That was when that particular bulge fell into place beside another very similar bulge at about diaphragm level, indicating that those bulges actually belonged to the woman and were actually breasts.
I had to grit my teeth to keep the laughter from pouring out of me.
Beverly’s eyes met mine over the top of the old woman’s head and what I saw had my belly clenching in laughter.
Son of a bitch.
Nothing would surprise me anymore.
Nothing.
***
It took me more than three hours to get all my paperwork done and to delegate some of my responsibilities to other officers before I could finally make my way out to the man’s house who had pressed charges against Reagan for trespassing.
When I arrived, it was to find him standing on his porch, glaring at me.
“Mr. Stoll,” I said carefully as I closed the door to my cruiser. Not just because it was starting to rain lightly, but because Groot had proved quite the escape artist since this day had begun.
I would not be bringing him on any more police encounters until I had proof that I could contain him.
Not only had he gotten out during the first two traffic stops I’d made, but he’d also gotten out while at the station and had waltzed his happy ass straight inside, delighting almost every single one of my officers and staff. All of them but one, the older man who had been there since I first started there.
He was the man in control of the booking process and the only man who had been there before me that had actually kept his job.
I fired every single other person but him.
No, ol’ Rubio Huss hadn’t liked Groot and Groot hadn’t liked him.
Neither one of them hid that fact, either.
“Can I help you, officer?” Arden Stoll asked.
I took a few careful steps away from where I’d been leaning against the cruiser and allowed Arden to see me fully.
“I wanted to play something back for you,” I said softly. Menacingly. “Let you listen to it before I get your final answer.”
Arden narrowed his eyes.
I pulled out my phone and then hit play on the recording that I had saved.
I’d listened to it seventy or eighty times now, maybe even more if you counted all the rewinding I’d done to see if I could hear anything name-wise in what Reagan screamed.
But, this time wasn’t any easier than the first time.
Her words, her pleas, still got to me.
Anger boiled up in my body, threatening to choke off my ability to think. But I shoved it down.
I needed to be able to think rationally and not kill anybody if I could manage it.
Watching Arden listen to the words, I studied his every move.
Each word that came out of Reagan’s mouth, he became stiffer and stiffer until finally, the recording ended.
“I’m not a bad person,” he whispered.
I put my phone back into my pocket.
“You’re not?” I asked.
But what I thought was, could’ve fooled me.
The screen door of the small trailer Arden had previously been standing by banged open then and I turned to find a little girl about the age of Autumn standing there.
She was a cutie.
Dressed in nothing but a white diaper and a t-shirt that came just low enough to cover half her little booty, she stared at me.
Her thumb went to her mouth and the little teddy bear she’d been holding by one ear got tucked in close to her chest as she peered at me through baby blue eyes.
Soft ringlets fell around her face and they reminded me of Reagan’s hair, making a pang of wanting shiver through me so fast and hard that I barely had any time to process it.
I wanted children with Reagan.
I wanted a baby to come outside to meet me after a long day at work, with Reagan hot on her heels.
“No, I’m not,” Arden said as he walked to the porch and leaned over the steps to pick up the little girl, tucking her close to his chest.
I watched the move.
“Doesn’t seem like that from where I’m standing,” I pointed out.
Arden swallowed.
“I don’t have the money to pay the fines,” he said, looking down at his daughter. “And my daughter has medical bills that are piling up.”
I didn’t see where he was going with this.
“I was just supposed to look the other way.”
And that’s when I understood.
“He paid your fines,” I guessed.
Arden nodded once. “Yeah.”
“In exchange for what?” I asked carefully, trying to contain my anger.
“It was stupid. I honestly didn’t think it’d work, or I would’ve never done it,” he admitted. “I reported hydrilla taking over the lake in front of my house. He said he just wanted to talk…”
That’s when I knew that the man had been fucked over just like I was sure many others had in Dusty’s reign of terror.
That didn’t make it right, though.
“You need to come to the station,” I ordered.
Arden looked down at the little girl in his arms.
“I don’t have anyone to watch her,” he admitted.
I gestured toward his house. “Go get her things. We can watch her until you find someone to come get her.”
That was when Arden knew that he’d be arrested.
I could see the lines of strain around his mouth lessen.
“It’s been killing me,” he murmured, looking down at his girl. “I would’ve eventually caved.”
Maybe, maybe not.
That wasn’t for me to decide anymore.
This man had done wrong and he needed to know that.
Some mistakes you just had to pay penance for before you could be forgiven.
Chapter 20
It’s not illegal if it’s for a Klondike Bar.
Reagan
I groaned and fell onto Tyler’s bed, my head hitting the mattress so hard that a corner of the sheet flew up in my exuberance and covered my face.
“I’m never moving again,” I whined.
Tyler chuckled from the bathroom. “Autumn’s hell on wheels.”
She and the little girl that Tyler had brought home with him for a couple of hours, Jessica, had played like wild animals. Running this way and that, splashing in a small kiddy pool that Alana had set up for them. It’d been like babies gone wild.
