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“It’s really not as scary as it feels right away,” another female voice said, moving up behind me.
Turning, I saw a gorgeous Black woman with literally the most perfect face I’d ever seen, walking up holding what had to be one of Remy’s cats.
Shy.
This was Shy.
McCoy’s girl.
“Feels weird coming into the group,” she added, voice low. “But they are really more like a family. A big, welcoming family. You’re going to fit right in. If at any point, you want any of the guys to leave you alone, though, all you have to do is pick up this cat,” she said, waving him around. “He pretty much wants to rip the eyes out of all men.”
“Oscar, right?” I asked, reaching out to scratch his head.
“Or as Huck calls him, Hellcat,” Shy agreed. “Come on, let’s go find Remy.”
So we did.
And I learned that there was nothing scary about these Golden Glades Henchmen. Or their women.
Their children, on the other hand?
They were terrifying creatures.
So much confidence and bravery for such small, fragile things. I found myself gasping and cringing at least fifty times over the course of each day I was there.
“They’re okay,” Remy assured me as he walked up behind me where I was watching the kids on the giant jungle gym in the backyard.
“Are you sure? Because that one has fallen down trying to climb up that slide at least eight times.”
“If it hurt too much, he wouldn’t keep doing it.”
“I think I’m too high-strung for motherhood,” I declared, hissing when the little kid landed flat on his back on the rubber mat yet again.
“What are you talking about? You mother all your animals. And mine. And all the ones you come across randomly.”
“Yeah, but, like, they listen when I say to sit and settle.”
“Did you seriously try to tell one of the kids to sit and settle?” he asked, his laugh making my hair dance around my head.
“Maybe,” I admitted, shaking my head at myself.
“Kind of wish I’d been there for that. What’d they say?”
“Well, she just kind of stared at me for a second like I didn’t make any sense then said No, thank you and ran off.”
“At least she said thank you.”
“She was very well mannered. Before she went and knocked one of the other kids out of the way so she could get on the last available swing. Kids are… complicated.”
“And you can’t stick them in a cage for a time out when they’re being bad,” Remy agreed.
“That’s what I said! In front of one of the mothers of said children,” I added, letting out a humorless chuckle.
“I’m sure she laughed.”
“She did.”
“It’s cool if we don’t have kids,” Remy said. “Because, in a way, we will always have kids,” he added, waving out toward the many of them in the yard. And there would only be more to come as the other men settled down and found the loves of their lives.
