Free Complete Harmony by Julia Kent Page A

Josie continued as Laura pulled the phone away from her ear and hissed at him. “Did you see the baby around any insects?”
    Just as he was about to craft the smoothest, best PR-spun answer ever, he heard a baby wail in the background of Laura’s phone. Laura listened for a second. “And she’s warm, too? Insects don’t give babies fevers, do they? Could she have picked up some G od-awful disease from eating”—GLARE—“something as disgusting as a bug? How big was the bug? Oh my God, what if she ate a cockroach!”
    Laura descended into hysterics as Mike calmly pried her fingers off the phone and said to Josie, “She’ll be there in five minutes.” He ended the call and slowly, deliberately pressed the Jeep’s keys into Laura’s hand.  
    “Go,” he ordered. Dylan had to admire his chillness. Not cold. Just in control and considerate.
    “But…” Laura’s eyes were wild and a bit crazy. She looked at the wine, the swing, which now looked like a limp dick in Dylan’s eyes (joining his own), and the bed, made neatly and begging for action.
    “But nothing. You won’t enjoy a single moment if you aren’t with our sick baby. Dylan and I just need to unload the fridge so the food won’t spoil. We have backpacks. It’ll do us good to hike home. It’s not even two miles.”
    Internally, Dylan groaned, but he said nothing. He was already in the doghouse for letting the baby eat an insect (or…maybe she only ate that wing…).
    “I—” he blurted, guilty conscience kicking in. Apparently, he had one. “She found an old teething biscuit this morning and there was this insect wing…”
    Mike rolled his eyes and crossed his arms, now joining Laura’s glare. “And you didn’t say anything?” You would think that years of living with Mi k e would give him some indication of what the guy thought, but no. He was either roy a lly pissed and ready to rip him apart, or barely keeping it together to not laugh.
    Dy l an could have flipped a coin.
    “ I don’t even know what to say!” Laura screeched as she zipped out the door and slammed it behind her. He’d never seen her run as fast as she did to the Jeep, spewing snow-covered gravel as the tires spun over ice patches until they caught and she drove off.  
    Mike winced at the grinding sound his poor engine made.
    “Smooth. Really smooth,” he said, pouring another glass of wine. Dylan watched with growing amusement as Mike downed another half a glass.
    “ You working on your frat-boy skills? Is beer pong next?” he asked.  
    Mike smiled wistfully over the top of his wine glass, then downed the rest, carefully swirling the stem between his thumb and index finger.
    “No. Just…relaxing.”
    “ L et our baby eat a bug and you’re sucking down wine like it’s coffee. What the fuck has happened to us?” Dylan plopped down on the bed and stared at the ceiling, the swing in his peripheral vision, taunting him.
    “We’re parents.”
    “We’re boring.”
    “You tried. Thank you. This was a great idea.” Mike handed Dylan his glass of wine, and Dylan figured when in Rome, do what Thor does.
    And drink the fucking wine.
    “ Cockblocked by an insect.” Dylan sighed.  
    “That’s a first,” Mike said, nodding. “And your lo b ster tails are in the fridge now.”
    Fuck! He’d forgotten about that. “You seriously want to stuff them in a backpack and hike home?”
    “No. Let’s just boil them up and eat them. We can get more some other time. Laura’s not coming back.” Mike’s words stung.
    His plan was a failure.
    Chugging the rest of his glass, he eye d the final third of the bottle. “We could steam the lobsters in water and wine and have the meat with some butter. Bring the steaks home.”
    “Deal.”
    And while the rest of the afternoon did not involve sex whatsoever, it turned out to meet one of Dylan’s needs.
    Time to just be .

Laura
    The day after the Great Insect Ingestion Disaster of 2014, as it would forever be known,