever, dude. You’re just jealous I still got more hair than you.”

Dom, extreme fighting machine that he was, spent more time trying out hair products that anyone else. During a beer pong session in college, he’d unconsciously blurted out that he spent more than thirty minutes on his head. For what purpose, I had no clue. Dom was bald. Balder than an eagle. As a matter of fact, Sofia didn’t wanna hang out with him so much because she had nothing to grab onto. His head was shinier than an Armor-All’ed car. I often wondered if he buffed and waxed it too.