Page 11 of The County Line
I pull back, giving her a soft smile. “Of course. We’ll go together. Tomorrow. I’ll be the warm-up act, and you can swoop in and steal the show.”
Regan laughs, her usual brightness flickering back to life. “Okay. Now let’s make this ugly house green already.”
Chapter 6 – Colt
“Driver’s license, sir.”
I nod and fish my wallet from the back pocket of my dirt-streaked jeans. Sliding my expired license through the glass partition, I pass it to the woman seated at the table in front of the Boys and Girls Club. She’s wearing bright green, oversized glasses, her expression a mix of curiosity and skepticism.
“Colton Marshall?” she asks, glancing between the ID and my face. Her brow furrows as she studies the picture again.
I can’t blame her. The photo is from when I was twenty-two, nearly unrecognizable to how I look now. My hair back then was longer, shaved on the sides in a style I thought was edgy but now realize looked just plain dumb. I was forty pounds lighter and free of tattoos. A lot has changed since then.
“You can call me Colt,” I say, keeping my voice neutral.
She arches a brow. “I won’t be calling you nothing, but you can tell your Little to call you whatever you want when you meet him.”
I give her a nod because I can tell this woman doesn’t mess around.
“Okay,Colton. Looks like it’s your first day with us here at theBoys and Girls Club of Whitewood Creek.Normally, I’d give you a full tour of the facilities, but…” She gestures to the long line of volunteers who are waiting to check-in behind me. “I’ve got thirty more volunteers to register. So, let’s skip to the important part. Your little is…” She flips through a clipboard, scanning the pages until she finds my assignment. “Malachi Richardson. He’s the boy with red hair sitting by himself at the green table.”
Following her gesture, I look over to the far corner of the room. A kid who looks no older than my nephew, is hunched over at a table. His red hair is messy, sticking out at odd angles like his barber cut it wrong, and he’s wearing thick, coke-bottle glasses that magnify his eyes. HisAvenger’sT-shirt is a size too big, swallowing his frame. And the expression on his face mirrors mine:not thrilled to be here.
Great.
Neither of us wants to do this.
Eight weeks of mandatory volunteer work with the Boys and Girls Club as part of my parole, and I’ve been paired with the human embodiment of me.
“Awesome,” I mutter under my breath, nodding to the woman as I head toward my new pain in the ass.
This is going to be just great.
Kids are bouncing off the walls, literally, trying to run up a straight wall. I don’t get it. Is this what kids do these days instead of going creeking and tipping cows? Even in prison where guys knew they were doing time for years, sometimes decades, they weren’t this wound up. There’s pizza on a folding table in thecorner and board games that are untouched on another. I scan the space, always searching for threats and thankfully finding none except for the threat to my already frayed sanity.
The volunteers look like a mixed group. Some women and some men. A few of them look like they’re here just for the kids and because they enjoy this chaotic energy, where others look about as thrilled as I do to be enduring their punishment with children.
“Hey,” I grunt out when I reach the green table. Malachi’s eyes lift to meet mine as his brows bunch and his nose scrunches like my smell offends him. I lift my shirt to take a whiff of my armpits and get nothing but my cologne and aftershave.
“Who the hell are you?” he asks.
Oh great. The quiet, broody kid has a smart mouth on him.
“Your new big brother,” I spread my arms wide, trying to be funny but instead, must come off as creepy since a little, blonde girl standing a few feet away lets out an ear piercing scream.
Her big sister glares at me with a warning, “Did you even read the instructions? No loud, quick movements around the kids. Some of them startle easily.”
I look around the space where one kid is now hanging upside down off a table while beating his chest and another is jumping up and down screamingMore! More!It’s pure chaos filled with loud sounds and overstimulation.
“Oh… sorry,” I respond, because I hadn’t read the damn pamphlet and didn’t realize a forced smile and an open arm gesture would be considered more threatening than this mad house.
She stalks away, little girl in tow as I look back at Malachi who’s now smiling in a way that I can only assume is his impression ofTheJoker.
“Hey, at least you’re smiling now,” I grunt out then move to sit down in one of the chairs and fail miserably. My thighs squeeze painfully against the tight plastic, so I give up quickly and decide I’ll be standing for the next hour instead.
Malachi’s smile is quickly replaced with a hard scowl. “My last big brother tried to be a funny guy and wasn’t. I just think you might actually be funny.”
Well, you're the first person who’s ever thought that kid.
