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She jerks, glares at me.

“You got wheels, babe.” I grin at her. “And a wicked right hook.”

“I think you mean that Oakes has a hard head,” she mutters, but her lips have curved up the slightest bit at the edges.

“That too.”

“He’s just lucky his dumb face didn’t ruin my manicure.”

I laugh. “Or my favorite shirt.”

I think there might be the slightest bit of pink on her cheeks and fuck, I want to kiss her again.

But I also don’t want to experience that right hook.

“This,” she says, pulling at the material that absolutely dwarfs her, reminds me how small she is compared to me, and makes me want to murder Oakes all over again, “is your favorite shirt?”

“Yeah, is that a crime?”

“It says Silly Goose on the Loose.”

“Is it wrong?” I ask.

She stops, glares at me. “And which of the two of us is the”—she does air quotes—“Silly Goose?”

I shrug. “I’m not the one who’s wearing the shirt.”

“You’re the one who bought it.”

“No, one of my teammates bought it.”

Clearly, stymied, her nose wrinkles.

“I’m also not the one who dodged three hockey players and a firefighter to score a touchdown.” Her face changes and I can’t read it. “Though I have punched Oakes’s dumb face a time or…well a hundred.”

“It was one touchdown,” she says. “It’s not like I’ve etched my name into the record books.”

“Still.” I tap her nose. “Color us all suitably impressed.”

“Men are dumb.”

“You’re not wrong—at least in this family.” Then, because it’s so damned cute, I tap her nose again and say, “But trust me, baby, your run—and subsequent knockout—were so epic that there’s no way Lex, Beck, or Oakes are ever going to live that shit down. It’s going in the Ambrose Shit-Giving Historical Guide to be brought up at all manner of family gathering—hell, Beck may even use your punch in his wedding speech.”

“Oh God,” she groans. “The wedding. What if Oakes has a black eye?”

I touch her cheek, tug her up to her feet, and push her in front of the sink. “Wash your hands.” I order softly, turning the water on. “If he does, it won’t be the first time one of us has a bruise in important pictures. It’ll be fine.”

Scowling, she keeps washing, squirting soap in her palms, scrubbing at her scrapes. “I don’t know what came over me.”

“I do,” I say, reaching by her and shutting the water off when she finishes.

“You do?”

I nod, snag a hand towel, and dab her hands dry when she’s done, hating that I can already see a bruise forming on her knuckles.

She really does have a killer right hook.

“It’s that Asshole Ambrose energy.”