Chapter 8
Chapter Eight
“ U ncle Coop! Uncle Coop!” Johnny was in tears, screaming from the front room.
Again.
“Mason broke the antenna off my costume! On purpose!”
Oh, damn that little shit. He couldn’t help but torture his baby brother. It drove easy-going Mason crazy that Johnny had skipped two grades and they were in the same grade now. Mason’s football buddies were being shits.
“I did not! I was trying to help! Uncle Coop! I was trying to help!”
“You were not!”
“You are a whiny titty baby!”
“Shut up!”
“BOYS!” If his roar could stop a bull in its tracks, he could sure as shit stop a seven-year-old and a ten-year-old. “That is enough.”
He turned the corner from the office where he’d been paying some bills. He didn’t know where Brooks was—he’d bet the man was out working in the barns, cleaning up. He imagined he was going to have to ask Brooks to start helping here in the house.
If Brooks liked working, he could use the help.
“Let me see, Johnny,” Coop said, then leveled a finger at Mason. “Back off. No ‘helping’.”
Mason’s expression went surprised, then mutinous. “I didn’t do it on purpose.”
“I didn’t say you did, but you know you’re not as careful with Johnny’s things as you are with yours.”
Mason’s cheeks turned a deep red, and he looked at the floor.
“Now, come here, Johnny. And screaming ain’t the way to handle things, kiddo.”
“He just makes me so mad.”
The urge to pinch the bridge of his nose was huge, but he resisted.
“Hey. Everything okay?” Brooks walked into the front room. “I was coming in for the day and I heard shouting.”
“Mason broke my costume.”
“Johnny’s a crybaby.”
“You’re fixin’ to get grounded, Mason. No name-calling. I mean it, son. I will shut your ass down in your room and there won’t be any fun. Do not try me.” He didn’t threaten. He’d dealt with cowboys his entire life. He didn’t have to. If this, then that.
“I’ll talk to Mason, if you can fix the costume?”
“That’s more than fair, thank you.” He quirked a finger at Johnny. “Come on. I can help.”
Why couldn’t this little boy want a costume from the Walmart like his little sister? It was so much easier than all of the other little ones.
“Okay. I just really want it to be right.”
“I know, kiddo.” Johnny was so smart, but he was also very precise. It was like one went with the other. He didn’t like itchy things. He didn’t like his food touching if it wasn’t meant to. Butter on bread? Sure. Green beans touching his chicken? No.
“Mike’s making one too. We’re going to be robot buddies.”
Coop reminded himself this little boy was seven years old. That was so young.
“Yeah? What does your robot do?” He took the foil-covered box that was the robot’s head, careful not to dislodge any of the strands of battery-operated LED lights on it. He’d just poke a hole in the top of the cardboard, attach with glue and tape to make sure the wire didn’t scratch Johnny’s head.
“He makes baked goods—muffins, cakes, doughnuts, crescent rolls, lemon pie, cookies. You pour the ingredients in here.” Johnny pointed toward the back of his costume. “And they pop right out here.”
Then he pointed to his belly, where he’d drawn a cake.
“Oh, that’s clever, honey. Real clever.” Such a smart kid.
“Yeah. Mike’s is a vacuum—kind of boring, but super necessary. I mean, no one likes a dirty floor.”
Coop chuckled softly. “You’re so right. No one does.”
“And you find such cool things in the vacuum sometimes. Like nuts and bolts and pieces of jewelry. Or, you know, pennies.”
“See, now that I like. So vacuums are less boring than you think.”
“I like it.”
He got the antenna on again, and he showed it to Johnny. “What do you think?”
“That’s perfect, Uncle Coop. Thank you.”
“You are very welcome, kiddo. Now, let’s go see if everyone else is ready to get moving. ”
“Okay. I don’t want to sit by Mason in the car.”
“You don’t have to.” He led Johnny out into the front room. Brooks was there with Mason, who wasn’t red-faced or crying or nothin’, but he did look at Johnny and apologize, so that had to be a good thing, right?
“So, how are we doing on the preparedness front?” he asked Brooks.
“The girls are dressed and are just deciding how they’re gonna divvy up whatever candy they get. Ricky has already headed out to pick up another bunch of kids. Benji is asleep on the couch over there, and I have to go wash up real quick.”
“All right. You going to come in a costume?”
Brooks gave him a glinting grin. “Yep. Aussie stockman.”
“Oh, that’s a cop-out.”
