She smacked me on the chest, and poked her tongue at me. “No, smartass, I’m not getting married.”
I laughed, and managed to shove some of the shit in my mind to the dark corners again; hidden just enough to be able to function.
She dragged me into the kitchen where the rest of our family was, and they greeted me with the usual Walker hospitality of ‘hey, asshole’ and ‘bout time you got here, dickhead’. I grumbled some shit back at them but my heart was warmed by the love I found in this room. It was a welcome distraction from everything else in my life at the moment.
“So,” Carla announced, “I’ve broken up with Jesse. For good this time.”
Relief laid a huge smile on my face; this was the best news I’d had in days. “Thank Christ for that.”
“Yeah, well, you were right about him, but don’t let that go to your head.”
“Shit, never say ‘you were right’ to Nash,” Erika chimed in.
“That’s the fucking truth,” Jamison agreed, “He’ll never let you forget it now.”
I raised my hands. “Nope, I promise not to remind you of just how often I’m right,” I winked at Carla, “but let the record show, it happens often.”
My mother rolled her eyes. “My cocky son. You haven’t changed much over the years.”
“And yet, you still love me just as much,” I joked with her.
“Most days. On the other days, I remind myself that there’s a nice guy in there somewhere.”
Erika chose this moment to bring up her issues with me. “I’m having one of those days with Nash today; reminding myself he’s not all bad.”
“You still going on about your neighbour?” I asked.
She put her hands on her hips and glared at me. “Yes, I’m still going on about that. Why did you confront him when I told you not to?”
“You said you’d call the cops; they’d do nothing for you, so I did.”
“Well, he came and had a go at me about it last night.”
“I’ll come and see him again.”
“God, no! Just stay out of it, okay? I think we’ve come to an understanding.”
I grinned. “Hate to break it to you, sis, but it looks like I was right again.” I held up my fists. “People listen to these.”
She rolled her eyes. I laughed and turned to Carla. “So kiddo, what do you want for your birthday?”
She groaned. “Nash, I’m a grown woman, I’m not your kiddo anymore.”
I hooked my arm around her neck and dragged her closer to me. “I think if we could just get this one thing agreed upon, it would make my life a lot easier. You’ll always be a kid to me and as such you shouldn’t date ever again. Okay?”
Jamison started laughing. “I’m with Nash on that one, Carla. If he and I didn’t have to deal with the guys that want into your pants, our stress levels would dramatically decrease.”
She struggled out of my hold. “I’m only thirteen years younger than you so I’m not sure why that’s a huge deal to you.”
“Hell, even if there was only three years between us, I’d still have issues with it,” I muttered. Carla had given us many reasons over the years to worry about her; Erika too. But Carla seemed to have a knack for finding the biggest dickheads around.
Mum stepped into the conversation again. “Thank God Nash and Jamison worry about you, Carla, I’ve lost track of the number of times they’ve had to bail you out, baby.”
“And score three to Nash. Right again,” I boasted with another huge grin on my face.
Everyone in the room groaned, but I continued to flash my shit-eating grin at them. Family. It was just what I’d needed tonight. And to think I’d almost walked away from them after I served time years ago. Thank fuck Griff had talked some sense into me and led me back to them.
***
I walked out of church the next day in a worse mood than I’d walked in. The feeling in the club at the moment was very apprehensive after the fall out between Marcus and J, and Marcus had just cemented his asshole status. Problem was that most of the boys were behind him, leaving the few of us behind J with our dicks swinging in the wind.
“Nash, got a minute?”
I turned to see Marcus walking towards me. “What’s up?”
“You know where J has gone?”
“No, that fucker doesn’t tell me anything,” I lied.
He assessed me for a second. His scrutiny pissed me off; actually, everything about him pissed me off.
“You seen Madison lately?”
“Fuck, Marcus, I don’t keep tabs on your daughter. If you wanna see her, you sort that shit out, don’t go through me.”
His anger threatened to erupt, but he kept it in check. “You need to learn some fuckin’ respect. Shit’s gonna go down and if you don’t pull your head in, things are gonna get real messy, real fuckin’ quick.”
I stepped closer to him. “Have the fuck at it, asshole, because the way I’m feeling, I could give a flying fuck.” My anger burned in me; it was getting harder each passing day to contain it, and Marcus copped a lick of it.
He growled. “Remember you said that.”