“Helpin’ Parrot.” Bo had really clicked with Parrot, one of the current Prospects. He had a lot of patience for the watchful ten-year-old and let him hang around with him in the clubhouse and ‘help.’
“I know. But I need to talk to you. You can come back and help Parrot again in five minutes.” She held up her hand, her fingers splayed. Bo looked at his watch and nodded. He let her take his hand, and they went outside to sit on one of the picnic tables in the July sunshine.
Bo was comfortable in the clubhouse, and had a fairly good tolerance, by his standard, for its chaos, but even here he didn’t connect much. He had a hard time understanding people and never really got in on the joke, even with other kids. He and Loki were not even two years apart in age, and Cory and Lilli had sort of expected them to be close. When Bo was a preschooler, he’d seemed totally normal, if a little slow to speak, and had been great with Loki the toddler. But Bo began to pull inward when he was around four, and Loki had eclipsed his social development quickly once they were both school age. Now Loki—a loud, energetic kid who had both a quick, charming laugh and a fiery temper—didn’t have much patience for the older, quieter Bo, who would rather play on his computer or draw mazes and fractals in one of his hundreds of sketchbooks than throw a ball or run a race and, when he talked at all, sometimes said things that were better left unspoken. He got along better with Nolan and Parrot than he did the kids closer to his own age.
He’d been diagnosed with Asperger’s Syndrome almost four years earlier. He didn’t have the tics and quirks a lot of children on the autism spectrum had, and Lilli had been reluctant to see that his differences were in his way—they weren’t in his way at all when he was home. He didn’t mind being touched, as long as he knew and was comfortable with the person doing the touching. He liked and sought out hugs from his family. He didn’t rock or hum or flail when he got stressed, and he almost never yelled or lost control. For him, when he was over-stimulated or stressed, he sort of stopped. Lilli called it ‘hitting his pause button.’ He became almost entirely unresponsive. At first, his fugues had terrified her; her mother had often gone into similar states during her depressive phases. Now, understanding, she’d simply say, “G—Bo’s hit pause. Let’s turn it down.” And she and Gia would make his world a little saner until he could come back.
For Bo, public school had been an unmitigated disaster. With a tested IQ of 163, learning was not his problem. But learning in the clamor and cacophony of thirty other children had been impossible. She’d fought his kindergarten teacher hard at first—hard enough to scare the little twat. Well, Jesus, she’d nearly instantly decided he was ‘intellectually disabled’—which was the new term for what used to be ‘mentally retarded’—because he was quiet. Six weeks into kindergarten, and she’d decided she knew everything she needed to know about his intellect and abilities. So, since kindergarten attendance wasn’t mandatory in Missouri, and since he’d been reading chapter books already, she’d pulled him out of kindergarten at the winter break and started with first grade the next fall.
His first grade teacher had been more experienced both with developmental disabilities and with understanding how to work productively with parents, and she had finally convinced Lilli that Bo needed to be evaluated. Once she’d grasped the implications of his diagnosis, and what he would need to be able to develop successfully, Lilli had spent a lot of time looking for the right school placement for him. There was none. She was homeschooling him.
She’d become a self-taught expert on what felt like everything in the world. On Asperger’s and the rest of the autism spectrum. On the required state curriculum for elementary and middle grades. On all the best places for field trips and enrichment activities. The guys had built them a little schoolroom in the yard at home, so that the house would no longer be overwhelmed by their teaching and learning supplies.
Lilli’s life had become devoted to Bo in a way she knew Gia felt. She did everything she could to balance and give her daughter what she needed, and she knew that Gia was intensely devoted to Bo and would never begrudge him. But Gia would be thirteen next week. It was hard to be a thirteen-year-old girl under the most ideal circumstances, and Gia’s circumstances had not been ideal for a long time.
But that time was coming to an end. Isaac was coming home. He was on his way now. He had called her on Show’s phone, sitting astride his bike. His voice had sounded more real, more him, than it had in two thousand, seven hundred, and thirty-six days.
Sitting next to her at the picnic table, Bo stared at an ant ambling over the worn, dry wood. Lilli laid her hand on the table, over the space at which he’d been staring. “Bud. I need your attention.”
