Page 13 of Shattered Oaths

NOAH

Pulling the sleeve of my undershirt down over my hands, I use it to wipe the sweat beading on my brow.

It’s hotter than Satan’s balls in this damn house.

“Dude, why the fuck is it so hot in here?” I grumble at Grayson as I pull the nail from between my lips and line it up with the wood.

“It has to be a comfortable seventy-two degrees in the house for the baby,” Grayson replies, casually rolling his paintbrush against the wall. I narrow my eyes at his bare back, not a drop of sweat visible on his skin. Fucker had the right idea.

“Do you realise it’s a beautiful spring day out there? Take the baby outside and turn on the aircon inside.”

“I dare you to say that to Liv,” he says, turning to me with a challenge in his eyes.

“Say what to me?” Liv appears in the doorway, a small bundle of dark curls restingagainst her shoulder.

“Uh…” I open and close my mouth, trying to think of something.

“Noah was just complaining about the temperature, weren’t you, Noah?”

Liv raises a brow at me, her head cocked. “Something wrong with the temperature,Noah?” She asks, her British accent making her question ten times more intimating than it should be. Just the way my name rolls off her tongue sends a terrifying chill down my spine.

Grayson watches me, a smirk on his face as I glance back and forth between him and his future wife, not sure how to go about answering without getting my ass chewed out.

“Cat got your tongue?” Liv challenges, her head tilted to the side, striking blue eyes boring into me.

I’m almost certain she’s going to show me her teeth next.

Just as I open my mouth to squeak out an answer at the scary mama-bear in front of me, my nephew, Rueben, begins to fuss, his small head rolling back and forth against Liv’s shoulder, no doubt in a search for milk.

I wait until she’s halfway down the hall before I release a heavy breath and turn back to Grayson. “What the fuck was that, dick?”

Grayson laughs, his eyes twinkling with a mischief that was once missing from them. “I was hoping she’d go all psycho mama on you. Honestly, I think it’s my favourite version of her.”

“You’re so whipped it makes me sick,” I grimace.

“Not whipped, man. Just happy.”

That makes me pause. If anyone in this world deserves to be happy, it’s him. And for the longest time he wasn’t.That is until Liv came walking into his life two years ago and reminded him that it’s okay to have bad days, but it’s also okay to have good days too. And that no matter which one of those days he was having, she would love him anyway.

“I’m glad you’re happy, man,” I tell him, hoping he can hear the sincerity in my voice.

Grayson smiles. “Thanks.”

“Just don’t pull that shit again. Last thing I want is to be on another wife’s shit list. I’m barely off Daisy’s.”

He chuckles, resuming his painting. “I don’t think you’ll be off any of their shit lists until you’re off Bella’s.”

I scoff. “I don’t even know what I did to get onthatlist.”

I say I don’t know. What I really mean is I don’t know what I didthis time.There is likely a long list of reasons why I deserve to be on her shit list. The first one being Halloween night eight years ago but I’m not about to admit that to anyone.

I’ve done a handful of things in my twenty-six years of life that I regret but the events of the morning afterthatnight will always be the biggest one.

“Have you seen her lately?” Grayson asks, the quiet concern in his tone snapping me back into reality.

I shake my head, lining up another nail with the wooden changing table I’ve been tasked with assembling. “Nah. She avoids me these days.”

I might not know why I’m on her shit list, but I know whyshe avoids me. It has nothing to do with anything I’ve done and everything to do with the asshole she’s been dating for the last two years.