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Chairs scraped on the floor and a fucking line formed to hug Mom as she headed our direction. I stayed where I was, chuckling as I listened to the small talk. Mom was a bonafide commodity. Warm hugs and kindness. Who didn’t want a piece of that?
“Cole Stone!” she exclaimed as Cole approached her first. “Are you married yet, young man?”
I snorted. Pushing fifty, Cole wasn’t that much younger than Mom.
“Not yet.” Cole laughed. “Haven’t found one crazy enough yet to fuckin’ marry me.”
“Language,” Mom chastised with a playful smack to his shoulder.
“Yes, ma’am.”
Danica was next—for a woman who hated contact of any kind, she fucking sank into that hug. The woman melted and clung to Mom. Not sure I blamed her. The Stones had no mom, their dad was a piece of fucking work, and Cole had raised his younger sisters while manhandling the pack. No words were exchanged as Mom stroked Danica’s hair.
“Mama Byrne!” Alice greeted with a smile. “Retirement is lookin’ good on you.”
I scoffed. Mom would never retire from taking care of the pack. Maybe in title alone, but she’d always take care of everyone for as long as she could. It was just her nature. Kind of like how she was mom to all the pack leaders.
“And look at you! Red and orange hair this time.” Mom touched the ends of Alice’s hair. “I like it. It looks good on you.”
“Thanks. I’ve been thinkin’ of addin’ pink to it next time Bea does it.” Seeing Alice so casually hold a feminine conversation about her hair was strange as fuck. The woman would just as readily bury a man as she would dye her hair. It made her fucking terrifying.
“Mama B,” Cade greeted with a giant ass grin, stooping to hug her. Nope, still didn’t fucking like him. And it bothered me how comfortable he and Mom were with one another. Okay, maybe I was stupidly possessive of my mom. Also, I was fully aware that it shouldn’t have been an issue because I didn’t mind with anyone else.
I just didn’t like Cade fucking Locke and how comfortable he was with my wife and my mom.
“How’s that shoulder treating you, sweetheart? I saw you doing a few extra stretches at your last game.” Mom watched his baseball games? God, she really did adopt every stray.
“It’s good,” he said. “I’m good.”
“I’m happy to hear that. Did you get my packages?” What fucking packages was she sending him?
“I did. The boys at the ball club send their thanks. They also sent me with tickets for the last few games of the season in case you and David feel up for a little extra vacation time. All expenses paid on us.”
“Well, now if that isn’t tempting, I don’t know what is,” Mom said.
Watching Mom with Raven next was adorable but didn’t surprise me. Mom was surrounded by boys. The minute we brought a girl around, Mom adopted her like a long-lost daughter. She’d been that way with Genevieve, and it was no different with Raven. Their interaction made my stomach turn with guilt. I was about to take that away from both of them. Mom loved having Genevieve around as much as Genevieve loved being around Mom. Fuck, Genevieve needed Mom.
Declan, Sam, and Lucas cycled through their hugs with ease. They spent enough time with Mom that they didn’t need to pull a ton of her attention.
“Mom!” Finn slid the distance between them and lifted her clean off the ground in a hug. “I missed you!”
“I know you did, sunshine.” She laughed. As he put her down, she said, “Having fun on this trip, are you?”
Oh, I knew a setup when I fucking saw one.
“Yes,” he replied slowly. From the look on his face, he did too. “What’d I do?”
“Sunshine, the next time you want to drunk dial Ella, give one of your brothers your phone, okay?” she told him. The color drained from Finn’s face, Sam fucking lost it, and I damn near tipped out of my chair from laughing so hard.
“Oh no…” he whispered. “What’d I say? Never mind. I don’t want to know.”
“I wouldn’t repeat it anyway, Finnegan, but good on you for being such a giver.” She patted his shoulder. The poor fucking kid looked ready to crawl into a hole and disappear.
“I’m never drinking again,” he let out softly. He would.
Mom turned to me, a soft smile turning her lips and crinkling the corners of her stormy gray eyes. She looked older, like somehow the past three years had aged her more than they should’ve. Probably the fucking worry. That part killed me. I knew she’d spent a fuck ton of time worrying about me.
“Hey, Mom,” I said as I stood.
