Page 165 of Him Lessons

Mary blinked a few times, then gave a quick nod of affirmation. “The knife had slid across the floor, and she picked it up and plunged it into the side of his neck.”

“Jesus.”

“No. He was the devil. Our father was the devil, Luke, and I don’t regret how he died. I never have. You shouldn’t either.”

“I don’t,” Luke said swiftly. “He deserved what he got.”

“He did.”

Luke matched the fierceness in his sister’s gaze before glancing away with a sigh. “I guess I’ve just been stuck on thinking I had that kind of violence in me.”

“You do. We all do. But there’s a big difference between being a protector and a bully, and you’re no bully, Luke. You’re not like him. You’re not like our father. You wouldn’t hurt someone who didn’t deserve it.” Gaze slipping back to Frankie as she roused on the pillow, Mary grasped Luke’s hand and placed it on her daughter’s head. “And you’d never hit a child.”

Wispy hair tickled his palm, warmth seeping through the baby-fine strands. “Never,” he vowed just as Frankie raised a hand and took a swipe at her mother’s mouth.

They both burst into laughter at the timing. Then Mary kissed the tiny fist flailing in front of her face. Eyes suddenly glistening with tears, she dashed at them. “So,” she said with a flippant bounce of her shoulders, “now that I’ve absolved you of patricide, little brother, when are you gonna haul ass out of here and chase down your girl?”

Luke yearned to do exactly that. He missed Andy. It had only been twenty-four hours since he’d seen her, but it felt like eons had elapsed. “Soon,” he said, excitement drawing a grin from him. “But first, I want to hold my niece.”

Mary needed no further prompting. Beaming, she handed over her daughter. “Isn’t she just the most beautiful thing you’ve ever seen?”

Luke held Frankie in front of him, hand cupping her head, arm supporting her body as she peered up at him. She had dark eyes. Dark eyes that were kind of feisty-looking. “’Sup?”

Frankie’s fist came up for another swipe.

Yeah, she was definitely a feisty one.

“I think she likes the sound of your voice. It’s much deeper than mine and Paul’s. More like Kyle’s.”

“Speaking of, did you wanna talk about what happened here yesterday? You know, the whole exploding-vagina thing?”

“Yeah, uhm,no.”

Luke chuckled at his sister’s mortified grimace. Then they were back to gushing over her offspring.

“Oh my gosh, was that a smile?” Mary cried. “She’s smiling at you, Luke!”

She was. Kind of. Mostly, it looked like Frankie was constipated. But there were a couple quick upturns of her feisty little mouth. “You and I are gonna be buds, kiddo. Full disclosure, I’ll probably piss you off a time or two post-puberty owing to Lesson Number Two. So will your Uncle Dylan and your Uncle Kyle, for that matter. But, mark my words, we are going to be tight.”

Mary giggled as Frankie batted at him. “Lesson Two?”

“It’s the protector thing. Ask Andy next time you see her.” Frankie let out an excited baby shriek. Luke winked. “Oh, you’ll dig her too, kid. Everybody does because my woman’s remarkable.”

“She is, isn’t she?” Mary held his smile for a moment before glancing back at her daughter. “And you are too, Little Miss. Oh, yes, you are,” she said, cooing out more praise as she snagged her daughter’s foot and kissed the bottom of it. “Doesn’t she have the most perfect toes? Like, if there was an award for best toes, she’d totally win it.”

“I mean, yeah,” Luke said, studying the digits in question. “I can see her winning some kind of toe pageant, but why bother with that? Look at the length on these babies. She’ll be able to hang five or ten of ’em off a board easy.”

“Oh, yeah. You’re right!” Mary laughed in delight, then punched him affectionately in the shoulder. “Holding babies is the best, huh? Doesn’t it just make you so happy cuddling this warm little body in your arms? Doesn’t it chase away all the bad stuff?”

It did chase away all the bad stuff. Every last ounce of it.

Luke was good.

No, he was great actually.

And something his sister had just said was giving him an idea. A brilliant one. One he hoped would win him another tiny smile from his sad little bird.

No, not a tiny one this time.

---