“He sure is,” Mrs. Heely said, a smile in her voice.
“You don’t have your truck,” Carissa told him.
“Swing back around when you’re done, you can take him home and I’ll ride behind you,” he said.
“Okay, sweetheart,” she murmured, leaned in and this time he turned his head so she didn’t get his jaw with her kiss but his lips. “See you later,” she whispered when she pulled away. She bent in to Travis, who turned his face into Joker’s neck and pressed, thinking she was going to try to separate them.
She blew a raspberry on his neck and he giggled but kept shoving into Joker.
She moved away.
“So cool to see you again, Mr. Robinson,” she said.
“Keith, Carissa,” he invited.
“Keith,” she said warmly.
They shook. Mrs. Heely said her goodbyes to Keith. Carissa came in for another lip touch for Joker and a raspberry for Travis. After that, Keith and Joker watched Carissa and Mrs. Heely walk to his woman’s wreck.
With his mother walking away, Travis exposed his plan and started struggling to get down, showing that he may like Joker, but what he really wanted was to crawl all over the dirt and grime of a garage.
Joker held him steady, eyes locked on Travis’s mother’s sweet ass.
“How old is he?”
At this question from Keith, Joker tore his eyes from Carissa’s ass and looked to the man beside him.
“Nine months.”
Something moved over Keith’s face that was easy to read. Unhappiness and anger.
“Please tell me Mr. Neiland is a better father than he obviously was a husband,” he requested.
Yep.
Nothing got by Keith Robinson. He knew exactly how big a jackass Aaron Neiland was back in the day, which was why he was a bigger one now.
“Far’s I can tell, he digs his son.”
“And Carissa has you,” Keith said quietly.
“And I got them both,” Joker replied.
“Would you like to know one of the best feelings in the world, Carson?” Keith asked.
Joker wasn’t sure he did. With all that had just gone down, anything could come of that. All that just happened but also, Joker was holding in his arms what Keith and his wife could not have.
Still, he said, “Sure.”
Keith looked him deep in the eye, Joker tensed at the force of his gaze, and the man whispered, “Being right.”
Joker drew in breath.
Travis shouted, “Bah goo dee fah luh dah koo!”
Keith grinned, looked to Joker’s car and said, “Now, if you have time, show me everything.”
Holding an annoyed Travis close, Joker did that.
* * *
Sitting at Carissa’s dining room table with the dirty dishes holding the remnants of the cherry pie Mrs. Heely made in Carissa’s kitchen, Joker felt something.
He looked to his right.
He was at the head of the table.
Carissa, being Carissa, had given Mrs. Heely the foot.
So she was sitting to his right.
And when he looked at her, he saw she had eyes to the couches and a look on her face he felt in his gut.
He turned his head that way and saw Linus and Kam’s boys crawling all over the couch, mostly wrestling with a lot of grunting.
Candy was sitting to the side, her little dress pristine, her eyes on her brothers like she didn’t know what to make of them but what she was coming up with wasn’t much.
As he looked, he saw Travis crawl around the corner of the couch, roll to his diapered ass, pound his fists in his knees, and screech, “Kee lah!”
He wanted in on the boy action.
Joker looked back to Carissa.
She just wanted that. All of it.
Kids and babies all over her couch and living room.
And watching the mix of peaceful, happy, and eager on her face, Joker determined not to freak her shit out by moving them forward at the speed he wanted, that being taking her ring shopping next week, hitching her ass to his the week after when they had Travis back, and planting a kid in her belly the second one of his boys conquered an egg.
But he still wasn’t going to delay.
Maybe a month.
If he could hack it, two.
“I got two boys who better cool it or they’re gonna get their booties tanned by Poppa’s hand!” Linus boomed the second after they heard a thud, which meant the wrestling fell off the couch.
Joker looked that way and saw Candy had her head turned to the dining table and she was clearly a five-year-old little girl who worried at the state of boys today.
His eyes went back to Carissa when he felt her kick him under the table.
She was staring at him.
He lifted his brows.
She jerked her head to the foot of the table.
He shook his head.
She kicked him again and jutted her chin to him almost imperceptibly.
He sighed.
She’d found her time in the whirlwind that was throwing together this dinner to take him aside and tell him it was Joker who had to broach the subject with Mrs. Heely. Even though it was Carissa’s idea, she said she didn’t know Mrs. Heely all that well and it might seem weird coming from her, the fact she wanted the woman to move in across the street.
Joker figured Mrs. Heely didn’t give a fuck. She obviously liked Carissa. She’d like the idea that Joker’s woman, like Joker, wanted her close.
Carissa reiterated it would seem strange.
He didn’t agree.
She was called away before they could come to an agreement, but obviously she felt that somewhere between their hurried, whispered conversation in the hall, he’d come around to her way of thinking.
She jerked her head to the foot of the table again and this time it was a lot more perceptible.
“Butterfly, just talk to her,” he said out loud.
Her eyes got huge and then narrowed.
“Talk to who?” Kam asked.
Joker turned his attention to Kam. “Carissa’s got somethin’ she wants to mention to Mrs. Heely.”
