Page 76 of Not Mine to Rescue

“I can’t, Walt. Because if—and it’s a huge fucking if right now— but if Honor comes around, she and Mary are going to hit it off. What then? Do you want to be that guy ordering me to use her friend?” I wouldn’t put it past him.

“It won’t be like that.”

“Are you sure? Because I think you were going there.” He’d asked me for shit like that before.

The barn was quiet. He studied me as I stood my ground. “Are you finally growing hair on your balls?”

“I’ve had hair on my balls since I was thirteen.”

He bit his lip, another tell. One he usually constrained. But it came out when his other emotions surfaced. “I had doubts about you.”

“Not a surprise. Everyone doubts me.”

“Boots didn’t. Kid didn’t.”

I’d call bullshit on that, but he had picked the two members who’d sponsored me. They’d been my tormenters and my champions. Two fucked-up sides of the same coin.

“Well. If you ain’t going to fuck her for us, what are you planning to do?”

That was easy. “Keep her all to myself.”

“Good luck with that. She’s hot.”

“I’m telling Mary you said that.”

“You do that.” He had that look. Both eyes squinting at me.

“I’m giving you shit, Walt. Mary knows you look. Just as long as you don’t touch, she’s chill.”

His jaw shifted a little. “You think they’ll be friends.”

“Mary’s friends with all the ol’ ladies.”

A heartbeat, maybe two, was all I got before he doubled over laughing. It got so bad, he was wheezing. “Ain’t no fucking way.” He gasped and tried to talk again. “Her? Your ol’ lady?” He almost fell over he was laughing so hard.

Asshole.

When he finally started crying from his amusement, I got mad. “What part of our relationship is so hard to believe?”

He wiped his face with a sleeve. “She ain’t going to be your ol’ lady.”

“Why?”

He blinked at the tone I’d used. “Caught a nerve there, didn’t I?”

“Why, Walt?” Seventy pounds or not, an extra four inches of reach or not, he was going down. It was either that or kill myself trying.

“Wombat, hard truth? You ain’t got shit to offer her. Look around. Your farm? You share it with your sister. It ain’t making money. Your house? It’s a garage. She’s used to more. You know that, right?”

“You’re pointing out material things.”

“That’s what women want.”

“Bullshit.”

His left eye twitched and his forehead tinted pink. “Before I slap that insubordinate mouth of yours, enlighten me. What do women want?”

The tone he used was too condescending to stomach. It only made me angrier. “To be seen. Loved.”