Page 45 of Sinners Keepers
He was ridiculous, even as injured as he was. I fucking hated my dad, and seeing Law like this made me wish I could wrap something tight around his throat and watch him struggle for air as the light left his eyes. Not that he had any light left in him.
I stood in front of Law and reached for his hand. “I’ll help you up the stairs and bring you anything you need.”
He took my hand, but instead of allowing me to help him up, he pulled me down onto the couch next to him and nuzzled his face into my neck. “Anything?” he asked.
I eyed him suspiciously, but if I was being totally real with myself, the answer to that question was a resounding yes. “What did you have in mind?”
“Hmm,” he contemplated. “For starters, you could bring me this pussy on a silver platter.”
I giggled, kissing the corner of his mouth. “You’re seriously so silly sometimes.” It was still a bit shocking when he was, but it was nice to see this playful side of him when it came out. Before, I’d just assumed he was always super serious with that permanent scowl of his etched on his face.
I loved his scowl. I gazed down at him, running my thumb across his forehead and smoothing the skin there.
"For the love of all things holy, please wait until I’m out of this house before you say anything about anyone’s genitals again.” Nelia had popped back in, bringing with her a steaming mug of what I assumed was tea.
I appreciated that she didn’t question my relationship with Law—with any of them. I figured she was pretty in the know about all of, well,us. They were all very casual about having their hands on me in front of her. But the judgment you’d expect from someone’s mother when it came to the fact that you were sleeping with her son and his two best friends… it just wasn’t there.
Not that I had slept with Law yet. But I was most definitely going to. And he was most definitely not making a point to keep that fact a secret fromanyone.
Alec stood and pulled me to my feet before offering Law a hand. “Let’s get you in bed.”
“Oh, so you’re trying to get fresh with me now, too?” Law joked.
“First of all,youwere trying to get fresh withme,” I said.
“Yeah. But you liked it,” he replied, grunting as he stood.
Nelia had curled up in the recliner and pulled a throw blanket over her legs. She sipped her tea, giving Law a motherly look that screamedplease just shut the fuck up.
He stiffly made his way over to her and bearing his weight on the back of the chair, he bent at the waist to place a kiss on the top of her head. It was more than sweet seeing him like this. I loved when I thought he was only ever really soft for me, but seeing him soft for Nelia gave me a different kind of warm fuzzies. I didn’t know how Law ended up in the line of work he was in, especially not if he’d come from a loving home with at least one present parent, but I was thankful for whatever brought him to it because it also brought him to me.
That was probably selfish of me, being that I was pretty certain none of them enjoyed the things they had to do sometimes. I’d seen both Alec and Law looking downright despondent coming back from jobs in the past, and Ijah had explicitly stated to me how much he hated the number of lives he’d taken—and for what? They’d all been trapped in this line of work. It wasn’t as if it was something they could easily leave behind once they decided they didn’t like it anymore. But I felt like I was allowed to be selfish after all the things I’d been through. Especially when it came to them.
“Love you, Mom,” he said, straightening and taking my hand as he stood. “Thanks for coming over.”
“Love you, too. Rest,” she said to him. “Make him rest,” she said to me. “If you need anything for pain, text me and I’ll see what I can do. I’d rather you not take anything if you can manage without it.”
“I’ll be fine.”
Once we made it to his room, he immediately fell into bed.
“Mom will most definitely be in to check on me throughout the night. The hit my head took was pretty rough. But I’d like for you to stay. I’ll keep my hands to myself.”
I climbed into bed with him. He wrapped his arm around me, tucking me into his side. “What torture that will be,” I said, partially kidding, but it actually would be.
It wasn’t likely that I would sleep. I was too keyed up from the events of the night and too concerned with checking on him nearly constantly to even consider closing my eyes. But I was content to lie next to him and watch him sleep.
Alec slipped in just as Law drifted off and shuffled in behind me, snuggling against my back. He ran his hands over my hair, eliciting a sigh from me. “I watched you just like this for so many freaking nights while you were in the hospital. It sucked, but at the same time, it was nice to know you were able to rest. I was always so worried about managing your pain. So when you slept at night, I knew you weren’t struggling—at least in that moment—and I felt so at peace. Everything had gone to shit, but you were resting and that was all that mattered right then and there.”
I hummed, nuzzling against him. “I love you.”
'‘I love you. You can sleep now, too,” he assured me. “I know you’re anxious to keep an eye on him, but we’ve got it.”
“What about you? You need to sleep.”
“Ijah is just taking a quick shower and he’ll be in. We’ll sleep in shifts.”
“I wish I could sufficiently snuggle all three of you at the same time,” I said through a yawn.
