Page 46 of Absolution

“Get up, Ratchet,” she yells at me from the bathroom. “We over slept!”

I roll over and look at the clock. Sure enough, it’s only an hour before we’re due at the courthouse, and we have at least a thirty-minute drive ahead of us.

Rolling out of bed, I stretch my stiff muscles and she huffs her displeasure of how slow I am moving. I stalk to the bathroom, and find her quickly throwing make-up on her face with her hair still up in the messy bun from last night.

“I like you like this,” I whisper against her neck as I wrap my bare arms around her.

“Not now. Go get dressed.”

I scoff at her, but she swats me and I pad out of the bathroom. There’s no use in fighting with her today. This is it. Our point of no return. Either we can move forward with the process of gaining custody of her brother, or we’re dead in the water.

I step back into the bedroom, and grab the new clothes that I picked up, while she was at work. Her demand to fix the truck covered my tracks to take care of this one last detail for today. Little did she know, the truck had been done for a few days, but I liked having her on the back of my bike too much to give it back to her just yet. Call me selfish, but that’s how I am with her. Every moment I get with her, whether she is chewing me out or giving her body to me, is a moment I cherish.

It doesn't take me long to finish getting ready, and when I step out of the room, her eyes bug out.

“Wow,” she utters. “You, um, clean up nice.”

I look down at my blue button-up shirt, and khakis and smile. The look on her face is approval enough to know that I did okay picking out this monkey get-up. I smile thinking back to the storeowner’s face, when I walked in asking for dress clothes. It’s not every day that a guy like me walks into a place like that. I also learned that finding a shirt that would fit my larger upper body was not as easy as I thought. This is why I stick with t-shirts.

“I could say the same for you.”

Ricca’s hair is up in a smooth, sophisticated bun. Her curves are on display in the simple black dress that hugs her in all the right places. The heels on her feet only accentuated her shapely legs and ass. Had this not been important, I would have probably helped her right out of that dress and into my lap. But that will have to wait for later.

“Stop looking at me like that,” she demands, while grabbing her purse off the bar. “No way.”

“I didn’t say a thing, but now that you mention it.”

“No, Ratchet.”

“Later then,” I promise her.

She laughs her way right out the door, and at my protest, we take the truck. While I would usually prefer to drive, she needs the distraction more than I do.

We make it to the old grey stone courthouse a few towns over with a few minutes to spare. It takes us less than no time to make it through the metal detectors at the front of the entrance, and before I know it, we’re standing in the hall.

We take the stairs up to the third floor where the family court is located, and find her caseworker lingering in the hallway. As soon as she spots us, she walks right over to us.

“Good morning, Mr. and Mrs. Azzo. Are you ready for this?”

Hearing Ricca being called Mrs. Azzo makes me smile. She notices and throws a side-ways glare back at me.

“As I’ll ever be,” she answers Nicole.

“Is there anything we should know before going into this?” I inquire.

“This hearing will be very basic. The judge will review your application, and any additional paperwork that you included in with the application. The judge may ask for additional details such as employment or assets, but other than that, it should be pretty straightforward. Judge McCain is pretty evenly fair, so you shouldn’t have any trouble.”

The doors of the courtroom open and a large group of people tumble out into the hallway. Ricca’s hand comes to her chest as her anxiety strikes.

Coming up behind her, I pull her against me.

“Just breathe, Siren. I’m right here,” I whisper to her. “Just breathe.”

She practices the breathing exercises that she was given to do back in her California group therapy session, and as the last person exits, her breathing slows.

Nicole waves for us to follow her. Ricca reaches back and grabs my hand tightly.

“Together, nothing can stop us,” she repeats from our conversation last night.

---