Chapter 12

Classy as balls.

-T-shirt

Wolf

I wiggled my jaw as I stared at the man on the floor with a look of such disdain that it was a surprise he didn’t burst into flames from the scathing look I directed at him.

“Mother fucker,” I growled. “What the fuck was that for?”

My head was now pounding, and I hadn’t been gone from the office for even fifteen minutes.

That’s how long it’d taken me to get a call from Travis and then immediately detour to this little peckerhead’s place to find him not only fucking with my life, but fucking with my sister’s life.

“You were coming at me like you were about to eviscerate me!” the kid squealed.

“I was,” I promised him. “Get the fuck up.”

The kid stood from where he’d thrown himself down to protect his head.

From what, I still didn’t know.

In his haste to cover said head, he’d fallen and had taken not just the table, but his computer and bookshelf out as well.

In my haste to save the computer from biting the dust, which I did somehow manage to save, I’d gotten a jaw full of keyboard.

“I’m sorry!” he cried.

I looked at the little kid.

“You know you’re doing wrong,” I surmised. “You know you’ve been fucking with stuff you shouldn’t be.”

The kid’s eyes filled with tears.

He had to be fifteen at most.

“Yes, Sir,” the kid confirmed. “I…I’m sorry.”

I crossed my arms over my chest and looked over to Griffin who was standing beside me.

He hadn’t moved to do anything as it all went down, so he, of course, was clean of the Coke that’d spilled on the floor, as well as the dozens of powdered donuts that were now soaking up the Coke.

“I don’t know,” Griffin said. “How old are you, kid?”

The kid bit his lip.

“Fifteen. Sixteen next week,” he answered, whisper soft.

I glared at him.

“So you know you’ve been hacking into DMV records. Bank accounts. Government fucking, blacked out, nobody sees them but God records?” I gave him my best glare, and to be honest, I knew it was chilling.

I knew that the minute I said ‘God’ that he’d flinch, and he didn’t disappoint.

I used to be a drill sergeant in the Marines.

I knew my shit. I knew what to do to get a reaction out of a fucking kid. It didn’t matter that this one wasn’t eighteen and under my employ.

He was a wayward fucking soul, and no matter what he did to me or my sister, he was still a kid.

A dangerous kid, but a kid nonetheless.

“I’m sorry!” the kid started to wail.

“What’s your name?” I asked shortly, fed up with the crying and it’d just begun.

“Xavier,” he sniffled.

“Xavier what?” I persisted.

“Xavier Delgado,” he answered.

“Where’s your parents?”

Griffin stepped around me to pick up the bookshelf that’d tipped over, and I snapped my fingers at Xavier when his eyes went to follow Griffin’s movements.

“Focus,” I growled.

Xavier’s eyes came back to me with a start, and I nearly caved when I saw the fear in his eyes.

He didn’t like having Griffin at his back.

His body was tense, and his eyes were hyper aware.

He kept trying to look behind him, and then stopped the moment he realized what he was doing.

“My mom’s dead. My father’s…gone,” he hesitated.

“Gone where?” I pushed.

Xavier bit his lip.

“Xavier,” I said shortly. “You’re really close to going to jail. In Texas, you can be charged as an adult for crimes such as the ones I know you’ve committed. Not to mention I haven’t even had the chance to go through your computer.”

Xavier’s head dropped.

“My papa left me. Traded my services to some gringo who needed them.” He bit his lip. “Everything I’ve done is what he’s forced me to do.”

“What ‘gringo’?” I asked, sensing that this would be the break I needed.

“Tall. Brown hair. Curly. Crazy eyes that make him look fucking demented.” Xavier pointed to his eyes as he gave his colorful explanation.

“Ice blue,” I guessed.

Xavier nodded exuberantly. “Yes!”

“Name’s Josh Fry?” I continued.

“Don’t know his name,” Xavier said, his accent getting thicker. “He never gave me a name, and I didn’t ask. I get paid once a week. He comes to see what I got accomplished every week, gives me cash and then leaves.”

I crossed my arms over my chest.

“You’re all alone?” I asked.

He nodded.

“You paying the bills?” I held out my hand.

He took it, hesitantly, and I pulled him to his feet.

“Yes.” He licked his lips nervously. “I pay them in person when they’re due. Pay in cash.”

“You going to school?”

He shook his head.

“No.”

“You haven’t had a truancy officer here wondering why you’re not at school?” The thought that nobody cared about him was starting to tug at my heartstrings.

The kid was fifteen. Still a baby, and all alone in this harsh world that we lived in.

Xavier shook his head no.

“No, Sir.”

I looked around at the trailer house.

It was just like the one I’d grown up in with my sister.

Not a surprise considering it was only about seven trailers down from the one where I’d spent the first eighteen years of my life.

I could still practically hear the whispered, cruel words from the town residents when they saw July and me walk into an establishment. Could remember the exact words that I tried to shield July from.

Now those same town residents thought I was a fuckin’ hero but still treated my sister like she was the trash of the trailer park.

I made a decision, one that surprised not just Griffin and Xavier, but me as well.

“Get your computer and whatever you need for tonight,” I ordered. “If you have anything else that you think will be of use to us, bring that with you, too.”

Xavier’s eyes went wide.

“Why?”

“Because you’re coming home with me.”

***

“What the hell, Wolf?” Nancy, Nathan’s grandmother, asked as she got out of the car.

I pointed at Xavier. “Stay there.”

