Page 17 of Finding Hope

In the first year of a relationship, most couples bend over backwards to make the other happy. It’s what people do.

It’s human nature.

But by that seventh year, Steph was still indulging me on most things.

Hell, I was the guy on the sides of buses. I was the guy who signed autographs. I’d become accustomed to people wanting to please me.

But I didn’t exactly return the favor as often or as selflessly.

Stopping at my front door and patting Julie…Sophie? Tracey?…on the ass, I stand in the doorway and watch her do the walk of shame along my eighty-foot-long driveway, past my family, through the entire estate, and to the double iron gates.

Mini skirt, messy hair, shoes in her hand, I wait until she reaches the gates, and when she turns back, I slap my hand over the security screen by my door and buzz them open.

I should feel guilty for making her do that… but I’m a selfish asshole.

As soon as she slides into the waiting cab and the door closes, I buzz the gates closed and turn back into my house. Not until my door slams closed does Annie come out of hiding tofinallysay good morning.

It’s like Annie’s my jealous wife; she doesn’t like my female visitors, and she’s not too shy to let me know. She refuses to talk to me while any girl is here, and she definitely doesn’t talktothe girls.

She doesn’t have a problem withallgirls; she likes my sisters and nieces just fine. It’s just the flowery smelling chicks that come and go that she has a problem with.

She stops across the room and glares.

I glare back.

Her brows pull low, and taking a deep breath, she lets it out on a noisy‘harrumph!’

My eyes narrow at her attitude. “Don’t look at me like that, jerk.”

She snorts, literallysnortsher disappointment, then turns her ass in my face and walks to the kitchen to be fed.

I roll my eyes, but following, I take out some of the meat, gravy, and rice mix I made up a few days ago, and spoon it into her silver bowl.

Shooting one final filthy glare, one that shouts she’s unhappy with my behavior and decision making, Annie tucks into her food while I wander to my coffee maker and start it up.

My sister instilled many values in me over the years. Several of them – my manners and good behavior – seem to be lost lately, but my love of coffee remains. I’ve been addicted to this shit since I was fifteen years old. Three or four mugs of coffee before my shower, then another couple mugs before the gym.

Then I spend half my morning pissing, but it’s totally worth it.

A knock at the door has my ferocious guard dog lying down and dropping her face into the bowl to eat.

She’ssuperangry at me.

Looking toward the clock on the oven, I close one eye and read 11:11. It’s Sunday, which means one of my brothers or sisters are coming over to lecture me on my poor life choices.

Awesome.

Rolling my eyes and wandering toward the door, I wonder which of my siblings has a problem today. Or perhaps it’s my niece, Evie. My first niece, eleven years old, her sass and penchant for troublemaking speaks to me on a soul-deep level.

She’s me, but a female version.

She has my temper, and she has my smartass streak, and though we’re not blood related at all, wegeteach other, and are often each other’s bail-out when we’re in trouble.

Though ourtypesof trouble are wildly different.

She helps me out of girl trouble; parading around my house and pretending to be my kid to get rid of a clinger, or just flat out showing her crazy and sending weak women packing.

And I buy her whatever snacks she ever asks for, and provide a solid alibi whenever she picks on her younger cousins and sisters.

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