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“Nah,” I told her with a grimace. “I’ll figure it out. I’ll just call Mila.”
“River, stop being so adult.”
A soft laugh escaped me. “Mom, I hate to break it to you, but I am an adult now.”
She huffed. “Shut up, little girl. I’m not old enough to have an adult daughter.”
The pout in her voice only made me laugh more, and it felt…good. “Yeah, okay. I’m going to go now. Whatever you’re doing, please be careful.”
“I love you,” she murmured softly. “Don’t ever forget that, okay?”
The smile faded from my face as tears stung my eyes. “I-I won’t.” I swallowed hard. “I love you too.”
After I hung up, I just sat there for a while, letting my tears spill over. I hated crying, but I couldn’t seem to stop it from happening. Being sad was exhausting and made my entire body ache. It wasn’t an emotion I’d had to experience all that often in the past, but it seemed to blanket me at that moment.
Once I had my emotions under control, I decided to call Kingston. Not only did he have a car that I knew he would let me borrow until I either got mine back or bought a new one, but he was my favorite male cousin. His mom and my dad were best friends, and Aunt Quinn and Mom had been roommates before they’d married two of the Hannigan brothers. Kingston was more like my brother than my cousin since the two of us were both only children.
“It’s the ass-crack of dawn,” Kingston grumbled when he picked up after it had rung several times.
“It’s after noon,” I informed him dryly.
“Really?” He sounded dazed, and then I heard him shifting around. “Fuck, it is.” His groan sounded like he was in physical pain. “Shit. I should have been up over an hour ago to help at Aggie’s. Mom is going to kill me.”
“Um, before you go to be murdered, could you pick me up and drop me off at the shop?” I asked hopefully. “I’m kinda without a vehicle at the moment.”
“What?” he yelled. “Why the hell don’t you have a car?”
I squeezed the bridge of my nose as a headache began to pound behind my eyes. “Can we discuss that after you pick me up? I’m sure you want to get to the diner before Aunt Quinn comes looking for you.”
He groaned again. “Yeah, okay. I’ll be there in fifteen.”
I was waiting outside when he pulled up, thankfully in his car and not on his motorcycle. I wasn’t hurting, but I didn’t think riding on the back of a bike would feel all that great to me. I climbed into the front passenger seat as soon as he came to a complete stop.
“Why don’t you have a car?” he demanded as soon as we were out on the road.
I told him about Dad supposedly bringing mine over, but he hadn’t, and I wasn’t sure if he was going to. “I don’t really care if he does,” I told Kingston with a shrug. “He paid for it. Let him keep it. I’ll get my own.”
“I’m sure Aunt Kelli will have shit to say about that,” he muttered unhappily. “He’s being such a fucking prick over this whole thing, River. I knew he was going to be pissed about you and Maverick, but I figured he would get over it once he saw how much Mav loves you. This…” He tightened his hands around the steering wheel. “He needs a good knock upside of his hard head, if you ask me.”
I wrapped my arms around myself, fighting off a chill. It wasn’t even cold out, but I still found myself shivering. “I’m just glad no one got hurt at the party. My fear was that Dad would kill Maverick then and there. I call it a birthday miracle that no blood was shed.”
“Yeah, I guess,” he said with a grunt as he pulled into the parking lot of Aggie’s. “You take the car. I’ll catch a ride with Mom later. It’s not like I need this damn thing right now anyway. I’ve got my bike, so you keep this as long as you need to.”
Giving him a grateful smile, I leaned over and kissed his cheek. “Thank you,” I murmured and was rewarded with him wrapping me in a tight hug.
“Happy belated birthday, by the way. Sorry I didn’t get a chance to say it at the party.” He pulled back and gently tapped me under my chin with his fist. “Don’t drive fast. At least ten people will murder me if something happens to you in this thing.”
I smacked another kiss on his cheek. “You know you’re my favorite cousin, right?”
Opening his door, he winked at me. “Of course I am. I’m everyone’s favorite.”
Snickering, I climbed into the driver’s seat. After adjusting everything, I pulled my seat belt on and drove the few miles to the Ink Shoppe.
It was still early, so no one else was there yet. The door was locked, so I used my key and opened the back door. Maverick said his mom had gone in the day before to help run the front for his dad, but she normally didn’t do the things I took care of, like count inventory in the stock room and make sure the receipts were in order so I could keep up with the account books.
Locking the door behind me, I walked to the front of the shop and booted up the computer system. While that was getting started, I went into Uncle Spider’s office to see if there was anything in there in need of immediate attention. Sometimes he left me notes in case he needed a certain ink ordered in time for a specific tattoo. Some colors of ink weren’t kept in the shop because they weren’t regularly used and it would be a waste, so we only ordered it if a client asked for it in advance.
As expected, there were a few things I needed to order, so I went into the stock room to see if we were low on anything else.
