Chapter 39
THIRTY-NINE
STORM
M utinous.
That’s the only way to describe the girl sitting in front of me. Shae’s been gone all day and should be home soon, and I’d hoped she’d be here with me when meeting my cousin for the first time in forever.
Unfortunately, she’s tied up at work, but at least she put that Zane motherfucker in his place. Pride wells in my chest, thinking how powerful my Sweetness is.
“You have no idea who you’re fucking with, asshole,” my cousin hisses, and with her slight UK accent, something from her mother’s side, I’m sure, the words come out like “focking” and “arsehole.”
She shoots glares so lethal in my direction, it’s a wonder how I’m still sitting upright.
Luckily, there’s a broad expanse of polished wood between us, and the nine-person dining room table in the guest house I’ve plopped her in is an effective shield.
“Laura,” I start.
“I told you, it’s Skai. No one calls me Laura.” Her eyes flash again. “Not anymore.”
I tilt my chin down in acknowledgement.
“ Skai , we brought you here to be safe,” I say. “I promise you’ll be free to do what you want as soon as we can get you sorted. You’re not a prisoner here.”
Where the fuck is the medical team?
“You promise ? Fuck promises. I haven’t heard a promise that hasn’t been broken,” she says, her tightly curled red hair trembling around her face.
Laura—Skai—is undeniably Black given her paternity, but it’s also clear she’s mixed.
Her mother was Irish or Scottish, so I guess Skai got her hair and eye color from that side of her parentage.
Skai’s so fair she could barely pass as kin, but she has some Sandoval features to connect us despite her having freckles like Little Orphan Annie.
“You think you’re so big and bad, but you don’t know what you’re doing fucking with me,” she says, and I have to bite back a laugh. She’s young, and the profanity she lobs at me makes me think of one of the Alvin and the Chipmunks cursing me out.
It’s cute and funny, but I know if I let her know that, she’s liable to kick me in the balls.
“Skai, why are you so upset? Can you explain it to me?” I try to look at her as if she were my daughter, if Tempest were in front of me, not giving me a hard time, but having a hard time.
She curls her lip and folds her arms as she looks down at me.
“You think Lakeland was dangerous, but with what I know about him, you’re off track, mate,” she says, and I note she doesn’t call Lakeland “Dad.”
I lean back in the chair.
I’m supposed to be helping her, but with the way her face flushes down to her camisole-covered chest, I’m unsure about everything.
“All I want is to be let go and left the fuck alone,” she says, and for the first time, I see an edge of…not softness, and not quite vulnerability.
More like exhaustion.
“Skai,” I say softly, putting my palms flat on the table and moving slowly, almost like one would face a scared tiger. “I swear it on my children’s lives, I have no intention of hurting you. I know promises mean shit to you, but what means a lot to me is family.”
She looks at me for a long moment, her face morphing from one emotion to the next, when with the snap of a finger, her expression clears.
Completely blanks.
And then, she smiles and licks her lips. I rear my head back. What the fuck is happening here?
“How will I ever thank you, Storm?” she says, her voice low and gravelly. Leaning forward, she rests her breasts on the tabletop, causing the flesh to start to spill from her thin-strapped shirt.
“No ‘thank yous’ are necessary, especially with all things considered,” I say, looking away from my little cousin.
“Hmm,” she says, slipping into this very uncomfortable, clunky version of a femme fatale. “Well, if you change your mind, I’d love to show you my gratitude, Daddy.”
Oh, that’s fucking gross.
I shoot to my feet, thoroughly skeeved out.
“Okay!” I shout, turning away from her and looking out into the hallway.
“There are gonna be a few nurses staying with you here, and the doctor will be by every day, for the next little while, at least. Axel will be your main way of contacting me.” Suddenly, her contacting me feels like a really bad idea. “Or my…or my wife, Shae.”
There. Boundaries.
I look back at her after motioning for Axel to come here from his position down the hall.
Her face falls.
“You’re married?” she asks, her voice small.
“Yup,” I reply, popping the “p.”
