Moving here had been the first time he hadn’t had a member of his family walking into his home like they owned it or demanding he fix something or date some long-distance cousin. The flip side was that they weren’t there, and for the first time in his life, he spent a lot of time alone. At first it had been fine, and he’d been able to relax, but now he found he did miss them. Only a little, though. The interfering always became too much for Santino to handle.
“When everything here is how I want it, then me and Charlie will come to visit.”
“I can’t believe you have a dog. You know how Mamma feels about dogs.”
Santino was well aware of how Luna felt about dogs. “I’ve always wanted a pet, Bianca, and now I have one.”
“You can’t bring him home. You need to find someone to take him in.”
Santino rolled his eyes. “I know.” He needed to work harder to win them over where Charlie was concerned.
“Tell me. Are there any hot single men available there?”
“No, sadly. I looked for me, but there was none. At all.” If there were, Santino would warn them to stay away from his sister. It would be much easier on them. “I have to go now. Love you,sorella.” He didn’t wait for her reply. Sighing, he glanced down at Charlie and ruffled his fur. “If they ever came here, I’d let TJ and Cody take care of you. You’d be safe there. And once they left, I’d book us on a trip somewhere to recover. I love my family, but loving them from a distance is much better.”
Santino sighed and finished watching some comedy that wasn’t a comedy, then switched the TV off. Washing his dishes, he took Charlie out for a walk, waving to his fellow dog walkers. It made him chuckle thinking how he knew the dogs’ names, but none of the owners. They probably thought the same too.
As he walked back into his home, he tripped over one of Charlie’s toys, his knee hitting the edge of a step. Grunting in pain, he sat on his butt and stared at the blood pouring from a cut above his knee. Charlie licked his face, whining a little. “You and your toys will be the death of me. Serves me right, buying you so many.” Charlie whined again and nudged closer. “Let me get this cleaned up.”
By the time he’d seen to Charlie and dragged his leg into the bathroom, Santino was biting his lip. Sitting on the toilet lid, he grabbed the wipes and cleaned it, gritting his teeth at the pain. The blood kept flowing, and Santino could tell his knee had become swollen already. “Shit.”
By the time he’d finished treating the wound, he could barely bend it. “Fuck.” Charlie nudged his head under Santino’s hand and lay his head on Santino’s thigh. “I guess a hospital trip is in my future. You need to keep your toys in one place, and I need to stop buying them for you.”
The drive to the hospital had Santino breathing through his mouth, and the walk into the ER left him gasping. Checking in, he sat and waited, then was seen by a doctor, then sat andwaited, then had an X-ray and sat and waited, and finally had stitches put in his knee and was told to rest for the next couple of weeks. And a hefty bill coming his way.
As he left, he saw TJ walking in and waved to him. TJ came over, looked at his leg, and muttered, “You fell over the dog. See, this is why I tell Cody we can’t have one.”
“I fell over Charlie’s toy.”
TJ grinned. “Now I have some ammo with Cody.”
“Is everything okay?”
“I have to see someone.” TJ’s face closed up. “I can’t talk about it.”
“If it’s about the kid, then everyone knows already. Something about his dad being a mean drunk and attacking him.”
“Fuck. This is what I hate about small towns. The fucking gossip. When everyone found out about me and Cody, you should have heard it, but I didn’t want this for Orsen.”
“Anything I can do to help? I could reach out to some of my contacts in the city.”
“You know, I might take you up on that.” TJ ran his fingers through his blond hair. “He needs a break in life. I’d have him come to stay at mine, but with the kids…”
“You do have a unique family. Is there anyone else, or will he go into the system?”
“The last place I want him to go is into the system.” TJ glanced away and frowned. “What the hell is he doing here?”
“Who?”
“Crompton.” Santino watched as TJ walked over to a truck that had seen its last day many moons ago. An old wiry man with a full bushy beard got out. The man waved TJ off, then walked past him into the hospital. “Looks like one problem has been solved.” TJ walked in after the old man and Santino shrugged. The pain injection would be wearing off soon, and he wanted tobe home and in bed when that happened. Asleep, preferably with Charlie taking his spot at the bottom of the bed.
Hobbling away, Santino somehow got into his car and drove home, leaving the hospital and whatever was going on behind.
Chapter Three
Numb. Orsen felt numb when he wasn’t in pain.
He sat on the porch that wrapped around Crompton’s home and watched the birds fly overhead. Ambrose's death had been ruled self-defense, and TJ had searched the area around the sad, broken house Orsen had called home and found a skeleton. Female, from what Orsen had been told.
