In Rides Trouble (Black Knights Inc. #2)(23)

Pfft. “Well, then, when can I go and see Mark?”

“After you shower, my dear girl,” her brother told her, stopping before a metal door labeled women. “Not to be rude, but you two smell like something that recently crawled out from under a rock…at the dump…one that was sitting in the Porta-Potty section.”

From the corner of her eye, Becky saw Eve’s tired face glow crimson in the artificial overhead light.

Poor Eve. She’d always been particularly vulnerable to Billy’s bad manners.

“Geez, Billy,” she growled, “tell us how you really feel, why dontcha?”

“I just did,” he grinned as he held the door wide, handing her and Eve each a towel and a stack of clean, folded clothes.

The shower was heaven, and she heard Eve’s deep groan of pleasure from the stall next door, but she didn’t dilly-dally. She wanted to see Frank. She needed to see Frank in order to assess his situation for herself. Angel and Billy were obviously complete crap at accurately diagnosing a man’s injuries, evidenced by their quick assurances that he was absolutely fine.

He was not. How could he be? His arm was nearly ripped off!

After quickly scrubbing away the grease and grime of nearly a week, she put on the warm-up suit someone—one of the female crew members, she suspected—had loaned her. Slipping on the pair of blue hospital booties, she opened the door to find both men waiting.

Which was why she was twirling, arms held out, in order to give Billy and Angel a good gander at the racy, red, über-chic, cotton warm-up. Someone shopped at Victoria’s Secret. She made a mental note to find her mysterious benefactor and thank the woman.

“Angel’s going to take you down to sick bay,” her brother informed her. “I’ll wait here for Eve.”

She folded her arms and scowled up at him. “You be nice to her.”

Billy’s jaw locked, and she tried not to roll her eyes. That hard-ass expression of his might work on some. Not her.

“I was never anything but nice to her,” he grumbled.

“Pfft,” she punched him in the shoulder and gave up on not rolling her eyes. “I’m serious. She’s been through a lot. The last thing she needs is you rehashing the past.”

“Since when do I ever rehash?” He planted his fists on his hips. She called it his Superman pose. It made the little sister in her want to hold her finger an inch from his nose while chanting, “I’m not touching you, I’m not touching you…”

She resisted the urge, saying instead, “Just don’t mention—”

“Becky,” he growled, “I swear, after all you’ve put me through this week, I’m going to wring your neck if you don’t turn tail and run.”

It was his favorite threat, one he’d once made good on when she was five and he was ten. Although at the time, he hadn’t understood what the expression actually meant, so he’d taken a big black permanent marker, held her down, and drawn fat circles around her neck.

As punishment, their father forbade him to play Nintendo until the evidence disappeared completely. And she—never having been one for vanity—had delighted in “forgetting” to wash her neck. The humiliation of wearing the black smudges was nothing compared to the sheer joy of watching Billy gaze longingly at his Super Mario Bros. cartridge.

It’d taken weeks for the marks to vanish and to this day, she couldn’t help but grin every time he repeated that particular threat.

Ow!

Damn, that hurt. Her injured cheek wasn’t quite ready for grinning yet.

Note to self. No overly demonstrative facial expressions.

Billy patted at his pockets. “I know I’ve got a marker around here somewhere…”

“All right, all right,” she capitulated. “I’m going. But you’re a greasy, grimy monkey turd,” she called over her shoulder as she darted down the gangway, Angel following behind her.

“Grow up!” her brother hollered back.

“A greasy, grimy monkey turd with fish lips and bird legs and the brain power of an amoeba!” she yelled, joy and relief at finally, finally being back where she belonged making her voice bright.

“Oh yeah?” Billy just couldn’t let her have the last word. It would’ve gone against twenty-six years of tradition. “Well, you look like a can of smashed buttholes, and your breath smells like you eat used kitty litter!”

Her laughter echoed through the ship.

Man, it’s good to be back.





Chapter Six


“I feel like a new woman,” Eve said as she emerged from the women’s shower room, and Bill’s laughter at his little sister’s crazy antics died like a grease fire doused in baking soda.

Eve was dressed in a royal blue version of the cotton warm-up Becky’d worn—Angel had wheedled the clothes out of some starry-eyed female sailor—only on Eve’s 5’10” frame, the hems of the legs hit her mid-calf.

Still, she managed to pull it off. Oh hell, who was he trying to kid? She made the damn things look like they were supposed to be those short little island pants women donned when the weather turned warm. The kind of pants she’d worn that summer they dated. The kind of pants she’d paired with a super sexy set of wedge heel thingamabobs that’d made her mile-long legs look even longer.