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“Can you sing me that one too, pal?”
“Still loud?!”
“Super. Duper. Hockey game loud.”
A giant gulp of air being sucked in precedes the dramatic start to the new carol.
Locking eyes with the male underneath me, I state, “I’m not a man who likes to repeat himself, Howard.”
“Someone online paid me to take him!”
My head tilts to the side to indicate he has my full attention.
“Someone texted me his photo and where him and his mom would be. All I was supposed to do was snatch him, drive around with him for a couple hours, and then drop him off at the fire station or some shit,” he rushes to explain almost in a single breath. “This shit was just meant to scare his mom. I wasn’t actually gonna hurt him!”
“You don’t think bein’ taken away by a total stranger isn’t gonna do lastin’ damage, dickhead?”
Jeremy Howard suddenly cringes as if the thought hadn’t occurred to him.
Honestly?
It probably hadn’t.
Most people have a habit of only considering the consequences of their actions in the short run.
Especiallywhen it comes to kids.
The irony of the thought isn’t completely lost upon me; however, now is not the time to worry about the two little girls waiting for me to twirl them around to “El burrito de Belén”.
I have one shook up little boy to return home.
And one long stretch of local law enforcement paperwork to fill out.
Chapter 4
Arley
I’m taking back all of Kolby’s gifts.
Particularly the very pricey, custom designed “Just Add Ice” hockey themed bar set that was my idea.
He can just drink all his favorite schnapps out of red plastic beer pong cups like he’s always done.
That’ll teach him to hang up on me.
Who the fuck hangs up on their panicking sister-in-law like that?!
Who the fuck drops a bomb and then just gets the hell out of the way?!
Okay.
Fine.
There are probably a large number of cases I could bring up where that exact thing occurs – in war as much as relationships I’m sure – and where the pattern of behavior appropriately fits a certain group of individuals thrust into a situation with very particular parameters, but now is not the time for logic.
No.
It’s the time for instinct.
