He and my new stepmom traded places, and Faye hesitated for a moment as she searched my face. Her reluctance was understandable since I’d struggled with my dad’s remarriage and hadn’t really embraced it until their wedding day.

“Come here,” I said to her with a welcoming grin and my arms open.

“I’m so happy for you two,” Faye said as she eagerly accepted the hug.

Cash had his back to us, seated across from our dad and Faye, and once the older newlyweds were out of his way, he stood and hugged Chloe.

“Welcome to the family officially,” he said. He’d given me congrats and skepticism yesterday at work and nodded at me now, saying, “Holden.”

Next to Cash was his new BFF, Zane, Hayden’s husband. When Hayden had broken her pregnancy news to my brothers and me over a year ago, Cash had put on his badass brother act for all of about five minutes. Then he’d learned Zane was fresh out of the Navy, and the two had bonded over their military ties.

“Congratulations, you two,” Zane said.

“Thanks. It’s good to see you again,” Chloe said. She’d met Zane for the first time at my dad’s wedding.

“Who is that?” Hayden asked in the baby voice she used for her beloved son. She sat at the end, on the other side of an empty high chair. Harrison, world’s cutest baby, was bouncing on her leg until she hugged him to her and stood. “Do you see Uncle Holden?”

My favorite chubster of all time peered up at me with the corner of a slobbered-up soft purple block in his mouth, unsure blue eyes, and a serious expression on his rosy apple-cheeked face.

I made my eyes go big, smile go exaggerated, and then I leaned in slowly toward him and said, “Hairrrrry baby!”

Hayden pretended to hate my play on hairy and Harry, but then she’d started calling him Harry as well, despite insisting his name was Harrison—and only Harrison—when he’d been born.

It was my destiny to be the kid’s favorite uncle, and little Harrison finally gave me what I was working for—a big, toothless grin and a near hit of my nose with the purple block. I held my hands out and took the boy from my sister.

“Chloe,” Hayden said as she hugged my wife. “I can’t tell you how thankful I am to have another female in the family. With you and Faye, we’ve almost caught up.”

“Until you count the North side of the family,” Seth said from his spot next to my dad. He’d also congratulated me and tossed me plenty of good-natured shit yesterday at Henry’s.