Wild Wind: A Chaos Novella (Chaos #6.6)(61)

He got another warm look after he said that, and she sidled closer.

“I’m currently in denial about the fact you met my brother like you just did. Not to mention, all I’ve done pretty much is bitch about him. Because he’s not a dick. He can be a dick, but he isn’t a dick.”

Jag moved too, to hook an arm around her and pull her even closer.

He did this saying, “I get the distinction.”

“You guys will get along. Though, warning, I’m not sure you’ll be tight. Haley will love you. Dad will really like you. Eventually, after we get past this, Elijah will dig you, but you won’t pal around. He’s into sports, watching and playing, and he’s putting himself through law school.”

That law school bit was news.

“So he’s not lazy, he’s just conditioned to lean on you, and in some cases, that means taking advantage of you,” Jag remarked.

She nodded.

Right then.

They needed to move this along.

“Okay, you’re on with Mal’s mom,” he said. “But I think we should warn him that’s going to happen. If he’s not sharing with her, then he won’t want to be blindsided by that, because she’s probably gonna be all over it.”

“She will be,” Archie confirmed.

“And as for the group, I got an idea.”

She was running her hands up his chest and when she got to his shoulders, she held on and asked, “What’s your idea?”

“I think they should come to Chaos, to Ride. Meet the brothers. Field trip. Showing them another version of a tribe, how we work together, and I’ll figure out how to do the lecture about looking out for your people without making it seem like a lecture between now and whenever that happens. Do we have to get their parents’ permission for them to leave the store?”

“Yeah, I always tell them when we’re off to do something. But we have an email group so it’s easy. I can just pop a line to them. They’ll all be cool with it. They dig when the kids have something fun to do.”

“Great. Once you do that, I’ll arrange some brothers to come for pickups.”

She leaned some of her weight into him and said, “Awesome, boyfriend, now maybe we should talk about you being all alpha all over my storeroom with my brother, and incidentally, me.”

“Babe—”

She placed her three middle fingers over his lips to stop him from speaking.

“I’m not going to say that was the wrong call. I honestly don’t think I’ve ever seen Elijah that pissed. I don’t think he would have hurt me, but I was not okay with him being in my face like that. That said—”

He pulled her fingers from his lips. “It’s the guy you got.”

She did a perplexed blink. “Sorry?”

“Me, that’s the guy you got. I’m not gonna be okay with anyone up in your face, Archie, and I’m also not gonna hang back, let it happen and let you deal with it if I can do something about it.”

“You knew he was my brother.”

“I did. And as your brother and as a man, he needs to respect you.” He shook his head sharply when she opened her mouth. “Nope, babe. No. He never should have been in your space like that. If you gleefully shot his dog, I’m out and he can take his anger out the way he sees fit. You’re calling him on pulling shit, he doesn’t like it, he takes a goddamn breath and gets some control. He does not come to your space and get into your face. No. End of discussion.”

He said those last three words because it was worth a shot to say those three words.

But this was Archie.

Consequently, it was not the end of the discussion.

“I would have told him that once he calmed down,” she returned.

“I believe you, but it didn’t happen that way, and I’m just not that guy who is going to walk in on his woman in that sitch and not make the move I made.”

They both fell silent.

Jagger broke it.

“That an issue for you?”

“It’s definitely sweet, you looking out for me and being protective. But I can handle myself and my brother is never a threat.”

“But you get where I’m coming from?”

It took her a second, then she nodded.

Though after she gave him that, she asked, “If you’re having words with Dutch, how would you feel about me pulling you out of that and getting in Dutch’s shit?”

He rolled his neck.

There was no popping, then again, he’d already popped it not long ago.

She did not miss this move, or likely what precipitated it, even without the evidence being audible, so her voice was sweet to soften the score she noted with her next words. “You get where I’m coming from, boyfriend?”

“All right, I’ll take a breath next time. Though, just sayin’, that happens again with Elijah, the fact of that alone, that breath might not work.”

“Sometimes I think I should introduce you to my friend Joany,” she joked. “She thinks boys like you are all kinds of cute.”

He adjusted so he had an arm around her shoulders, and he tucked her into his side.

He then moved them in the direction of the door to the store while he said, “There’s a dude out there special enough for your girl. He just is not me. I’ve figured out I like them chill.”