Joker laid it out, “Not sure I’m readin’ good from you, Carrie.”
“Then you’re not reading me,” she replied quietly. “This was you.”
“It was,” he confirmed, still cautious.
“You looking out for Travis and me.”
Joker said nothing because he finally got his read.
You man up for her and her kid, you’ll be the rest.
Yeah. High was right.
Carissa continued, “I don’t know whether to cry or do cartwheels, but I can’t do either because I’m at work and I can’t mess up my mascara because I didn’t bring the tube with me and they might get mad at me because I’m pretty sure cartwheels are a health and safety violation.”
“It’s not that big of a deal. My take, your landlord wanted to take you for a ride. He didn’t. You probably woulda eventually looked at your lease and questioned it. It would be a headache, but my Butterfly doesn’t take shit. You woulda got in his face. Just saved you that hassle, Carrie.”
“You did,” she agreed. “I appreciate it and I don’t know how to express that appreciation.”
He knew how she could do it but that would wait until after they went out on their date next week.
“I could wash your bike,” she suggested.
“The only thing you have to do with this bike is when I put your ass on the back of it. You don’t wash it. You also don’t do payback. It isn’t necessary. We’re new, but if we wanna do this right, this is how we start, Carissa. You’re in the position I gotta take your back. We get beyond new, there’ll be a time you return the favor. It’s just what it is. Roll with it.”
That bought him nothing.
So he called, “Carrie?”
“I wanna cry and do cartwheels again,” she told him, voice clogged.
He grinned and said nothing.
He heard her clear her throat before she went on, “That’s all the good news. The bad news is, I’ve lost important days of packing so I need to get on that pronto. And to top that, we have two cashiers down with the flu. Sharon needs me to take a shift tomorrow.”
He didn’t want her to take a shift tomorrow. He wanted to have another day with her and her boy, this time packing boxes.
But he figured she needed that shift. She probably got paid dick but more was better than less, even if it was more of practically nothing.
“Right. Dinner and me helpin’ you pack boxes tomorrow?”
“Yes,” she said quietly.
She wanted that.
Fuck yes.
“I’ll bring shit and I’ll cook.”
“I hope you won’t be cooking shit.”
He started chuckling at the first cuss word he’d heard from her ever.
“It’ll be good shit,” he said through his laughter.
“Whatever,” she said, sounding amused.
“Okay, Butterfly. Give Travis a cuddle from me, yeah?”
A soft, quiet, “Yeah, sweetie.”
Sweetie.
No old lady called her old man sweetie.
Joker fucking loved it from Carrie.
“Right, tomorrow,” he said.
“Tomorrow, Joker. Can’t wait.”
And he fucking loved that she gave him that. No bullshit. She couldn’t wait and she told him so.
He shared his feelings about that by dipping his voice when he said, “Later, baby.”
“’Bye.”
He waited for her disconnect before he shoved his phone in his back pocket, started his bike, backed it out, and took off.
* * *
“I had hoped you’d visit a barber before you showed for a family dinner,” Mrs. Heely said after Linus’s wife, Kamryn, opened the door to their house and Joker had walked in.
“I think you look wonderful,” Kam said quietly, coming up to his side, touching his hand lightly, then reaching up and kissing his bearded cheek.
He looked down at her and caught the soft smile in her gorgeous face. Linus was a good-looking man, but he still scored with Kamryn Washington.
“You’re an enabler,” Mrs. Heely sighed.
“Pipe down, woman, and give me a hug,” Joker ordered.
Her eyes lit, her face lost its fake irritation, and she moved to him and into his arms.
He closed those arms around her and bent to kiss the top of her head.
She smelled like she always smelled, a few days ago and way back when she brought him dinner.
He wondered if her son liked her smell and figured the guy had never thought of it. He also figured if he thought he’d lose it, he’d think of it and like it.
Like Joker.
“Buddy!” Linus boomed.
Mrs. Heely pulled out of his arms but Joker didn’t let her get far. He kept her close with one arm around her shoulders.
“This menace is Jackson,” Linus stated, his hand on the head of a kid who was studying Joker curiously, until his father gently swiveled his head around and he started grinning and rolling his eyes back to get a look at his dad. “This is Tyler.” Linus let his boy go and bent deep to touch the head of a little one sitting on a step, eating from a bowl of grapes. “And this,” Linus went on, twisting and hefting up a pretty little girl who was hiding behind her daddy. “Is Candace. My little Candy.” He looked into her face and ordered, “Say hi to Daddy’s friend, Joker.”
She did a quick wave then tucked herself closer to her father.
“Joker? Like Batman?” Jackson asked.
“No, son, he’s a good guy,” Linus answered.
Jackson had a look on his face that said he didn’t comprehend this but he was trying.
It was funny and Joker wanted to crack up watching him.
But he didn’t.
Because he was taking it all in.
The house was a newish build, on a small lot, but that didn’t mean it wasn’t huge. It was also nice. Clean. Decorated. All about Kam’s colorful, stylish personality… and family. And Linus, with his beautiful wife, his three healthy, cute kids, the man of the family standing among all he built, the most important things in life. Woman. Kids. And the home you could give them.
He took this in glad as fuck Linus had it.
But he took it in thinking for the first time in his life that he wanted this.
Just this.
Gorgeous woman. Cute kids. Clean home decorated in the warmth his woman wanted to give their family.
“You gonna stand there starin’ at me, or you gonna take off your jacket and drink some of your old friend’s beer?” Linus asked.
Joker let Mrs. Heely go to shrug off his jacket, answering, “Beer.”