“Yes?” Mrs. Heely asked. “What’s that, dear?”
“Actually, Joker has something to mention,” Carissa said.
“Wasn’t my idea, Carrie,” he reminded her.
She kicked him under the table again.
He dropped his head and grinned at his cherry pie–smeared plate.
“Well, someone spit it out,” Linus put in.
Joker turned eyes to his woman and again lifted his brows.
She made an irritated noise that was fucking cute before she cast her eyes down the table.
“There’s a house for rent across the street,” she announced.
Linus looked to Kam.
Mrs. Heely’s brows drew together in confusion. “There is?”
“It’s two bedrooms,” Carissa declared. “Not small, not huge, a lot like this house. I went over and chatted with the current renter. She’s really nice and she loves that house, but she got a job in Boulder so she’s moving there.”
“Is that so?” Mrs. Heely said, still looking confused.
“It has a big yard but that should be okay. There aren’t a lot of plants and shrubs to maintain,” Carissa went on.
Mrs. Heely didn’t look any less confused.
Jesus.
“Carrie wants you to move into it, Mrs. Heely,” Joker stated.
Linus grinned at Kam.
Joker’s attention was diverted by Travis hightailing his ass across the floor toward the dining room table.
“I… um, I… well, I don’t know what to say,” Mrs. Heely said as Joker pushed back his chair and got up to go get Travis.
“The for rent sign has a number. I can call. We can have a look,” Carissa told her.
“I’m in a place, sweetheart,” Mrs. Heely replied.
“I know,” Carissa said and Joker could hear the caution.
He bent and lifted up Travis.
Travis immediately shoved an arm out toward the couch.
Joker took him there.
“But this place is bigger,” Carissa went on. “And it’s closer to Carson. He doesn’t officially live here, but he’s here a lot. And he’d mow your lawn.”
Joker sat on the back of the couch and looked to Linus, and he didn’t try to hide how he felt about how he was now going to mow Mrs. Heely’s lawn, something he didn’t know was part of the deal.
Linus was shaking and doing it hard, trying not to laugh out loud.
“Carissa, you’re being very sweet, but I’m happy where I am,” Mrs. Heely told her.
Joker took in the look on his girl’s face, knowing she didn’t believe that.
“I have company,” Mrs. Heely said gently. “Anytime I want, there are folks around. We have things to do. They plan activities away and we all get on buses and go. It’s fun. And I still have my car, so it isn’t like I don’t have my freedom. I just have to let someone know I’m going.”
“Okay,” Carissa mumbled.
“And I’m halfway between you, Carson and Travis and Linus, Kam and the kids. Perfect spot,” Mrs. Heely kept at her.
“Right,” Carissa said, adjusting her plate in front of her.
“I love you want me close,” Mrs. Heely said on a loud whisper, and Joker looked at the back of her head. “That’s very sweet. But I’ve got friends where I am, and I like that I can still take care of my own place. Anything bigger, even a little bit bigger, that would be a lot on me.”
“I could help,” Carissa offered immediately.
“You want Carson to have his family,” Mrs. Heely replied quietly and Joker’s back shot straight.
He didn’t know that was it. He just thought it was Carrie being Carrie, taking care of people, taking care of a woman who meant something to him like her father took care of the woman who raised him.
Carissa didn’t answer, but it wasn’t lost on Joker that she avoided looking at him.
And there it was, that was it.
“I’m not far away,” Mrs. Heely said.
“You’re right. It was a stupid idea. I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have brought it up,” Carissa returned and Joker could see the pink in her cheeks. She made a move to get up and start collecting dishes.
“Carrie,” Mrs. Heely called.
Carissa stopped moving, planted her ass back in her chair, and looked to Mrs. Heely.
Mrs. Heely said nothing.
But then again, Joker didn’t see her face.
What he saw was that Mrs. Heely actually did say something. Just not with words. He knew it when Carissa’s face went soft, her eyes especially. He knew it when Linus cleared his throat. And he knew it when Kam fidgeted, pulling her napkin from her lap and suddenly pushing back, grabbing some plates, averting her eyes, and moving directly to the kitchen.
“Okay,” Carrie whispered.
“Okay,” Mrs. Heely whispered back.
Whatever she said was huge.
That being, he figured, Mrs. Heely officially passing the buck of looking after Joker to his girl.
Joker didn’t make a big deal of it. It was over and the women started to clear the table.
So he joined the boys on the couch, or actually he let Travis do it, but he allowed this when he could pay attention as they rough-housed with their toddler friend to make sure Jackson and Tyler didn’t do any damage.
Linus joined him and he shot the shit with his friend as the women shot the shit over dishes in the kitchen. Then they all shot the shit lounging on Carissa’s couch, the men with fresh beers, Kam and Carrie with their wine, Mrs. Heely with her decaf.
They did this until it was time for Linus and Kam to get their brood home and Carson to get his ass in his truck to take Mrs. Heely to hers.
It all went well until he was walking Mrs. Heely to her door and she suddenly shouted, “Yes, Bertie! This is the Carson I told you about!” while tugging at his arm.
