Page 88 of Snow in Texas

“That was a love tap,” Jinx decreed when he saw the damage.

Unable to frown because of the pain it caused, head ringing, Colin swallowed the aspirin Fox handed him and closed his eyes. Already the initial shock of the blow had faded, but he was going to hurt for days, no doubt.

“You shoulda kicked him in the balls,” Fox suggested, sitting down on the curb where they were having their junk food meal. “Then you wouldn’t have this problem anymore.”

“Nah.” Candy crammed half a Hershey bar in his mouth and spoke around it. “That’s part of the deal, keeping Jen happy. If she decides to castrate him, that’s her business.”

The others chuckled.

Colin waited for the anger to set it…but it didn’t. The man with a penchant for knocking out teeth had just sucker punched him, and his friends were laughing about it…but for the first time it felt like they were laughing with him. Maybe. Hopefully.

“Knowing my old man,” Colin said, voice muffled by the swelling in his jaw, “I’ve got a half-sister out there somewhere. You can knock her up, and then I’ll sledgehammer you in the face. We can call it even then.”

Candy laughed, a real laugh, eyes dancing. “Now there’s an idea, prospect.”

~*~

Jenny

Pup grew visibly happier and more relaxed as their outing progressed. The poor kid; it must be hard to bounce back as one of the guys after you’d wet yourself in front of them. The whole thinking-he-could-be-a-mole thing had to have been a downer, too.

“What would you use that for?” he asked, wrinkling his nose at the large white vegetables laid out beneath the misters.

She read the label. “That’s daikon. And I have no idea.” She snapped open a plastic bag and began filling it with green beans. “You wanna go grab me a pack of bacon? That’s the last thing on the list, and then we can head to Crockett’s.”

“Sure.” He jogged off to do so, too-large prospect cut flapping against his back.

Grocery shopping wasn’t her favorite activity – was it anyone’s? – but she was glad she’d gotten out of the clubhouse for a reason other than work. Sitting in her room and planning what she’d say to Candy was a recipe for anxiety. But of course, she couldn’t totally shake thoughts of her brother’s reaction, even while selecting broccoli.

The worst part of it all was that she wasn’t worried for herself. Candy wouldn’t be a problem. He might ask her what she’d been thinking, scrub his hands through his hair. But at the end of the day, he’d be a loving and devoted uncle to her child. But Colin? Candy might be ready to boot him from the club. Or worse.

It was the “or worse” that worried her the most.

Suffice to say she wasn’t looking forward to explaining things to her brother.

Pup returned at an awkward gallop, bacon clutched triumphantly in one hand. “Got it.”

She smiled at him. Would motherhood be so different from looking after the young ones? No. She didn’t think so. “Awesome. Let’s go check out.”

~*~

She knew something was off the second they pulled up to Crockett’s house. An itching in her palms, a prickling up the back of her neck, cold weight in her stomach. Everything was as it should be, the landscaping tended by the company that always took care of it, Crockett’s old station wagon in the drive, dim beneath a layer of dust. But a sense of great wrongness vibrated off the place, an aura she swore she could see.

Pregnancy paranoia?

She didn’t climb out of her Jeep right away, but sat, hands on the wheel, contemplating the front of the house.

When Pup knocked on her window, she leapt.

“Whoa, sorry,” he said as she buzzed the window down. “You alright?”

“Fine…” She rubbed at her bare arms. “You’re armed?”

“Yeah.” He lifted his cut to show her his piece, and his brows knitted together. “Should I be worried?”

“No. There’s nothing…” She bit her lip, completely at a loss. She couldn’t shake the sense of unease, but had no proof that anything was actually the matter.

She had a .45 in her purse, though.

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