Chapter 12
Twelve
Two wrongs don’t make a right, but a left hook certainly makes a point.
—Gentry’s everyday thought
Gentry
She left a little over an hour later, heading to work.
She gave Neo a couple of blown kisses, then disappeared out into the yard and into her RV.
I watched her through the kitchen window for a long moment before Black interrupted me.
“So, your wife, huh?”
I blinked and turned my attention back to Black. “What?”
“She told Kelly Waller that she’s your wife.” He grinned. “Present tense. Not past.”
My lips twitched. “Oh yeah?”
“You realize that’s going to be all over town by tomorrow, right?” he asked. “And it’s not really going to save you from Kelly. You know she has no issue with married men.”
I grimaced.
Kelly Waller was a train wreck.
From a broken home, she dressed for attention, did things that she shouldn’t, and caused drama wherever she could.
Honestly, Black should’ve fired her a long time ago.
But she really was his niece, and he felt like he owed his brother.
She was a stain on the department, and she made working there uncomfortable.
He was also right.
Kelly would only be even more determined to interfere. It was as if she found the forbidden nature of breaking up people’s marriages exciting.
She hadn’t accomplished it with anyone from the department yet, but she sure had tried.
All of the deputies’ wives hated her.
“Well, you need to have a serious talk with her.” I shrugged. “She can talk to me at work, but she doesn’t need to be coming to my house. Not with Neo here.”
Black shook his head. “How’s he doing?”
I told him about today’s “breakthrough,” and he grinned. “He’ll get there. He may not ever be the dog that he was, but I doubt he gives up without a fight.”
“Agreed,” I said as I once again looked through the kitchen window toward the camper at the end of my backyard. She was standing in her kitchen in her scrubs, throwing her hair into a ponytail.
“She’s fuckin’ gorgeous, man,” Black said, following my line of sight.
I shot him a look. “Stop looking.”
He winked. “I’ll try. But whoa. She answered the door in just your flannel shirt. She’s got some great fuckin’ legs.”
She really did.
Sage was average height, around five-foot-six.
But her fuckin’ legs? They looked like they went on forever.
You wouldn’t know it by looking at her in those scrub pants, but the woman had a great set.
Not to mention she had great curves and a perfect set of tits.
She was the total package.
We watched as she jogged down the steps of her camper, slammed the door, then walked over to the fence where she spoke soothingly to Neo.
He looked at her, curious.
But he didn’t move closer.
She tossed him a pig ear and cooed something at him.
Neo didn’t reach for the treat until she’d rounded the hood of her Mazda.
“That thing ain’t gonna survive the winter,” he pointed out.
“No,” I agreed. “It won’t.”
“Why’d you let her get that anyhow?”
I grimaced. “I didn’t let her get anything.
Before I even knew she was here, she’d already purchased it.
I about killed Daniels when I found out that he sold it to her.
But she seems to like it, so I didn’t have the heart to tell her that she’d never be able to get around anywhere in the winter in it. ”
“She can have two cars,” he suggested. “You have that old truck in the shop that you don’t drive.”
When I’d bought the place, the house had come with a farm truck that had seen better days.
I’d put some new tires on it, had Court, the local mechanic, give it a tune-up, and I’d had it in the garage since I’d asked Apollo to get Sage here for when she finally arrived.
“That’s my plan,” I said. “One day when it snows for the first time, she’ll have to admit she needs something different. And I’ll offer her the truck.”
“She’ll fight you.” He laughed.
I looked at the ceiling and admitted, “I know.”
“You sound excited about that.”
I thought about his words for a long minute before replying, “When I was in jail, I had a lot of time to think. I thought about my boy, and what I missed out on. I thought about what I would do to the Irish Mob if I ever got out and found a way to keep it secret who was messing with them. I thought about getting rid of Dario O’Neal so that Sage never had to deal with him again.
I thought about Sage’s parents and her brother, how they threw her to the wolves.
I thought a lot about Sage, and what I would do differently had I had all the information.
