Total pages in book: 91
Estimated words: 88290 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 441(@200wpm)___ 353(@250wpm)___ 294(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 88290 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 441(@200wpm)___ 353(@250wpm)___ 294(@300wpm)
“But because you’re a man, it’s okay?”
“No. But I think Duncan’s right. All he thought was good job and then gave me a swat.”
“Would he have slapped my ass?”
I chuckled. “No, dear. No one slaps your ass without your permission.”
He was quiet a moment. “Would he have slapped Aaron’s ass?”
“Uhm, have you ever seen Aaron make anything in his life?”
“That’s not the point.”
It wasn’t. “I think you’re making too big a deal of a spontaneous action.”
“I think if he smacked your ass, there’s a good chance he would smack Steph’s or Ersi’s as well. I don’t know Ed’s or Gene’s wives, but maybe he’d do the same to them.”
“I––”
“It’s disrespectful.”
“Again,” I reiterated. “I think it’s only that I’m a guy that he was all, good job, buddy, and then the smack on the ass.”
“Hey,” Kola said, walking out onto the porch to join us, with all his focus on me. “The hell is with that guy slapping your ass?”
“Can we all stop saying ass?”
“Can that guy not touch yours?”
God. “Listen––”
“We don’t touch people without their express permission,” he told me. “I had to correct a guy in my lab group when we went out for lunch the other day. He kept touching our server, and when she walked away, I told him to knock it off.”
“What did he say?”
“He said he wasn’t making her uncomfortable and he’d ask her when she got back,” he replied, crossing his arms. “But I said, it didn’t matter if it was making her uncomfortable, it was making me uncomfortable as well as complicit if I didn’t say anything. So he had a choice to either stop or he could go get lunch somewhere else.”
“And?”
He shrugged. “Well, so yeah, he stopped, and when the waitress came back and stood only on my left, between me and Blair, another guy in my group, he got the picture,” Kola explained. “Plus, when I was leaving, the waitress stopped me and thanked me for speaking up. I mean, she’s in college like the rest of us, she needs her tips, so some guy touching her for a few seconds, she’s gonna deal with to get her money. But that’s bullshit, just like that guy touching you in the kitchen. I…I didn’t like it.”
“There,” Sam said, taking a breath. “We’re agreed.”
“He apologized,” I said. “Let’s be kind and let the spirit of the season surround us.”
Kola was scowling at me, and Sam appeared skeptical.
I groaned and went back to the kitchen.
“Honey,” Mark said to Hannah, who was next to the refrigerator. “Could you bring me a beer?”
She turned to look at him. “Hannah,” she corrected him. “Not honey. Only guys the same age as my grandfather, and members of my family, get to call me honey.”
He chuckled. “You don’t think that’s a bit much?”
“Nope,” Pat chimed in. “My daughters are the same way.” He then looked up at me. “We’re gonna call it a night after we eat, Jory, because watching Hannah and the boys put up decorations is making me think that even though Ersi threw me out of the house, that maybe she could use some help at home.”
“Awww,” I crooned.
“Shuddup,” he rumbled, going back to eating his food.
I noted that Chaz was out in the living room, his phone held to his ear with his shoulder as he wrote things down on one of my kitchen pads that I kept in a drawer that he had clearly grabbed. Ed was outside on the porch, nodding, I was guessing, speaking to his wife as well. Gene was at the table chuckling as he looked at pictures on his phone.
“Sorry to eat and run,” he said, glancing up at me, “but my daughter says my wife wants Target birds—whatever that is—and a couple pillows, so she’s gonna meet me there so we can grab ’em together.”
“That’s nice,” I told him.
“Well, being here is nice, Jory,” he said softly and then cleared his throat. “You have a sweet family.”
“Even me?” Sam teased him.
“Yeah, asshat, even you.”
Sam scoffed but smiled.
“Thank you,” I said, feeling it then, the warmth and happiness that comes with having the people you love under one roof.
He stood up and tipped his head at Sam. “Next time you guys can come to my place. I’m telling you now, though, my daughter’s gonna play, and she’s mean about it.”
“Bring it on,” Sam told him. “Hannah’s coming to play with me.”
Hannah gasped. “Daddy, I can’t play po––”
“You can do anything,” he assured her. “You are woman, hear you roar.”
She rolled her eyes. “Oh good Lord. Maybe take Kola instead, he’s the card shark.”
Sam turned to his son. “Really?”
Kola shrugged. “Shark is a vast over––”
“No, no,” Jake interrupted. “That’s true. And you’re kinda mean about it too.”
“Oooooh-whoooo, Kage,” Gene said, waggling his eyebrows at Sam. “It’s game on when next we meet.”