Hold (Gentry Boys, #5)(32)
The rest of the morning wasn’t too busy. I inked a rose vine around a delicate wrist and a lone pansy flower on the upper bicep of a cranky fraternity type.
“I lost a bet,” he explained, as if I cared.
Brick was in by late morning and traffic in the shop was very light. I was especially glad because it meant I could take a lunch once Creed showed up. Maybe we could head closer to campus and dine at our old hangout, Cluck This, a greasy chicken joint where once upon a time Saylor and Truly and even Stephanie had worked before they moved onto better things.
I was in the office and heard Aspen’s chirpy voice call out, “Hey there Creed, he’s in the back.”
When I heard the heavy footfalls in the corridor I sat back and waited for my brother to fling the door wide but after a few short knocks he merely eased it open soft as a whisper.
“What the hell?” I said because I wasn’t prepared for the sight of Creed looking as if he’d spent the night beneath a freeway overpass.
“Not hell exactly,” he said, sinking into a chair.
A sour smell had entered the room with him. I pointed. “What’s on your shirt?”
He looked down absently. “Spit up, I guess.”
“Yours?”
“No.”
“Is Truly sick?”
“Truly is fine.”
I handed him a box of tissues and a water bottle, figuring he’d want to clean himself up a little and wondering what on earth was going on to make Creedence Gentry oblivious to the fact that he was wandering around with a stained shirt and smelling of expired milk. “Are you going to elaborate or do I have to keep guessing?”
He started wetting down his shirt and patting it with tissues before giving up with a scowl. “Fuck, it’s worse than I thought.” He pulled his shirt over his head with one fluid motion. “Cord, you got something I could change into?”
“Of course. I always haul around a complete wardrobe change in my back pocket.”
Creed tossed the damp shirt at my head. “Glad I have two wiseass brothers instead of one.”
“I can’t compete with Chase. He’s in a class by himself.” I pushed back from the desk. “Hold on, I actually do have a spare shirt folded up in that corner filing cabinet. You’ll owe me one though since you’re bound to stretch it all out of shape.”
Creed flexed. “Can’t blame me for being physically fit.”
“I’m physically fit. You’re a f*cking monster.”
I dug around in the two-drawer file cabinet which served as an informal depository for things that didn’t easily belong anywhere else. The black t-shirt I knew I’d find in there was clean, if a little faded. Creed seemed glad enough to have it though.
“Thanks, man.”
I stared at him as he rolled the shirt over his muscles. If I’d just met him on the street I’d assume he was juicing but I knew better than that. Creed put in gym time of course, but he’d always been huge.
“You ready to start talking now?” I asked.
Creed stood up and ran a hand through his short hair. He looked like the dictionary entry for ‘hung over’. But he just shook his head with a wry smirk before reaching for the door.
“How about I buy you lunch?” he offered. “I’ll tell you all about it.”
CHAPTER ELEVEN
CREED
My dreams were full of crying kittens but that was only because Truly had brought the baby into the bedroom. I knew it even before I was fully awake, as the dream image of mewling animals faded and my mind caught up to the fact that the cries were human.
The gentle light filtering in through the blinds meant the hour was early. Truly was on the far side of the room, facing a window and soothing the baby with a soft lullaby in her dreamy southern accent. Her thick black hair spilled halfway down her back and her hand cupped the baby’s head as he closed his eyes with a soft sigh.
“I’m sorry,” she said when her song ended. She didn’t turn around. “I didn’t mean to wake you.”
“I didn’t say nothing,” I yawned, swinging my legs over the side of the mattress and stretching. “So how’d you know I was awake?”
“Because I always know, Creedence,” she answered, finally turning around with a brilliant smile and an infant cradled to her breast. It was such a devastating sight that all I could do was hunker there, gaping, as the baby stirred. Truly whispered “Hush, angel,” before kissing his downy cap of dark hair. Then my wife looked right into my eyes and my heart felt like it was being squeezed by invisible fingers.
“Mia’s still asleep,” she explained, glancing at the closed bedroom door with a frown. The second bedroom where Mia and the baby had been sleeping was across the hall.
“Hmph,” I grunted and stood, hearing a small crack in my back. Truly’s screwed up sister had arrived on our doorstep three days ago. There’d been that odd phone call where she’d hinted she was heading in our direction via bus, refusing Truly’s offer to pay for a plane ticket. What she forgot to mention was that she was bringing her four-month-old baby with her. Because then she would have had to first mention that she actually had a baby.
Mia Lee’s impending arrival wasn’t even on my mind the night I arrived home after playing to a raucous crowd at The Hole to find my sister-in-law sitting cross-legged on the floor and twisting her pale hands together. Meanwhile, my wife was perched on the couch, watching her sister with a helpless expression and a dark-eyed baby in her lap who was hiccupping and ogling me with curiosity as he waved his arms around, capturing a fistful of Truly’s black hair.