He turned vivid green eyes on her. Both of the children had their father’s eyes.
“Daddy’s going to be home—here, with us—in about forty minutes.” Bo looked at his watch, and Lilli waited. When he looked up again, she knew he’d figured out what time that would be. “I need you to do me a very big favor.”
He didn’t say anything. She hadn’t expected him to; as far as Bo was concerned, she wasn’t finished speaking, because he didn’t know what the favor was yet.
“Two favors, really. I need you to do two things. When he gets here and comes up to you, I need you to say ‘Hi, Dad.’ And you have to use words that he can hear. That’s one favor. The second favor is: I need you to give him a hug.”
He turned and looked out toward the road. Again, she waited, letting him process her request.
“I get a favor back. Two favors.”
“Yes. For the hug, you can have thirty extra minutes tonight playing video games at Uncle Show and Aunt Shannon’s.” The next favor was a tactical risk. “For the words, Dad will take you to the art store in Springfield for one hour, and I will give you fifty dollars to spend there.” Yes, it was bribery. Yes, she was trying to pay her kid to say literally two words to his father. She didn’t care whether it was a good parenting idea or a bad one. She did not want Isaac to come home after all these years to a cold shoulder from his son. Plus, this bribery also forced Bo to choose to spend time alone with Isaac. Knowing him, Lilli was betting that the trip would break the barrier between them.
“When?”
“Use a full sentence, so I know what to answer.”
He spoke slowly. “When do we go to the art store?”
“He’ll take you on Monday.” She hoped like crazy nothing would get in the way of that.
Bo nodded. “Okay.” He looked at his watch. “It’s been five minutes. Can I help Parrot now?”
She leaned over and kissed his cheek. “Yes. Thank you, bud. Love you.”
“Love you, Mamma.” He got up and returned to the clubhouse. Lilli sat where she was and, alone for the first time since Isaac’s call, allowed her heart to race.
~oOo~
She was still sitting there, her mind rioting while her body had not moved, when Gia sat down across from her. On the table before her she set the white vinyl binder Lilli had bought her years ago. Inside were the calendar pages Lilli had created on her laptop, printed out, and hole-punched, so that Gia could mark the days her father was gone. She had not missed a single day.
The cover had a clear sleeve, meant for a sheet of paper to slide in and serve as a title page. Over the years, Gia had taken to using that sleeve, front and back, like a kind of scrapbook, sliding little mementos in, things she wanted to tell her father about. The stub from a movie she’d seen and thought he’d like. A flyer from a bike rally Uncle Show had taken her to. A fortune from a fortune cookie, things like that. Now the cover bulged, and she’d had to tape the edges of the clear vinyl back down in a few places.
Lilli hadn’t known Gia had brought the binder with her to the clubhouse today.
“Hey, cara. What are you gonna do with that?”
Gia shrugged, releasing her shoulders with a sigh. She was so lovely. Dark, wavy hair, long and thick, her father’s eyes behind long, dark lashes, a sweet bow of a mouth.
She was tall and coltish, all slender legs and arms, and just the tiniest hint of breasts—not yet enough to warrant more than a camisole, but of course, upon the first inkling of swelling on her chest, she’d wanted a full complement of bras. Lilli had laughed and told her than one day soon, bras wouldn’t be so awesome to have to wear, but she’d bought her the underwear anyway.
“I brought it because I wanted to ask Daddy to tear it up and set it on fire with me.”
At the same time her eyes blurred with a glaze of tears, Lilli laughed. That was such a perfectly Gia thing to want to do—sweet and fierce all at once.
“Wow. That’s pretty badass. It’s actually kinda Viking, if you think about it.”
Gia nodded. “Yeah. But…this is weird.” She opened the binder and flipped through the pages—page after page filled with red Xs. She flipped to the last page, where today’s date was still unmarked. Gia had always marked the date just before bed. “I kinda want to keep this. I hate it. But I don’t want to burn it. I don’t know why.” She looked up at her mother. “That’s weird, right?”
