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18.

Ice cubes are really just swimming in their own blood.

Dice

C YDNEY

The flight to Vegas didn’t take long at all, and even though I had a million thoughts and worries running through my head - did I turn the thermostat down so my power bill wouldn’t be outrageous? Should I have shut off the water heater just in case it sprang a leak? Should I have closed all the doors in the house to help the thermostat regulate temperature? Had I set the alarm? Would I get robbed if someone figured out that I wasn’t home? - the usual questions any sane person would ask when they were going away for any length of time . . . it helped that the flight wasn’t long enough for me to think of too many more.

“Do I need to order an Uber?” I asked Kenny as we held hands and walked toward baggage claim. He insisted that I not carry anything other than my purse, so he was burdened with my backpack, his backpack, and my carry-on as we started walking through the terminal. “I’ve already got the app and . . .”

“Someone’s coming to pick us up.”

“Someone?”

“Yeah. I’m not sure who, but Court said she’d take care of it.”

“Will we go straight to your place or . . .” I gasped when I realized that I had no idea where Kenny lived. “Do you have an apartment or a house? I guess that’s something I should have asked about before.”

“I bought an apartment a few years ago when I decided to settle permanently back in Vegas.”

“Oh. You bought one. We don’t really have that option in Rojo.”

“I could have bought a house, but I didn’t want to have to do the lawn thing or any of the maintenance, so I bought one in a hotel - the same hotel where I met you.”

“You own a unit in that bougie hotel?” I looked over at him in shock and said, “That’s where Bella’s boyfriend lives when he is in Vegas.”

“He doesn’t just live there, babe. He owns the building.”

“I know!”

“I guess Vegas isn’t as anonymous as you first thought, huh? You already know one of your neighbors.”

“He lives in New York, but Bella said that he goes to Las Vegas all the time, so she’ll be happy to hear I’ll be living in the same building.”

“Do you and Bella get along?”

“Of course. We’re really good friends.”

Kenny laughed and said, “Your idea of friends and my idea of friends are vastly different.”

He and I stopped to let a man in a wheelchair cross in front of us and then took off again as I asked, “What makes you say that?”

“When you and Amethyst are together, it’s a toss-up as to whether you’ll be hugging each other or finding the nearest thing to use as a weapon.”

“It’s always been that way.”

“Do you and Bella get along the same way?”

“No, but you should see how she and Dylan fight. Good grief.”

“Dylan?”

“That’s her twin brother. I think you met him. The guy at the restaurant?”

“That BBQ joint? Holy shit, that man’s a god among men.”

“He promised to send me some sauce once I’m settled. When we ate at Rubb My Butt the other day, I realized that the fresh rolls dipped in barbecue sauce were sent straight from heaven to settle on my thighs. I’m perfectly okay with that, so I asked him for a few gallons to tide me over while I’m here.”

“The sauce doesn’t do bad things to your stomach?”

“Milk does bad things, cheese does horrible things, and don't even get me started on salads. The sauce was fine.” My stomach rumbled, and Kenny laughed when I said, “I might be a little hungry.”

“Good. We’re having dinner at Debbie and Frank’s when we leave here.”

“We’re what? ” I asked so loudly that people turned to look at us. I glared at a woman who rolled her eyes and then asked in a much calmer voice, “What did you say?”

“We’re going over for dinner. It’s a whole thing for their anniversary. We’re giving them tickets to go on a cruise.”

“Why didn’t you tell me we had plans this evening? I can’t go looking like this!”

“You look great, babe,” Kenny said as he edged us closer to the luggage carousel. “They’re chill.”

“I’m wearing my travel clothes which have the germs of at least a hundred strangers on them because I’ve been in a tube for the last two hours, Kenny. I look like a vagrant, and I know my hair is all wonky because I fell asleep on your shoulder for a little bit. You can’t introduce me to your family looking like this! What will they think?”

“I didn’t take you for the kind of woman who cares about what anyone thinks.”

Now, the woman who had rolled her eyes at me was listening intently, so I said, “I don’t give a whistling polka-dotted fuck what strangers think about me, especially nosy ones who probably need to braid their mustache to keep it out of their soup, but your family is an entirely different story!”

“Huh?”

The woman turned around and glared at me outright, and I raised my eyebrows and snarked, “Yes, I’m talking about you, Karen.” She spun around with a gasp, and I sighed before I looked at Kenny and asked, “Do we have time to stop at your house so that I can shower and change?”

Kenny shook his head and then let go of my hand so he could grab one of my bags from the carousel. “Can’t do it. The kids have to get to bed at a reasonable hour, so we usually eat a little early to make it easier for the girls to get them home and settled on time.”

“The whole family is going to be there?”

“Yeah. The Turners . . .”

“Why don’t you call them your family?” I blurted.

“They’re just good friends,” Kenny insisted.

I didn’t have time to reply because a woman called our names from somewhere behind us, and I turned around to look as Kenny grabbed my second checked suitcase.

