Lucky Charms: A Hudson Family Series- Book 3- Dalton and Cami

by Chontelle Brison

  Jack smiled as he looked past me out toward Camille’s clown car. When his eyes caught mine, I could swear the man was laughing inside his own head. I mean, at least I hoped he was. Otherwise I might find myself thrown into a ditch when he found out I had practically kidnapped his daughter.

  “Did you and Cami get along okay on the ride here?” he asked knowing full well what the answer to that question was.

  “She’s a very… spirited woman,” I spoke slowly trying to gauge his reaction, “I’m sure we’ll get along fine once she gets to know me better.” Lies all lies, I had a better chance of Darth Vader being resurrected in the new Star Wars franchise.

  I let out a breath of relief when Jack let off a loud belly laugh and clapped my shoulder. He looked at me and with a serious face said, “She’s got a tough exterior, but on the inside she’s soft as a marshmallow. I think you’ll be good for her to have around Dalton, just remember she’s my daughter and I do know how to hide a body.”

  I nodded. Okay, what was I supposed to do? I got the feeling Jack knew exactly how headstrong his daughter was. He had taken in Synclair when her mother died when she was still in College, but I also caught the veiled, “Don’t fuck with my daughter,” threat. So I did the only thing I could, I nodded. The truth is I have no intentions of hurting Camille, she’s been dicked around enough by people in her life. I just had this overwhelming urge to help her, protect her, show her she was better than everyone thought she was, including herself. Why? I have no idea, I don’t even want to try to figure out the reasoning behind these urges, I just know they're there.

  Cami

  I couldn’t believe it, me eyes must be decievin’ me! I did not just watch me Da welcome that bloody Hudson into our home like he was the second comin’ of Christ! I looked around me front yard, I was sure Ashton Kutcher was goin’ to be jumping out any minute yelling, “You’ve been punked.” After a few moments of nothing but being eyeballed by our cows Pip and Pep, I realized this was no fecking joke!

  True to his word, Dalton had loosened the neckties and I was able to wiggle them above me head so that I could get out of me own car. My vision was seeing red as I imagined what body part I would separate from his body first. Slamming the car door I stomped up the steps and threw open the door to the home I shared with me parents.

  What the actual fuck? Me Da was seated on the couch laughing at something Dalton was saying while me Ma was flitin’ around the room like she was serving tea to Queen Elizabeth.

  “You’re doin’ me fecking nut in Dalton, you know that right?” I ignored the shocked gasp from me mother and didn’t let me Da’s chuckle break the death stare I was giving the frustratin’ gobshite. He didn’t even have the decency to look offended. Instead, he raised one perfectly arched, dark eyebrow at me and threw me his Dalton Hudson, knicker-wetting smile.

  I was about to tell him what he could do with his smile when me Ma smacked me in the back of the head. Ouch… Shite!

  “Camille! Dalton here is our guest and you will be showin’ him some hospitality.” Me Ma had that tone… come on, you all know that tone. The one yer Ma gets when you have just done something that embarrasses her and you’re goin’ to pay for it later. However, at that moment I was too pissed to care. I don’t know what it was about Dalton Hudson, but the man drove me mad.

  “The only thing I will be showin’ him is my foot when I kick his arse with it,” I growled stepping forward to make good on my threat.

  I should have known my Ma had other plans. She grabbed me ear, yes me, a grown woman of twenty-six was just dog-eared by me Ma. If there’s one thing about Irish mothers to know, it’s that it doesn’t matter if you’re six or forty-five, they’ll smack ya about if they feel like yer disrespectin’ ‘em.

  “Yeesh Ma, did the man tell ya how he tied me to the front seat of me own car? Did yer precious guest tell ya that?” I wasn’t a tattler by nature, but ever since Dalton had hit Sean my maturity level seemed to drop into the single digit level. Once she had me dragged into the kitchen she let go of the vice grip she had on me ear lobe.

  “Yes girly, he told me how Sean had said something to ya and how he had no choice but to come to yer aid,” she hissed at me as she pulled the kettle off the stove.

