Page 71 of Tango Down

Each item brought the boys a step closer, and Nicolas’s bruised eyes widened when I dumped a bag of chips into a bowl.

“That’s a lot of food.” He seemed mesmerized.

“We love tacos in this family,” I replied with a grin. “Here—” I set the bags of soda bottles and cans closer to them. “You can pick the sodas you want and bring them to the patio.”

He perked up. “We each get one?”

Jesus Christ, what had they been through?

“Or two or three. I always tell Blake, drink as much as you can because we only allow soda on the weekends and when we eat tacos,” I answered. “Otherwise, I try to stick to water and milk in the middle of the week.”

“I like milk,” Mattie noted.

“We’ll buy that tomorrow,” I said with a nod.

* * *

Mattie was coming out of his shell, which felt amazing. He wasn’t relying as much on Nicolas. He ate chicken quesadillas and guzzled his Fanta, while Nicolas wanted to try a little bit of everything on the oven tray.

Mattie kept looking toward the swimming pool, so maybe we could take a swim before it got dark. That was another horse I wanted Blake to get back on. I watched her take everything in while we ate—the pool, the new deck, the lawn, even the avocado grove farther away. But most of all, she looked up the hill, where I knew the attack had begun. That was where they’d come from.

“Can I take more chips?” Nicolas asked.

“You take all the chips you want, buddy,” I told him. “The guac is really fucking good too.”

He smiled carefully and grabbed a handful.

Elliott sat next to me, and he was beyond beat and hiding it poorly. He’d barely eaten anything yet; he was spending his last energy on getting Julian to eat a quesadilla.

Blake was tired too. She’d crawled up on Piper’s lap halfway through dinner.

Elliott yawned, a sight that made Julian sit up straight and stare. The boy was taking it all in, curiosity evident in his eyes.

I gave Elliott’s hand a squeeze on the armrest, and I noticed Piper’s reaction a second too late. But fuck it, right? We’d agreed not to hide. She was going to find out.

She didn’t say anything, though. She just stopped eating and buried her face in Blake’s hair.

“I can’t believe Em and Danny did all this,” Elliott murmured. “I can’t believe…”

That all this had happened.

I had a feeling he was thinking about Tariq too. He hadn’t really been able to process the death of his friend until now.

* * *

Holy hell, he’d done it?

I rose from my seat, reactivating the motion-sensor lights, and watched Elliott trail out onto the patiowithoutJulian.

He grinned tiredly. “He’s asleep.”

Praise Jesus or whatever. “Where?”

“Between Nicolas and Mattie.”

That was good. We’d originally thought the whole living room sleepover was a kid’s dream come true, but to two boys who’d never had their own room before, Elliott’s offer to prepare a bed in one of the guest rooms was too good to resist. He’d placed a flat screen on a chair too, which I was sure had sweetened the deal.

“I’ll have to check in on him often, but for now, he’s out.” Elliott came over to me and stole my cigarette, and he took a couple drags.

---