“Hey, I had no time to come up with anything.” Brooks waved a hand at him. “I don’t see you dressed.”
“When have I had time with you hiding in the barns?”
Brooks stopped and blinked, then looked at the kids, who were assembling. “Lucy, don’t let your brothers fight. Coop, you want to come up, and we’ll get you a costume together?”
Damn. He had a feeling he was going to get dressed down. “I got one. You come on to my room when you get dressed, and I’ll get you those boots you asked for.” He was damned if he was going to haul his ass upstairs to get yelled at.
“Sure.” Brooks nodded, then headed up and he went to his room.
So Coop knew he’d been a little snappy. But it had already been a long damn day.
Coop dug his vintage rodeo clown nonsense out of the closet. He hadn’t had to wear it professionally except for throwback shows, not since way back in the day. It shouldn’t scare Mina since he wasn’t a full face clown and she’d seen her share of bullfighters.
But everybody knew the old makeup, and everybody knew the baggy shorts, and besides that, he could wear layers up underneath and wouldn’t freeze to death while he was doing whatever it was the Chiaras needed him to do or whatever kids needed to be wrangled.
God knew this year he was wrangling five. It didn’t look like Benji was even going to wake up, really though.
Coop had pretty much decided it was time for Benji to start getting himself up off the couch and moving on a regular basis, because nobody could heal if they just sat there on their butts. Bodies were meant to move and meant to do things.
He wasn’t going to have this. Benji was fixing to have to go back to work in two months, and that meant hours of running.
Nobody thought about that—but bullfighting was a game of stamina, when it came right down to it.
He ran ten miles a day. Six in the morning, two before lunch, and two before he took his shower at night and went to bed.
He’d been doing it since he was eighteen, and it didn’t matter a bit that he was retired. There wasn’t any guarantee that he wouldn’t need to haul himself back into a fire. Cowboying was a tough life, when he got right down to it.
Benji was going to have to learn about that, and quick.
It had been six-plus months since his accident. And eight months was plenty enough time to heal up from this and get back to work.
They were fixing to have a come-to-Jesus meeting. With him being Jesus.
And it was going to be tonight.
Benji could come help with the hayride, along with Ricky.
Ricky needed his big brother keeping an eye on him anyway, the way that boy was going. Ricky was bringing his little girlfriend, and he sure hoped that that little girl’s mama was having the birth control conversation with her, because he’d had it with Ricky.
Twice.
But there was no way Coop was having that talk with a teenage girl who wasn’t someone he was raising. He was already going to have to deal with cramps and pads and acne with Lucy. Talking about being on the pill with Bella McCall? That was a bridge too far.
He stripped off his jeans and started rolling on the heavy compression socks he wore when he was working. Then he settled on warm shorts, then baggy pants before adding three different shirts, then his sponsor T-shirt, then his rainbow suspenders.
By the time he’d gotten his tennis shoes on, he was exhausted, and he wasn’t sure how he’d managed to do all this every weekend. Hell, he’d done it in the back seat of a pickup more than once.
Now he had to find him some makeup. He didn’t do much, not like the entertainers did. He put on a big blue smiling mouth, and he painted on a diamond around one eye.
And that was good enough.
He was almost done with the diamond on his eye when he heard a knock on the bedroom door. “Come on in.”
He swore to God if Mason had so much as touched Johnny’s costume, he was gonna beat that child to death with a limp spaghetti noodle.
Brooks came in, just about like he was fixin’ to start something. “Don’t you snarl at me in front of those kids.”
Now, one, Coop had forgotten that Brooks was even going to come in and be mad because time had passed.
Two, he had been fixin’ to apologize. Had been being the appropriate words in that sentence.
And three?
Well, three was this was his God damn bedroom, and the only time he expected to have raised voices in here was when he was fighting with kids or he was having wild monkey sex, neither of which were going to happen with Brooks Whitehead.
So .
“Noted. You need anything else?” That was about as polite as he was fixin’ to be. And if Brooks pushed it one more second, he didn’t get to come to Halloween. He would be grounded. He could stay here and talk to Benji about being a little bitch.
“I figure if you need me to help out more here at the house, just ask. I’ve been trying to stay out of the way like everyone seems to want me to.
Benji still glares at me sometimes if I even try to say anything to the other kids besides how perfect they are, and I sure don’t want to step on your toes, but dammit, I don’t know what else to do! ”
Brooks was working up a real head of steam, but suddenly Coop couldn’t be mad at him all that much. Maybe a touch. But put that way, he reckoned he’d be at sixes and sevens too, just hanging out and not having a real thing for him to be.
