“It’s coming.”
Salinger glares at us over the mounds of zucchini.
“It sounds like you’re making progress if she gave you all this zucchini and made that post about Buddy.” Hawthorne sneaks Buddy some zucchini.
The dog scarfs it down happily then rests his head on the table.
“What firm is Jenna at now?” Salinger asks. “Mandy wants to use her on the port project and is thinking about hiring her.”
“Jenna doesn’t do well working for other people.” I sip my drink.
“You can’t just keep her locked up in your weird-ass penthouse all day.”
“I’m not locking her up anywhere.” I can’t keep the anger and bitterness out of my voice. “She’s staying with her mom and stepdad and refuses to see me.”
“Wait.” Faulkner chokes out a laugh around a stick of zucchini. “She didn’t take you back? After you went to prison for her and got her fiancé charged with fraud and got her money back? I stan her. Love any woman who fucks you over.”
I told you Faulkner was a complete psychopath.
“You did what?” Salinger hollers.
“Aww.” Hawthorne ruffles my hair while Buddy barks happily, thinking it’s a game. “He does have a heart after all. What a romantic sacrifice. It’sTitanicworthy.”
Whitman whistles a bar from “My Heart Will Go On.”
“Shut up!” I scream at my brothers while they roar with laughter. “I hate all of you.”
“No, I hate all of you,” Salinger snarls. “McCarthy, you went to prison for a girl you barely know? Are you out of your goddamn—”
A barge blares its horn.
“Oh, hell yeah, is that them?” Faulkner’s eyes light up.
“Who?”
“Chill out, Sally.” I slide back my chair.
Our older brother follows us down the cliffside path to the dock where the barge is offloading ten of the biggest bison I’ve ever seen.
“Whoa ho ho!” Faulkner whoops.
“Sign here.” The barge captain, who’s chewing a huge wad of gum, thrusts a clipboard at me, and I scrawl my signature on it.
“How are you going to get them up the slope? Did you bring a crane?” Fitz asks the captain.
“You’re not. You’re taking them back to wherever the fuck you got them from.”
“One-way trip.” The captain jumps back up on the barge.
Buddy, who has waited at the top of the path, barks as the buffalo make a lowing sound.
Salinger is pissed. “What were you thinking?”
I wince as he swears at me.
“Doesn’t it feel like home?” Faulkner is giddy.
One of the buffalo surges against his cage, and it creaks ominously.
