Total pages in book: 55
Estimated words: 55769 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 279(@200wpm)___ 223(@250wpm)___ 186(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 55769 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 279(@200wpm)___ 223(@250wpm)___ 186(@300wpm)
“Then I like it,” he only slightly lied.
“Good,” she whispered.
“How’d you do that and get your hair done today?”
“Stevie and Duke came over to help.”
“Ah.”
“And it’s a small room.”
“Right.”
“She’ll take him back.”
Now she’d lost him.
“What?”
“Lavonne. She’ll take Bear back. She always does.”
“Not my problem, not yours. Unless you’re in the line of fire when she’s waving around a revolver.”
“There’s nothing fun about watching people fight, but I’ll admit, that made it a whole lot less fun.”
Considering Jet had been in that room, and it had concerned her enough to call him, Eddie started to get pissed.
Jet covered his hand at her neck and said gently, “It’s over.”
His voice was inflexible when he said, “That was far from cool.”
“Agreed, but I noticed you didn’t give it back to her when we left, so it won’t happen again.”
No, he didn’t. And he wouldn’t. You didn’t use a firearm to put strength behind a threat when you were bickering with your spouse. You used it for protection. The end.
But he wasn’t going to discuss that with Jet.
“It was sweet, when Tex saw Mom was over it and he waded in.”
“You need to prepare, mi amor, he’s in deep for her.”
He said it even knowing he didn’t have to. Jet adored Tex. In the short time the man had been in her life, he’d been a better father to her, and a better partner to Nancy, than Ray had in her twenty-eight years.
But the stillness he felt in her was not about what he said.
It was about what he hadn’t yet said.
She loved him, he knew it, she showed it with peanut butter and chocolate sauce sundaes, and a fuckuva lot more.
She’d also told him.
He hadn’t told her.
He felt the same. It was there. He knew it when he saw the empty space where her bag used to be when she tried to break up with him after her ordeal.
But before he gave it to her, he needed them to have more than a couple of weeks under their belts.
They had that now.
She had to know.
He had a purple bathroom, and he didn’t throw a shit fit.
He came home from work only to have to haul his ass to Lakewood to extricate her from a situation that involved a .44.
But he wasn’t going to tell her. Not now.
She wouldn’t believe him.
Ray seemed to be turning his life around, but he’d been a shit dad and a shit husband who’d left his woman and daughters with serious baggage.
Eddie had more work to do to show her, and he was down to put in that work, as long as it took.
And when the time was right, she’d have the words.
“I know,” she replied belatedly about what he said about Tex, maybe waiting for Eddie to say what he hoped they both knew. Maybe not.
But since it wasn’t time, he moved them past it.
He touched his mouth to hers then asked, “Ready to go to sleep?”
He watched her nod on the pillow.
He grinned, saw her eyes drop to where he knew his dimple was, and they warmed. The love blasted out of them, and Eddie decided it wasn’t time to sleep.
Not yet.
Later.
They had more business to see to.
But this time, it wasn’t about the fact he had ice cream to work off.
“Oh my God, stop doing this!” Jet cried as he hauled her out of bed the next morning.
“You like our showers,” he reminded her as, hands to her hip with her in front of him, he guided their way to the bathroom. “Why you always bitch about it, I have no clue.”
She turned in his hold and stood firm, so he “had to” bump into her. He then took the opportunity to stay close.
“Do they have to happen at five thirty in the morning?” she demanded.
“Yes.”
She heaved a huge sigh that was cute, and which had the added benefit of pushing her tits against his chest.
After he enjoyed that, he whipped her around, replaced his hands on her hips and took her to their purple bathroom.
Jet was at his side. She had heels to her chair, thighs to her chest, the chair angled away from the table and facing him sitting at its head, and she was munching toast and staring at him.
Eddie swallowed the eggs she’d made him and advised, “Chiquita, give it up. We’re gonna fool around every morning in the shower until I croak at age eighty-nine.”
Her lips parted, her eyes went huge, but she said nothing.
Show her.
Right, so that wasn’t showing as much as telling.
Though, the shower was definitely showing.
When he didn’t follow that up, she threw her toast on the plate, swiped her hands above it to get rid of the crumbs, then refocused on him.
“Eddie, I’m all right.”
He smiled at her. “Know that, cariño. You’re vocal.”
She rolled her eyes and said, “I know this is hard, given the certain appendage you have that makes it always on your mind, but I’m not talking about sex.”