he knew what everyone wanted, so when Sydney passed by the table again, he was able to place their order.
Charlotte and Hanna returned first, and Josh was settling his youngest niece into the booster seat again when Tristyn’s sister Jordyn came over. Jordyn was married to Marco Palermo, whose grandparents had started serving pasta in the original downtown location of Valentino’s almost fifty years earlier. Recently, Marco had spearheaded the expansion of their business with Valentino’s II. He and his wife had also recently expanded their family with the addition of twin boys, who were now about nine months old.
“Gemma told me that Josh Slater had come in with four gorgeous females, which I thought was a little excessive—even for you.” Jordyn winked at him before turning her focus to the girls.
“These are my nieces Charlotte and Hanna,” he told her. “Emily must still be in the bathroom.”
“She stuck her hands up under the faucet and sprayed water all over her shirt,” Charlotte explained. “Tristyn’s drying it off under the hand dryer.”
Jordyn’s brows lifted as she turned back to Josh. “My sister Tristyn?”
“She’s the only Tristyn I know,” he acknowledged.
“She was supposed to have a date with Rafe tonight.” Then she shook her head. “Apparently her plans changed.”
“That might be my fault,” he acknowledged. “She saw that I was overwhelmed by the prospect of cooking another meal for three fussy kids and obviously took pity on me.”
“We’re not fussy,” Charlotte interjected. “We just like what we like and don’t like what we don’t.”
“Which is exactly what their mother used to say when she refused to eat what was put on the table,” he acknowledged.
“How long have you been staying with Uncle Josh?” Jordyn asked Charlotte.
“We got here yesterday, and we’re supposed to stay for the whole summer,” she said, her glum tone clearly indicating her displeasure.
Josh wasn’t overjoyed, either, but he couldn’t see a way out of the situation for any of them. “My sister’s in Spain on business for the next eight to ten weeks.”
“The whole summer with Uncle Josh,” Jordyn mused. “That should be...interesting.”
“For all of us, I’m sure,” he remarked drily.
But Charlotte was shaking her head. “He doesn’t have any cool stuff and I had to sleep with Emily.”
“In my bed,” he pointed out. “While I slept on the sofa.”
Jordyn chuckled softly. “Oh, yes, it will be an interesting summer.”
“How are Henry and Liam?” he asked.
“If I had my phone handy, I’d bore you with a thousand pictures,” she said, her deep green eyes—so similar to her sister’s—suddenly going soft and dreamy. “They are the lights of my life.”
“Along with your darling and devoted husband,” Marco said from behind her.
Jordyn grinned as she glanced over her shoulder. “Along with my darling and devoted husband,” she dutifully intoned.
The aforementioned spouse slid an arm across her shoulders. “You said you wanted to have a quick word with Gemma while I went to the kitchen to grab a tray of lasagna for the potluck tomorrow, and when I came out of the kitchen, you were gone.”
“Gemma told me that Josh was here, so I came over to say hi. And now I’ve met his nieces Charlotte and Hanna—and this must be Emily,” she said, as his third niece and Tristyn made their way back to the table.
“And now we really have to go,” Marco urged. “We’ve already been away longer than we planned and your mom has a ton of things to do before the picnic tomorrow, none of which she is getting done with Henry and Liam underfoot.”
“You’re right, we have to go,” she agreed. But she gave her sister a quick hug before she turned to Josh again. “Are you taking the girls to the parade tomorrow?”
“I hadn’t really thought about it,” he admitted. But if he had, he would have answered with a resounding no. He’d barely been able to keep track of them in an electronics store; he didn’t want to imagine the nightmare of trying to keep them together in the midst of the crowds that gathered to celebrate the Fourth of July.
“What parade?” Charlotte asked.
“The Independence Parade is part of Charisma’s ‘Food, Fun & Fireworks’ celebration,” Jordyn explained.
“I wanna see the fireworks,” Charlotte told Josh.
“I wanna see the fun,” Emily chimed in.
“I wanna see some food,” Tristyn interjected. “Tonight. I’m starving.”
“I starvin’, too,” Hanna said, clearly not wanting to be left out of the conversation.
“And Sydney’s on her way with your food right now,” Marco said, gently nudging his wife away from the table.
“See you at the park tomorrow,” Jordyn called back over her shoulder, though Josh wasn’t sure if she was talking to him or—more likely—her sister.
* * *
Charlotte polished off her chicken fingers and ate most of the fries on her plate; Emily ate two slices of the individual cheese pizza she’d wanted; and Hanna ate one slice of her pepperoni pizza—but only after picking off all the pepperoni—and half of Tristyn’s garlic bread. Josh offered her some of the spaghetti that came with his chicken parmesan, which was what she’d originally wanted, but she wrinkled her nose and shook her head.
He was waiting for the check when Tristyn noticed that Hanna had fallen asleep at the table.
“Because she didn’t have her nap at two o’clock,” Charlotte said matter-of-factly. “And now she’s going to be awake until midnight.”
“How was I supposed to know that she should have a nap at two o’clock?” he wondered.
“It’s in the book,” his eldest niece informed him.
“And when did I have time to read the book?” he asked.
Charlotte just shrugged.
“The book?” Tristyn said.
“Is actually a binder,” he told her. “Filled with about four hundred pages of instructions from my sister on what her daughters like and don’t like, dosages for medications, if required, and apparently nap times.”
“Only Hanna has a nap,” Charlotte said. “Emily and me are too big for naps.”
He looked at his youngest niece, her head flopped back against the chair. “What do you think the odds are of me getting her home and into bed without waking her up?” he asked Tristyn.
