So much for advance warning. "White Hall! Watch your mouth!" Petal yells from across the room. Her son, River, is with her building houses with blocks and she is not happy when one of her brothers uses bad language around them—which is often.
"He knew you were here and didn't tell me? He lied to me. I'm going to string him up by his balls—"
"You asked him if he had seen me. Technically, he hadn't." I shrug, moving towards the kitchen. I figure this conversation might get a little more heated, and being out of Petal and River's ears is for the best.
"Why the fuck did you just leave like that?" White growls.
"I didn't feel like arguing with you and you were being stupid."
"So you thought you'd just run away?"
"I didn't run, White. I left. I was planning on coming here tomorrow, anyway. For some reason, I wanted to talk to Green before you talked him out of hiring me."
"You're damn right I would have. You don't need to be—"
"The only objection you have to me working for your brother is that he was on a short list of suitable fathers."
"That's not the only—"
I sigh and walk to him, stretch up on the tips of my toes and kiss his lips to stop him. It's a quick kiss, there's nothing even remotely sexy about it. Unless you count the way his arms come around me to hold me. I steady myself on his upper arms as I pull away.
“I’m not looking for a potential father now. There’s no reason for you to be upset.”
“You had a crush on him,” he grumbles, sounding like a little kid who has had his favorite toy confiscated for being bad.
“White, that was ages ago and lasted a minute. I missed you,” I tell him in complete honesty.
“Then you shouldn’t have left. There were things we had left to discuss.”
“Is ‘discuss’ code for sex here?”
“Maybe,” he says, and his lips spread into a smile as he relaxes. I can feel the tension leave him.
“Then maybe we can discuss things later,” I tell him and this time I know it’s not my imagination that his hands bite into my hips as we stand there. Suddenly out of nowhere it hits me that White thinks I’m pretty. It’s there in the way he’s looking at me, and the smile on his face. It’s in the way he’s holding me, and the way he’s jealous over his brother. To a woman who has never felt particularly pretty in her entire life, this discovery is life-altering.
“What you two better be discussing is why no one told me about my grandkid you are hatching!”
My head goes down with a wince and I close my eyes. I’ve told Ida Sue that I’m not pregnant. She’s either completely tuning me out or thinks I’m lying. I hear White’s matching groan of frustration and feel his fingers bite into my hips again. There’s definitely going to be bruises there tomorrow.
“Mom, I told you. Kayla’s not pregnant.”
“Then what was all the crap in the papers?”
“Someone who knew me saw us standing in front of the clinic and snapped a picture, Ida Sue. She sold it for money. I promise you, if I was pregnant I would tell you.”
“What a fur-burger,” she grumbles. “White, what were you doing at the clinic anyway if you hadn’t knocked up my girl?”
“Fur-burger?” I repeat, mostly dumbfounded. I’m used to Ida Sue. It’s just I’ve never heard of that particular term before.
“Yes, dear. You know a hairy twat. A fur-burger.”
“I want a fur-burger!” Little River says, coming in with Petal and Petal’s face goes pale as a ghost.
White loses it, laughing into the back of my neck as he pulls me into him.
“With the way the boys in this family are, you probably will someday,” Petal mumbles, and this time I have to bite my lip to keep from joining White in laughing.
“You don’t want one. How about a regular hamburger instead?” Ida Sue says, bending down to the little boy.
“No, thanks. Daddy is coming to take me to dinner. We’re gonna have pizza!”
“Yay. When’s Puke-a getting here,” Ida Sue mutters.
“His name is Luka and can you please be civil about him around River? He is his father,” Petal whispers.
“He’s not paying attention to me,” Ida Sue says, and it’s true since the little boy in question has moved to the other side of the room and is petting a dog.
“Still, Mom. You know better. Luka is a part of our lives.”
“I didn’t choose that. I remember telling you from day one you were making a mistake with that one.”
“Did you ever think that if you had lightened up on Luka, we might have made it?”
“Don’t go blaming me for the reason your marriage ended. The fact that Luka was cozying up with his new female deputy had a lot more to do with that than me.”
“I don’t want to talk with you about this,” Petal sighs. “I’m going to get River ready to see his dad.”
“Fine with me. I’d rather not think about that idiot. It will ruin my appetite. Besides, I’d much rather know what Kayla and White were doing outside a family planning clinic.”
“They give out rubbers at those things too, Mom,” White sighs.
“Nice try, dear. But I’m not buying that since Kayla here wants a baby and we all know that.”