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“Hey, Vi,” I said, giving her a smile. “Yeah, I got back like half an hour—“
“No. Not that,” she cut me off, moving over toward my bed to drop a fast food bad on the mattress. “I told Mom I’d get you lunch,” she explained. “I mean, finally you got your head out of your ass about Louana. I will say it is pretty fucking ridiculous that it took a bullet in her ass and whatever is going on here,” she went on, waving at my aching body, “to make it happen. But it sort of makes sense with your stubborn asses.”
“She’s just sweet as fucking pie, isn’t she?” I said, looking over a Voss who shot me a smirk.
“Hey, you not only derailed your two lives when you ran off, you know. We were supposed to be a skip-tracing trio. I had to do it all by myself when you two took off. And deal with Mom’s incessant phone calls because she was worried about me not having back-up. She still calls. Sometimes when I am mid-chase.”
“She worries about you.”
“Meanwhile, you’re the kid who she needed to worry about,” Vi said, shaking her head at me. “Anyway. Good for you for getting your head out of your ass. I expect to be invited to the apartment-warming party. And I wouldn’t mind the middle name of your firstborn being named after me. Okay. I have to go pick up Layna from the airport. Don’t tell the others, but it sounds like one of her high stakes games went sideways. She’s going to be holed up with Hope for a while so she can recoup.”
With that, she was gone, leaving Voss staring at the closed door.
“It’s always something,” he said, looking back at me. “With the women in this town,” he added.
“They’re a handful,” I agreed. “But we think they’re worth it. Speaking of, there’s my handful now,” I said, smiling at Louana as she came in a moment later.
“I don’t know if I like that nickname,” she declared as she brought a coffee over to Voss. “There’s donut holes in the kitchen. If you want some, you better hurry up before Dezi finds them,” she said. “You too,” she called, somehow hearing Nave even though I’d practically forgotten he was in the bathroom cleaning.
“I could go for something sweet,” Nave said, pausing to wash his hands, then moving past her.
“It’s cut that they know when to fuck off,” Louana said, giving me a soft smile as she moved toward my bunk. “Is that from Vi?” she asked, nodding toward the grease-stained bag.
“Fast food is how she shows her love,” I told her. “So how did the apartment search go?” I asked as she handed me my coffee before reaching for her own.
“So Jazzy said there is actually a house going up for sale down the street from the club,” she told me.
“A house,” I repeated.
“I have a nice little nest egg,” she told me. “I figure real estate is probably a good place to put it. And if I get the job with Lo, I will have a steady enough income to handle all that homeownerly shit. Besides, I figure since we lost a couple of years, we might as well skip the whole apartment stage and get the house we want to settle down in.”
“I can see the logic in that,” I agreed.
“There’s only one problem,” she said, suddenly looking grave.
“What’s that?”
“We are going to have three OG Henchmen as neighbors,” she told me. “We will be the riff-raff moving in,” she added.
“Oh, it will be good for them to have something to bitch about,” I said, shrugging.
“I kind of want to walk across their front lawns just to see if they yell at me,” she told me.
“Damn youths,” I agreed. “I think it’s a great fucking idea, baby,” I told her, leaning over to press a kiss to her cheek. “Neither of us are the tip-toe into shit kind of people. Might as well jump in with both feet.”
“My thoughts exactly,” she said.
“So, what do you think Andi is going to bring us?”
“What?”
“Apparently, she gifts everyone with their new home pet.”
“Is there any way to subtly drop a hint that I’m allergic to cats and guinea pigs?” she asked.
“I’ll let Niro know,” I assured her. “What’s the matter?” I asked when her gaze seemed far away, untouchable.
“It’s so much,” she said, exhaling hard. “I feel like when you’re a kid and you throw your arms out wide and spin until you drop. And the earth is still moving even after you stop.”
