Mannies Incorporated by Michael, Sean (phonics books .TXT) 📗

this sauce thing… Is there a recipe?" God help him.

"I'll ask." Christian took off, running. "Uncle Slayde! Uncle Slayde, wake up! Is there a reepery for the sauce?"

He heard a muffled. "A what?" Fuck a duck, he hadn't expected Christian to go and wake Slayde. He supposed he was going to get blamed for this, too.

"Uncle Drake needs a reepery."

"Ah…okay. I will make sure he gets one. No problem." The man had a happy laugh.

He gave Slayde an apologetic look when the man came into the kitchen. "I was hoping to let you sleep, man."

Shit, Slayde looked adorable, all sleep tousled.

"Oh, it's cool. Sleep is a precious commodity." He got a wink. "What is a reepery?"

Drake chuckled. "Recipe. Apparently it's pizza night and instead of ordering it or even dumping sauce out of a jar we have a magical recipe to follow."

"Oh. No. I mean, yes, but no." The fridge was opened -- again, everything was labeled and dated -- and a square container of sauce was pulled out. "I make sauce on Sunday, enough for the week."

Seriously?

He scratched his head. "Okay." Jesus. It was like Little House on the Prairie here. "So we sauce it and then let everyone dress theirs how they want?"

"Within reason, yes. Everyone gets a bowl of their ingredients and they can put them on however they'd like."

"Ah… so no jelly bean pizzas then." He winked.

"No. Although we do make dessert pizza sometimes." Slayde chuckled, then turned as Jenny came in.

"Have to potty."

"Okay, baby girl. Let's go. Christian, can you please check on Maggie?"

He watched Slayde walk out. God. Okay, he would admit it. The man worked his ass off. And it was a mighty fine ass, too.

He shook himself. No. He wasn't going there. There was nothing but trouble with weird, flaming, queenie little homemakers. Even if they were sexy.

Drake cleared his throat and told his dick to back the hell off before starting to unwrap the frozen pizza crusts. Did they go into the oven frozen like this?

"Okay, everyone needs to wash their hands. Christian, sausage or pepperoni?"

"Pepper-ponies!"

"Pepperoni it is. Maggie, mushrooms or green peppers?"

"Peppers."

"Rock on." The three crusts were stuck in the oven as is. Bang. Bang. Bang. "Jenny, cheese or no cheese?"

"CHEESE!"

"Excellent choice. Aprons on!"

Oh, God. This was hilarious.

"Can I have everything on mine?"

Slayde nodded, grinned at him. "You can. One day Mindy will be home and we'll be sharing a pepperoni and jalapeno again."

"Oh, jalapeno. Are there other things you didn't mention that can go on it?" He liked a loaded pizza.

"There's olives, onion, Canadian bacon, basil."

"Yes, please." That all sounded good.

Pepperoni and peppers and cheese were put in bowls, the kids aproned up and waiting.

It was cute as hell. "Maggie, do you think you could help me with mine?" He was going to win her over. He was.

Maggie stared at him with those big, distrustful eyes.

"I have a lot of stuff to put on mine…" He gave her his best puppy dog eyes.

She looked at Slayde, who nodded, smiled. "That would be very nice, to help."

Christian looked at his sister. "Don't be a baby. He's nice. He can eat an elephant."

Drake burst out laughing at Christian.

"No elphans on pizza." Oh, she was so serious.

"No, honey. There isn't. But I need help putting on what needs to go on. Maybe when you've finished yours?"

She looked to Slayde again, who nodded again. "'kay."

Drake beamed. "Excellent!"

"I could help, too." Christian was pouting.

"You all can."

"Not the baby." Christian frowned. "She's messy."

"I don't mind messy. It's all going to the same place, right?" He totally wasn't a picky eater. At all.

"Not the baby."

"Jenny can help me. We're sharing anyway." Slayde stared the little boy down, waiting for the nod.

He opened his mouth to reiterate that he didn't mind messy, but Slayde shot him a glare that clearly told him to keep out of it. Drake closed his mouth again and grabbed a couple of pieces of pepperoni, popping them in so he couldn't say anything even if he was tempted.

"Okay, the crusts are almost ready." They came out of the oven, were set aside. "I'll warm up the sauce and we'll start."

"It smells great and I'm starving. How long before we eat?" He grabbed more pepperoni pieces, wagging his eyebrows at Christian and he stuffed them into his mouth.

"Uncle Slayde! Uncle Drake ate some!"

"Should I put him in time out?" Slayde asked.

"Yes!" The little boy clapped. Traitor.

He shook his head. "I'm too old for time outs. Besides, I'm starving." There had not been enough food at lunch, and a cookie and some milk was not enough to tide him over. He should have grabbed some McDonald's while he was out shopping.

Slayde chuckled, put the crusts on the table and put sauce on all of them. "Okay. Top your pizzas."

Drake made a show of watching everyone else work on theirs and then slowly began to put pepperoni and Canadian bacon all over his, he'd let the kids put the rest of it on.

Slayde fluttered around the table like a damn bird, helping and cleaning and shit. Would it really kill them if the counter wasn't cleared the second it was messed up? He was going to see to it the kids got to play in the mud a bit.

Christian put the mushrooms and olives on his pizza for him, while Maggie carefully arranged peppers around the outside.

The pizzas went in the oven, Slayde making three little salads and two bowls of cut-up carrots. It was almost scary, how efficient the man was.

He turned to Christian. "Show me where to find the plates and sh-- stuff."

"The plates are above the dishwasher. Christian's is green, Jenny's is red, Maggie's is blue."

He almost asked if Slayde's was pink, but bit the words back. He sighed and rubbed his face; he was so used to playing the macho stud, it was hard to rein that in. It certainly wasn't needed here; Slayde wasn't going to care who he liked in the sack.

"You okay, man?" Slayde got out a glass