Coop paused and took a deep breath. “Okay, cool. Look. I need help, and Benji is sitting on his ass. So if you’re going to stay?—”
Brooks opened his mouth, but he held up his hand.
“—which I told you that you could, then I need some kind of schedule where I get a breath, and you help with the kids. Not that I mind you cooking at all, but I need some time off once in a while. Maybe a couple times a week?” He kept his tone calm, reasonable.
Like he would at work with a new bullfighter.
Brooks pondered him for a moment. Then he nodded. “Right. That’s fair. I’m sorry I snapped at you. I just feel…”
“Out of place?”
“Yeah. Yeah, I’m used to working with horses every day, and cooking. That’s it. But we can sit down tomorrow and make a schedule, hey?” Those black eyes were serious as a heart attack.
“Sounds good.” And it did. He could so use a couple of days to go into town and just get away. Maybe go fishing. “Now, come on and help me get Benji peeled off the couch. I want him to chaperone Ricky and his girl while we wrangle the kids.”
“I’m all set for wrangling,” Brooks said. “And you’re the cowboy protection.” Brooks looked him over. “I like the retro look.”
“Thanks. I prefer my vest and jersey and shorts to actually work, but this is good layers. I’ll be warm.” He let himself grin.
“Cool. I’ve layered up myself. It’s going to be chilly later, I hear.”
“Yep. Okay, so before we go out. Johnny is still a little hysterical about possibly breaking his costume, so be careful. Mason is a butthead and will tease him. Lucy will be very upset if her makeup smears, so we’re carrying the kit. And Mina just wants candy and her friends.”
“And Ricky just wants his girl.”
“Bingo.” Now he really did grin. “You remember that age?”
Brooks scoffed. “Not really. I spent my Ricky years hiding.”
He blinked some. “Hiding what?”
Brooks gave him a searching kind of look. “Well, you work for Kase and Ryder, so I guess I’m safe? I was in the closet.”
He felt like someone had punched him in the chest. Brooks was gay? He would never have thought it, and that was with him being wired the same damn way. His freaking gaydar was broken. “No shit?”
“Not even a little shit.”
“Well then—” He snorted and held out one hand to shake. “Welcome to the family, man. Ricky is the straightest young buck in history. Benji is… I don’t know that there’s a label for where he is. He’s sort of…well…he likes them a little on the trashy side, as the song goes. ”
“But not of one particular gender?” Brooks asked with a raised eyebrow.
“Nope.”
“Uncle Coop! Uncle Brooks. Look at meeeeee!” Mina twirled when they got to the front room. “I’m Bluey!”
“Wow, Miss Thing,” Coop told her. “Look at you.” He mouthed a thank you at Lucy, who had gotten her all dressed. “Checklist time. Jackets.”
“Check!” Mason said.
“Bag packed with clothes in case someone needs to change.”
“Check!” That was Lucy.
“Water bottles.”
“Check!”
“Candy bags.”
“Yaaaaaaaaaaaaaas,” Mina shouted.
Brooks snorted out a laugh. Then he glanced at Benji. “Up and at ’em, kid. We need your help tonight.”
Oh, good man.
“The cold hurts my pelvis,” Benji griped.
“If Coop can do it, you can,” Brooks said, deadpan. “Now up you get.”
Benji rolled his eyes, but sure enough, he rose, going to get his jacket and his heavy down vest. “I don’t have to hike the trunk or treat, right?”
“No, but you need to keep an eye on Ricky.”
“Oh, man!” Benji grinned then, though. “He’ll hate that.”
“Don’t we all?” Coop winked at him. “It’s time to show your Uncle Brooks how we do Halloween around here.”
“Yes, sir.” Benji gave him a mock salute.
“Benji, you ain’t got no costume!” Mina stared at her oldest brother. “That ain’t nice!”
“Isn’t nice,” Coop corrected gently.
“Isn’t nice. ”
“Sure I do, Mina. I’m dressed up as a cowboy.”
Mina rolled her eyes. “You are a cowboy. Silly brother.”
“Yeah, you know it.” Benji stood a little taller and grabbed his hat. “I’m a bullfighter. Now let’s go.”
Cooper rolled his eyes at Brooks and headed out the door. It was time to get their spooky on.