Lilli reached out and laid her hand over Gia’s on the book. “No, cara. It’s not weird at all. I think that book is how you’ve been staying close to him all this time. I wouldn’t want to get rid of it, either. The pain in it is part of your love.”
Gia’s lower lip pooched out in a small pout, and her eyes glittered. Lilli swallowed her own emotion back down. She’d been pushing her emotions away for years. If she gave over now, she’d just dissolve, and she had big plans for the day. Big. Plans. “It’s over now, baby. He’s almost home. Any minute now. He’ll be with us. And he’ll stay. We won’t let him go again.”
Their little girl dropped her head with a nod, and Lilli squeezed her hand. When the roar of an army of Harleys rose in the distance, Gia looked up, and they both grinned.
He was home.
~oOo~
The last nearly three years had been endlessly horrible. Although by then, they’d achieved a routine at home that worked, Isaac’s prison life had gotten massively harder, seeing him so rarely, and in that place, the way he’d been changed, lines deepening on his face, his hair greying, scars appearing—every visit, every letter more despairing than the last. Even as his time had grown short, he seemed to go deeper into a darkness she hadn’t seen since he’d been paralyzed. It was like he’d been waiting to have his salvation ripped from him the second he believed it was real.
But it was real. He was home. And now, he was here. Everybody in the clubhouse—Prospects, old ladies, children, townspeople—came out and made a crowd as the bikes pulled in and parked. Isaac, grinning hugely right at her, took off his helmet and sunglasses and then dismounted. God, he looked so happy. She’d forgotten what he looked like when he was happy.
With Bo at her side, Lilli stayed back, her heart thumping so hard her ribs ached, and let Gia go to him first. She watched as Isaac lifted their girl right off her feet and swallowed her up in a bear hug. She was glad to see that his back allowed it. He stood in the lot, Gia in his arms, their heads tucked together, and everyone waited, paying a kind of quiet respect to this love between a girl and her daddy.
He set her down and took her hand, and they walked together toward Lilli and Bo. With every step he took closer, Lilli’s heart raced faster. She was lightheaded.
He stopped in front of Bo and squatted. Bo was tall, so Isaac’s change of position made him a little taller than his dad. “Hey, there, Bo.”
Bo cleared his throat. “H-hi. Dad.”
The muscles of Isaac’s face went through a tumult of spasms as he reacted to hearing Bo’s voice for the first time in…Jesus. Four years? Longer?
“Hey. Good to see you, son.” His voice was suddenly hoarse and rough. Then Bo leaned in for the required hug, and Isaac just lost it. Right there on the gravel lot, surrounded by the Horde and Signal Bend, his son in his arms, he held on and sobbed.
There was only so much of that Bo could take, even for a trip to the art store, and Isaac let him go as soon as he went stiff. Still squatting, he wiped his face with both hands.
And then he rose and went to Lilli.
“Hey, Sport.” Smiling, his face still damp, he raised a hand to her face and brushed the tips of his fingers over her cheekbone. “You are beautiful. My dream.”
Lilli laid her hands on his chest, splaying her fingers over the leather of his kutte, hot from the summer sun. He was so big and broad. So hard. So warm. So real. “You’re home. You came home to me.”
He nodded, his eyes locked with hers. Then he fed his hand into the hair behind the band of her ponytail, clutching her head hard. His other arm went quickly around her waist and brought her whole body against his. “I’m home,” he growled, and then he kissed her.
His mouth came down so hard and fast that, though she was ready for him, he mashed her lips against her teeth, and she tasted her own blood. She didn’t mind—in fact, she reveled in his force and brought both hands up, cupping his bearded jaw with one and reaching back to grab his braid and wrap it around the other. When she pulled, he made a long throaty sound, like a swallowed roar, and thrust his hips hard. The crowd around them erupted in cheers and applause, and she laughed into his savage kiss.
He pulled back just a fraction, panting. His hot, already labored breath danced over her face. “I gotta get you alone, baby.” He touched his forehead to hers, and they rested like that, breathless together.
Show cleared his throat, and Isaac turned his head, not losing contact with her forehead. “The girls made you up a room. We know you’ve got priorities.”
