Total pages in book: 126
Estimated words: 122206 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 611(@200wpm)___ 489(@250wpm)___ 407(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 122206 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 611(@200wpm)___ 489(@250wpm)___ 407(@300wpm)
I hadn’t had a chance to pop over and introduce myself. I had been busy with my nephews once I got home from work, so it slipped my mind. However, at that very moment, my foot tapped against the floor, itching for the chance to walk across the hallway and say hello by shoving my foot up the bloke’s arse. I had no idea what he was doing, but so much noise was coming from the place that it woke Jax, which then woke me. The apartments in the building were made with thick concrete walls that were heavily insulated, so sound didn’t travel easily, if at all. Whatever the guy was doing, he was doing it loud.
The one night when I didn’t need loud, I got it.
“Unc!”
“Jax, be quiet.”
“Locke!”
I shushed him. “Locke is sleepin’, so don’t wake him up.”
“My baby!”
I smiled. “Yeah, your baby is sleepin’, so shut it.”
Jax bobbed his head as though he understood me, but he didn’t because he was still being loud.
“Jax,” I hissed. “Shush.”
“No,” he replied and started to sing — well, he tried to sing the Barney theme song but failed miserably.
“You’re such a little shite.”
“Shite!”
I widened my eyes. “Don’t say that!”
“Shite!”
“Jax. No.”
“Shite.”
I facepalmed myself. “For fuck’s sake.”
“Fuck’s sake.”
I sucked in a terrifying breath and dropped my arm to my side.
“No,” I almost cried. “No. Bad Jax. Don’t say that. Your ma will skin me alive!”
“Shite!” Jax shouted merrily. “Fuck’s sake.”
“Ah, bollocks.”
“Bollocks!”
I was going to cry.
“No,” I pleaded, my voice cracking like a kid whose balls had just dropped. “They’re very bad words.”
“Bollocks. Shite. Fuck’s sake.”
I was going to be dead by morning.
“Jax,” I whispered. “No.”
He grinned at me, and it was a silent ‘fuck you’ if I’d ever seen one.
“Just … Just say Uncle Harley taught ye those words. Okay? Uncle. Harley.”
“Harley.” Jax nodded. “Unc.”
“Sure.” I rolled my eyes. “Ye say his name correctly.”
He smiled a big toothy smile.
“You’re not playin’ me, kid.” I glared at him. “It won’t work. Cute smiles don’t get ye out of trouble with me, sunshine.”
Jax lost his smile and narrowed his grey eyes, and it caused a grin to spread across my face. “I’ve got your number, buddy.”
He huffed.
“Ye babble your words and blow spit bubbles any other day of the week, but when it comes to sayin’ curses, you’re suddenly a linguistic genius at the age of eighteen months. Is that it?”
He yawned in response, and fireworks went off in my mind at the prospect of getting him back to sleep. I was just about to pick him up and give him some ‘big boy cuddles’ when the racket that woke us started up again. Jax looked at the door of my sitting room and whimpered.
“Fuck this,” I grumbled to myself. “Fuck fuckin’ this.”
I was going to confront whoever was making that noise, then put my foot up the son of bitch’s arse.
“You.” I crooked my finger at my nephew. “C’mere to me.”
Jax clutched his rattler and waddled over to me without argument, which was surprising. The kid liked to give me a hard time whenever he could, but not now, and I suspected it was because he was more than a little tired. That was bad news for the motherfucker who woke us up because I wasn’t letting him get away with it.
Not. A. Fucking. Chance.
I stormed out of my apartment. When I heard more god-awful banging coming from the apartment directly across from mine, my eyes narrowed to slits. I had one arm wrapped around Jax’s behind and thighs while he smacked on my shoulder like he was playing the drums. I ignored the boy and rapped my knuckles on the apartment door across from my own.
I. Was. Pissed.
This new neighbour wasn’t going to gain friendships if he didn’t learn to keep it down. I enjoyed a party as much as the next man, but fuck, it was four in the morning, and I had two kids under the age of two spending the night.
“Open the fuck up, man!” I pounded my fist on the door once more. “I’m gonna kick your arse for wakin’—”
The door I was banging on suddenly opened, and instead of a man opening the door, a short woman did. She had thick, black-framed glasses slipping down the bridge of her button nose and a mop of black hair tied up on her head in a bun that resembled a bird’s nest. She was wearing an old, off-coloured white T-shirt that was easily three or four sizes too big and fell to her mid-thigh. Her thighs were bare and as thick as they were creamy. I looked up from her legs and focused on the green eyes behind the frames hiding them. I noticed they were bloodshot and puffy, and my offensive stance instantly became defensive.
She was crying, and an unknown urge to hurt whatever made her cry filled me.