“Hey, girl, how are you feeling?” Kat was taking a batch of cookies out of the oven when Dax walked in. She smiled at him and set the cookies down.

“Good as new. I’m ready to make some money. I haven’t gotten any calls from the posters we put up in town; have you?”

Dax went over to the coffee pot, took a mug off the tree, and poured himself a cup. “Sit with me?”

“Not a promising answer.” Dax had paid for Kat to make a full-color poster for her new business, and between her and the prospects, they’d plastered them all over Dorchester. Kat was planning a trip into downtown Boston with David over the coming weekend and she planned on putting more up there as well.

He grinned at her and sat down at the table. “Sit. I just want to talk.”

Kat wiped her hands on the cup towel and went over and sat across from Dax. She suddenly remembered what David was doing earlier that day before going into work. “Oh, no! Is David okay?” He had asked Dax to teach him to ride a motorcycle. He was thinking of buying a Harley. Kat thought it was sweet and a little bit hilarious. Suddenly she was worried, though.

“He’s fine. We had a good lesson today. He only dumped it once.”

Kat smiled. “That’s my boy. Okay, so what’s up?”

Dax took a sip of his coffee and sighed. “Vinnie Tucci.”

“What the fuck? Is there anything you don’t know?”

Smiling again he said, “Not if it happens in my town.”

“Seriously, who told you?”

“I’ve been doing my own research. Kat, we all know you couldn’t afford that surgery for Dillon—even Dillon knows. He asked me to look into it after I already had people on it. You made a trip out to California. That was easy enough to find out. From there…well, I had to get creative, but once I traced the cash to Tucci, he was more than happy to talk to me.”

“That fucker. Why was he happy to talk to you about me?”

“He’s funding an HBO show. It’s called ‘Rebel Hearts.’ Have you heard of it?”

“That biker show? I heard it sucks balls.”

Dax laughed. “Yeah, I watched an episode of it at his request. It may as well be made by Disney.”

“So what does any of that have to do with me and my agreement with him?”

“He needs a consultant. He’s offered the job to me.”

“Wow, well…that’s cool, I guess. Tucci is kind of a bastard to work for, though.”

Dax chuckled. “So am I. He wants me on set for the filming of this entire season. It’s filmed in upstate New York so it would be a lot of traveling for me. Angel could come with me sometimes, and Susie, so we could turn it into a family thing.”

“Cool, so is he paying you good money?”

“Well, there’s the part that involves you. I told him I’d only do it if he wiped out your debt.”

“What the hell? No way! Dax, I owe that man a quarter of a million dollars!”

“I know. By the time you paid it back, if you ever could, you’d owe him half a mill. Kat, he would own you and frankly, I would’ve thought you’d know better.”

“I do know better. But Dillon was going to die, Dax. What was I supposed to do?”

“Come to me?”

She shook her head. “You have over a hundred people to look out for, not to mention a family. I wasn’t going to come to you over that kind of cash.”

“I would have figured out a way to help you.”

“I don’t doubt that. You always figure out a way.” And look fucking fine doing it, she thought. “But this was my problem—it still is. Take Tucci’s cash for your work and don’t worry about me. I’ll be fine.”

“You’ve been saying that since you were thirteen years old, Kat. All this time and you haven’t figured out that you’re our family too. Family is what it’s all about, and I won’t turn my back on you even if you beg me to. I’ve already talked to Angel. I’m taking Tucci’s job. Shooting doesn’t start for a few months and that will give me time to take care of…something I’m working on here. But he had one other stipulation before he’d agree to wipe the slate clean between you.”

“What was that? My father’s balls on a platter? My ovaries fried for his lunch?”

Dax chuckled and shook his head at her. “No. He wants you to work with the stunt crew. He said you don’t have to do the stunts, unless you want to. He wants you to make them look like…and these are his words…‘they’re riding a fucking motorcycle and not their mother’s ass.’”

Kat laughed. “Shit. I miss the stunt scene. But that would take a lot of time away from the catering business, if it picks up…”

“The girls said they’d help. I talked to them already too, just in case.”

“The girls? The Bunnies from the ranch?”

“They’re good people and most of them are good cooks too. You have three months to train them. You don’t have to give me an answer today, but I told Tucci I’d let him know by the weekend.”

She wrinkled her nose and said, “I haven’t told David yet…about Tucci.”

“Hmm…” Dax got up and put his cup in the sink. Walking over to the oven and grabbing a cookie off the pan he said, “I guess you ought to do that first, huh?”

* * *

“I’m only going to be gone one night, Dillon.”

