We’re focused, because we’ve been giving all our free energy outside of his training and my filming to this. Focusing on this one-day hearing that can either steal his life or set him free. Sadie’s got no clue about the gravity of this, because we didn’t want her to know. Landry actually asked me my opinion, like my say of what happens means something to him. I don’t take that lightly.
Landry stirs next to me, but I’ve been up, wearing his readers, sifting through my notes on my phone for the last two hours.
“You up already?” he asks through a yawn. My entire body lights up when he rolls over, muscled chest on display, sheet bunched at his waist, one thick thigh slung over the top. Ignoring the thickness hardening behind the sheet as his cock wakes up is torture. But you know what they say, we do crazy things for love.
“Yeah,” I tell him, sliding his readers down my nose. “Just antsy, is all.”
He kisses my arm, and I sift my fingers through his hair, scratching his scalp. “You sleep okay?”
I abandon my phone on the mattress and twist beneath the covers until my body is pressed tight to his. “Yeah, how about you?” I know I should have struggled to fall asleep with all this mess on my mind but I can’t help that the truth is, I sleep so well next to Landry.
He weaves our fingers together, and I kick my leg out from under the covers, draping mine over his. “You wear those boots so much, I forget how small you are.” He yawns. “I slept pretty darn good.”
We fall into a comfortable silence, lying there, his soft breath dusting my hair. Outside, Bertha and her friends are bickering, and I swear Petunia is out there yelling aboutsomething already. But still, it’s so peaceful, even on our biggest day yet.
Sadie opens the door, and the handle knicks the wall where there’s proof she’s done this many times. “Daddy! Quinn! Come quick! Miss Mabel came over and she brought Mr. McCharger and helovesBig Bertha!” She jumps up and down, her bare feet thumping the worn shag carpets. “We’re gonna have a weddin’ today when we get back! Miss Mabel says we can!”
She’s back out the door in a flash.
I look up at Landry. “Aren’t they… brother and sister?”
He nods. “Yeah. We split ’em up ages ago.”
The devil chicken wedding doesn’t keep our focus long, not with what’s stretched over the horizon of this day.
Landry runs a hand down his jaw. “I gotta shave today. Show up nice. Wear my good suit.”
I nod toward the closet. “The one you wore to our wedding is in there. I pressed it last night, along with the dress I’m wearing today.”
We sit up in bed, stretched against the headboard, and he kisses my lips, and then my bare knee. “Thanks, baby.”
Outside, the girls laugh, and Big Bertha soundsassaulted. Maybe the chicken wedding is what we need to take our minds off today. “Big B and McC, isn’t that, like… incest?”
Landry snorts, sitting farther up, adjusting his spine against the headboard as he tugs me onto his lap. He pushes my hair away from my face and kisses the tip of my nose. “Chickens aren’t like us. Charger and Bertha can breed. Charger can even hook up with Betty if she were still here.”
“Betty?” That’s a name I haven’t heard.
“His mother,” Landry says. “See, it’s called line breeding. In small flocks, sometimes farmers line-breed in order to keep the traits similar. Same size chickens, same coloring, stuff likethat.” He peers out the window, and I enjoy the way his chest and neck flex when he does. “The thing is, Vaughn Ranch sells eggs. And if you line-breed too often, sometimes you can get some… well, bad eggs, I guess.”
“So while they can have sexy times, they shouldn’t.”
He nods. But that’s as far as casual conversation can stretch.
Together, we get out of bed and start pulling clothes on. Landry wears a T-shirt and blue jeans, and I tug my overalls over my tank top. I stop him in the doorway. “Hey, everything is going to be okay. Today is going to go in our favor. I promise.”
He nods, and we head down, and spend the morning with Tate and Love going over all of the possible questions and our answers as Mabel keeps the kids occupied.
When we leave for court, Landry keeps his hand on my thigh for the entire drive, and Sadie plays with Daisy Two quietly in the back seat, and I realize that this is definitely, without a doubt, where I’m meant to be.
I had no idea courtrooms were so small and stuffy. It smells like pencil shavings and mothballs in here, and I swear to goodness, half the people I’ve interviewed or interacted with in Sable Sky are here. I lean over to Miranda, our lawyer, and ask a few questions to put my nerves at ease.
“They won’t call Sadie up, right?” I glance back to where Sadie is sitting with headphones on, watching cartoons on my laptop, her hands nervously plucking at Daisy Two’s cotton mane as she watches.
She shakes her head. “Absolutely not.” Miranda glances at the yellow legal pad covered in notes, written in a cursive sosharp it’s unreadable to me. “This hearing is about proving that Landry, and you, are the best place for Sadie to be. All of the other character witnesses have already given their testimony.” I look back at the sea of familiar faces, then at Miranda. She nods.
“They started at eight. Everyone who we called showed up to sing Landry’s praises.”
My eyes water, and she passes me her linen embroidered handkerchief. “Save those for the stand.”
