Chapter 14

When I’m through with you, even the neighbors will need a cigarette.

-Mig’s secret thoughts

Mig

“What the fuck are we doing here?” Casten asked, walking beside me down the corridor of Jefferson High School.

“Exactly what I want to know,” Wolf grumbled.

I took Nathan from Wolf’s hands, delighted to hear him giggle for the first time in weeks.

“Because, for some reason, I was roped into it,” I said, blowing a raspberry into Nathan’s neck.

He was looking really good, and I was happy to see that he’d started to come back to his old self.

“How was a six foot three motherfucker, such as yourself, ‘roped in’ to anything?” Ridley asked.

I waited until we made it into the gym, entering the door that Annie told me to enter through, and pointed.

“That,” I answered, pointing at Annie’s small shorts that covered slightly more than panties would.

“Damn,” Casten hissed, his eyes going to Tasha.

Tasha was wearing much the same as Annie was.

Short shorts that could double as a pair of those boy shorts underwear, a ribbed tank top, knee pads, long socks that came up to her knees, and white shoes the likes I’d never seen before.

I snorted, then walked to the bleachers, stepping up on the first bench to take a seat on the second.

The shoes reminded me of those old 80’s shoes that the women used to wear to work out in, offering what I guessed was ankle support.

I had to admit, Tasha looked good.

But she wasn’t Annie.

“The little high school girls aren’t doing it for me, but motherfucker, look at the other side,” Ridley drawled, looking at a young woman who was still in incredible shape, even though it was blatantly obvious that she hadn’t been in high school for a while.

“My eyes haven’t made it past that ass,” Casten mumbled, mostly to himself.

“So why did the cops get called out to your house this morning?” Ridley asked, keeping his eyes on the woman.

I sighed, shifting Nathan onto the floor between my legs.

He immediately got down and started across the court.

Annie, having seen the little boy, broke off from where she’d been setting a ball, and picked Nathan up.

Nathan and Annie had met at the party last night, and Annie had fallen in love.

Nathan had a way of making women melt, so it wasn’t much of a surprise.

“Nate!” Annie crowed, bending down to gather the boy into her arms.

Nathan squealed, and Annie took him to a cart that was holding about fifty balls, pulled one out and handed it to him.

He wrapped his chunky arms around the ball as far as he could, then laid his head against the top of it.

I turned away from the sight of her holding a baby.

My God, how I wished, yet again, it’d been her that I’d gotten pregnant.

Things would be so much simpler, easier—happier—if it were her carrying my child.

“We went to my place last night, so this morning I had to make a hasty trip by her old place, next to my house, to get her some clothes she was storing there, to wear to this,” I said. “And when I pulled up on my bike, Jennifer, who was home at the time, came out of my front door thinking I was there to see her…which I wasn’t. I’d originally intended to meet with her this morning to confront her about what Casten showed me last night, but I called and canceled when Annie asked me if I wanted to come with her.”

“And she got pissed,” Casten said dryly.

I nodded. “She got pissed.”

Wolf chuckled when his son threw the ball, causing Annie to bend over for it.

He continued to do it, too, thinking it was a fun game.

I, of course, thought it was awesome.

Annie kept bending over, giving me a fine show.

“Needless to say, she started wailing and carrying on, accusing me of cheating with our neighbor. Called me every name in the book,” I continued. “And the old woman on the other side of my house called the cops.”

Ridley nodded.

“Not really sure what she expected. You can’t just scream profanities in your yard like that. I could have charged her with disturbing the peace,” Ridley growled.

I clapped my hand down on his shoulder causing him to jerk forward slightly.

He glared at me.

“What?” He asked. “She would’ve deserved it.”

She would have, but I was trying not to be petty.

“Thought she was going to have a coronary when I told her to stop it,” Ridley continued.

“Why didn’t she?” Wolf asked.

I snorted. “She probably would have, but I got her calmed down enough that I could get gone before she could start back up again.”

“The last time you gave into her temper, you ended up marrying her,” Casten observed.

I sighed.

“He told her he’d go to her doctor’s appointment this afternoon,” Ridley said when I didn’t answer fast enough.

Casten laughed.

“You’re so fucked. You won’t be able to keep Annie for long. She’s not going to put up with your shit…nor your ex’s,” Casten informed me.

“I’m taking her with me, and you’re right. She wasn’t happy. But Jennifer doesn’t get a say so in how I live my life anymore, not when she’s in bed with the fuckin’ devil,” I ground out.

“You think she knew what she was doing at the time?” Wolf asked.

A whistle pierced the gymnasium’s air, and I looked up to find Annie hurrying toward me.

She had Nathan on one hip, and she was smiling as she walked quickly towards Wolf.

“I’ll let him keep the ball, but try not to let him throw it on the court. He might kill one of us since we’re so rusty,” Annie snickered, handing Nathan over.

Wolf took Nathan and sat him on the bleacher between his feet. “Don’t throw the ball, boy, or you’ll get me in trouble with the pretty lady.”

Annie laughed softly, raised a hand up to her face, then blew a kiss in my direction

I smiled, barely resisting the urge to ‘grab’ it out of midair and paste it to my lips.

I was not that far gone…yet.

“So how does this volleyball game work?” Wolf asked as the girls lined up.

I shrugged. “I thought you just hit it over the net. There are rules?”

“You get three hits,” Casten said, surprising both of us. “One player serves it to the other team, and they have three touches to get it back over the net and grounded on the serving team’s side for a point. And you can’t go out of that little box around the court once it goes to the other side. There is a little more to it than just that but, you get the idea.”

“How do you know all that?” Wolf asked what we were all thinking.

“My sister. I used to have to go to her practices since she was my ride home,” Casten explained.