She looks at me again with that flat expression and her head tilted.
“Is it serious?”
What. The. Actual. Fuck.
“Yes,” I emphasize. “Quite.”
She hums again and says, “That’s too bad.”
In-fucking-deed.
I almost shout with joy when I hear Axel come in with a group of people, most likely the medical team, who are creating a custom outpatient mental health program for Skai.
It felt…kinder to have her be in a home setting where she can be free to exist quietly and in peace, rather than in a sterile hospital.
The doctors—a psychiatrist and a psychologist—enter the room. I pull Axel aside while they introduce themselves to Skai.
“‘Sup, chief?” Axel says, rocking on the balls of his feet with a sour straw hanging from the side of his mouth.
“Axel, since this is your grand idea, I need you here with Skai,” I say, giving him a hard look. He rolls his eyes.
“She’s just a kid. Why are you so scared of her?” he murmurs, turning so his back is to my cousin.
“Oh yeah? You real fuckin’ sure about her being ‘just a kid?’” I ask, and Axel lifts an eyebrow, giving me a confused look.
“Whatever, man,” he says with a shrug. Just then, Skai rises to walk across the room with a nurse.
Axel stops her and says, “Hey, I’m Axel. You like playing video games?”
Skai smiles again, but instead of answering him like a normal fucking person, she takes a small step closer to him.
“I love playing games, Axel,” she murmurs.
Aaaaaaand , I’m out.
I look past the two of them to see if a nurse or a doctor or any-fucking-body just heard what my sixteen-year-old cousin just said to this grown man. Apparently not.
“Yeeeeeah,” Axel draws out, clearly freaked the fuck out, too. “I’ll send over a console and a few games you might like to play.”
I leave him to handle that shit on his own. Truth is, Skai would never be on my property if Axel hadn’t pitched such a bitch fit. This is his circus to manage until she gets stable and can go off on her own.
I leave the room and head to the other side of the house, where the twins are in their playroom. I watch them from the door for several minutes. Raiden and Tempest sit on matching cushions, both playing a game with gorillas wearing party hats.
“You gotta jump, Rai!” Tempest says, damn near growling.
“Help me! I don’t know how!” he shouts back.
“Ugh! R2 and up, dummy!”
“Hey! I’m not a dummy, dummy!”
Raiden pushes Tempest at that, and before they can get into a real tussle, I step into the room.
“All right, you two. No fighting,” I say.
“He started it!”
“She started it!”
They say at the same time.
I hum, giving them a thoughtful look. Tempest huffs and turns to her brother.
“Sorry, Rai,” she mutters, and I suppress a chuckle at her orneriness.
“Okay,” he says back, folding his arms. Tempest throws her arms out.
“You aren’t gonna say sorry back?” she screeches, then turns to me. “Dad! Make him say sorry!” I freeze like my name is motherfuckin’ Bambi at how easily she calls me “Dad.”
Clearing my throat, I collect myself and say, “Rai, you called your sister a bad name, so you should apologize, too.”
Raiden quickly turns to his sister.
“Sorry,” he grinds out. I guess that’ll do.
“Guess what?” I ask.
“What?” they say at the same time. I lean down to get to their level.
“We’ve got tacos for dinner.”
After looking at each other, they shout, “Yay!” and rush off toward the eat-in kitchen.
I pull my phone out when it chirps, smiling when I see the message is from Shae.
The smile immediately turns into a scowl.
I don’t think I’ll be in until well after midnight. Sorry.
I glance at the time, noting it’s seven-thirty, and my expression deepens. My finger pauses over the keyboard.
I could follow my first mind, which currently screams at me to tell her to get her ass home immediately for several competing reasons—the top two being because I miss looking at her and because she’s been working all day. I stop myself, though.
What would the evolved Storm do?
Do your thing, Sweetness. I’ll wait up for you.
There. Evolved. Understanding. Non-caveman.
I’m so proud of you. I love you.
I go to the kitchen and move through setting up and eating tacos with my kids. I try not to panic at the fact that Shae doesn’t text me again.