“I didn’t realize that kids were so much work,” I admitted. “When Janie’s and Kayla’s kids get too rowdy, I just hand them back and go home. I’m not sure how I’d do at motherhood.”
Tyler came into the room then.
I couldn’t see him, but I could feel his wild energy wrap around me like a velvet glove.
“You’d be a good mother,” he rasped, one hand running up the length of my exposed thigh. “It’s harder when they’re not your own I’m told. When they’re ours, I’m sure that you’ll like them more.”
I whipped the sheet off my head and stared at him in amazement. “Did you just say ‘when they’re ours’?”
His grin was wide.
“Yeah,” he admitted. “Realized today seeing Jessica that I wanted babies with you.”
He crawled up the bed over my body until he was on his fists hovering over me.
“I want a lot more than just babies with you, though,” he admitted. “I want you to love me forever. I want you to move into my place and then I want us to look for a new place that’ll fit us along with our growing family. And I want you to marry me.”
I blinked. “Did you just propose?”
He shifted all his weight to one fist, then brought the other hand up to curl around my jaw. “Not yet…but I just wanted to warn you that it was coming. Because I don’t see this leading anywhere else but there.”
I swallowed. “Why not now?”
He hovered down until he was i
nches away from my lips. “Because I want to ask your father for your hand in marriage and make sure he doesn’t hate me too much before I do it.”
I snorted. “My dad loves you.”
And he did.
“We’ll find out tomorrow.”
Then he shifted his weight so that he was between my thighs.
I’d never been happier in my life that the house had emptied of its occupants.
The little girl Tyler had brought home had been picked up by her grandmother. Tyler’s family had left and Groot was locked out of our bedroom because of his habit of crawling into bed with us at night if we didn’t.
Because the next thirty-eight minutes was spent with Tyler giving my lungs a workout—along with other parts of my anatomy.
Chapter 21
I hate people, but I hate saying that I hate people. It makes me sound mean when I’m really a nice person. It’s just that I hate people.
Reagan
“What the fuck, Way?” I was so confused. “What the fuck is up with the black mug? And, just sayin’, I’m not a mother. You don’t need to get me a present. Hence the word ‘mother’ in Mother’s Day.”
Wade, my baby brother, looked at the mug he was given, too. “The last time I checked, I had a dick and balls—and it’s physically impossible for me to be a mother.” He paused. “Now Father’s Day? I might or might not be a candidate for that particular holiday some day.”
Way, my baby sister, better known as Calloway Rhea the awful, looked like she was about to bust a gut as she tried to hold in her laughter.
“I just wanted to get you all something special,” Way lied through her big fat front teeth.
That’s when Tyler chimed in.
“Thanks,” Tyler drawled, looking at the plain black coffee mug with amusement. “It’s what I’ve always wanted.”
I looked over and up to see Tyler’s face set in a frown.
He wasn’t sure what to do with Way’s gift…then again, neither was I.
Though, I knew without a doubt that the damn thing was a joke of some kind. Way never managed to be an adult, despite her age indicating that she should be.
Way snickered and finger waved at Tyler. “Who are you again?”
I sighed. “I’m going to kick your ass, Way. Trust me on this. I’m going to walk up to you, shove my foot into that fat meat and knock you straight on your face. Then I’m going to…”
Lennox walked into the room and clapped her hands.
“Girls…” Lennox sighed. “Seriously, if there is one day that y’all shouldn’t fight, it’s Mother’s Day. If only because you love me and you want me to have a nice day.”
Both of us snorted. “She started it,” came from my mouth just as Way said, “I didn’t start it. I just tried to give her a thoughtful gift.”
My dad grunted. “You’re sure you want to have a part of this?”
Tyler looked amused. “I have two sisters myself. Most of the time they fought forcing me to be a referee. I’m thinking that since I don’t see blood yet, this isn’t anything I can’t handle.”
My dad grunted. “Give it time. It’s still early.”
That’s when Way started to let her asshole out to shine.
“Correct me if I’m wrong but…aren’t you both very close in age?” Way asked teasingly.
Silence. Utter and complete silence.
“I’m a few years younger than your dad, I think,” Tyler admitted finally.
He looked uncomfortable. Really uncomfortable.
Which he would be. Since the beginning, that’d been an issue in the back of his mind, along with his heartbreak, as his major reasons for not being with me.
It didn’t matter, and honestly wasn’t even that big of an age difference between the two of us.
But he obviously thought it did.
Way didn’t. She just liked to be a douche bag.
Hell, the last time I talked on the phone with her, she was banging her professor.
“Huh,” Way murmured. “That’d make y’all what…twenty years apart in age?”
“Ten,” Tyler said, sounding like he was being choked.
I narrowed my eyes at Way, telling her without words to drop it, or else.
She didn’t.
Because that wasn’t who Way was.
She was never satisfied with anything. She’d beat the dead horse until there was nothing left that would be recognizable as a horse about it.
