Chapter 11 #2
Mark and Luke step apart like curtains opening for a great reveal, but it’s just me.
I swear a record scratches in the air as I get a glimpse of Brody’s family and they get a first look at me.
Shayanne is doing some fist-punching, boot-kicking air fight thing from her chair that looks to be a celebration at my arrival.
There’s a blonde woman holding a big bowl of mashed potatoes, another blonde at the sink, and a brunette holding a baby with crazy pigtails.
A child that small should not have enough hair for pigtails, but this one does.
A young boy is making faces at the baby, who laughs in delight.
There’s also another edition of a blonde Barn Door Boy, a threesome then, and two more tall, dark, and handsomes who must be Brody’s brothers.
Each and every one of them looks from me to a petite blonde woman standing by the stove with a spoon in her hand.
Mama Louise.
That has to be her. I know who the commanding officer is in any room. It’s not by size. It’s not by age. It’s purely by presence. And she’s the fucking Commander in Chief here.
“Nice to meet you, Rix. Come on in and have a seat. First-timers don’t have to help.” The implication is that next time, because she’s already deemed there will be one, I’ll be expected to help with dinner. I’m not sure how I feel about that yet.
Brody guides me to a chair and sits down beside me.
Everyone else falls into what seems to be their usual places.
Brody goes around the table, giving me everyone’s names, and I make a joke that there’d better not be a pop quiz later, but really, I learned them all.
Barn Door Boys plus one are Mark, Luke, and James.
Their wives are Katelyn, Shayanne, and Sophie, who is holding Cindy Lou.
The other kid is Cooper, and his mom, Allyson.
Brody’s brothers are Bobby and Brutal. I don’t ask about the nickname, but Shayanne has no such filter.
As soon as grace is said and food starts passing, she asks, “Why Rix? I’d get Ric or Ricki from Erica, but Rix? What’s the story?” She’s plopping mashed potatoes on her plate, never missing a beat as she passes the bowl to Luke and takes the plate of pork chops from Sophie.
I swallow a bite of cinnamon apple chutney, testing it alone before adding it to my pork chop because I don’t even know what a chutney is.
Cooking is definitely not my strong suit.
It’s pretty good, though, so I spoon it over the meat.
“It actually was Ric when I was a kid, but I went through a grabby mine-mine-mine phase when me and my sister were around four. Anything Emily got her grubby little hands on, I wanted it and would rip it from her, saying ‘Ric’s.’ Apparently, toddlers tend to talk about themselves in the third person?
” I shrug at the memory and the story I’ve told several times before.
“Before long, ‘Ric’s’ became ‘Rix’ and here I am. ”
“Cute,” Shay decides. “I like it. But I’m pretty sure I like that Brody calls you Erica even better if everyone else calls you Rix.”
She’s looking from Brody to me and back again like we’re going to declare our undying love for one another at any given moment and she doesn’t want to miss a thing.
Suddenly, this whole thing feels ridiculously awkward. I mean, Brody and I explicitly said that we’re not doing serious. Just hanging out and okay, fucking. And yet, here we are, doing family introductions after one night of crazy-awesome sex and one spontaneous date.
Is a car show a date?
I think yes. I think Brody thinks yes too.
So yeah, one night and one date.
And now, family dinner.
What the hell have I gotten myself into?
As much as my brain is thinking this whole thing through and trying to sound the alarm, my body is warm and fizzy thanks to Brody’s fingers tracing soothing circles on my thigh.
He’s not even high, closer to my knee than anything naughty, but any skin on skin contact between us feels intimate.
His touch is purposeful, like he knows I’m about to bail and is telling me it’ll be fine.
Luckily, the not-quite interrogation ends as conversation turns to cattle, something I know zilch about. But their worries are clear—cattle prices are falling and it’s almost market time. That’s straightforward enough.
“You gonna be good without me here?” Luke asks Mark. Shayanne’s face goes anxious, a new expression for the seemingly always bubbly and biting woman.
Mark grunts and lifts his chin toward Brody.
