Chapter 22
Gather…somewhere else.
— Wall sign
SHASHA
“I like her,” Auden said. “She’s great with Lola.”
“Brecken taught first grade before she moved on to high school,” JJ said as she watched Lola and Brecken bring in dessert.
The entire family was gathered around the table except for those two, and all of us were watching how cute they were together.
Another leaf had been added to the table. Chairs had been brought in. Food. So much food had been consumed.
And I’d enjoyed myself immensely.
So had my family.
Dima was currently laughing with Tibbs and Holden about some military fuck up from last week. Milena was talking to McCoy at the opposite end of the table. Nastya was holding Brando, who was sound asleep on her chest, and talking with Ryler and Bronc about a legal case set to be tried in the supreme court this week.
I felt so…full.
I hadn’t felt this full in a very long time.
“Why’d she move to high school kids?” Maven shook her head. “I can’t even imagine.”
“Long story short, she liked being able to actually teach what she loves—history. She has a love so deep for it that she almost obsesses over it sometimes. If you ever want to win her over, talk to her about the war or something. She’ll go all gooey eyed over it,” JJ admitted.
“Oh, we should’ve asked Jessa to come.” Nastya turned, hearing our comments. “She would’ve wowed her with the World War II stories.”
“World War II?”
I grinned at the way that Brecken was standing in the doorway, bent over, helping Lola hold up a couple of pies balanced on a tray.
“Our grandmother, who goes by Grams or Jessa only, loves talking about the wars,” Nastya explained. “We almost asked her to come with us, but she was very firmly entrenched in Bingo today. It was black light night.”
“What, exactly, is black light night?” Tibbs asked.
“Exactly what it sounds,” I admitted. “She goes up there with her black shirt covered in fluorescent paint and plays Bingo in the dark with only black lights to light the area. I’ve gone once and came home with a pounding headache because of the amount of bass that was playing.”
“They like to listen to techno and screaming metal bands.” Nastya shivered.
She, too, had experienced the Bingo Night From Hell.
“The last time I was there it was nudie night. I didn’t realize that until Grams told me I had to get undressed.” Milena shook her head. “I waited out in the parking lot for four hours for her to get done.”
I’d died with all the messages that night Milena had been sharing.
Apparently, you’d been able to see from the windows what was going on inside, and what she’d seen had scarred her for life.
“That’s wild.” Auden shook his head. “I had no clue that was even a thing here.”
“It’s done at the old folks’ home that she moved into when we moved here. She adores it. It keeps her active, and also slightly independent. Two things that she adores,” Milena explained.
Lola and Brecken came farther into the room and placed the two pies on the table.
She had to lean over me to do so, and I had to resist the urge to push my face into the side of her breast.
Just as that thought hit me, the sound of her stomach gurgling had me wincing.
The poor thing.
She’d eaten a lot tonight, and no doubt all of it had dairy in it.
The tray was sat down, and then Brecken said, “Dig in!”
Then, very quietly, she disappeared out of the room, hoping not to be noticed.
I knew, but I didn’t bring attention to her or her issues.
Instead, I ate, and wondered how it was that we already had this level of contentment in our relationship that I didn’t care if she was exploding in the bathroom or not.
My phone rang after about thirty minutes, and I got up to answer it in the hallway after seeing who it was.
Alexi.
“We found him,” Alexi said.
I didn’t ask him who.
He was only tasked with finding one man, after all.
“Where?” I asked.
“Trying to break into the gate,” he answered. “We called the police because there are a few witnesses.”
Fuck.
Of course there were witnesses.
“Who?” I asked.
“The man’s parents.” He paused. “And a sister of his. We had to call because they were already on the phone with the police, saying that we were holding his baby captive, and he wanted his child.”
What he likely wanted was his fifteen minutes of fame.
He had a big case coming up that he wanted to win, and to do that he had to get his name out there and garner as much support as he could.
Because the case he was working on now was a doozy.
A cop killing a dog in front of a kid.
Though, that cop was fully justified in the shooting.
The dog was about to bite a three-year-old, again —for the fourth time—when the officer had come on scene. The toddler’s mother was freaking out, screaming and begging for help. All the while the black lab’s owner was watching it all go down, not trying to help in any way, while she watered her begonias in the flowerbed while drinking a cup of coffee with her kids playing in the front yard.
The cop had done what he’d had to do and had shot the dog when the dog wouldn’t be contained any other way. In front of the family that owned the lab.
It was heartbreaking all the way around, and the entire community was divided.
“Fucking wonderful,” I said. “I’ll be there in fifteen minutes.”
“We’ll be here,” he said.
I carefully picked my way through the large farmhouse, correctly guessing that if Brecken was going to disappear into a bathroom, it’d be one not easily accessible for the rest of the guests.
I was right, finding her in a back bedroom that looked like the master bath.
The door was closed, and the only reason I knew she was there was the moaning.
I winced. “Brecken?”
The moaning stopped, and then a wheezed, “Please, please tell me you’re not directly outside the door right now. That I might have misheard.”
I found myself grinning. “I hate to break it to you, but you didn’t. I have to go, though. Gabriel Stone is outside my house right now and I have to go deal with it. Do you mind catching a ride home and then coming to my place after you pack a bag?”
There was a pause. “I’ll do just about anything if you step away from this door and act like you’ve never heard me in here.”
I grinned. “See you soon, Kisa .”
I left her there, wondering how the hell this feeling in my chest—the feeling of such rightness—had taken root without my knowledge.
After explaining what was going on to my family and Brecken’s, I headed out of the house and down the stairs.
The drive to my place was uneventful, Dallas traffic cooperating for once, and I made it home in time to follow three more police officers up to my front gate.
I pulled off to the side, unable to get through my front gate due to the two random cars I imagined belonged to Gabriel Stone and his family and got out.
There were two police officers talking to Stone and his family.
The two that’d just arrived stood back and observed.
I stopped next to them and said, “What’s going on?”
One looked at me, and I inwardly winced.
Haze Hopkins. Detective Haze Hopkins.
Fuck.
Haze Hopkins was hard to read.
I’d met him upon moving to the area, and it was almost as if he’d known who I was without a single introduction.
And let’s just say he’d hated me on sight.
“We’re here to figure that out,” Haze said as he dismissed me and moved toward the small crowd.
I caught Artur’s eyes from the guardhouse and jerked my chin at him, getting a chin nod in return.
As soon as I arrived slightly offset from the group, Gabriel turned to me, narrowed his eyes, and said, “Give me my baby!”