“You must be Cydney!” the woman said excitedly before she threw her arms around me. She held on as she leaned back and said, “I’ve been so anxious to meet you! Dice has told us all about you, of course, and he’s even sent us some pictures, but you are even more gorgeous in person!”

“Thank you,” I said nervously. “I guess . . . um . . .”

“I’m sorry! You don’t even know who I am, and I’m pawing all over you,” she said, even though she still didn’t let me go. “I’m Carrie.”

“It’s a pleasure to . . .”

“Get off of her! She just had surgery!” Kenny said as he rolled my suitcase closer to me and his . . . sister? Friend? I was having trouble figuring out the dynamics, but I had my suspicions and knew that watching Kenny interact with the Turners would answer several of my questions.

“Oh! I’m so sorry,” Carrie said as she let her arms drop and took a step away from me toward Kenny, who put his arms out for a hug. “Did I hurt you?”

“No, you didn’t hurt me. I’m still a little sore, but it’s much more manageable than the pain I was in before.”

“Kenny told me about it, but I got overexcited and forgot. There are a few ladies in my mom appreciation group that mentioned they’ve had theirs out. A few of them said it was the best thing that ever happened to them, and a few others couldn’t tell any difference.”

“I can tell the difference,” Kenny said as he let Carrie go and reached for the handle on my suitcase.

As he attached my carry-on to one and my backpack to another, Carrie asked, “How can you tell? It’s not your body.”

“She hasn’t puked on me once since the surgery, so I consider that a win.”

“Of course it’s all about him.” I said as I rolled my eyes.

Carrie scoffed as she shook her head. “The penis gets in the way of normal brain function. He can’t help it.”

“He should try harder.”

Carrie burst out laughing, and I smiled at a glowering Kenny. “You said you wanted me to get along with all of them. You didn’t say how, so I thought bonding over your . . . quirks . . . would be the best route.”

“Let’s not,” Kenny growled.

“Oh, let’s!” Carrie said as she hooked her arm through mine and took off, presumably toward the parking lot. “Has he done that thing where you’re right in the middle of something and he just thrusts the phone in your face to show you a video?”

“He does that to everyone? Thank God. I thought it was just me that he wanted to irritate.”

“Ugh. He does that all the time.”

I thought about it for a second and then asked, “Does the way he cuts his steak make you feel homicidal, or is it just me?”

“I’d be careful about that complaint because in that scenario, I’m the one with the sharp knife,” Kenny warned.

“You don’t act like any knife is sharp. You just saw away like you’re a lumberjack trying to fell a tree,” I argued.

“And then he scrapes the tines of his fork on the plate,” Carrie said before she gave an exaggerated shudder.

“It’s like a chorus of nope. ” Carrie burst out laughing and Kenny growled, which made me get the giggles. “I think you were right, Kenny. I’m going to get along with them just fine.”

Kenny’s irritation disappeared in an instant, and he smiled at me before he said, “Good. I want the women I love more than anything in the world to get along.”

I was still processing that sentence and trying very hard not to either burst into tears or dance a little jig on the sidewalk next to Carrie’s SUV while Kenny walked toward the back to load the luggage like he hadn’t just dropped a bomb in front of me.

“Are you okay?” Carrie asked as she touched my arm. “You look pale.”

“Just a . . . I just had a quick thought and . . . Yeah. I’m fine.”

Carrie tilted her head and studied my face for a second before she said, “You lie just as well as my sisters and I.”

“It’s a skill I’ve cultivated over time.”

“Yeah. I learned it when I was young too.”

There was a darkness in her tone that I didn’t have time to explore because I was too busy watching Carrie and Kenny argue about who was going to drive. Carrie said she should drive because the car belonged to her, but Kenny disagreed and compared her to a blindfolded NASCAR racer with one arm and a raging meth habit. When she replied that his driving skills were on par with her infant in his walker playing bumper cars with the furniture, I lost it and started cackling.

Since I wasn’t even part of this ongoing argument - one that had apparently been going on for years, I got into the back seat and buckled myself in for the ride, knowing that even though I was far from home, there were going to be plenty of opportunities for me to get my fix of a crazy family dynamic, whether Kenny wanted to admit he was part of it or not.

Somehow, Kenny convinced Carrie to hand over the keys, and we were on our way. My nervousness about meeting the family who was so important to Kenny had abated after meeting the youngest daughter - a woman who was just a few years younger than me and reminded me so much of Viv and Evi Erickson that it was uncanny. Since the ride didn’t take very long at all, I soon figured out that the other sisters also reminded me of friends from home, but Mr. and Mrs. Turner gave me the biggest surprise. Even though they were from a completely different world - he owned multiple car dealerships ranging from luxury to run-of-the-mill, and she was a successful realtor - they reminded me of my parents and so many other couples I’d been around growing up. You could feel the love emanating off of them in waves.

Walking into their house was like coming home. The delicious aroma emanating from the kitchen was like going to Gamma’s house.