  “I don’t know what ya did to make Sean so mad, but you best get that stick out yer bum because he’s coming over for supper tonight with his mother.”

  What? Wait, okay, you caught all of that right? I wasn’t sure which shitty article to address first, the fact that she just assumed I must have said somethin’ to assface, Sean, to make him mad or that she had invited the cheatin’ bastard for dinner. My head was spinning, I just gawked at her like she was a crazy woman.

  “This is a dream, I’m dreamin’,” I said out loud as I tried to wake meself up from his horrible nightmare.

  Owww! “You did not just pinch me, Ma, Jesus Christ!” She went to smack the back of my head for using the son of the lord’s name as a curse, but I ducked away from those talons she called fingers.

  She pointed a long spoon at me and gave me her most fierce glare, “Dalton told us how you were so upset after what happened at the airport that you tried to walk home in the bleedin’ rain. He was fearin’ for your safety and did the only thing he could to get you home safely. If you ask me you owe the lad a thank you,” she finished putting tea cups on the large serving tray she usually only brought out on holidays and put both hands on her hips.

  Here we go, lecture time, sit back folks as you’re about to witness Kathryn McDougall fire off her favorite speech about how I am bein’ a disappointment and how I need to let bygones be bygones. Which would be great if I had any idea was a darn bygone was in the first place. Are ya ready?

  “Camille McDougall-Patrick, you are embarrasin’ me, I did not raise you to go gallivantin’ about Dublin picking fights with Sean and givin’ grief to the poor Hudson lad. Who I might add came here out of the goodness of his heart and love for his brother and for your cousin!”

  I sat down at the table, I could tell this was going to be a long lecture. Oh, and did you catch the guilt comin’ from her? No one can guilt like a Catholic Irish mother, no one, I think they take classes as children or somethin’ of the sort.

  “Ma, Sean cheated on me with Tara also her mother,” I reminded her making a disgusted face as I tried not to imagine Sean shaggin’ a woman almost as old as me Ma. “And Dalton Hudson may be here out of the generosity of his black heart, but the man tied me to the seat of me own car after he lip locked me!” I retorted, surely once she knew how he had made advances on my person she would get on my side.

  “Ach, it would do you good to have a man’s lips on yers!”

  Seriously? Did you all not just hear that? Me own mother just condoned that bloody Hudson putting his damn lips to mine? I felt like Alice, who fell down the fucking rabbit hole. Only in my version Dalton was the white rabbit and I wanted to find him, cut his heart out and dance a jig around his fluffy white carcass, but I digress.

  My Ma sat down across from me and her eyes softened as she grabbed my fisted hand, “Camille, I love you, I do, but you have cut yerself off from datin’ ever since Sean broke yer heart. Five years is long enough, you need to get out there and start living. Yer wasting away, going from Walt’s buildn’ company and workin’ at the pub in town. You need to ask yer heart why you’re killin’ yerself like this,” my Ma patted my hand and then stood, lifted the tray from the table and walked out of the kitchen.

  Trembling I went the press to get the biscuits out that would go with the tea. I slammed the box on the counter and hung me head.

  I didn’t need to ask meself why I was doin’ what I was doin’. The shame burned so hotly I felt like it would melt me from the inside out. When I had gone to the University, I had wanted to study Architecture, but Walt insisted I study for my teaching credentials. I never did tell him that I earned a post graduate degree in Architecture and design along with my post-graduate certificate in Education.r />
  I had hoped that I could convince me Step-Da, Walt, that I could be an asset to the contractin’ company that he owned. I had watched him build new buildings and do add-ons to some of the houses both in Dublin and out in the countryside. I was constantly givin’ him my input on where the best place for a support beam would be or how to open a space to capture the most light possible. However, although Walt allowed me to work with his crew, he didn’t seem to take me seriously. The only person he appeared to listen to was his real son, Finn.