But the thing is, most of my thoughts centered around her and my boy.
My boy’s not here anymore. There’s no way I’ll ever get him back.
But Sage? She’s here. And I only have to reach out and try.
And fuck, do I love looking at her out my back door every morning. ”
Black cleared his throat. “Wish I could say that one day you’ll wake up and the pain of losing your kid won’t be there anymore.
But it’s definitely there. It’s never ending, too.
Some days are better than others, but the ache?
It’s always there. Right in the middle of your heart where it will never go away. ”
I’d experienced that myself over the last seven years.
I hadn’t had much time with Dean.
In fact, I’d had a whole lot less time with Dean than I should have.
It didn’t make sense to me, this sense of loss.
One would think that having him for less than six months, and seeing him for less than a month total if you added up all the time I’d had with him, that I wouldn’t have this sense of loss weighing me down.
But sometimes, I felt like it hurt worse.
I’d missed out on so much.
His first crawl. His first step. His first word. His first laugh. I’d never see him walk across the stage at his graduation. I’d never teach him how to drive a stick shift. I’d never get to hear him call me dad.
Yeah, I would say it’s way worse, because I had nothing but an imagination, and it ran wild thinking about all the missed possibilities.
I looked down at the photos of the young boys that were missing and thought, at least I’ll never know what it feels like to lose him with all those memories buried deep.
Yet another thing that Nadine had stolen from me.
So many memories.
“What do all these parents do?” I went back to the task at hand.
“Two work for the steel mill. Mom from this case.” He tapped the file. “Dad from this one. In different departments, though. This mom is a financial advisor. That one is a stay-at-home mom. This dad is a car salesman.”
He went through everyone’s profession. Even the grandparents.
By the time we hit lunchtime, I was starving and we’d gotten nowhere.
“Interested in heading to lunch?” he asked.
I got up and stretched. “Sure. Just have to feed Neo.”
Neo was laid out on the back deck, his ball between his paws.
I got a can of dog food out, poured it into a bowl, then heated it up for good measure.
No one liked cold food.
Placing the bowl on the back patio, I filled up his water bowl then headed back inside.
Neo waited until I was behind the door before he got up.
He eyed me suspiciously through the glass sliding door, as if he fully expected me to come outside and trick him.
I locked the door, then slid the security bar in the door.
Only then did he head my way.
He ate it suspiciously, glancing up at me to make sure I wasn’t making any sudden moves.
Turning my back to the door, I headed toward the sink where I washed my hands and stopped next to Black who was staring out the kitchen window.
“He’s gorgeous.”
“He is,” I agreed. “I found him in a parking lot being sold out of the back of a Corolla. This man said that it was his dog’s first and only litter.
That his neighbor’s Belgian Malinois got out and got his dog pregnant before he’d had a chance to fix her.
Neo is half German Shepherd, half Malinois. ”
“High energy,” he mused.
“I wouldn’t know,” I admitted. “I gave him to Sage the day before I was sentenced. Only had him for a couple of hours. Bought him all the things. Food. Toys. Spent a couple of hours playing with him. Then I named him, got him a collar, and dropped him off in a crate at her front door. Watched the place for about thirty minutes to make sure no one took him. Sage looked ecstatic. Almost as if she loved dogs, but never thought she’d get one. ”
Black rubbed at his chest. “I bought Sheba for Shelby and thought that she’d be the one taking care of her. And she did for a little while. But then Marcia disappeared with Shelby and Sheba goes to the door every day like she’s still expecting her to come home.”
Black’s ex-wife, Marcia, had been ordered to give Black full custody.
Until that point, Marcia had been a decent mom. But she’d been kind of flighty, and they thought it would be best if Black got full custody of Shelby and Shelby only visited with her mother on the weekends.
Black had been the full-time parent, and Marcia had been the fun parent who only did the things that she wanted to do. No actual parenting. No law and order. She hadn’t held down a job in years, flying by the seat of her pants, according to Black.
That was what had Black so worried all this time.
Shelby was only seven when she disappeared with Marcia.
