Games of the Heart (The 'Burg #4)(119)

Rolling back down to the soles of her feet but keeping her body pressed close, she answered, “Fin’s room. We were watching TV.”

Dean nodded then ordered, “Living room.”

Without delay, he turned on his sock-covered foot and stomped in.

Della followed.

Dusty pressed even closer.

“What’s going on?” she whispered.

“I read Darrin’s will,” Mike whispered back.

“Oh shit,” she kept whispering, her gaze scanning his face for clues.

“Damn straight,” Mike replied.

Her eyes narrowed and her nose scrunched. This was her seriously pissed off look, he guessed, seeing as he’d never seen it before.

If that was her pissed off, they were both in trouble. She thought he was hot when he was pissed. He thought she looked adorable.

He guided her into the living room and they made it to find Dean standing and Della perched on the arm of a chair, her fingers on both hands engaged in wringing each other. Mike let Dusty go then he turned and slid the pocket doors closed behind him.

Dusty moved to perch like her mother on the arm of the couch.

Mike moved into the room and crossed his arms on his chest.

Then he gave it to them straight but thorough.

When he was done, Della dropped her head. Her hands now in her lap motionless, she was the image of a mother who was wondering where she went wrong.

Dean, on the other hand, was red-faced and looked like he was about to explode. He was the image of a father who was wishing his daughter was thirty years younger so he could still tan her ass.

Dusty had her head up but it was turned, looking away. Her face in profile was thoughtful but her thoughts were easily readable – pain, confusion, anger mixed with relief.

“Why would she do that?”

This came from Della, it was whispered, injured, baffled.

Dusty, Mike was mildly surprised to see, didn’t jump all over that with catty comments, taking the golden opportunity to sink the blade of their daughter’s betrayal deeper by pointing out this might be a more egregious transgression but the behavior was not uncommon. Something Debbie wouldn’t hesitate to do. Instead, she remained silent and reflective.

“That doesn’t matter,” Dean answered. “What matters is, legally, the farm is safe. That’s what matters.”

He had moved from angry to relieved and he was right. Put it behind, move on.

“I’d like Debbie’s home phone number,” Mike requested. “I think we shouldn’t delay in informing her we understand what we understand and as she has no legal recourse, she’ll need to stand down. This will allow Fin, Kirb and Rhonda to rest easy, at least on this.”

“I’ll phone her,” Dean muttered, moving to the cell sitting on the coffee table and as Mike watched him do it, he debated the merits of allowing it.

However, Debbie would very likely be more responsive to a phone call from her father, who Mike had to assume she loved or at least had some feeling for, than Mike who at this point she’d convinced herself she detested.

As Dean dialed and Mike watched, Dusty left her perch on the couch and came to him. He looked down at her, again sliding an arm around her waist as both her arms circled his middle.

“So, Debbie’s derailed. Wanna go upstairs and celebrate by making out on a teenage boy’s bed?” she whispered.

No, he did not want that. What he wanted was to walk her back to his house, put her ass in his truck and drive her to the watering hole where they could celebrate decisively. But this time in the backseat where he’d have the freedom to flip her after she was done so he could drive in hard to give the same to himself using her silken, tight, wet pu**y to find it.

Unfortunately, with her nephew on his couch, this was not an option.

Dean started muttering on the phone while Mike answered, “Sweet as that offer is, Angel, I’m gonna have to pass.”

“Barn?” she suggested softly for only him to hear. “I’ll bring blankets. We can break up a bale of hay.”

“Honey, love you but do not love the idea of gettin’ hard in your family’s living room with your parents in attendance. You wanna cut me some slack?”

Her face got soft with the “love you”, her eyes flashed in that way that made his dick go hard when he mentioned his dick getting hard then the humor slid through it when he finished.

All of this happened in seconds. It was a spectacular show.

“Right, I’ll be good,” she muttered.

“Appreciate it,” he muttered back.

“Have you lost your mind!” Dean shouted, Dusty tensed next to him and both their eyes cut to Dean Holliday.

Mike tensed too when he saw the man red-faced again, fist planted on his hip, head bowed to look at his stocking feet.

The room was silent for some time then the silence was ended when Dean spoke.

And his tone hurt Mike to hear and he had never been particularly close to the man, just knew him, respected him and shot the shit with him on a variety of occasions over twenty-five years.

It had to kill Dusty and that was why, as they listened, Mike turned into her and curved his other arm around her tight.

“I do not know you,” Dean whispered, his voice tortured. “I cannot understand why you’ve done what you’ve already done to this family with your mean-spirited deceits, your sister-in-law, your nephews having lost what they’ve lost and why you’re staying that course. I cannot understand it. I don’t want to understand it. You contesting your brother’s will has no possible result but more aggravation and heartache not to mention depleting the reserves Rhonda has to care for her boys as they try to make a go to keep this farm viable. And what’s worse, you’re a goddamned attorney and you know you have no hope of winning and still, you’re doing it. Out of spite. Out of greed. I don’t know which it is but neither of them say one good thing about you. It’s like you’re not of my loins, you’re not my daughter. I don’t know who you are. I just know that right now, Deborah Holliday, I don’t wanna know.”