“CJ okay with that?”
“Does CJ use the treehouse anymore?”
“Suppose he want you to do all that shit for him with that fuckin’ treehouse?”
“I’ll talk to him.”
“That still won’t fuckin’ fly, Megan. I built this big fuckin’ house for you. The kids can have their own fuckin’ suites. I don’t even fuckin’ wanna think about how sad you gonna be if they move. You moped for weeks after Diesel left.”
“Uh, do the kids know that?”
“I just thought about it,” he confessed.
“We can talk about it with them.”
“Anything else you want to give Diesel?”
“I want you to impress upon him how important it is to respect a woman’s autonomy and to treat her with love and kindness. I want you to reward him and praise him when he does good.”
“I do. I say good fuckin’ job. What the fuck else I’m supposed to say?”
“If Rebel is over eighteen and Diesel ends his marriage to Jana, I want you to let her handle it,” Megan inserted as if Christopher was a stupid motherfucker and would just say ofuckinkay.
“Fuck no!”
“Hear me out—”
“Megan—”
“If she’s twenty-one, you stay completely out of it. If she’s eighteen, nineteen, or twenty, then…he loses something.”
“His cock, balls, and motherfuckin’ brain.”
“I don’t mean to hurt him. I mean like a penalty or a fine. Or something.”
“This ain’t no fuckin’ game. It’s Rebel’s fuckin’ life.”
“Christopher, I hope Kaia sweeps Rebel off her feet and they ride off into the sunset. We both know you, CJ, Diesel,and all the boys will block her from meeting anyone else. You’re clipping her wings when she deserves to fly. I don’t want her pregnant at eighteen because she’s too inexperienced and naïve to understand what she’s getting herself into.”
If Megan had stomped his dick, Christopher wouldn’t have been as crushed. Not that she realized it because she kept talking.
“I hope she goes to college, graduates, have all the experiences I didn’t, and settles down when she’s twenty-five or thirty. It’s the same thing I want for the boys.But, unless you and her brothers ease up on her, she will be at such a disadvantage.”
“Like you was?”
“I was never at a disadvantage,” she said. “I had the choice of going back home, giving Johnnie a chance, or living on my own. You were sending me money to take care of whatever I needed. I didn’t want any of that. I wanted you. I loved you. I love you,” she said, and continued talking about Rebel. “But Rebel doesn’t…as much as we’ve given her, she’s so sheltered. Of course, she thinks she’s in love with Diesel. What else does she know? However, if that’s who she wants, we have to whip him into shape and also try to stop them from anything serious until she’s at least twenty-one.”
Christopher stared at the ceiling, wishing Megan didn’t focus so much on the bad and the ugly. He decided to change the subject. “I been thinkin’ about another kid.”
A baby wasn’t bad or ugly. They were pure and innocent. Like Megan once was.
“I don’t want another baby right now, Christopher.”
“You told me at Christmas you wanted another kid to have a good last pregnancy.”
“I do. I did. I do,” she amended again. “Not now, though. I want Jo home. I want to help Rebel. The summer is comingup and I need to think about what to do to keep the kids entertained.”
“You on pills, right?”
