She squeezes the door handle. “I know. I’m going over to see Saint, so can you pick me up from there?” My lips roll between my teeth to stifle a laugh.
“Yes, Kitty. I will pick you up from there. Is that fucking all?”
I sigh, leaning back and attempting to block them out.
She smiles sweetly. “That’s all.” Before she gets to slam the door in his face, Nate and Eli walk in. They both take a seat on one of the many chairs scattered in the room.
“Tillie is at your house,” Nate says, nudging his head at me.
“Figured.”
“Did we all pick the worst fucking girls to settle with? They’re all different, but none of them are compliant. They all wanna fight, and aside from that, why the fuck do they all get along so painfully well? I’m telling you all now, we’re fucked. They’re like a tiny gang, and the only one we don’t have control over. Fuck.” Bishop squashes his cigarette in his ashtray.
“Oh, did you finally claim Saint?” Eli asks with a bold smirk.
“I don’t fucking need to. When is your little brain going to get that?”
Eli winks at me. “Maybe when I see it. Live, preferably.”
Bishop shakes his head, squeezing his eyes with his index finger and thumb. “There’s something we need to talk about. It involves” —his eyes go to Eli— “you.”
Eli’s smirk falters. “What?”
Just as Bishop opens his mouth, his office phone blares off and he answers, “What?”
“Are you all there?” Hector says, but his voice sounds different. Strained and exhausted. “There’s something I need to tell you all.”
Saint
I remember watching Coyote Ugly and thinking how it must feel to have a group of friends you could trust. Like always, I’d try to relate with the characters I’d be watching, since it’s about as close as I would get to feeling it, but it was always a fleeting moment. So I started reading, which gave me more in-depth feelings of what it felt like to live a life that isn’t yours to live. Tillie and Madison haven’t been in my life for long, but to imagine my life without them in it would cripple me.
We’re dressed up and I don’t know why. Denim washed Levi’s with a slit right below my left ass cheek, a black drop-top, and a Gucci belt is secured around my waist. I’m wearing black heels with thin straps crisscrossing over the top of my foot that I hadn’t been able to find an occasion to wear them for, and my hair and makeup are probably the best they have ever looked.
“Daddy Bran Bran left the Tesla.” Tillie wiggles the “key” to both Madison and me, just as Bailey walks into the room dressed and ready. “We are getting into so much trouble tonight.”
Madison finishes her lipstick, popping her mouth open. “We’re having a boy and girl.” She hasn’t said much since Bishop dropped her back off after her scan. She almost seems more tense than usual, which I’m beginning to realize that when she’s tense, that means Bishop is going to get grief.
“Madison!” My heart swells. “Congratulations!” It takes me a second to realize her shoulders are tight and her brows are knotted together in distress. “Wait, what’s wrong?”
She flicks her perfectly manicured fingernails. “I’m so happy, Saint. So happy.” There’s a long pause, and I’m almost afraid of what she’s going to follow up with. “But I don’t know how to fix us.”
Tillie and Bailey move in closer and I lean against my dresser to face where she’s sitting on the stool.
“I would usually say give him time, but I don’t think you should.” I squeeze the wood of my vanity, stained a pure white. “In the weeks I have been around my gloriously unique brother, I have found one thing that is constant, and that is he likes honesty, despite the fact he’s so good at keeping secrets. I think you need to bare it all with him. I’ve seen him when you weren’t here, Madison.” I bore my eyes into hers. “It broke me in one thousand different places to see him the way he was.”
Tillie clears her throat. “Are you saying that she should maul him?”
Bailey snickers, blowing out a catcall.
“I am.” I shrug. “Maul. Him.” I smile down at her. “Make him realize what he’s been missing for so long.”
“Fine.” Madison brushes back her hair. “But for right now, we’re getting you into trouble. Which, by the way,” she turns and narrows her eyes at Tillie, “why are we playing with Brantley like this?”
“Simple!” Tillie says matter-of-factly. “He shouldn’t have fucking allowed her to be taken away.”
I push off the vanity and we all make our way out of my bedroom and down the gloomy hallway. Heels click against the ancient wood floors when we hit the foyer.