Page 130 of Chasing Home
Slapping a hand on my shoulder, he leans close, a no-bullshit expression on his rugged features. “Yeah, Johnny. She’s goin’ to come back. I was wrong to think she was goin’ to take off on you the way I did, but now, I know it deep in my bones that she’s meant to be here. Right now, you just have to let ’er go so she can learn what it is she really needs.”
“And that’s me?”
“A family. She needs a real family. And you can give her one.”
“Crazy fucker!” Thomas shouts, jumping back after he locks the back of the trailer.
Zeus grunts and snorts, and the trailer shakes as he throws himself around it. The three of us stand around rigid and huffing, the past few minutes a lot more than we expected.
Loren takes his hat off and bends at the knees to shake his hair out, sweat flying. “I’m not touching another one of those again. It nearly bit my goddamn hand off.”
“Pain in the ass he’s such a good breeder,” Thomas grumbles. “Wade won’t give him up. He actually reminds me of you when we first met, Lo. Fucking everything that breathed your way and taking bites out of anyone who tried to get to know you. But hey, you’ve softened right up for us, eh?”
“Do you ever get tired of hearing yourself speak?” Lo throws back.
I chuckle. “No, he doesn’t.”
“Don’t even get me started on you, Jonathon,” Thomas snaps, a long finger jabbing my chest.
“What the fuck did I do?”
“You took my tractor out this morning without permission.”
I roll my eyes. “Your tractor? Be for real.”
“Is it true that Rory’s leaving with Wanda?” Lo asks, the level of curiosity in his expression making me glare.
“It’s Aurora to you, fuck boy.”
Thomas holds his hands in front of him before spreading them out in a rainbow shape. “Lo, the emotionally available fuck boy. That’s a good one. Has a ring to it.”
Loren flips him off but repeats his question for me. “Is it true?”
“Yeah. It’s true. They’re goin’ to Toronto with Lee.”
“When?”
Panic flares in his eyes, and I tug my brows together while trying to piece together why. “Tomorrow. What does it matter to you?”
“If you’re going to admit to wanting Johnny’s woman, Lo, I’m going to have to encourage you not to. I’d have to hand you over to Zeus,” Thomas says.
Whatever it was running through Lo’s mind clears enough for him to snap back into the conversation long enough to frown. “What? Fuck off with that. I don’t want Aurora.”
I believe him. “So? What was it, then?”
“Wanda?” Thomas asks, a smirk slowly spreading his lips. “Ah, shit. You’re into Wanda? You’re fuckin’ with us.”
Loren reaches out and shoves Thomas in the chest, but the instigator just laughs. “I’m not talking about this with you.”
Thomas covers Loren’s hands and keeps them on his chest, encouraging him to shove him again, the fucking masochist. “So you admit it, then?”
Loren doesn’t answer him. He rips his hands away and starts toward the truck hooked up to Zeus’s trailer. I chase after him, leaving Tommy behind to collect himself.
“Hey, don’t fuck off yet,” I say when he reaches for the driver’s door. He stalls, huffing. “He’s just trying to get a rise out of you. Ignore him.”
“I know. He’s a shithead.”
“It’s more than Tommy, then, I take it?”