Suddenly, I felt like this move - and it was a move . . . not a quick trip like I had originally planned - was the right choice. I could have the best of both worlds with Kenny: reminders of my family with each visit to his family’s house and the anonymity of living in a big city far away from the town of people who had known me since birth and had no problem invading my space at their whim.

We had just finished dinner when I asked where to find the restroom, and since Chelle needed to change her son’s diaper, she offered to show me. She flipped on the light in the hallway as we turned the corner, and I was greeted with snapshots of all of them through the years. When I slowed to look, Chelle stopped and turned around to give me a rundown of some of her favorites.

“You and your sisters study martial arts?” I asked when I saw several pictures of the younger women in doboks with trophies and medals.

“Taekwondo,” Chelle explained. “All of us started taking classes together after what happened. You can’t see it in the pictures because Mom is almost always the one taking them, but she did it with us.”

“What happened?” I asked, trying to sound flippant. It was mostly because I was nosy, wondering what had prompted every woman in the family to take up a self-defense sport but also because it wasn’t the first time I’d heard someone reference a before-and-after situation. I spotted a picture nearby with Kenny in the center of the family and said, “Oh! There’s one with Kenny.”

“Yeah. We were celebrating his thirtieth and my twenty-third birthday,” she explained. She moved a little farther down the hall and pointed at a picture before she said, “This one was the first time we went to visit him.”

“How old were you and your sisters?” I asked, recognizing the same plain background in that photo as the one before - also with Kenny wearing a prison jumpsuit. “Are there any pictures of y’all before he went inside?”

Chelle burst out laughing and said, “No!” And then she said, “Oh, wait! This is one that the lawyer took after one of our depositions. That lady with us is our counselor. She was there to make sure we understood what was going on with the trial and were processing everything okay. I think she developed quite a crush on Dice.”

“You went to Dice’s trial?” I asked.

“Of course. We all did . . . well, at least to the parts that they allowed us to attend. Since we were witnesses, we didn’t get to sit through everything, but we did go to the courthouse every day. Looking back, I think it was an important part of our healing process after the attack.”

“You were attacked?”

“Dice didn’t tell you how we met?” When I shook my head, she took a deep breath and nodded as she said, “I guess he wouldn’t have because he’d think it was our private business, huh?”

When it didn’t seem like she was going to say anything else, I asked, “How did you meet?”

“Did Dice tell you why he went to prison?”

“He said was burglarizing what he thought was an empty house, but there was a family there. He said the guy he was working with wanted to hurt them, and he stopped him.”

“We were the family,” Chelle said as she resettled her son on her hip. “He was protecting us from being raped and probably killed.”

“And you . . . That’s how he became part of your family?”

“He could have just run away, but he came back to check on his friend. When he found out what he had planned, he stopped him. He protected us when we couldn’t protect ourselves, and then he was punished for it.”

“He killed the man that was attacking you,” I said simply.

Chelle’s eyes narrowed, and I realized she thought I was on the side of the law rather than the side of sanity. I knew I was right when she said, “He killed the man who very vocally told Mom, Carrie, and me that he was going to rape Courtney and then do the same thing to us.”

“And then he got prosecuted for it, which is bullshit, by the way.”

Chelle’s expression cleared, and she nodded in agreement. “He was terribly injured and still fought so hard. He didn’t stop until he knew we’d be safe. Mom begged him to go before she called the cops, and he said he didn’t feel right leaving her alone to face what was gonna happen. He untied all of us and checked Courtney for injuries while Mom called 911. When the cops got there, he laid down on the floor with his hands behind his back because he knew he was going to jail for breaking into our house. We had no idea he’d be prosecuted for that asshole’s death or Mom would have insisted he leave and never look back. I think that even though she spent years in therapy, she still feels guilty that Dice spent so much time locked up.”

“And she made him a member of your family,” I whispered in awe.

“Yeah, it was a fucked-up start to the situation, considering if he hadn’t been burglarizing houses, none of us would have ever met, but he did what any brother or father would have done in that situation - he protected us no matter the cost.” Chelle ran her hand over her son’s hair and kissed his temple before she said, “Dice is part of our family whether he wants to admit it out loud or not, and I’m happy that my children have such a good man to look up to in him.”

“I should have gambled that night when I first met Kenny. If I had, I'd be rich because that was the luckiest night of my life.”

“Family is more important than money, don’t you think?”

“Family is definitely more important, but money helps. I’ve got some saved, and I know Kenny works hard to make his own, but . . .”

Chelle burst out laughing and asked, “Did he tell you what the name of his company means?” When I shook my head, she laughed again and said, “He took the money he got after his father died and bet it against all odds on one roll of dice and turned it into $4,440,000.”

“Holy shit.”

Chelle put her hand on my shoulder and said, “It’s nice that you want to contribute and take care of him, but I think it’s probably going to be the other way around.”

“No. I’ll still take care of him, but I won’t worry about keeping the lights on while I do it.”

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