He sounded like he didn’t want to talk about it.

Not even a little bit.

So we let it be and watched the game being played in front of us.

The high school team was good, I’d give them that.

But they weren’t the alumni.

Even without practicing, according to Annie, they still had incredible skill.

And although they were rusty at first, they played like a well-oiled machine.

Sadly, the varsity girl’s team didn’t know what hit them.

“Perfect dig,” Casten muttered, his eyes fascinated.

The ‘perfect dig’ was received by Annie, who placed it perfectly in the girl at the front’s hands.

The next play happened so fast that I wasn’t even sure what was happening.

“Block! Block! Middle!” The assistant coach screamed loudly.

The girls scrambled, having misread the direction that the setter was placing the ball.

And Tasha flawlessly arced around the setter, then proceeded to slam the ball down the girl’s throat.

It hit the ground with such force that the ball bounced at least fifteen feet in the air.

“Holy shit,” Casten said.

I concurred.

That was awesome.

“Wonder why she quit. She could be a professional,” Wolf observed.

“She’s the coach. The woman that’s up there now is the assistant coach,” I said.

Casten’s eyes came to me.

“She’s the girls’ volleyball coach? I thought she was in nursing school,” Casten said.

I nodded.

“She is. But she’s also working full time,” I agreed. “Annie says she’s a perpetual student, and has three degrees now.”

She was only a year younger than Annie’s twenty-six, and I also wondered how she’d gotten so many degrees at such a young age, but I never asked

Casten, however, was intrigued.

I could see it the way his shoulders had shifted, following Tasha’s movements the way I did Annie’s.

Annie switched positions when the girls finally scored on the alumni, and she was switched out with one of the other players.

This one was taller than Annie, and she took her position on the front row closer to the net.

Annie sat down next to a smiling girl who looked on the verge of being too thin, animatedly talking to her while she gestured to the court.

The game continued around us, and as soon as Tasha was switched out, our topic of conversation turned to a case Griffin, Wolf and I were working on.

“Could you please stop speaking so vulgarly?” A snotty woman’s voice said from beside me.

I turned to find a woman that looked like the proverbial soccer mom, or in this case volleyball mom.

“What?” I asked.

She sneered. “You’ve said the F word no less than four times in the last three sentences. Please stop speaking like that or leave. And why on earth are you wearing those gang jackets to a school function?”

My brows rose.

“I’m sorry, I wasn’t aware that there was assigned seating. If I remember correctly, I was here first. You were the one who sat down next to us,” I said plainly.

She narrowed her eyes.

“I’ll have you know that my brother is the sponsor for this team, and damn near every sporting event in the school. And I’m sure he’d be more than willing to talk to your boss,” she hissed.

I laughed.

“Lady, do you know who I am?” I asked.

She sneered.

“You’re the guy who left his pregnant wife for another woman,” she hissed.

I turned my face forward, anger boiling to the surface like lava about to erupt from a volcano.

Out of everyone in the room, I would’ve expected the blowup from any one of the boys at my side.

What I didn’t expect, though, was it to come from Annie.

A ball flew within arms reach of my face.

I could’ve reached out and slapped it away, had I been expecting it. But I hadn’t, which was why the chick at my side got a face full of volleyball.

“Shut your mouth, woman! You don’t know what you’re even talking about! So before you open your mouth in the future, make sure you know what you’re actually talking about and have your facts straight before you spread gossip and lies about people!” Annie growled.

I blinked, turning to see Annie standing about five feet from me, another ball in her hand ready to launch.

Which she didn’t waste time doing.

She reared back and threw it again, but this time I was quick enough to catch it before it could hit the woman at my side for a second time.

“Now, Annie,” I chided laughingly.

She glared at me.

“How can you defend that…that horrid, awful woman while she sits there spewing those lies? I had not one thing to do with your marriage ending, and I certainly didn’t break up your home. And, she doesn’t know a goddamned thing about your life or mine, and she shouldn’t be spreading lies and gossip like that!” Annie spat.

The woman got up, turning to face us both. Her face obviously angry and eyes narrowed as she spoke. “Oh, you’re going to regret this, I’ll make sure of it. My brother will see to it that no one, not one single person, sets foot in your salon ever again. You can kiss your business and your home-wrecking life goodbye!” The lady sneered at Annie.

I wondered idly how long Ridley was going to let this go on, but when the young girl I presumed was the woman’s daughter started to cry, it was Casten, of all people, that got up.

“This isn’t the time nor the place for this. It’s time to go,” he ordered, starting forward.

“Don’t you dare touch me!” The woman hissed and she yanked her arm away from Casten before he could touch her. She turned on her heel, and stormed out of the room, leaving the distraught girl trailing slowly behind.

“Well,” Annie huffed, “that was a lot of fun.”

I moved forward, to grab hold of her hand before she could move away, and laid a wet, possessive kiss on her mouth.

“Finish up,” I ordered. “I’ve got a few things I want to do.”

Her brows rose. “Oh yeah? What’s that?”

I didn’t answer her, I just walked back to the bleachers and took a seat once again.

She stared at me the entire way, only turning back to the game when Tasha called her name.

For the remainder of the game, we just admired the view and kept our talk to things that didn’t have anything to do with what had just happened.

Once they were done playing, we went outside to wait for Annie and Tasha.

They must have hurried because it wasn’t long before Annie was back in my arms.

“You did good, baby,” I growled against her neck.

She tasted of salt, the sweat on her skin having dried in the time she’d spent talking to all the younger players.

“So what now?” She asked. “I’ve got an hour before I have to be in the salon.”

I shook my head. “I’m have to drop you off early…I’m sorry, I have to deal with Jennifer.”

She visibly slumped.

“I was afraid you were going to say that.”