Wild Like the Wind (Chaos #5)(120)

But he wasn’t cuddly.

“I’m turning over a new leaf,” he told me.

I looked beyond him to Millie, who was looking at her man’s back with a happy smile flirting at her mouth, and I knew why this leaf was turning.

So I looked back at High and walked to him.

He opened his arms, and when I got near they closed around me, so I returned the favor.

“Found your way home, I see,” I whispered in his ear.

“Home found me,” he did not whisper back. “Got lucky.”

I looked over his shoulder at Millie who now sported a tender, happy look, and at that look I wondered which one of them felt luckier.

“Yeah,” I agreed.

He let me go but kept one hand at the small of my back to push me around him and into my own living room.

I guessed it was time to move on from hugging.

“Throw your cut anywhere, babe,” I said to him and looked at Millie. “Wine? Beer? Tequila shooters?”

“Wine, whatever kind you have will be great,” she answered.

“High?” I asked.

“Beer, babe,” he grunted, proving he was Hound’s brethren beyond the cut he wore.

“You guys get comfy, I’ll bring the drinks in,” I told them, thinking this would give me a shot at texting Hound.

“We’ll help,” Millie offered.

Shit.

“No,” I said over my shoulder, seeing her glancing around my living room. “That’s cool.”

“I haven’t seen your house yet, Keely,” she replied. “And from what I can see, I want to see more.”

Yep.

Shit.

“Come on back then,” I murmured.

I heard the distinctive sound of a leather cut hitting a sofa and they followed me back.

I knew when Millie hit the kitchen because she exclaimed, “Holy crap.”

I grinned.

“This place is … this is … holy crap,” she went on.

I grabbed the grocery bags from the table and set them on a counter and then went right to the fridge to yank out a beer as well as a bottle of white.

“How many pitchers are there?” she asked.

I looked to my wall that ran behind the stove and farm sink and fed up to a slanted, vaulted ceiling. The entire wall above an area of tiled backsplash was shelves filled with different beautifully but brightly painted pitchers and canisters I’d started collecting even before Graham had died.

“A lot,” I answered.

“The fireplace is amazing,” she noted.

I turned my attention to the fireplace against the back wall that had a stucco mantel and chimney that was painted a deep, rustic yellow and adorned with decorative plates. It was filled with a wood burning stove that heated the kitchen in the winter in a way it was super cozy and suddenly walking my groceries from the garage to the kitchen didn’t seem like a chore anymore.

“Yeah, I … actually …” I turned from popping the cap on High’s beer to High. “Didn’t you paint that?” I asked, handing him his beer.

“Yup,” he answered, taking it. “With Hound.”

Yeah.

He’d painted it.

With Hound.

And Hound could help me paint our new kitchen.

I was back to thinking dragging my groceries from garage to house was a chore.

“I’ll grab the glasses,” Millie offered. “Where are they?”

“Over there.” I indicated the other side of the kitchen with a jerk of my head as High pulled the bottle from my hands in a way I couldn’t fight, so I didn’t.

“Corkscrew?” he asked.

I shifted, opened a drawer and handed him the corkscrew.

Millie came and set the glasses by him on the counter.

“Take a seat,” he ordered, like I was in their kitchen.

Ah, Chaos.

It was going to suck, having to hate them for as long as it took me to get over whatever they did to my man, because they were often just plain lovable (even if it was sometimes in an annoying way).

“We can take a tour later,” Millie declared, right then taking my hand and guiding me to my kitchen table.

We sat.

A cork popped out of a bottle.

I watched High start to pour but looked back to Millie sitting at corners to me as she put her hand on mine on the table.

“How are you, Keely?” she asked.

There was something weighty about that question that I wasn’t sure I understood.

“I’m good, babe. Though I’m sorry I didn’t reach out earlier when I heard you guys were back together, especially after what went down a while back, and definitely after seeing you at the funeral. Things have just been …” I hesitated before I decided it was safe to finish, “a little crazy.”

She nodded her understanding but did it watching me very closely.

When she said nothing, I carefully asked, “You?”

“I’m, uh … well, I’m … that is,” her hand squeezed mine, “I was so, so sorry to hear about Black, honey.”

Oh. Okay.

She’d been gone for a long time. The news might even be relatively new news to her. And like everyone, she’d loved Black. And as with everyone, Black had loved her.

“Thanks, Millie, that’s sweet, but it happened a long time ago,” I told her softly. “I’m more interested to know how things are going with you after what happened a few months ago.”