“I almost died. I saw the light, Kitty-Kat. I heard your dear, departed mother’s voice…”

“Give it a rest, Dillon. You’re giving me a headache. It’s been three weeks since your operation. You’ve been out of the hospital for a week and sitting on a barstool shooting off your mouth for three nights straight. Two of the prospects will be here to help you, there’s no reason why you can’t run this place for one night so I can go downtown with David.”

“Fine,” he said with a long sigh. “I’ll try not to reject your liver while you’re gone.”

“Give me a break. The doctor said that the graft is doing fine and it’s even already generating new growth. Take your fucking meds, drink a lot of water, don’t touch the alcohol, and you’ll be fucking fine! Why is everything an argument with you?”

“Because you’re meaner than a snake. Who leaves her father three weeks after major surgery? A transplant. A post-death surgery…”

“You know who does that? Someone who gave her father the chance to go on living so that he could annoy the hell out of her for another fifty years. What the hell was I thinking?”

Dillon smiled. “You were thinking that you love me, and you don’t want me to be alone and lonely…” He stopped mid-sentence and his eyes went to the door. Kat turned and looked in time to see Bess coming through the door. Dillon, the man who was on death’s door two minutes ago, now had his tongue hanging out and he was salivating over the old pole dancer. “You know what, Kitty-Kat? Maybe a free night would be good for both of us.”

Kat almost groaned aloud. Dillon and a sex life was not something she wanted to consider. She was saved by the object of her own sex life as David came into the bar through the kitchen door. He slid his arms around her waist and rested his chin on top of her head. “Aw, isn’t that Dillon’s girlfriend?”

Kat rolled her eyes and slipped around to face him. “Don’t call her that. It’s creepy.”

David laughed. “You have a problem with your old man having a girlfriend?”

“Bill told me she used to be a pole dancer at the Top Hat club out on I-91.”

David nodded. “I heard that too. I went to school with her youngest son…you might have known him too. His name was Brett Nichols.”

Kat made a face. “I couldn’t stand that guy. I heard his mother was a prostitute.”

David chuckled. “Rumors, just because people found out where she really did work. She raised two kids by herself. She made an honest living as a dancer—so what?”

“So who wants their father messing with an old worn-out exotic dancer?”

“Aren’t you the one who agreed with me when I said we were going to leave the past alone from now on? Bess should get the same consideration. I like her.”

“You mean you know her as something other than Brett Nichol’s mother?”

“I may have met her once, outside that capacity.”

She narrowed her eyes and said, “Where?”

“I don’t want to tell you.”

Kat stepped back and folded her arms. “Really? Now you know I only want to know even more. How do you know her? Oh, God! You didn’t…?” The very idea of David touching the old woman was ten times worse than Dillon touching her.

David’s face turned beet red. “No! No way! I mean…she could be my mother…or…”

“Grandma?” Kat said, sarcastically.

David sighed. “No, anyways, I don’t know her like that. I processed a scene a few years ago while one of the CSI guys was on vacation. Bess was there, that’s how we met.”

“Processed a scene? Like, fingerprints and DNA and stuff? Like a murder scene?”

“It was a stabbing, but the victim didn’t die. He was…stabbed a couple times…”

“Where was he stabbed?”

“At the grocery store.”

“You know what I mean. Why are you hesitating?”

“He was stabbed…in the genitals.”

“Ouch. I don’t even have a dick and balls, and that hurts. So, what was…oh, shit! She stabbed him? Bess stabbed someone in the genitals? You just said she was a nice lady, didn’t you?”

“Hey, Kat, can I get another beer?” Bill yelled at her from the other end of the bar. Kat turned, gave him a dirty look, and said:

“Get it yourself. I’m busy!” She turned back to David. “What are you smiling at?”

“Nothing, baby. I was just thinking it was a wonder that this place is struggling, the service is so good.” Kat hit him in the arm.

“Funny. Now stop trying to change the subject. Who did she stab and why?”

“Some guy groped her. She was just standing in line at the grocery store and some old coot that recognized her from her…shit…”

“What? Shit what?”

“Well, you knew she did a porn video about thirty years ago, right?”

“Jesus, this just gets better all the time. My future mommy…the porn star.”

David looked like he was trying to control his laughter as he said, “Anyways, the dirty old man put his hand between her legs and under her skirt, right there in line at Dorchester General. She happened to be carrying a blade and when she turned on him, his genitals just happened to be in striking distance. He was charged with assault and she was charged with possessing an illegal weapon. She got a few years’ probation. She should be off by now.”

Kat looked at Dillon and the redhead. They were standing next to the jukebox and Dillon’s mouth was close to her ear. She wondered what he was saying…then when her stomach twisted, she decided she was better off not knowing. Looking back at David she said, “I guess it’s like the old saying…”

“What saying is that, baby?”

“You can take the family out of the apartment over the bar…”

He laughed. “You both still live there.”

“Yeah, whatever. Fuck my life.”