“He’s not a bully!” she said.

Brandon laughed. “I know, but he doesn’t know his own strength. He just bulldozes through a crowd of kids, so it’s better that it’s a crowd of bigger kids than smaller ones.”

“That’s your fault for always wrestling with him. It’s all he ever wants to do, even with my brother and sisters—girls.”

Again Brandon couldn’t help laughing. “Well, we’ll just have to teach him some manners with that. It’s not okay to push girls around, but with boys, it’s fine, even bigger ones.”

Regina sighed, rubbing her swollen belly, then groaned. “I can’t even imagine two of them.”

“Yeah, that’s gonna be fun,” Brandon agreed with an even bigger smile.

Regina’s brother had given up trying for a boy after three girls. Regina mentioned it would’ve been nice if her brother had had a boy and they’d named him after her brother and her dad. So when their son was born, Brandon insisted she name him after her dad. She then insisted if they were doing that his middle name would be after Brandon’s dad. Now that they had another boy on the way, she’d already told him this one would be named Brandon. He’d agreed, though she’d balked at the suggestion that if they ever had a girl she’d be named Princess.

“No way,” she’d said. “Girls are evil. She’d probably have a miserable time in school with all the other jealous girls hating on her just because of her name.”

As much as Brandon had talked shit about families like the Moreno’s who were way too overprotective about the princess in their family, he already knew he was going to be a total hypocrite about it. He made no apologies. How the hell was he supposed to know what it felt like to love someone so much you’d be ready to kill if anyone messed with him? He felt this way about both Regina and Artie already, and he was damned sure it’d be even worse with a little girl.

Now that they were going to have two bulldozing boys, maybe if their third was a girl, he could convince Regina that, with brothers like Artie and little Brandon, no one would pick on their daughter, not even girls. Brandon still had time to work on her.

They got home and started their nightly ritual. Regina finished changing their half-asleep little boy into his jammies, saying she didn’t have the heart to put him in the tub now as sleepy as he was.

“He can take a bath in the morning,” she said. Artie stood a little wobbly, holding on to Regina with one hand and rubbing his eye with his other. “Say goodnight to Daddy.”

“Goodnight, Daddy,” Artie said.

“Goodnight, champ.” Brandon smiled, his heart swelling as it always did when his little boy smiled at him. “I love you.”

“I love you too,” Artie said as he took Regina’s hand and they began to walk away.

Brandon waited to see if his smartass kid would ruin the tender moment like he always did by saying something to take from it. As young as he was, Artie already knew how to make a funny, but Brandon thought he might be too sleepy. Just when Brandon thought he was home free and he’d gotten an “I love you” from his son with no follow-up wisecracks, Artie turned and smiled.

“And Buddy too.”

Brandon jumped from the sofa, making Artie squeal and take off running to his room. He heard Regina groan as he ran past her to catch Artie.

“Brandon!” she whined. “He was almost out for the night. Oh my God, I already have two of them.”

Brandon laughed as he tackled Artie on the floor, shushing him because he was suddenly wide awake. “I think we’re in trouble,” he said as Artie scrambled to his feet.

Just seeing his son’s bright smile as he leaped into the air to make a flying tackle onto him had him smiling big. Artie landed on Brandon’s stomach, nearly knocking the wind out of him, but he still had to laugh. “Good one!” he said with a groan.

Maybe they would be in trouble, but this was totally worth it.