“Who’s that?” Nancy asked as she got Nathan’s bag out of the back of the truck.

“That’s a kid I found living by himself today,” I said. “He’s going to be spending the weekend with me until I can find him somewhere to go.”

“Oh,” Nancy said. “I fed Nathan after I picked him up from school.” She handed me a bag of old French fries and nuggets. “I got enough for you, but they’re cold now.”

I grinned and pulled Nancy into a one-armed hug.

“How’re the knees feeling today?” I asked.

Nancy sighed.

“They’ve been better. I have a doctor’s appointment to get a couple of cartilage building shots in them to see if that helps. I have to have three injections before they’ll even consider surgical options.” She winced when she stepped to the side and hoisted up Nathan’s bag.

I took it from her and walked it to my truck, throwing the bag over the side of the bed before turning back to Nancy.

“Let me know if you need me to take you,” I told her. “And I want to know how this weekend goes.”

Nancy grinned.

“I’ll be fine, Wolf,” she smiled. “You’re such a worrywart.”

“I haven’t met your new friend who’s somehow managed to keep himself hidden every time I try to meet him, so excuse my worry.” I pulled her into a short hug.

Nancy giggled.

“You’ll like Frank,” she promised. “I’ll be going to the Texas Rangers’ game. Maybe you can watch and see him there.”

I snorted and let her go.

“I’ll see what I can do,” I told her. “Nathan got his medicine already tonight?”

Nancy nodded her head. “He has. I gave it to him before his dinner.”

I walked around to the opposite side of Nancy’s three quarter ton Dodge and opened the passenger side door.

The first sight of Nathan after such a long time apart hit me straight in the heart just like it always did.

I sure did love the kid like crazy, and it bothered the hell out of me that I needed Nancy’s help.

It helped us both out, though.

We both compromised, and the schedule really worked out well for both of us.

Nancy ran a farm outside of the city and had no trouble keeping Nathan during the week. Fridays through Sundays were a problem for her since her work hands had those three days off. Her granddaughter helped her on the weekends, but it was definitely not something she could do with a small child running underfoot.

Hence, why I got him for those three days.

She was just happy that we could work something out.

When Darren had died, I’d been named as Nathan’s legal guardian, and since that was what Darren wanted, nobody, not even Nancy, had protested it.

“Daddy,” Nathan’s sweet, soft voice filled the cab the moment I started to unlatch him from the car seat.

“Hey, boy,” I said. “You fell asleep.”

“Tired,” Nathan muttered, his voice thick with sleep.

I chuckled under my breath and picked him up.

Nathan automatically curled into my chest and wrapped his arms around my neck.

And everything inside me that’d felt unsettled, instantly calmed.

Nancy’s eyes were happy as she watched me round the car with Nathan.

“He helped me birth a couple of goat kids today,” she smiled. “I remember doing the same thing with Darren. I definitely wore his little hiney out.”

I laughed.

“I was there enough with Darren when goats were born. That is tough work, even if you’re only watching,” I told her, remembering my own experiences.

Goats were cool and all, but they were a hell of a lot of work, and although I had the land for them at my house, I wasn’t ever going to have animals there. Even if they would help me get a tax write off on the land.

“It wasn’t that bad,” Nancy laughed as she went to the passenger side door of my truck and closed it.

“No,” I agreed. “But it sucked.”

Nancy laughed, and continued to laugh about the situation until I waved goodbye to her and pulled out of the parking lot five minutes later.

My first time seeing a goat birthed had traumatized me, and it tickled the hell out of Nancy to know that I got squeamish when it came to birthings of any kind.

I’d, of course, thrown up the moment I’d seen the hooves coming out of the goat’s vagina and that gave Darren material to rag on me for years to come.

He was also with me the first time I’d witnessed a woman giving birth while on patrol during our deployment in Iraq. I’d thrown up then, too.

And Darren had promptly told his mother. Again.

“This kid doesn’t look like he’s yours,” Xavier observed as we pulled out of the parking lot.

“That’s ‘cause he’s not,” I said. “He was my best friend’s son. When my best friend died, I was given custody of him.”

Xavier made a humming noise under his breath, and stared straight forward, not saying a word, for the remainder of the drive.

The moment I pulled into the driveway of my place, Raven opened the door, and her eyes took in everything at once.

She came to Nathan’s side and opened the door as I got out, followed shortly by Xavier.

“Sleepy boy,” Raven said as she got Nathan out of his car seat and pulled him into her arms.

I nearly laughed at the sight.

Nathan, at five years old, was almost her height. His feet hung past her knees, and his head was nearly as big as hers.

Did she care that he was practically as big as her? Hell no.

She loved Nathan and had since the moment they’d met.

Two wounded souls always gravitated towards each other, and Nathan was definitely a wounded soul.

Although he’d been given everything he could possibly want in life, he’d had a tough time of it.

When he was only a year old, the man who had shot his father and mother had shot him as well.

He’d taken a bullet to the head and had to have fifteen surgeries to repair the damage.

Although he was okay now, it was touch and go at first, and it’d been a very long road to recovery.

Seeing the two of them together again had my heart fucking pounding for a different reason than had been normal for me lately.

“She the baby mama?” Xavier asked as Raven turned around and walked inside.

“No,” I grunted and pushed Xavier. “Get inside.”

Xavier reluctantly followed me inside. As he took in my house, I couldn’t help but notice that his eyes were haunted, too.

Leaving me to wonder what exactly I thought I could fix with this kid when I couldn’t even fix myself.