“True, but they’re my precious babies. You’re a demon from hell.”
I blinked when Alannah took her glasses off and rested them on her thigh.
“Why’d you take them off?”
“Because I don’t wanna see ye’ right now. Your ugly face gives me headaches.”
Keela snorted. “That’s funny.”
Alannah looked in her general direction and smiled.
“Can ye’ see me, Lana?”
“Just the outline. All of your features are blurred beyond recognition.”
Keela looked at me. “She takes ‘er glasses off a lot when she’s around you.”
“It’s because I’m so sexy that she’s tempted to grope me, so in order to keep my little brother happy, she hides her insane attraction to me by taking her glasses off in my presence. She can’t help that she wildly attracted to me.”
Keela lips twitched in amusement.
“Oh,” Alannah snorted, “and here I thought I did it because your ugly mug makes me eyes burn.”
“Nah, that’s what you want to believe, so you don’t feel bad about wanting my sexy body.”
Alannah rolled her eyes. “I swear ye’ love the sound of your own voice.”
“I’m partial to it,” I agreed.
“Remember when ye’ had strep last year and lost your voice?” At my nod, she said, “Those were the best ten days of me life.”
Keela burst into giggles as I glared at my arch-enemy.
“You’re turning my own wife against me, Ryan.”
Alannah, looking mighty pleased with herself, put her glasses back on and looked at the television screen and said, “Are ye’ watchin’ Star Wars?”
Keela nodded. “The Force Awakens.”
“I don’t really like them, the old or the new ones.”
I gasped. “Get the fuck out of my house.”
Alannah didn’t move a muscle. Instead, she beamed at Keela when my wife thumped my side. “Ye’ can’t kick people out of the house because they don’t like the same films as ye’.”
“You calm yourself.” I pointed my index finger at her. “Star Wars is more than a movie franchise, and you know it.”
Alannah snorted. “Star Trek is better.”
Keela sucked in a breath. “Alannah, run.”
I felt my blood boil. I shot to my feet and put my entire focus on Alannah Slater. She was a pest that I was about to exterminate. Keela’s warning was all the head start she got as I made a beeline for her. She jumped to her feet, screamed like a banshee, and ran out of the house at high speed, but that didn’t derail me from chasing her. Neither did just being in my boxers.
“Get back here, you little Trekkie whore!”
I could have sworn I heard her fucking laugh as she ran from me.
“Help!” She screeched as she sprinted for Ryder and Branna’s house.
She made it to the front door just as Ryder and Damien raced outside. When they saw the scene before them, they started to laugh. Damien stopped laughing and widened his eyes when he realised that his wife wasn’t slowing down. He opened his arms and caught her as she flung herself at his body and wrapped her short-ass limbs around him.
“Save me,” she panted. “He’s fuckin’ crazy!”
“Death!” I hollered as I slowed down to a brisk walk. “Death is what you shall—OW!”
I cut myself off when blinding hot pain shot up my right foot. I reached down, grabbed my foot and hopped around as agony tore through me. It happened. What every parent feared happened ... I stepped on a motherfucking Lego. Right there in the front yard of my eldest brother’s home.
“The devil is real!” I hissed as I lowered my foot back down to the ground. “So fucking real!”
I heard my brothers crack up, then childlike laughter joined them. I turned to Ryder’s van, loaded with his kids and mine, and they were all pointing at me and laughing their little heads off while Enzo was grinning with his phone pointed in my direction. I glared at him until he put the phone away with a rueful smile.
I looked at Damien and Alannah who was standing next to Ryder smiling so wide I knew her damn cheeks had to be hurting.
“Where are your demon kids?”
“In our car behind you,” Damien answered.
I turned around and waved at my nephews who were laughing at me, too. I think they were laughing at me being outside in just my boxers rather than stepping on a Lego.
Little shits.
“Dame and Ry are goin’ to watch their footie games. Don’t ye’ wanna go?”
“You know I’m not allowed at one of their games until my two years are up.”
“Oh yeah,” Alannah mused. “I forgot ye’ got a two-year ban for distruptin’—”
“I disrupted nothing,” I stated firmly. “That damn referee was paid off. I could feel it in my bones.”
The entire ban was a joke. I was standing up for the club’s honour, and I get a two-year ban for assaulting a referee. I barely touched the man. I think I shoved him at best and maybe told him I’d lodge my foot up his ass, but that was it.