Isaac turned his head the other direction, toward their kids. Lilli tugged gently on his beard. “It’s okay, love,” she spoke softly, so only he could hear the words. “I talked to them about it.”
At that, Isaac stood straight. “What?”
She laughed. “I didn’t get specific. But they know they have to wait so you and I can have some couple time.”
Gia, leaning against the table she and Lilli had been sitting at earlier, chimed in. “Yeah. Mom thinks we don’t know she means you’re going back to have a lot of sex. But we do. It’s okay.”
Isaac looked a little befuddled, his head swiveling from his kids to Show and the people all around, to Lilli. He was still panting and flushed, and his erection was obvious. So she took his hand. “Come on, love. Follow me.”
“Wait!” That was Gia, and Lilli, surprised, turned back before she’d led Isaac even one step away.
“Yeah?”
“I’m sorry, I know you want to…but…” She sighed. “Daddy, would you do just one quick thing first?”
That was all it took for Isaac to find his center again and focus. He squeezed Lilli’s hand and let it go. “Sure, squirt. Anything.” He went to her side. Lilli followed and stood behind Bo.
Gia opened her calendar book. Isaac understood what it was as soon as he saw all the red Xs, and Lilli saw him go rigid. But he stood with his daughter as she flipped to the last page that had any red marks at all. Then she looked at her father.
“I had a day circled when we thought you’d come home, but then we had to add a bunch of pages, and I didn’t circle another day. I was too scared to. Even when Mom said it was definite, I was afraid to jinx it. But now you’re home.” She pulled her red marker out of her jeans pocket and circled this day’s date. Then she held the marker out to Isaac. “Will you X it out and sign it? Is that dumb?”
He stared down at that full binder, and Lilli saw his jaw moving tensely under his greying beard.
After a moment, Gia dropped her eyes. “It’s dumb. I’m sorry.”
“No. No, G. It’s not dumb at all.” Isaac cupped his hand around the side of his daughter’s head. “I’d be happy to.” He took the marker and made the X, then wrote across the rest of the blank page, I’m home, and I’m never, ever leaving you ever again. I love you. Daddy. He handed her the marker and kissed the top of her head. “That’s a promise, squirt.”
>
She started to cry, and he pulled her to him and tucked her into his kutte.
Isaac looked lost and sad and completely overwhelmed, and when Gia finally settled, Lilli went to him and took his hand again. “Okay, love. Now you’re mine. Come on.”
~oOo~
It was easy to tell which room the girls had made up, because they’d taped red streamers and foil hearts all over the door, like it was Valentine’s. Lilli guessed it was. It was seven and a half years’ worth of Valentines, and Christmases, and birthdays, all rolled up in one afternoon. They both laughed at the sweet absurdity of the decorations, and she opened the door and pulled him through.
Satin sheets. Red. Good lord.
Before she’d taken more than three steps into the room, Isaac slammed the door behind them and yanked her around and back, mashing her chest to his. “I fuckin’ need you right now, baby. I swear to Christ, I’m gonna explode.”
She wedged her hands between them and pushed away. At his frustrated groan, she smiled and took his hand, leading him to sit on the edge of the bed. “We can take as long as we want, love. But let’s get the exploding out of the way first.” She knelt on the floor between his legs, and he whimpered and put his hands on her shoulders.
“Fuck, baby. You can’t think one blow job is gonna give me stamina I haven’t needed in seven and a half years.”
Opening his belt and jeans, she grinned up at him. “You mean you haven’t been training? Building up your stamina? All that working out, and you neglect this muscle? Well, that’s okay. We’ll catch it up today.”
He groaned. “Fuck, just seeing you there”—she pulled him out of his boxer briefs and he flinched, his breath catching—“Lilli—fuck, I’m…fuck.”
His cock, his huge, gorgeous, perfect cock, weeping with need of her, was in her hands. After so long. She could have wept for the joy of it. In the tension of his body—still familiar even though it had been so long—and in the throb of his rod in her hands, she knew that he was near orgasm already. Tipping her head so that she could see him looking down at her, she sucked him into her mouth.
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