I take it to mean he’ll be fine with Brody’s help.
A movie plays out in my head, Mark and Brody astride horses, working the cattle one way and then another.
I’m not sure that’s even what they do since Brody said they use ATVs and a Gator too.
But it’s my mental movie fantasy, so I can choose anything I want.
Like a shirtless Brody, with the sun reflecting off his bare chest. And oh, yeah, he’s pouring water over his head, the droplets running in rivulets I want to chase with my tongue.
Errrk. Definitely a mental movie I need to save for later. Not at Mama Louise’s dinner table.
“We’ll have to get in a night out before we go. Celebrate the start of market season with fried food, good music, and friends.”
Oh, shit. Shayanne’s looking at me as she says that.
Normally, I’d throw up a middle finger and tell her to fuck off.
I don’t do things I don’t want to do. Or at least I like to think that’s true.
But with every eye at the table on me, including Brody’s, I’m finding it hard to be that crass.
Mom would be proud that some of her manners and politeness did wear off on me.
She’s had serious doubts over my mouthy nature.
“Oh, uh . . . maybe.” It’s all I’ll promise now. And that’s mostly because I felt Brody’s hand squeeze my thigh supportively. Or encouragingly? Or in warning? I don’t know, but it’d felt nice there.
Shayanne doesn’t take no for an answer. She doesn’t take maybe for one, either. “Next Saturday night. Hank’s. Brody’ll pick you up. Wear boots if you got ’em for the dancing.”
I cut my eyes to Brody. “You said you don’t dance.”
The smirk he gives me says ‘oh, I dance’, and I realize he only said that to get out of dancing with Emily. Well, maybe that and the fact that the music wasn’t exactly danceable at Two Roses. Mosh pit bouncing off one another like pissed-off pinballs, sure. Dancing, no.
Oh, the music.
“What kind of music?” I grin widely. “Please don’t say country.” I’m kidding, mostly, but not a single smile cracks.
Bobby beats everyone else to the punch. “No carrot cake for you if you talk smack about country music. It’s the best genre known to man.
And I don’t just say that because I contribute to the industry.
” He places his hand over his heart, and I swear he’s serious, but there’s such a current of humor through the Barn Door Boys that I can’t be sure how straight he’s being with me.
“What do you listen to if not the best music ever created?”
“Rock. Seventies, from my dad. Eighties and nineties, from my sergeant. And everything since just because I like it. The louder, the better.”
“Loud is right,” Brody deadpans. “It’s more screaming than music too.”
Everyone cringes as if I pulled out my phone to start my latest Spotify playlist.
Brody sighs heavily and confesses, “You don’t have to come, but I’d like for you to. Unless you don’t want to hang out with these guys . . .” He mouths assholes behind his hand, hiding the curse.
I should run through town, over the mountain, and back to my garage. Work all night alone with whatever decade of rock music I want playing loud enough to shut up the chatter in my head.
What I shouldn’t do is sit here and get to know these people. What I shouldn’t do is agree to a night out with them. What I shouldn’t do is look forward to seeing Cowboy in his country element, busting out his moves to impress me.
But that’s what I do, anyway, knowing it’s a piss-poor decision that’s got the potential to get someone hurt. Mostly, me. Maybe Brody. He said he’s fine with casual, and I have to take him at his word, but tonight doesn’t seem casual, doesn’t feel like no big deal. And that worries me.
“Sounds like a plan. Saturday night. Twirl me around the dance floor, Cowboy.”
What the fuck did I just agree to?
Quiet and low enough that no one should be able to hear, Brody whispers out of the side of his mouth, “Fuck yeah, I will, Lil Bit.”
Mama Louise, who’s been silently watching the whole dinner and a show before her, finally interjects. “Language.”
I almost laugh. The air actually bubbles up from my belly and the sound catches in my throat when I realize that she’s serious.
A table full of big, growly alpha guys and their wives, who all seem to be pretty awesome themselves, but they all bow down to a single word from Mama Louise.
She doesn’t even have to try. Her power here is absolute.
I want to be her one day.