Page 151 of Pregnant By A Rich Demon 4

“Delphine, I need to get back out⁠—”

“I said sit down!” she barked, loud enough to rattle the china in the hutch. “You look like a corpse that dug its own grave. You think you’re gonna outsmart your crazy-ass brother when your brain is running on fumes and your hands are shaking like a junkie? Sit your ass down.”

I walked into the kitchen and sat at the small linoleum table.

Within ten minutes, she slammed a plate in front of me: three scrambled eggs, two thick patties of hot country sausage, a mound of yellow grits with a slab of butter melting in the center, and two toasted biscuits.

She set a glass of whole milk and a steaming mug of chicory coffee beside the plate.

“Eat all of it,” she commanded, leaning against the counter and crossing her arms.

“I’m not hungry, Mama⁠—”

“I didn’t ask if you were hungry. I told you to eat.”

I picked up the fork. My stomach turned at the first bite, but under her unblinking stare, I forced it down. Then another. And another. The hot, heavy food hit my empty stomach like lead, but within minutes, the violent trembling in my fingers began to subside.

When the plate was clean, she snatched it away, set it in the sink, and pointed a finger toward the sofa in the living room.

“Three hours,” she said.

“Delphine, Priest is outside⁠—”

“Priest can come inside and sit his ass down too if he wants, or he can sit in that fancy truck,” she cut me off. “You are sleeping for three hours. If you try to walk out that front door before nine o’clock, I’ll take that heavy skillet and put you to sleep myself.”

I looked at her. In the entire city of New Orleans, there wasn’t a man alive who could give me an order and live to brag about it. Winston couldn’t do it with a bullet.

But Delphine Renois looked at me not as a crime boss, not as a threat, but as the father of her grandchild, who needed to be put back together so he could finish the job.

I walked into the living room, sat on the faded floral sofa, and lay back.

She threw a heavy handmade quilt over my shoulders. It smelled like cedar and vanilla.

“Sleep,” she muttered from the hallway. “I’ll keep watch.”

The moment my head hit the cushion, the darkness took me.

Three hours later, exactly to the minute, a hand shook my shoulder.

“Up,” Delphine said.

My eyes snapped open. The room was flooded with morning light. My mouth tasted dry, but the crushing, suffocating fog behind my eyes had cleared. My thoughts were sharp again. The panic that had nearly driven me to murder an innocent man on that barge was locked back in its cage, replaced by cold, surgical focus.

Delphine stood over me, holding a large stainless-steel thermos and my truck keys.

“Priest is waiting,” she said. “He had some coffee and a plate too.”

I swung my legs off the sofa and stood. I reached out, took the thermos, and looked at her.

“Thank you, Mama.”

Delphine looked at me for a long moment, her expression softening just a fraction around the corners of her mouth before hardening back into steel.

“Don’t thank me,” she said, pressing the car keys into my palm and closing my fingers over them. “Bring my daughter home.”

“I will,” I said.

And for the first time in a month, I knew exactly what I had to do.