  Oh, that’s right, you don’t know about that tasty development. It seems me Step-Da, Walt, was not as careful with the condoms as he should have been. Apparently, he got some slapper pregnant on a trip to Wales that he took before he met my Ma. Walt used to always tell me how happy he was that he got to be my Da. He filled my head with lies about how I was special, how he wanted to be my Da so bad that even though me Ma got pregnant with me while they were on a “break”, he loved her something fierce and wanted to marry her and raise me as his own. Yeah, it sounds like a real fairytale doesn't it.

  Like all fairytales, this too was bull shite! A few years back this woman showed up on our doorstep and informed Walt and me Ma that Walt had fathered a son, his name was Finn and he looked just like Walt. They were both tall, lanky, with little to no muscle on them anywhere, they both had dark beady eyes like a crow, and red hair that looked like a tomato had squat on their heads.

  I had been living in a flat in town that Walt owned. Walt was a good business man and owned many flats that he rented throughout the city. He decided that I should move home and he gave me flat to Finn. After that, it was like I didn’t even exist. Walt was gone more and more and suddenly started referring to me as his step-daughter. He had never done that before, he even had the mind to ask me to call him Walt, instead of Da. He then crushed my heart when he told me to refer to him as my Step-Da on account of his son feeling uncomfortable about our relationship. Of course, after twenty-three plus years of calling him Da, I found it humiliatin’ and difficult to be demoted to step child.

  What can I say? I loved the man. Sure I loved my real Da, Jack, too. However, I only saw Jack on holidays and spoke to him through text messages. The man I saw day to day was Walt and it broke me heart to be cast aside like wrung out tissues. It was bad enough that I hadn’t been good enough to listen to on the job site because I wasn’t a man, but then he went and added insult to me wound and hired Finn as the foreman for the crew. Taking the job from Daniel King, a man that had been the foreman for Walt for over ten years and basically making the skinny wanker my boss. You can imagine how wonderful my work days are with the hoity-toity, power-hungry twit, constantly lording it over my head that he’s the top shit in the crew now.

  This is the part where I am supposed to pull my knickers up and tell Walt and Finn to go to hell. I’m supposed to recognize that I am worth more than this and not chase the love and affection of a man that clearly doesn’t want it. Right? Yep, that’s what I am supposed to do, but I haven’t. I know it’s silly, but a part of me wants to prove Walt, and even Finn wrong. I want to show them both that I could be a good contractor that my designs make sense. I know, I know, I’m looking for respect and validation in the least likely place. It just hurts ya know, I just can’t bring myself to give up on Walt just yet. I know he must have loved me, and a part of me feels if I can just make him see how good I am, he’ll regard me like he used to. Hey, no judging from the peanut gallery out there, I know it’s stupid, I just haven’t been able to convince my heart to let go yet.

  That brings me to the next part of the story. When Da got hurt in the fire in Las Vegas, I pushed hard to convince him to come to Dublin to convalesce. The simple reason was that my Ma was so damn sad. Walt left her and moved into a large residence in Dublin and filed for an annulment. Oh wait, you thought divorce in Ireland was easy? Let me tell you, to get a divorce in Ireland you have to live apart for years, basically agree to never get back together and then finally see a solicitor. I’ve broken it down to the basics, but that’s the gist of it. So how then did Walt procure an annulment after living with my Ma for so many years? He provided “proof” from a priest that attested to the fact that Walt and me Ma were only sixteen when they wed. That and some greased palms later made my Ma a divorced woman and Walt free to marry Finn’s mother.

  It was quite the scandal here in town and I was so furious with Walt that I wanted to scream. However, me Ma made me hold my tongue and be thankful that he had deeded the farmhouse to her and paid her a monthly amount. Which was only fittin’ since they had been married so long and me Ma had never worked outside the home. She insisted that I keep working with Walt and I took on whatever expenses his shitty stipend didn’t. I couldn’t bear to see my Ma suffer any more than she already was.

  So when I brought me real Da, Jack, to Dublin, I settled him here in the guest room and waited to see if sparks would fly. It didn’t take long before Jack was turnin’ on the charm to me Ma. She would flit around the house humming and when he didn’t know I was watching Jack would pat her behind or kiss her cheek.

