Page 9

There were piles of laundry on the floor, Cheetos ground into the carpet, toys scattered from one end of the room to the other, and a dirty diaper wrapped up into a little ball on the corner of the coffee table.

Not that I would say anything to my sister about it.

I was sure she knew how much of a mess it was in there, and if she weren’t sick as a dog right now, she’d be embarrassed as hell that I was seeing it.

My sister was like that.

She always looked presentable, and her shit was always clean and kept. She cared about making a good impression and always worried about what people thought of her. Even when we were kids, she wouldn’t leave the house without her hair brushed.

I wasn’t sure where she got that from.

Lord knew I could give a fuck less what anybody thought of me. Especially since I got out.

Ten years I’d been told what to eat, when to sleep, when to shit—I was done living by anybody’s rules but my own.

Angel came back down the hall with a backpack over her shoulder and the baby’s diaper bag in her hand.

“Boys, shoes on,” she said.

JJ groaned.

“Now, Jacob.”

He put the iPad down and begrudgingly did as his mother instructed.

While the boys dug around under the couch for their shoes, I buckled Mathew into his car seat. The kid was out cold the second I stuck his pacifier in his mouth.

“Gonna need the keys to your van,” I said.

Angel grabbed them off the hook by the door and dropped them in my palm. “Car seats are already in there.”

“Figured.” I leaned down and kissed the top of her head, flu germs and all. “Get some rest, sis.”

“Love you.”

“Love you back.”

Slinging the bags over my shoulder, I grabbed the handle of Mathew’s pumpkin seat and herded the boys out the door so my sister could get some rest.

Pulling around to the back of Sinful Sweets, I parked beside Joy’s white Jeep Cherokee, cut the motor, then twisted around in my seat so I could see my nephews. “Y’all ready to go in?”

“Yeah!” they cheered, throwing their arms up in the air.

I shook my head.

One day somebody was going to figure out how to harvest all that energy and bottle it. And when they did, they were going to make a damn killing.

On that thought, I climbed out and hauled the sliding door open.

One by one, the boys unbuckled themselves from their booster seats and jumped out onto the gravel. “Party! Party! We’re gonna party!” they chanted, while I leaned in and popped the pumpkin seat off its base.

“What do you two know about partying?” I asked, herding them toward the black door under the overhang.

JJ’s eyes grew wide. “That it’s fun!”

I snorted.

“Yeah. I guess it is.”