Chapter 9 – Knox
nine
Knox
The doorbell’s chime has me blinking my eyes open, blurriness hitting right away so I blink my eyes again.
This time the bell rings one after another, and I jump out of bed at the same time my phone buzzes on my bedside table, and I see it’s Josephine.
“Fuck.” I grab a pair of shorts that are on the bench at the end of the bed.
I run down the steps, the doorbell ringing again.
“Coming!” I shout and run to the door and open it.
“Hey.” The kids are all there looking up at me.
“Sorry I—” I shake my head. “Come in.” I move to the side so they can enter.
“Hey, buddy,” I say to Vincent as he comes in and kicks off his sneakers before walking into the house, not once turning back to look at his mother.
“Hey,” I remind him, “say goodbye.” I motion with my head.
“Bye,” he says, holding up his hand.
“Vincent,” I say his name in a warning, and he walks over and goes out in his socks.
“Bye, Mom,” he says, going over to her on the last step and side hugging her, and I know he’s only doing this because I told him. He walks past me again, not saying a word.
“Bye, Mom.” Westley goes over to her after witnessing what Vincent just went through, and probably not wanting to deal with it. “Call you later.” He steps in. “I’m hungry.”
I raise my eyebrows, like what else is fucking new? “When aren’t you hungry?” I ask him and he smirks, kicking off his shoes to the side to join his brother’s but one goes all the way to the stairs. He, of course, does nothing about it as he rushes to the kitchen.
“Bye, Mommy,” Nora says, getting on her tippy toes to hug her. Josephine goes down and gives her a hug.
“I’m going to miss you,” she says before kissing her head and watching her walk up the stairs.
“Daddy,” she chirps, her voice filled with so much joy as she jumps up knowing I’m going to catch her. She wraps her legs around my waist and puts her hands on my shoulders, staring straight into my eyes, like she needs to have a serious talk with me. “I’m hungry.”
“Did you guys not eat this morning?” I ask her then look over at Josephine.
“Of course they ate.” She folds her arms over her chest. “But it’s almost noon.”
“Shit,” I say, dislodging her from me. “Go get a snack. I’ll come and make lunch in a second.” She takes off her backpack and tosses it at the foot of the stairs before skipping into the house.
“You look like shit,” Josephine states, and I turn my head to look at my soon-to-be ex-wife.
“That’s the look I’m going for.”
“You were two hours late.” Her eyes go into slits, and I have to hold onto the door.
“I’m really sorry, I don’t know what happened,” I tell her. “Thank you for bringing them over.”
“We are going to have to discuss—” The minute she starts with that, I put my head back and groan out loudly.
“Jo,” I use the nickname she hates, “it’s one time I overslept.”
“Not about that.” I cross my ankles. “Should I come in and talk?”
“This is a Josephine-free zone,” I inform her, “so no.” She has not stepped one foot into this house. She’s stayed at the front door, but not one step more.
“Okay, well, what is going to happen when you go on the road and it’s your week?” she asks me, and I tilt my head to the side. I’m about to answer her when I hear Vincent from the kitchen.
“Dad, can I have a pizza pocket?”
“Yeah!” I shout back before turning to Josephine.
“We discussed this. Two days after I left you. We met for coffee because there was no fucking way I was going back into that house.” I raise my eyebrows to see if it jogs her memory.
“We decided we would look at the calendar and swap out the days so it’s fair.
So if I’m gone for four days, you have them, and then when I get back, I get them for the four days. ”
“What’s going to happen when you have a game, and you are gone until eleven at night?”
“I don’t know if you’ve heard of this thing, it’s called a babysitter.” I shrug. “It’ll be like when you came to the games, and they stayed home.”
“Who is this babysitter?” she asks, and I chuckle.
“Okay, well, you have a nice day.” I ignore her question because it’s none of her business.
“I have a right to know who is staying with my children.”
“I don’t ask you who stays with the kids when they are with you.
I have to think that you wouldn’t endanger our children, and you should think the same.
What I feel for you is not what I feel for our kids.
” I stand up, done with this conversation.
“So, this has been fun. Thanks for bringing the kids over. Sorry about oversleeping, won’t happen again. ”
“I can never win with you.”
“That’s not true,” I tell her, closing the door. “We just had a conversation, and I didn’t tell you to fuck off, so consider that a win. Bye, Josephine.” I shut the door and turn around to head into the house. The kids are all lounging on the couch, watching something on TV.
“I’m going to go brush my teeth, then we’ll make some lunch. How about we hit up the zoo maybe?” I suggest and they don’t really answer me. “Or a movie? We can go to the beach?”
“Movie,” Vincent decides.
“Movie,” Westley agrees with his brother.
“Movie,” Nora adds. I’m sure she’s only saying it because the other two have said it.
“Okay,” I reply and walk back to the stairs, heading upstairs.
I walk past my bed and into the bathroom, turning on the water in the sink first before cupping my hand and splashing water on my face a couple of times.
Then I grab a towel on the side and dab my face.
I can’t believe I slept in and missed my alarm.
I mean, I can believe it because I didn’t fall asleep until after four this morning, even though I got home at eleven.
I was in a state of shock as I walked into my house.
