Chapter 15

TALON

 

The whole family went out to dinner that night. There was lots of laughter and bantering back and forth. Nonna was in her glory running rough shod over our egos. From where the conversation was heading I have to remember to hide the damn family albums once we got back home before I ended up knee deep in naked toddler pictures of my ass.

"I had a nice chat with my Kevin earlier."

She looked at me squarely, fuck; I'd forgotten about that angle. There was no doubt that the little tattletale had spilled his guts. Then again it could be about something else, nonna has a way of fishing for shit and getting things out of you when she didn’t know shit to begin with. The old sneak.

"Oh yeah? what did your little stool pigeon have to say?" I know if it’s about the team this old tyrant is gonna give me shit, just what I was trying to avoid.

"Played any football lately?"

I'm going to kick his ass. Lucky for him he’d gone home with Stephanie for the holiday or else he’d be sitting right here with us, maybe taking some of the heat off my ass. Still I could try to waylay her, if only.

"Nonna..." She held up her hand for silence, oh joy.

"I've already put in a call to the president of the school."

"What's going on mom?" Dad looked back and forth between us. “Something happen at school son?”

"It appears the coach is an asshole." Geez nonna, hearing your silver haired queen of the manor grandma drop the A bomb is always a little shocking. I thought poor Skye was gonna choke to death on her wine.

"Mom...."

"Don't censor your mother boy, you know that only makes things worse." Grandpa scolded dad who rolled his eyes at both his parents.

"Quite right hon, anyway, said asshole seems to have a problem with your future daughter in law being at practice, which apparently she's been attending without incident for some time. But because some other asshole followed her to school at which point your son, my grandson, proceeded to kick the ever living shit out of him, coach thinks she should be penalized."

"I call bullshit."

"Here, here Olivia, now as I was saying, I simply told Oliver to bench the fucker."

She promptly took her shot of ouzo followed by an opa.

"Nonna, you're not Greek."

"Mind your manners boy, now what I want to know is why you didn't see fit to fill us in on this turn of events, I would've loved to set Damien loose on his degenerate ass."

Grandpa quietly removed her wine glass from next to the old terror, about damn time. When she got into her cups it was hell dealing with her.

My baby had been extremely quiet throughout this whole exchange, in fact she'd been quiet all evening.

"You okay baby, tired from the flight?"

"No I'm good."

"You took your medicine?"

"Talon what're you a dealer? stop pushing drugs." She teased me as she flicked my hair with her fingers.

"Something's off, you're being way too quiet."

"Stop worrying already would ya I'm just enjoying the camaraderie of your family. It's nice and nonna is a hoot."

I left it alone but kept my arm around her as I listened to my busybody nonna tear into coach in between rehashing embarrassing moments from my brother's and my lives. Skye started to relax finally and everyone was talking about the coming holiday. The women asked Skylar lots of questions about her childhood, things I hadn’t even bothered to ask, but it was nice to hear of her joy in being raised on the farm. At least she’d had some good memories before that fuckwit messed shit up for her. She didn’t seem to be too bothered any longer about not going home which made me breathe a bit easier. For all my talk I only wanted her to be happy, so it was good to know that she was enjoying her time here with my family.