Doc was in the process of building a bonfire, while June and Smokey chatted nearby. Around the picnic table sat Ginny, Joe, and Sylvia on one side, while Debbie and Max sat across from them. Half-eaten plates of food and bottles of beer were scattered across the table.
Someone had brought out the tape deck and Ginny was singing along to Billie Holiday. Eyes half-lidded, her chin resting in her hand, a clove cigarette smoking between her fingers, she swayed gently from side to side.
The Judge, thankfully, was nowhere in sight.
As Preacher drew closer to the picnic table, Ginny was the first to notice him. She smiled, and he felt that smile wrap around him like a warm blanket.
A flicker of light turned his attention to Max. His brother had lit a cigarette for Debbie and had used the opportunity to slide himself closer. Max, with his usual dopey-as-shit smile plastered across his face, leaned into Debbie and whispered something in her ear.
Preacher’s eyes narrowed into slits. That stupid little fucker likes her.
Although Max wasn’t quite so little anymore. It was yet another thing that had changed while he’d been locked up. Joe had married Sylvia, and Max had gone from a gangly fourteen-year-old obsessed with pinball and Planet of the Apes to a taller, thicker version of himself, and with a five o’clock shadow.
Max was nearly a man now, and it wouldn’t be all that much longer before The Judge patched him into the club.
Preacher frowned. Man or not, Max should know better than to encroach on his girl.
He paused, his forehead wrinkling. What the hell? Debbie wasn’t his girl. Debbie wasn’t his anything. But as he resumed his trek toward the picnic tables, watching Max continue to try and coax Debbie into conversation, he found himself growing more and more irritated.
So irritated in fact that, when he reached them, he hooked his arm around Max’s neck and forcefully dragged him, flailing and cursing, down the entire length of the bench and deposited him onto the ground. While Max continued to curse, Joe burst into a fit of laughter, pounding the table with his fist.
Preacher took Max’s seat beside Debbie and placed her backpack between them. “Whatever he was sayin’ about me, it ain’t true.”
She attempted a smile, but her eyes were shuttered as she looked up at him, and her bottom lip was wet and swollen as if she’d been chewing nervously on it the entire time he’d been gone.
Dropping an arm over her shoulders, he bowed his head to hers. “You okay?”
She faced him fully, bringing their faces nearly flush, and his gaze dropped again to her mouth. Man, this girl had some seriously great lips. Kissable lips. Lips that begged to be sucked on. Lips that he knew firsthand tasted both salty and sweet. Lips that he wanted to—
“Damon? Earth to Damon?”
Preacher’s eyes snapped to his mother. “What?”
“I was saying that I had Max set up your tent for Debbie—”
“Found a Playboy in it,” Max interrupted, and Preacher could hear the smirk on his little brother’s face. “December issue,” he continued. “Big ole titties and—”
Preacher reached behind him to where Max now sat, grabbed a fistful of his brother’s shirt, and shoved him off the bench. Max hit the ground with a loud “oomph,” and again Joe roared with laughter.
Stubbing out her cigarette, Ginny shot Preacher a look that made him feel like he was twelve years old again. “As I was saying,” she said pointedly, “I had Max set up your tent for Debbie, and you can share with Joe.”
Joe’s laughter abruptly cut off. Horror-stricken, he faced Ginny. “What? Mom, no!”
Preacher, feeling equally horrified, jerked his thumb at Sylvia. “What about Sylvie? Shouldn’t Joe be sleepin’ with his wife?”
Preacher had been forced to share a room with Joe until he’d moved out on his own and knew better than most that Joe snored at a decibel level very few could reach—a horrible combination of braying mule and table saw. Joe also came with his own unbearable stench, a cross between stale beer and dirty socks.
When it came to sharing sleeping space with another man, Preacher would choose anyone over Joe.
Sylvia shot Preacher an annoyed glance. “In case you haven’t noticed, you idiot, I’m pregnant with your nephew. And I’m too big to be sleepin’ on the ground. You put me on the ground and I won’t ever get up again.”
“She’s been sleeping in the camper with us,” Ginny added.
“Nephew?” Preacher asked, glancing at Joe. “It’s a boy?”
“We don’t know.” Joe rolled his eyes. “Just last week she was sayin’ he was a she.”
Sylvia glared. “Well, I have to call it something, don’t I?”
“She’s carrying low.” Ginny gestured to Sylvia’s swollen belly. “My guess is it’s a boy.”
Sylvia beamed. “See! We can call him a he!”
Joe ran a hand through his short dark hair and mumbled something that sounded suspiciously like, “How ‘bout we call him a life-ruining cock block?”
“Joseph Fox!” Ginny snapped, her eyes wide.
“What did you say?” Sylvia demanded, thrusting a finger at Joe, the nail painted bright red.
“Nothin’,” Joe muttered.
“It wasn’t nothin’!” she shot back. “I heard you!” Sylvia slowly lifted herself off the bench. Standing over Joe, she glared down at him. “You apologize!”
Joe, refusing to look at his wife, only scowled at the tabletop.
“What about Max?” Preacher had to raise his voice to be heard over Sylvia. “Why can’t he double with Joe?”
“Hell no!” Max chimed in, “I’m sharin’ with Knuckles! You couldn’t pay me to sleep in that stink-hole!”
No one paid either Max or Preacher any attention. Sylvia had graduated to shouting while Joe looked like he wished a lightning bolt would strike him dead. Ginny had moved to stand between them and was attempting to calm Sylvia down with hand gestures and softly spoken words.
Preacher sighed. Didn’t his mother know by now that her attempts were futile? A bat to the head wouldn’t shut up a Jersey girl—let alone an Italian. The only chance anyone had at peace was walking into traffic.
Eventually Sylvia burst into loud, exaggerated tears and shuffled away. Joe looked momentarily relieved until Ginny snatched his arm and dragged him along after her.
“Is it always like this?” Looking bewildered, Debbie stared after Ginny and Joe as if she didn’t quite know what to make of his family.
“Yup.” It was Max who’d answered. At some point, he’d taken Sylvia’s seat across from Debbie. Leaning forward on his elbows, a cocksure grin on his face, Max said, “Sometimes it’s worse. You should see them when—”
“Go away,” Preacher interjected. He really, really did not like the way Max was looking at Debbie—like it was his goddamn birthday and she was a present he couldn’t wait to unwrap.
Max faced Preacher, his eyes narrowed into angry slits. “Man, what is your fuckin’ problem?”
“You are. So go away. Right now.”
Eyes flashing, Max shot to his feet and slapped his palms down hard on the table. “You’re just like Dad!” he accused, before storming off.
Preacher watched him go, more perturbed that Max had likened him to their father than anything else.
“That wasn’t very nice,” Debbie remarked.