“I’m too old for this crap,” King says, his scowl deepening before he hands his cut to Joker, while Puck drops his hoodie to the floor.
Then the two idiots stand eyeing each other like they’re actually going to fight it out.
“I’m not waiting around to watch this,” I say to anyone who’s listening. I slap Koz’s hand off mine when he tries to stop my exit.
“Raney,” he growls, and I turn to glare at him.
“What?” I hiss back.
He gives the smallest of shrugs, humour hitting his lips and making them twist slightly. “Wrong way, kitten, unless you’re going to…”
I do a less than graceful pirouette and start laughing as I breeze past him in the right direction. “Come on, Koz, I’m hungry, and we’ve got a million things to do before the girls get here.”
I don’t look behind to see if he’s following, instead I can feel his presence rubbing up against me suggestively with each step he takes. I brace myself to block out the noise of them all fighting, but before that happens I’m hit by a petrichor wave that sweeps me off my feet. Puck leans down for a quick kiss on my nose before he yells over his shoulder. “King, we’ll have to sort this shit out later. Raney is so much more important. But she said stop being a dick and come spend the next few hours with us. Apparently, she’s getting packed today and she’s going to ask me to pack with her too. Then we’re going to celebrate by hunting Sharlene and pulling her fucking toenails out.”
He looks down to double check what he said is right and it is. But I add a few more things we need to do. “Don’t forget I have to figure out the whole Hayes and Talon thing, track down a baby girl, start looking for a house back home, and you need to sign a contract with the Blackhawks.”
“Whose baby?” Koz demands as he suddenly reappears next to us. He takes me out of Puck’s arms and puts me back on my feet, keeping his hand in mine.
Puck just shrugs when I look at him, and then the cheeky shit slides his hand right back down my pants again, earning him more warning rumbles from everyone trailing after us.
“Hang on! One thing at a time,” Puck says as he pulls us all to a stop. “The Blackhawks play right over the other side of the country. Am I reading this right? That’s where you live, right down there?”
I nod, and before I can say a word, he keeps going.
“Are you asking me to move in with you and sleep in your bed, in the new house you want?”
I shake my head, slightly confused, “I guess I figured that was a given. Since you already said we’re packing.”
He throws his head back, laughing before checking over his shoulder. “Nah, that was you who said you and I were packing, right when Koz was railing you through my fucking hospital bed while I was blowing on your…”
And this time instead of hanging around for my dad to explode, Puck races down the empty corridor, cackling away to himself. Miraculously, the lift opens as soon as he touches the button and as the doors close on him, he yells through the closing gap, “Meet you downstairs, babe, I’ll give King a chance to cool off. In the meantime, I’ll check we’re clear and start looking for houses.”
He doesn’t need to check anything; Dad would have people stationed everywhere. And those people would be hiding in the same shadows Koz’s security are already in.
While we wait, everyone else falls back, giving King, Koz, and me some semblance of privacy. I get ready for King to start up again. It doesn’t take long.
“Raney, you can’t play around with Puck. Cut him loose if you’re seeing whatever is going on with you different from how he is,” King says, giving me another of his best fatherly inspired looks.
In return, I give him my best fuck you glare. “Yeah, I’m not even responding to that.”
“Just did,” King says, looking blankly at the lift.
I jab him in the ribs, and he slings his arm around me again, bending down to kiss the top of my head. “Would you stop giving me such a fucking hard time, kid. First, I had to spend way too many days with Koz and now you got me duking it out with my favourite rescue project. And you and I haven’t even sat down and had a pot roast dinner yet. You know what I mean about Puck though, he was pretty fucking loose in the head for a bit.”
“Again, I’m not responding to that. And as for the dinner thing, you know all you have to do is ask me and I’ll be there. I love your cooking. But we do not need a full-on club cookout. Okay?” I narrow my eyes at him because King often ends up opening his whole house up to everyone on roast night, making it impossible for us to catch up. He’s his own worst enemy in that regard, but it’s who he is: a very generous man to those he cares about.
He ignores me, still wanting to talk about Puck. “Do me a solid, Raney, let him know there’s certain things I do not need to hear about.”
“Sounds like the same discussion I had with a certain someone a few years ago,” Koz fake whispers.
King’s reaction to Puck and me hooking up is tame compared to what happened when Koz decided we needed to be honest with Dad. I shudder, making Koz smile and my dad growl and get all edgy again.
Koz switches the mood in a second as he jabs at the lift button once more. “And now can we address the baby girl comment from earlier, thank you very much.”
I grimace and close my eyes, avoiding the look I’m going to find on both their faces. “I can’t tell you everything.”
“Bullshit,” Koz snaps, his scent getting sharp to match his tone.
