Stone: At Your Service (Carolina Bad Boys #1) (31 page)

Josh found me drumming my fingers on a table, watching Javier court danger as he hunkered over his phone, tapping away with speed.

“Watcha doin’?” Josh asked as he slung a hefty arm around my neck.

“
Waiting for Javier’s imminent execution by your mom.” I peered at the black-eyed, black-haired boy. Then I knocked Josh’s arm off my shoulder, standing up straighter as Javier furiously typed on the screen of his iPhone, giggling quietly to himself. “Holy shit, he’s like—”

“
Janice.”

“
Yeah, man, if she was a Hispanic homosexual.”

Beer spewed out of Josh
’s mouth, landing on me. Oh well, no worse than Viper’s slobber. We continued to laugh our asses off while Javier imparted two regal middle fingers in our direction without looking up. He better be careful, Gigi was liable to snap them off. A young dude with surfer blond hair approached Javier, leaning in to kiss his neck.

“
So that’s his guy?” I took an appreciative look.

“
Yeah, Tate.”

“
How come we didn’t know about this?”

Josh shrugged.
“’Cause we’re dumbasses?”

He was probably right about that.

“They make a cute couple.” I nodded over to Javier and his All American jock. “They make a better couple than you and I did anyway.”

“
We sucked at that, huh? And not in the way we were supposed to.” Winking at me, Josh asked, “Which one do you think is the bottom?”

I squinted at the pair. It was hard to tell. Tate had some muscle on Javier, but maybe that just meant he was the tight-end receiver. Javier was the youngest of the garage crew at twenty-three and his boyfriend couldn
’t be much older. “Maybe they’re switches?”

“
The only switches I know are the ones Ma used to brand our behinds with when we misbehaved. Missy Peachtree would know all about that.” There was a fond smile on his face when he mentioned the Domme/grand dame from my writing group, the women we referred to as the Hens.

“
Hey, Stone!” Javier was no longer giggling, he was outright guffawing.

“
What up, ace?”

Just then, the rest of the Stone
’s crew surrounded us, each brandishing his cell phone to show us . . .
Oh, fuckin’ hell
. Lookee there, a do-over of the infamous “Stone’s Roses” photo the guys had cobbled together while Josh and I were away in Atlanta last May. This time it was tiled and titled “Ring Around the Rosy”, their hairy assholes and all in close-up. Now I knew what Javier had been working away on; he’d emailed it to all the gathered gang.

And that shit was funny.

“Y’all, it’s gonna be your puckers full of posies if that bullshit ends up anywhere near Twitter,” Josh boomed.

We all laughed at his expense until Gigi yelled,
“Chow’s on! Now put them damn gadgets away and get your grub on.”

One large table crowded o
nto, Gigi held everyone at bay with a nod to Josh. “Say grace, son.”

His deep voice began to rumble, and I held his hand on one side of
me and Mimi’s on the other. Holding them both tight. “We thank the Lord for the bounty he provided, for the family and friends we’re given, for the life and love granted us. For those missing, and those we will always miss, we take this time to remember.”

“
Oh, Josh,” Leelee sighed from the other side of him, knowing as I did he was thinking about his dad.

I squeezed his hand and released it so he could embrace his woman, pretending I wasn
’t blinking too fast when I kissed Mimi’s wrinkly cheek.

Stuffing her hankie away, Gigi started sending platters around.
“Eat up, y’all.”

There was a saying from Gigi, from way back.
The Stone family is everyone’s family
. I looked around the table bursting with people. She had that right.

Everyone
tucked in and talk turned to Leelee’s book
Ride
. Copies of it were everywhere in the lowcountry. The whole town of Mt. Pleasant was enamored with her. All the boys had read it, their wives, girlfriends, lovers, too. I could just imagine all the jealous broads who had bought that book simply for a hint about how Leelee had snagged the long-elusive Josh Stone.

“
How do you feel about sharin’ the limelight, Nicky?” One of the jackasses asked.

“
Yeah, you ain’t the only romance writer in town now.” Someone else chimed in.

I chewed a mouthful of slaw. Slowly. My writing and Leelee
’s were about as far apart as you could get, apart from the gasping-for-breath sex. She was New Adult, I was Paranormal. Never the twain did meet.

Giving a smug grin to the group, I tipped my head toward Leelee.
“Y’all can ask me that question when Miss Songchild has another five years under her belt.”

“
Booyah!”

“
Snap.”

“
Oh, it’s on,” Leelee said as she reached for me while Josh leaned out of the way. Grabbing the collar of my shirt, she growled, “Romance wars.”

“
You got it, L.” I spat in my palm. She did likewise and we shook on it.

“
Y’all about done hauling out your dicks yet? ’Cause I’ve got something else to say,” Josh grumbled.

Leelee slid her hand across his chest.
“First of all, I don’t have a dick, sug, which you well know by now. I have brass balls. And second,” she whispered something in his ear and his hand around a bottle of beer tightened until white knuckles appeared.

His voic
e came out low and gruff to her, “Yeah. I want that later, babe.”

Leelee
’s laughter tinkling, she sat back, a pleased smile on her face. Her haze of pale red hair brushed Josh’s shoulder as he stood up.

With his hands on the table, he looked over all of his, shaking his head and smiling.
“I asked Leelee to marry me, and she said yes. Would you believe it?”

The table erupted with victory shouts. I kept my eyes on Josh and Leelee, capturing the way she curled her fingers around his, silently mouthing,
“I love you so much.”

Tears shined in her eyes,
in his—
fuck
—in mine too. I couldn’t even bear to look at Gigi, but I knew she’d hauled out the hankie again.

