Tag
Finny slams her bedroom door and I scratch my head. Peck and Star take their husbands and go home, and Marta and Emilio hang out in the kitchen for a few minutes. Benji is stirring, so I go and fix him a bottle. He has been asleep for a while, and he’s going to wake up hungry.
Emilio leans on the kitchen counter on his elbows and glares at me. I look behind me, because I can’t think of any reason he would be staring at me like he hates me. I cough into my closed fist. “Is everything okay?” I ask him.
“Finny’s special,” he says.
I nod. “I’m sure she is.”
“No, I mean really special.”
I nod again, and pop Benji’s bottle in the microwave.
“Finny’s afraid of commitment,” he says.
“Aren’t we all,” I mutter.
His brow arches, but he doesn’t respond to that. “You’ll take care of her while they’re on tour, right?” he asks.
“I promise to do my best.”
“I believe you.” He points a finger at me. “But if you fuck it up, if she comes home with a single scratch on her body, I will murder you with my own two hands.” He grins, but there’s no humor in it. “You feel me?”
I swallow past the lump in my throat. “I feel you.”
I shake the bottle, waiting for Benji to start making those little mewling noises.
“There are two things you should know about Finny,” he says.
“Okay…”
“One, you have to listen to what she doesn’t say, if you want to figure her out.”
I nod.
“And two, never get between her and a coffee pot. She’ll chop your balls off.”
This much I already know about her, but I instinctively bend my back a little, and my nuts draw up. He laughs.
“Call me if you need anything,” he says. He claps me on the shoulder and follows Marta to the door, after kissing his daughters goodbye.
“Night, Melio,” Wren calls to him.
He waves at them and leaves.
Benji makes a noise from my room, so I take the bottle and go to him. I look down into his crib and see that he has kicked himself free of his swaddling blankets, and his skin is moist and rosy. I pick him up, talk to him as I change his diaper, and go back out to the rocking chair in the living room to sit with him.
Lark goes to bed, and Finny is still in her room, but Wren comes out to sit with me.
“So…” Wren says.
“So…”
“Do you think you can take care of Finny while we’re on tour?” She bites her lower lip, worrying it.
“I’ll do my best.”
“Try not to fall in love with her, okay?”
I jerk my head up. “I won’t.”
“Oh, you will. But try not to, okay?”
“I can guarantee you that I’m not ready for a new relationship, Wren.”
She heaves a sigh. “Neither is Fin. But seriously, Tag, don’t fall in love with her. You’ll just get hurt.”
I look up at her. She’s totally serious. “I can handle it.”
She nods, but she still looks worried. “Don’t say I didn’t warn you.” She gets up and goes to her room. She comes back out carrying a bank deposit receipt. “I put some more money in your account,” she says. She tosses it onto the table.
“I don’t want your money, Wren. Not now. I’m doing odd jobs for the Reeds and I’m okay. I really am. I just have to figure things out.”
“Well, I don’t want my nephew doing without while you figure it all out.” She bends down and kisses Benji on the cheek. Then she shoves the side of my head with the heel of her hand. She reminds me so damn much of Mom right then that tears fill my eyes.
“You do look like her, you know?” I say. I sniffle back a tear.
“She was beautiful,” Wren says softly.
“Yeah, she was.”
She goes to her room and shuts the door.
As soon as she does, Finny’s door opens and she stomps into the room. “Take off your shirt,” she hisses.
“What?” I am startled by her bluntness.
“You were injured. I saw it.” She points to my stomach, where Benji is resting. His mouth is slack around his bottle, so I pull it back and lay him on the couch beside me.
“I’m fine,” I say. But I get up anyway.
“Show me.”
I don’t move, so she reaches out, lifts the edge of my shirt and draws it higher, exposing my stomach. “Oh, it’s not bad,” she says.
“Just a scratch, I think.” I lower my shirt.
She goes to the bathroom and comes back with some antiseptic and cotton gauze. “Let me clean it.”
I hold out my hand for the bottle. “I can do it.”
She shakes her head. “I’ll do it.” She motions for me to take my shirt off, so I pull it over my head and toss it onto the couch beside us.
She pours antiseptic onto the gauze and starts to gently clean the area, but it burns like a bitch. I hiss loudly drawing in a breath.
“Oh, quit being such a baby,” she chides. She bends down and blows across it, and I suppose she’s trying to ease the sting. But the gentle feel of her breath on my skin starts a brand new kind of ache. My dick starts to press against my fly.
“I can do it,” I say. I try to turn, but she grabs my belt loop and holds me still. I close my eyes and think about cheeseburgers. Warts. Ice. But then my ice turns into a drop of water melting and sliding down her skin in my lust-filled mind. Oh, holy hell. “I can do it,” I say again.
Suddenly she notices the bulge behind my fly. “Oh,” she says, her cheeks turning rosy. “Whoops.” She giggles and shoves the first aid supplies into my hands. “Didn’t, um, mean to, um, cause that.” She waves a hand toward my dick. “I mean, we can’t do that again.”
“We totally should,” I tell her, my voice gravelly. “I mean, if you ever drop your moratorium against sleeping with someone twice.”
She nods at me, her gaze once more falling to my dick, which is still standing at attention. “Tempting,” she offers. She grins at me. “You might need help with that.”
I roll my eyes. “I can handle it, thanks.”
“If you say so.” She turns and goes to her room. At the last moment, she turns back to me. “What time do you want to leave in the morning? I need to go talk to my mother’s doctor before we leave, and I guess you’re going with me.”
“Whenever you get up.”
She nods. “I guess we can’t say whenever you get up, since, well…” She grins at me.
“Beautiful and funny,” I mutter.
She lays a hand on her chest. “Did you just call me funny?” She bats her lashes at me.
“Among other things.”
She shrugs. “I like funny better.” Then she goes into her room, the door softly clicking closed behind her.
“Yeah, I do too,” I murmur to no one.
I think I’m in trouble. Big trouble.