He looked through the fading light to see the shadow of a woman in her doorway in the place next to Mrs. Heely’s.
She was waving like a lunatic.
He lifted a hand then dropped it.
“She has six sons,” Mrs. Heely hissed. “Six. They’re always coming around then she’s on about telling us how they’re fixing her light switches. Bringing her her favorite LaMar’s. Taking her out for fancy steak dinners.” Her voice switched to cocky when she said, “But not one of them has found a woman, and some of them are in their forties. Six men, no wives. And not one single grandchild.”
Joker stopped them at her door and looked down to see a look on her face that said, clearly, she’d won.
“Good you got four,” he muttered.
She screwed her eyes up at him. “I better get more.”
He felt his lips twitch. “You tellin’ me to knock up Carrie?”
“I’m telling you that if you don’t, she’s going to expire from longing.”
She didn’t miss it then.
“Doubtful,” he muttered on a tease.
“She wants to be tied to you,” Mrs. Heely replied. She was not teasing, so he felt that hit his chest, and it was also warm. “She wants you to have all the things you didn’t. She wants to give them to you personally. She wants it herself, but she wants it more for you.”
Joker stood still and said nothing.
But he thought that what Mrs. Heely didn’t say was what Carissa really wanted.
She wanted to heal him.
And to do that, she was using family.
Maybe he needed to let her off the hook on that and let her know that was already done.
“You like her?” he asked quietly.
“There’s nothing not to like. I will say that I was uncertain when you shared at her age she’d had a child and had already been divorced. But seeing her with you, her son, she hasn’t told me her story, but I can well imagine. Before we learn what’s right, we put our trust in the wrong people, and it’s never good to start life’s adventures, especially important ones like marriage, when we’re too young even to know ourselves. But she’s bounced back from that very well, I think.”
“She has,” Joker agreed.
“Smart enough not to give up… on a variety of things… as well as find help.”
Joker got what she was saying so he grinned.
Mrs. Heely put a hand light to his chest. “I like her for you. I like the way you are with her. You seem happy.”
“I am, Mrs. Heely,” he confirmed.
He could swear he saw her eyes twinkle as she said, “Who would have thought my Carson Steele would catch butterflies.”
That was when Joker threw his head back and laughed.
Mrs. Heely laughed with him.
When they quit doing that, he got her safe inside and walked to his truck, knowing that Bertie was watching because he could see her at her window.
When he got back to Carissa’s house he found her in Travis’s room, her son in her arms, his PJs on. She was cooing and swaying as she paced the room. Travis had his hands around his bottle with her spotting him, his eyes drooping.
Joker rested against the jamb and watched, thinking she needed a rocking chair in that room and deciding to get her one.
When Carissa turned his way, she saw him, and that was when she gave it to him again.
Soft face. Warm eyes. Lips pursed. Blowing him a kiss.
He took it with a chin lift then walked out and left her to have some time with her boy.
When she had Travis down, she came out and spent some time stretched on the couch with her other boy.
He fiddled with her hair, his eyes on the TV, feeling her weight, her soft tits pressed to his side.
He gave it time.
Then he muttered, “You know I’m good.”
“I know you’re good,” she muttered back.
“No, baby, I’m good,” he said, emphasizing it but keeping it light, eyes still to the TV. “You
don’t gotta make me better.”
“Okay,” she whispered.
“Mrs. Heely likes where she is,” he told her.
“Those places aren’t the greatest,” she told him.
“You don’t think so, and I get that. But she’s happy there.”
“Right,” she murmured.
“Don’t mean she won’t like company,” he noted.
“Of course,” she replied.
“A lot of it.”
There was a beat before she said, “That we can do.”
We.
He grinned at the TV, fiddled with her hair, and let it go.
Carissa fell silent and let it go too.
They finished the program, and that was when Joker decided it was time for bed.
He put in some effort, but in the end it didn’t take a lot for Carrie to agree.
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
We Were Free
Carissa
THAT NEXT TUESDAY, with my son sadly back with his father, who was thankfully being nice but mostly leaving me alone, it was after work and Joker and I were grocery shopping.
I stopped suddenly in the aisle next to the shelves of beans (we were not at LeLane’s; they were great and gave an employee discount on some things, but they were way too expensive for everyday shopping needs).
Joker, trailing me, slouched over and pushing the cart with his forearms, halted just shy of slamming into me and muttered, “Jesus, baby.”
I looked his way. “Do you like chili?”
“Yeah.”
“Chili,” I declared and started to grab cans of beans.
“You know, a list helps,” he remarked.
“I have a mental list,” I told him, tossing kidney beans in the cart and going back for black.
“Was chili on it?” he asked.
I looked to him. “Don’t you want chili?”
“What I want is not to wander every aisle so we’re here for an hour rather than bein’ here for twenty minutes gettin’ shit from a list.”
“If I stick to a list, inspiration can’t strike, like the fact I suddenly have a craving for chili,” I told him.
He shook his head, grinning and muttering, “Whatever.”
He wasn’t annoyed.
He was easy.
So I turned back and grabbed black beans. Then I got some chili beans. I finished up with pinto.
Four-bean chili. The best.