Tate looked up at Piper to see her grinning at him, “I’m a horrible lightweight. I can’t handle alcohol well.”

Tate chuckled, “I see that.”

“Its cause she’s a hobbit,” Audrey giggled.

“Shut up! You are borderline hobbit too!” Piper spat back before falling back into her chair.

“Ha-ha, whatever, I am a good ole’ 5’5 thank you. You’re what? 4’7?”

“Oh. My. God. Audrey! That is horrible, I am 5’1!”

Audrey turned to Tate, giggling, “She is not.”

“I am too! Now call for my chariot!”

Audrey laughed, “The cab is on its way.”

“Right-o, good sir.”

“Oh Lord, here comes her majesty,” Audrey said, taking a long pull on her beer. Tate watched as Piper sat back sipping on her empty can of beer. “Let’s hope the cab gets here before she goes into full majesty mode. You’ll probably never want to see her again, if she reaches that point.”

“Majesty?” Tate asked.

“Yeah,” Audrey giggled, “we tend to think we are awesome British princesses when we are drunk. It’s quite scary. But really, if I had a British accent, or hell, any kind of accent, I would never shut up!”

Tate laughed, “Why is that?”

“Because accents are hot,” Audrey blurted out. A second later her hands came over her mouth, as if she had said too much.

He didn’t think so.

Tate liked that she thought accents were hot. He had one; anything to make him desirable to her was a plus in his book. Audrey turned her attention to Piper and then they were getting up.

“Is Aiden okay? I need to help her get her things,” Audrey asked.

Tate nodded, “Yeah, he’s asleep.”

“Oh! Okay, I’ll be right back to get him and put him to bed.”

“No hurry,” Tate said. Audrey smiled sweetly down at the two of them before turning back to her friend and helping Piper to the house.

As Tate sat alone with Aiden, sleeping in his arms, he couldn’t help but think of Matilda again. She was only 14 when the wreck happened, when her life was cut so short. But that wasn’t the moment he was thinking off. He could picture her when she was nine, with all her top front teeth gone and two on the bottom also missing grinning up at him after his hockey game. Her eyes were always so bright and full of life. Those were some of his favorite times. Matilda was loving and always cared about everything Tate did. A grin covered Tate’s face and he swore he could still hear her screaming for him when he was in goal. She was his second biggest fan, his first being his parents.

Just as his chest started to ached and his eyes pooled with tears, a cab pulled into the driveway. It didn’t take long before Audrey and Piper were making their way down the steps and towards the cab. Taking in a long steady breath, Tate forced the thoughts of Matilda away. He watched as Audrey put Piper in the cab, reassuring her that she would bring her back to get her car tomorrow after the party. It was then that Tate remembered he had Shelli Adler’s first birthday party tomorrow. He couldn’t wait.

Not.

The only upside to the little girly party was knowing that Aiden and Audrey would be there. Tate watched as Audrey made her way towards him, the cab pulling away just as she reached them. She clapped her hands together and looked down at Aiden, a loving smile on her face.

“Well, this has been fantastic, and it looks like it wore my little Punkin out. Can you hand him to me please?” she asked, her hands stretched out in front of her.

Tate shook his head, standing up quickly and efficiently as if he wasn’t holding a 60 pound child. “I’ll carry him in for you.”

Audrey paused for a moment, and then nodded, leading the way into her house. Tate followed behind her, his eyes drifting to the sway of her spectacular backside. He loved her curves, they drove him mad, but what he really liked was the curve of her ass. It was easy to say that those jeans were probably the luckiest things on earth. Tate would do anything to get the chance to hold onto Audrey’s ass again.

Anything.

Inwardly groaning, Tate followed Audrey up the stairs. He glanced over at the pictures on the wall, and smiled at the ones of her when she was a child. Audrey had been a beautiful child. She was still beautiful. Hell, the whole Parker family was beautiful. A picture of her and Lucas reminded Tate of his best friend. It had been a long week without him at practice. It was funny how much Tate missed his cocky humor and his mean words towards their teammates. Lucas was an ass, but Tate loved him just the same.

Once upstairs, Tate followed her into a room to the left of the stairs. When Audrey opened the door, she glanced back at him.

“This is the closet we are redoing. It still has a bed for Aiden, but it will be moved out once Lucas gets back and finishes.”

“Okay,” Tate said with a nod.

Audrey then pushed the door opened and Tate went into the bare room that was the length of the whole condo. Everyone wasn’t joking when they said Audrey had a lot of shoes. They were everywhere. Tate had never seen anything like it. Since he noticed she was embarrassed by the number of shoes she had, without commenting Tate entered and headed for the bed. After laying Aiden down and Audrey tucking him in, the two left the room.

Audrey shut the door and then leaned against it, glancing up at Tate.

“Thanks for bringing him in.”

Tate shrugged his shoulders, “No big deal.”