Lifting Leelee
’s fingers to his mouth, Josh stared at his fiancée. “She’s wearing my ring and that makes me the proudest damn man in the whole world. I don’t deserve a woman like her, but I’m gonna do my best to make her happy. And I’ll kick any motherfucker’s ass who hurts her again.”

Leave it to him to go barbarian/romantic
. The table shook when everyone rapped on it.

“
Date, date, date,” we chanted.

He brought Leelee to her feet and into his arms, to a kiss that would
’ve simmered off the pages. Breaking away, he was choked up. “We decided to get married on Thanksgiving. It seemed—shit.” He backhanded his eyes. “It seemed a good time to get hitched ’cause I’m so fucking thankful for her.”

I stood up and clasped his shoulder.
“Cheers, man.”

“
With beer!” Some wiseass cracked.

But those bastards couldn
’t fool me. Their wide grins and claps and shouts showed how awesome they thought this was. The boss finding his woman, falling in love, making her his wife.

JJ piped up,
“Weewee’s gonna be a pwincess!”

He was passed down the table for squeals and hugs and gentler than usual high-fives.

We raised our bottles and everyone shouted, “To love!”

I gave Josh a hug, and one to Leelee after.
“Tamed by love.”

“
I wouldn’t say tamed,” Josh groused. “Watch it, bro, you’re next.”

Later in the afternoon, Gigi cornered me.
“Now we’ve got Joshy settled down, what’re you waitin’ for, son?”

My gaze skidded
to Wildcat.
Hell no to that
. Put a stop to that impulse right there. Fuck, my cheek still stung from her smack last month. I did not need a ballbuster for my woman.

JJ interrupted the ill-fated love match, breathless and doped up on sugar.
“Uncle Wicky! Uncle Wicky!”

He grabbed me by both grubby hands until I hunched down. His sweet breath spilled across my face, and he grinned at me.
“Wuv you, Uncle Wicky. And Weewee’s gonna be my momma!”

Jesus.
I knew what JJ did to Josh’s heart . . . he just about flipped mine upside-down too. I’d been part of his life from newborn to now, helping my buddy out when Claire, his ex, left them high and dry.

These people were my family. The only family I needed. 

“Come see, we built us a fort!” he shrieked in my ear.

Tugged along after him, I flagged down Leelee.
“Just how much sugar has the kid had, L?”

“
Ice pops on tap, Coke on repeat.” She tallied off his cocktail of high octane sweets while the dude-man vibrated beside me, hopped up on his sugar rush.

“
Josh is gonna have a field day with that.”

“
You know as well as I do all it takes is a Disney song and a reminder we aren’t leavin’ him to settle him down, Nicky.” She smoothed JJ’s rumpled hair.

“
Weewee sings the bestest!”

His fingers slipping from mine, I turned to Leelee.
“Nights in the rocking chair?”

She watched Josh
’s son, soon to be hers, as he joined the ragtag bunch headed into the forest. “A few, but he’s getting better. I’m never gonna be Claire to him even if he barely remembers her, I don’t want to be. I just want him to know I love him, and I’ll never let him go like she did.”

“
I’m really happy for you and Josh, you know that, right?”

“
It shows, Nicky.” She reached up to pat my face.

I shoved my hands into my pockets and looked at the ground.
“Does it?” 

“
You are Josh’s brother in every way but blood.” She squeezed me close for a hug before letting me go.

Josh had got it right with her. He was one lucky sumbitch.

It sounded like the kids were playing a cross between Marco Polo and Zombie Attack in the surrounding woods, but I couldn’t find JJ. Confident the older kids would keep their eyes out for the youngsters, warning them away from the creek and the pluff mud, I ended up at the plankboard bar where the cooler of beer, water, and juice boxes were stored along with an arrangement booze. Making myself useful beneath the flowering canopy of crepe myrtle, I played bartender to all and sundry.

I stood up from restocking the beer cooler, coming face-to-face with Cat. I slotted my aviators into the neck of my shirt and wiped my hands down the front of my faded-to-fuck jeans. I
’d shaved in the morning but the evening stubble tickled beneath my fingertips when I scratched lightly on my jaw, never taking my eyes off Cat’s face. Her mouth parted, her tongue wetting the pouty bottom lip. I could take care of that for her.

Bracing my palms on the rough wooden bar top, my biceps bulged and my forearms flexed with muscles.
“Pick your poison, Wildcat.”
Hell, pick me, darlin’.

Suddenly,
I didn’t give a shit about Ray’s warnings or her hot temper . . . in fact I was more intrigued than ever.

Especially when her voice rolled over me like raw silk
, delivering another stinging barb. “If I had any poison, I’d have slipped it into your drink already.”

Yeah, that definitely got a rise out of me. My cock took the wake-up challenge and thumped against my jeans. Hot damn, I was
gonna have this woman sweet-talking in my ear and eating out of my lap by the time I was through with her. If she was determined, I was goddamn stubborn.

“
Hey, you don’t need to prove to me you’re tough as nails, I got it.”

Moving around the bar between us, I slid in front of
Cat. Close enough to feel the heat of her body, not near enough to touch although at this point I wouldn’t say no to another slap across the face. Wildcat riled me up and made me feel alive like no other woman had.

She pursed her lips and the only hint I affected her at all was the fluttering pulse in the dip of her collarbone.

“So, what’ll it be, Cat?” My voice a low, rough rumble, I made sure she knew I was offering more than a refreshment.

“
Sweet tea with lemon please.” Then her smile opened up, planting a perfect dimple beneath the apple of her right cheek. “Guess I could do with something to sweeten me up.”

I laughed, strolling back to get her a cup of sweet tea from the large silver tank of sun-sweetened brew. Serving her a red Solo cup filled with ice, lemon wedges and Gigi
’s own recipe, I crossed my arms over my chest. “So, are you telling me your bark is worse than your bite?”