  Now they’re sharin’ the master bedroom and I am pretty sure it won’t be long before he makes an honest woman out of her. Walt for his part was fit to be tied and threatened to stop paying her the stipend he had agreed on. That was just fine with me Da, Jack, he told Walt we didn’t need his money. Jack even told me I didn’t need to work for Walt anymore, that he could teach me how to run a bar. He was even willing to back me if I wanted to open a pub of my own. So I got a job in town at one of the local bars to see if it was something I could love. Jack was so excited when I told him about it that I wanted to keep that sparkle of happiness in his eyes.

  This put me right at the corner of Deep and Shite. Have ya been there then? If you have you know it’s the worst place to be. I was chasin’ respect and love from Walt because he had been my Da for so long, and I was chasing acceptance and love from Jack because I had missed so many years with him. The only thing I wasn’t chasin’ were dreams of me own.

  I know I seem like a weak, silly article, chasin’ the affection and respect of two men who both seem to want opposite paths for me. But cut me some slack will ya, Rome wasn’t built in a bloody day and I still have Sean to fecking deal with. It’s like a never-ending shite cycle.

  Decidin’ to drag myself from the pity party I am sure I deserve, I grabbed the biscuits and trudged out to the front room determined to be polite and cordial to Dalton -pain in me arse- Hudson.

  Dalton

  It takes a lot to make me feel like an ass. As I pride myself on being able to smoothly navigate any situation, I feel like I may have stooped a little low when I gave Camille’s mother and Jack my slightly revised version of what happened on the way home from the airport. Hey, I was feeling trapped. I knew Camille was going to bust me out to her parents about the fact that I had basically strapped her to her seat against her will, but that wasn’t what made me feel guilty.

  What made me feel guilty was the fact that both Jack and Camille’s mother, Kathryn, not only seemed to approve of my methods but actually apologized to me for having to do it. If that wasn’t enough shit on a cracker, I heard Camille shouting at her mother about how I had kissed her. My eyes had flown to Jack’s, surely he was going to pummel my face in and I was prepared to take a well-deserved hit or two. Then the strangest thing happened, Jack laughed and clapped me on the shoulder, and I heard Kathryn basically tell Camille that my kissing her was a good thing.

  Yes, asshole, that’s me. Now I know why Camille is so damned angry. She’s a grown woman torn between who she wants to be and who everyone else sees her as. Not even Jack appears to really understand her or listen to what she wants. It was sure as shit clear to me that Camille wants nothing to do with her ex-douchebag, but her mother doesn’t seem to care and now I was just as guilty as the rest of them.

  I watched her eyes as she approached the table. After only a few moments she ducked her head to her ches
t and set the plate of cookies on the small coffee table. Even though she refused to look at me, her eyes had said everything I needed to know when she entered the room. Defeated, she felt defeated against her parents, against Sean and even me.

  The next few moments were the most awkward of my life. Jack asked question after question about Synclair. I tried to catch Camille’s gaze, but she refused to look at me. Instead, she stared toward the fireplace, her eyes staring into the flames as if she was searching for something there.

  Jack was animated and lit up when talking about Synclair I could see why Camille was feeling left out. No wonder the girl doubted herself, if Jack was always this lit up when he talked about Synclair and Walt was ignoring her for his new, instant son, then who was left to make Camille feel wanted and loved? Don’t get me wrong, before Camille came into the room, Jack was telling me all about Walt, Sean, Camille’s new brother, and all the other details that Synclair had left out; you could tell by the way he spoke about his daughter that he loved her, deeply. However, by the way Camille was staring off into nothingness, Jack was doing a piss-poor job of communicating how he felt with his daughter.

  What everyone else seemed to miss was how miserable this woman was. Living to please everyone else, I wondered what Camille dreamed about? What would it take to make her smile, to make her laugh with happiness and sarcasm? It felt like my mission to get Camille out of her shell had just gotten an extra layer added to it. To get Camille to believe in herself, to stand up for herself and go after her own dreams. Suddenly, my trip to Ireland to build a wedding gazebo had just gotten way more serious.