I chuckled. “You’ll make it up to her.”
Apollo’s loaded drawl made me want to hurl. “Oh, I’ll always make it up to her.”
“Thanks, Apollo.”
That “thanks” was for a lot of things, which he knew.
He’d done a lot for me.
He’d broken me out of prison and given me a life again, yes.
But seeing my sister drooling on a couch with a small smile on her face? That was what I really wanted to see.
Her happy.
That was all that mattered.
Three
When doctors deliver a big baby, they should take a picture with it like a fish.
—Mable to Cody
Mable
“Hello, Ms. Mable. What’d you bring us for breakfast today?”
I walked into the huge room of blue-collar workers, and didn’t feel a single ounce of worry.
These men were the best of the best.
They would protect me with their lives.
There were about twenty huge, hairy, muscular, not-so-muscular, rough and somewhat scary men waiting for me at the door.
I pointed at the car. “There are three more huge bags in the car.”
I wasn’t sure how it’d turned into my job to cook for these crazy men once a week, but it was turning out to be a hella lucrative business for me.
In the beginning, it’d started out as me just sharing a few cookies with the crew when I had them to spare.
But if anyone had spent any time around men, you knew that they were whiny when they didn’t get a piece of the pie, so to speak.
So I’d started bringing more.
And more.
And more.
Until now, they paid me a hefty penny to cook for them once a week.
Every week, the men contributed some money to a jar in the corner of the room. I’d take that money at the end of the week, and Monday morning I would come in with some goodies.
Those goodies had become a tradition, and now I was cooking up a storm Sunday night and early Monday morning to bring in delicacies that these blue-collar men would devour the moment I walked through the door.
Today, I’d made skillet queso, all portioned up into individual containers, so they had their own and didn’t have to fight it out over who got more. I’d also made breakfast burritos with chorizo, brisket and corn. A fruit salad. And so many cheese Danishes that they would have enough to take home to their families.
“Oh my god,” Jesper, the biggest and scariest of the group, said when he saw the Danishes. “These are my favorite!”
