Justice
“This is the last time, fuck nuts. Next time you go all the way into the next town and get a dozen gallons of paint and Pine Sol or whatever else in the shit you think up.”
In the last two months, Etienne had gone into some kind of nesting frenzy. He cleaned everything. He’d repainted his house and sealed the roof. The dumbass had even built a new set of stairs to his porch, even though the old ones were fine. There was something seriously whacked out about the gator lately. Etienne jerked the massive pile of crap out of my hands and mumbled off checklists in his head.
I turned to his mate who was calm as a cucumber, sipping on her lemonade while flipping through a magazine. “What the shit did you do to him, Tansy? I mean, fuck. He’s been acting like that Jeff dude on Flipping Out, except meaner and not so much juice in the lips. What’s up his ass?”
Tansy rocked back and forth on the porch swing Etienne built for her when the weather turned cooler. She swung there every chance she got. She ticked her eyes to him and then back to her Vogue with a shrug. “He was so busy this morning, he didn’t even come in to get his king-nut. I think he’s sniffing the white lightning behind my back.” The dig was aimed at Etienne, but the bastard scrubbed the floor harder like he didn’t hear.
“Oh? A little nose candy for the gator?”
Tansy slapped her knee. It wasn’t that funny. “It’s a shame. We should have an intervention or something. Wait, can shifters take drugs? I mean, would cocaine even do the same things to you? Does cocaine even make people clean? Isn’t that why those urban housewives snort it? So they can get everything done? Is he becoming one of those women? Good Lord, I’m not even making sense. I don’t understand life right now. I think I need a drink.”
I laughed at her question. She had a lot of them. I didn’t mind. She was like the queen of Shotgun Row. We did, with pleasure, whatever Her Highness wanted or needed. “It would take a truckload of snow to even make us twitchy. I don’t know what’s wrong with this one. Wait, what the hell is that smell?” A light breeze whipped in from the swamp, but with it a spice, no, maybe a warm smell laced through the tang of the bayou. I’d never smelled anything like it before, but I knew the smell by instinct.
Tansy rolled her eyes and got up from the swing, patting my chest as she passed. “That, my friend, is Fabuloso that my mate cleans with, and it was fabuloso for about two days, and now it’s shitaloso.”
I held up my hand. “No, not that.”
That’s when three things happened all at once. One, I pulled Tansy’s palm to my nose and inhaled deeply. Two, Etienne dropped all his cleaning shit and got in my face like Mike Tyson even though I thought the rat bastard wasn’t even looking.
And three, I knew Etienne’s mate was pregnant.
“Get your hands off my mate, you cocky-ass motherfucker.” Etienne had both of his hands around my neck and was squeezing. He pushed me backward so that my head knocked against the siding of his shotgun house.
“Pregnant. Mate.”
Those were the only two words I could mouth to him. I grabbed his wrists, trying to pry his meaty hands from my neck before I kneed him straight in the nuts. He didn’t flinch.
“How dare you touch her. I oughta choke you and hang your ass out as gator bait.”
Tansy did her mate right. She lifted Etienne’s shirt slightly and put both of her hands on his skin. “Eti, honey, calm down. I think Justice has something important to say.” At the sound of her voice, we both turned to see Tansy a particularly pale shade of ghost, and her breathing was shallow.
“What is it, Tansy? What’s wrong?” While I tried to breathe again, Etienne checked over his mate like I’d discovered she had leprosy.
Finally recovering my breath, I bent forward. “She’s pregnant, dipshit.”
Etienne looked back and forth from me to Tansy like we were playing ping-pong with his brain as the ball. Then his eyes locked on his mate.
“You carry my young?”
Apparently, from the lack of color in Tansy’s face, she didn’t know, either. “Holy gator babies. Shit! I’m not gonna lay eggs, am I? Hell no! I’m out. Nope. Nope. Nope. You put this in me, you get it out.”
Our almost fight and yelling had drawn in the crew.
“So, the nesting is about her being pregnant. Good thing. I was this close to calling ole Jackson Asylum.”
Lazare slapped Loic on the back of the head. “That place has been closed for thirty years, dill weed.”
Lazare ran a hand down his torso and farther. “Fuck you. There are no dill weeds here. Freshly shaven for the ladies.”
Etienne’s voice boomed through the rest. “Would you assholes pipe the fuck down? You’re pregnant?”
“Smell her, Eti,” I interjected, not knowing if I was still gator bait or not. There’s no denying the smell. He growled at me.
Tansy grabbed Etienne’s shirt and jerked him toward her until they were nose to nose. “Am. I. Laying. Eggs? Yes or no. It’s a simple question.”
He took the opportunity of closeness to take a long, careful scenting of his female. His eyes darkened when he opened them. “No, darlin’.” Etienne’s tone calmed to, in turn, calm his mate who was freaking the fuck out about squatting down and shitting some eggs. Didn’t blame her. “It’s going to be a baby. No eggs. No gators. Just a baby. A beautiful baby with eyes like yours.”
Tansy looked a little relieved—a little. “Well, screw me sideways and call me Nancy.”
Callum spoke up. I hadn’t even realized he was there. “I think that’s how you got here in the first place, Tansy girl. Congrats to the new crew member.”
Loic again mumbled as he walked away, “We are not crew.”
I stared at the mated pair too long while the others went back to their jobs. Etienne had given us all some disease in taking Tansy as a mate. Like the sickness was spreading to all of us.
’Cause fuck me if I didn’t hunger for a mate of my own.