Total pages in book: 70
Estimated words: 68598 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 343(@200wpm)___ 274(@250wpm)___ 229(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 68598 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 343(@200wpm)___ 274(@250wpm)___ 229(@300wpm)
I lifted one hand, caught her around the waist, and twisted her until she was front to front to me. Only when her eyes came up to catch mine did I say, “And when it comes to your kid, you always put her first. I’m never to come anything but last when it comes to a choice between us. Do you understand?”
She swallowed. “Yeah.”
Watching her lip quiver made me want to kiss it.
“What are we doing here, Kobe?” She asked. “What…I mean…how? What do we do from here?”
We hadn’t said any words. We hadn’t made any promises. We hadn’t done a whole lot but confess to a few things.
Yet, that was enough. It was all I needed for now.
“We find whoever is going to take the hit that’s out on you,” I said. “We take your girl to the store. We then get rid of Farrell and Lisbeth through the eyes of the law. Then we figure out where to go from there. Whether that’s bringing you back to Accident or me joining a fuckin’ circus. Wherever you want to go, I’ll follow.”
She snickered at that. “You’ll join a circus for me?”
“I’d go beg my dad to remember I was alive for you,” I told her.
She may not know the significance of that statement, but I meant it with everything that I had in me.
If she’d told me the only way that we would move on to more was for me to make amends with my father, I’d bite the bullet and give her whatever she wanted.
“I feel like there’s a story there,” she said.
But before I could explain it to her, the significance, JP was back with a ball cap on her head, her backpack slung over her shoulder, and her shoes flapping around because she’d left them untied.
“Mother,” JP narrowed her eyes. “What are you wearing?”
Folsom looked down at her attire. “I’m going to change.”
“Then do it,” JP rolled her eyes. “How are those cookies coming?”
They were currently two minutes away from being finished.
“They’re almost done,” I pushed away from Folsom. “How about we let your mother get dressed, we clean the kitchen, and then eat some cookies while we wait for her?”
“If you don’t hurry,” JP gave Folsom a calculating once-over, “I won’t save any for you.”
Folsom snorted. “You may not, but I have a distinct feeling that Kobe would do just about anything for me.”
Folsom left, leaving me with her mini-me again.
“I’d save her all the cookies to see that smile on her face again,” JP said, words coming out of her mouth that definitely didn’t live up to her age. “I knew you were something special from the moment that she told me to run to you.”
With that, she shouldered me aside, then started to wash the dishes.
She did a shit job at it, and I had to wash more than one behind her, but she didn’t complain about “menial labor.” Not like my sister would’ve at her age.
The more I spent time with the two of them, the more I realized that my sister must’ve just been special, and not in a good way. In an “I hate my life with you in it” kind of way.
See, if this had been Myen, my sister would’ve been complaining by the first dish. Hell, I honestly didn’t even think that she would grace the sink with her presence. Eat off the dishes? Sure. Cook? No. Pick out the best dishes she could find? Of course. Wash those dishes? Big hell no.
But Folsom, she raised a good kid.
Though JP spouted off information to me over the next twenty minutes that most people wouldn’t know in their lifetime, I enjoyed every freakin’ second of it.
Which was totally weird.
Right?
CHAPTER 14
You complete me(ss).
-Text from Kobe to Folsom
FOLSOM
“What do you think I should do?” I asked. “I haven’t found her yet, but I know that she’s there.”
Kobe threw his cut over his shoulder.
He glanced around the bus, then gestured outside.
I followed him out, then paused next to my car.
He was standing next to the driver’s side door, holding his hand out expectantly.
I grumbled something under my breath but tossed him the keys anyway.
“I don’t think I’ve ever sat over here,” I admitted as I got into the cozy passenger seat.
He looked over at me as he pressed the push button to start it.
“I wouldn’t imagine you would,” he said as he watched as JP came out of the bus, locked it, then started pressing buttons on her phone. “What is she doing?”
“Setting the alarm,” I answered. “We have a routine. We go into the bus, we set the alarm. We leave the bus, we set the alarm. That way, we know that no one is in there waiting for us.”
She dallied so long that he felt safe in asking his next question. “How much does she know about the situation that y’all are in?”