I knew why.
Darius hadn’t given me the whole story yet, but I did knowshe blamed herself for her nephew getting sucked into a world where he didn’tbelong.
It was just, she held no blame.
So I stood in front of her, a bevy of Rock Chick eyesfocused on me, and I said softly, “Come on, Aunt Shirleen.It’s been a longtime.No hug?”
She caught my eyes and relief saturated hers, right beforeshe surged out of her chair and gave me a hug.
I remembered it right.
Her hugs were the best.
“Stop hugging.Sit your ass down.Drink.”Tex was close, hisbooming even closer, so I let Shirleen go, but made sure I gave her a smilebefore Toni and I were bumped and prodded into sitting beside each other on thecouch.
Jet assumed the arm of the couch by me, Indy wedged herselfin beside Toni, and Jules was perched on the other arm.Roxie and Ava loungedin the two armchairs across from us, Daisy sitting on an arm of Ava’s chair.Shirleen sat in the one at the end, Sadie in the other.Annette sat crosslegged on the top of a table between Jules and Sadie with Stella straddling aturned-around chair she’d pulled over from a table, doing this between Sadieand Roxie.Ally doing the same thing between Roxie and Ava.
The gang was all there.
A mug topped with foam was shoved in my hand.
“Don’t know what you like, so I threw everything good atit,” Tex low-boomed.“Vanilla, cinnamon and a hint of almond.Tell me what youthink.”
I sipped it.
My eyes rolled back into my head.
He’d shoved a mug into Toni’s hands too, and I knew she hadher sip when she whispered a reverent, “Motherfucker.”
“I’ll take that as approval,” Tex declared then he clappedhis hands, the sound so loud, I jumped, nearly sloshing coffee and foam over myhand.He then rubbed them together, saying, “Right.What wetalkin’here?I gotta dust off my grenades?Smoke bombs?Or dig out my brass knuckles?”
Slowly, my head turned to Toni to find she’d already turnedto me, and I was pretty sure we wore identical surprised/confused/terrifiedexpressions.
“We’ve never needed brass knuckles, Uncle Tex,” Roxie putin.
“Don’t mean you shouldn’t have them,” Daisy replied in heradorable country twang, studying lethally tipped nails embedded with so manyrhinestones, you could barely see the pearly pink polish underneath.“I got mesome years ago.Between Jules and Ava.Or was it Roxie and Jules?Don’t matter.Pink lacquer.They’re cute.”
Cute brass knuckles?
I was under the impression this was the chilled-out,hang-with-some-coffee-and-girlfriends-before-the-onslaught-of-a-big-party-in-order-to-get-to-know-each-otherportion of shifting into the life that I hadn’t shared with Darius until then.
How were we talking about brass knuckles?
The bell over the door sounded and I looked that way to seea tall slender white man with a brown crew cut and a shorter, handsome Hispanicman walking in.
The taller man had what looked like a scrapbook in his armtucked to his chest.
“I’m out,” Tex low-boomed, and immediately lumbered away.
Even as crazy as that man seemed, I should have taken thisas the warning it was.
Alas, I did not.
The crewcut guy walked right into the seating area, droppedthe scrapbook on the coffee table with a loudfunf,then lifted his hands, forefingers and thumbs in L-shapes, tips of thumbstouching to create a frame through which he squinted.
At me.
“Ummm…” Toni mumbled.