Marcia had never been the type of parent to actually do the hard work it took to take care of a child.
Black was terrified that Shelby, wherever she was, would be traumatized from having to take care of herself.
“Dogs are loyal,” I said softly. “That’s why I’m not nearly as worried as Sage is. I think that Neo will come around. It won’t be easy, but he’ll get there.”
Black slapped me on the back and said, “Meet you at The Mercantile.”
I headed for my cruiser while Black did the same.
When we got to The Mercantile, Bernice, another club brother’s sister, was the one to take our order.
We’d gotten our number and were chit-chatting with Bernice when another club brother walked into the room.
“Hux,” I said, offering him my hand.
His tattooed one took mine, and he said, “Gentry. Went to the hospital today and heard some interesting news.”
I sighed. “Oh, yeah?”
“Heard you’re married.”
I rolled my eyes. “Let me guess, one of the shitty nurses that you like to pretend you aren’t dating but really do?”
There was a screech as a mixer was shoved a little too hard across the countertop.
Bernice winced. “Sorry.”
My brows rose as I looked from Bernice to Hux and back.
Hux was blissfully unaware of the issue and kept talking. “It’s just a no-strings-attached thing. We’re both really happy keeping it casual.”
Bernice started to scrub extra-hard on the countertop where she’d just moved the mixer over.
I watched as the muscles in her arm worked before she yanked the mixer back into place.
Hux frowned as he looked at where my eyes were aimed.
“What?” I asked.
Hux shook his head. “Nothing.”
It was not nothing.
Bernice liked Hux, and she was trying not to let her jealousy show.
I inwardly grinned and kept talking. “How’s the meat packing business?”
“Overwhelming,” he admitted. “I need more help. I’m slowly working my life away.”
I grinned. “Welcome to the big league, boyo.”
A worker from the kitchen said, “Order up!” and Bernice walked stiffly toward the window where she grabbed Black’s and my food.
She gave it to us with a smile and then continued to ignore Hux.
Hux frowned at her.
Black headed toward a table, and I followed suit, taking a seat in the back corner where the Dixie Wardens had an unofficial assigned table.
Whenever one of us came in, we tended to take this particular seating area. The locals knew to steer clear. The ones that came in that weren’t local got told really quick that the seating was taken.
“What’s your take on the Bernice/ Hux situation?” Black asked as he took his seat and dug in.
I ate my own sandwich, thinking about what he asked before I admitted, “I think that the two of them would have to admit to themselves that there’s an attraction there.
And seeing as Hux still thinks that Bernice has a thing for Odin, and Bernice thinks that Hux has a thing for anything that has a vagina… ”
Black chuckled.
Black took his fourth bite of sandwich when his radio went off.
I continued to eat while he stood up and started to leave, taking his plate with him.
“Day off?” a local asked from my side.
I nodded.
“Gotta love it.” She smiled. “Hey, I heard that you were married.”
I shoved another fry in my mouth instead of answering, giving a grunt of ‘maybe so’ in answer.
She smiled at my grunt. “I heard she’s a good one. Though I’ve also heard that the hospital makes it hard to work there. You should try to get her into Doc’s.”
I took another bite, hoping that she would take the hint.
But, obviously, she didn’t.
“I mean, it’s not like the hospital is horrible. They’re good pay, and the money makes up for the company. But sometimes, it’s miserable enough there that not even a good paycheck will be enough to make you want to stay.”
I’d heard that the hospital wasn’t all that great.
They had a high turnover rate, and I swear I never saw the same set of nurses twice.
And when I did see someone new, I never saw them again.
Maybe it was just because I was mainly interacting with the emergency room department, and oftentimes they had a higher fluctuation of staff.
“And the food there is terrible,” the woman kept going. “Plus, when I was there for a few weeks before finding a different job, I found myself going home and being so dang angry. It was like the people there got something out of sucking all the life out of you.”
She eventually tapered off, but for the rest of lunch, I thought about nothing but the environment at Sage’s work, and whether she could use a decent sandwich.