Fuck, the whole night I lay in my bed, still fully clothed, thinking about what the fuck I just did.
Which made it even worse because I was as hard as a rock the rest of the night.
I even got up and took a cold shower, but the minute I closed my eyes, I saw Kylie on top of me, riding me like I’ve never been ridden before.
She literally fucked me, and I have never come so hard before in my life.
I have also never in my life been so far gone for someone that I had to fuck them in my fucking SUV.
Making out with someone, sure, we’ve all done that.
Fooling around and feeling each other up, yup, been there.
Dragging her over the fucking console and finger fucking her and then having her ride me.
Never in my fucking life. Never. It kept playing over and over again while I was in the shower, and I had no choice but to fist myself and make myself come again.
I thought after the shower sleep would come and find me easily.
But it fucking didn’t, I lay awake all night, wondering how she was going to act toward me the next time.
I mean, she made it pretty clear to me she didn’t even like me.
I wasn’t so fond of her either, which makes this entire thing crazy.
I keep trying to recall who went for the other first. The last thing I remembered was pushing her hand away so I could put her address in.
My body was already on high alert with her in that fucking skirt that rode up even more when she sat down.
Then she shimmied to the edge of the seat, and it was barely covering her ass.
She isthe sexiest woman I have ever seen in my life.
Hands down. Without a doubt. She was sexy for two reasons; besides her obvious pretty face complemented by the most unique eyes I’ve ever looked in to.
One, she didn’t even try to be sexy, she just was.
Two, her attitude of not giving a fuck about who I was and making sure I knew she didn’t like me, just made her different.
I also lay there wondering if she would tell Kirby, but I don’t think she would.
She would definitely tell Lexi and then she might tell Kirby, and in the end, Jaxon would have to hold him back from kicking my ass.
Or maybe he wouldn’t, maybe he would help him kick my ass.
Nonetheless, sleep evaded me until my eyes were so dry they burned, and I shut them and slowly drifted off to sleep.
The last time I saw the clock it was four twelve.
“Dad!” I hear my name being shouted from downstairs and push away all thoughts of Kylie right now. “Can we have lunch?” Westley asks me.
“Yeah, buddy,” I reply, turning and walking back down the stairs. “What do you think about ham and cheese melts,” I ask him, “in the Hawaiian buns?”
“Oh, yeah.” He nods his head. “Can you do the thing with the melted cheese on top?”
“Sure.” I walk into the pantry to grab the pack of Hawaiian buns. “How many do you want?” I ask him.
“Four,” he says.
“I want six,” Vincent adds, not looking up from the game he is playing on his phone.
“I want two,” Nora says, and I nod my head, walking over to the fridge and grabbing the ham and then the Swiss cheese.
I take out the whole pack of twelve and slice down the middle of all the buns, placing the tops on the side before filling the bottom parts with honey baked ham and then Swiss cheese.
I place the tops back on them before grabbing a baking pan and then setting it in the oven at three fifty for twenty minutes.
I walk back to the fridge, grabbing a stick of butter and two cloves of garlic.
Melting the butter in the microwave, I then crush the garlic into it before adding some dry parsley.
I know it’s better with fresh, but this is what I have.
I stir them all together before taking the almost finished baking sandwiches out of the oven.
I pour the butter mixture over the top of the buns, making sure it’s evenly spread before I sprinkle mozzarella on top, and then broil it in the oven for four minutes.
I grab a bag of chips from the pantry, placing some on each plastic plate before I take the tray out of the oven.
The tops are a soft golden brown, I cut them into small cubes and place the amount they requested on each plate.
I give them a couple of minutes to cool down before calling the kids over.
They run like they haven’t eaten in days, making me laugh.
I, on the other hand, make myself an omelet before I scroll the theater times.
“I’m going to get changed,” I tell them after I clean up the kitchen and they go back to their respective spots on the couch, “then we’re going to leave. ”
No one even says anything as I go upstairs and dress in a pair of jeans and a T-shirt.
The four of us walk out of the house twenty minutes later, the tickets purchased and waiting to be redeemed.
“Can I sit in the front?” Vincent asks and I shake my head as I walk with him to the passenger side of the car.
He pulls open the door, standing there waiting for my answer with me right behind him.
“You know the rules, bud,” I remind him, “twelve and up.” I put my hand on his shoulder, and he looks into the cab of the SUV.
“What is this?” he asks, reaching in and pulling out a white ball of satin. I have never lunged for something so fast in my life. I snatch it out of his hand before he has a chance to open the ball and let it hang, which would be hard to explain.
My heart feels like it’s beating out of my chest. “It’s a napkin.
” I lie to him and tuck it into my pocket.
“Get in, we’re going to be late.” I usher him to the back of the SUV and open the door for him.
“Quickly.” I rush around the front, hopefully making him hurry will make him forget what he found.
I start the SUV, gripping onto the steering wheel, feeling like I’m going to throw up when a text comes up and I see from the center screen that it’s Kirby.
I close my eyes and put my head back on the headrest, counting to ten before I reach into my back pocket and take out my cell.
“This is it,” I mumble to myself as I open the text.
Kirby:
I got your ticket for the fundraiser. It’s next Saturday, I’ll give it to you on Monday.