“Ten’s not too bad,” Wade said, surprising not just me, but our parents and Tyler as well.
Not Way, though. Meaning she must’ve known what was coming.
“Why do you say that, Wade?” Way fluttered her eyelashes.
I narrowed my eyes at her. “Your fake lash coming off?”
She flipped me off. “There’s nothing wrong with fake lashes and you know it.”
I shrugged. “I guess I’m just a little bit old school and prefer my eyelashes actually attached to my face.”
Wade snorted. Our parents didn’t comment. Tyler tightened his hand into my hair.
It was almost as if he was anchoring me to him so I wouldn’t take off from the couch and launch myself at my sister—which wasn’t outside of the realm of possibility.
My sister and I had gotten into many knock-down, drag-out fights over the years. Our ages—and maturity—hadn’t stopped us from duking it out every once in a while, when it was needed.
But, in the end, Way was my sister.
It didn’t matter if we fought. It didn’t matter if she stole my clothes and then lied saying she’d never seen them, only for me to see her wearing them at a party she wasn’t even invited to and I had been. It didn’t matter if hell froze over and we never fought again.
What mattered was that she was my family and she was mine.
“I did a senior officer when I was in boot camp. She was fifteen years my senior, but goddamn she was hot. We only went out four times and we stopped before anything more could develop and we got into trouble. But every once in a while, I think about her.” Wade sighed, sounding as if he was sad.
I knew he wasn’t.
My brother was a player, plain and simple.
He’d had his heart broken once and that was enough for him realize that he didn’t want to be tied down ever again—his words, not mine.
“Wow, Wade,” Way said while everyone else remained silent. “One wouldn’t think that you’d have chanced fucking that up. Especially since you were so adamant about getting into the SEALS.”
Wade shrugged. “There was just something about her that made my heart race.”
“It was probably the fact that you could see your career swirling down the toilet with your future in it,” my father drawled.
Wade shrugged. “It might’ve been that, too. The danger factor. The knowledge that what we were doing was wrong. Hell, I wasn’t even sure how the hell I found time to do her at all.”
Lennox made a choking sound.
Way laughed. “Oh, baby brother. You’re so tactful. I, however, would never do that. I’m a perfect little pupil.”
My brother and I made eye contact. No words were exchanged, but both of us wondered who was going to pop Way’s perfect little bubble.
Wade beat me to it, though.
“I remember getting a letter from you while I was at boot camp talking about you doing your professor. Remember that? You wondered whether you got the grade because of your knowledge of the subject, or the fact that you gave him an excellent blow job the day before the examination,” Wade said.
Then he got up and went to the kitchen with his black coffee mug in his hand while the rest of us digested that news.
I hadn’t realized that that particular tidbit had happened, but it didn’t surprise me in the least.
I looked over at my father, who had his head in his hands.
“We raised a bunch of awful kids,” Lennox whispered to my father.
/> I opened my mouth to argue, then shut it.
I had just gotten arrested…
“We’re not awful and you know it,” Way said, sounding amused. Nothing embarrassed the girl. “It could be worse. We could do drugs. We could be prostitutes. Sucking dick for money is never a good thing. Though, I might’ve considered it if I had to pay for my own college.”
I threw a pillow at Way, who fell back laughing.
My father groaned into his hands. “This is your fault, Lennox.”
Lennox punched my father in the shoulder. “It is most certainly not my fault. It’s your fault. All that cop talk at the table. Our children were never able to live their childhoods carefreely. They always knew the ugly truth.”
“And you coming home and telling us how you had a patient that shoved a water sprinkler up his ass and turned it on, then couldn’t get it turned off or pulled out and died, isn’t something that they didn’t take to heart either?” Dad countered.
Tyler started to silently laugh.
That laugh was cut short moments later.
I frowned, wondering what had set his back straight, then heard it.
“What the fuck?” I turned to see Wade staring at the not so black mug. “It’s changing.”
Way fell over with a wheeze and I narrowed my eyes at her and contemplated taking the mug she just gave me and beaning her over the head with it.
I would’ve, too, had a steely arm not wrapped around my waist and held me down.
Why, you ask, did I have such an extreme reaction?
Because of the photo that she used on the mug itself.
It was my mugshot photo from a few weeks ago.
I turned a death glare from the stupid fucking mug and my laughing brother, to find my sister on the ground next to Lennox—the only woman I’d ever called mom’s—feet, wheezing and laughing so hard that she was crying.
I felt the tears well.
“Do you think this is funny, Way?” I asked. “I worked for six years to get to the point where I could give my dissertation. I’ve dedicated my life to it. I almost lost my job because I’m not allowed to have a record. I did lose my scholarship. I even lost the help of my closest advisor. Even if they do let me do the dissertation, it’s likely that I’ll never graduate because I can’t afford to pay for college anymore—and not even the money that Mom and Dad saved would be enough to cover it. When they yanked my scholarship, they yanked it for the entire year. I don’t think you understand the magnitude of this. Yet, there you are, thinking shit is funny when it’s not.”
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