18. Slade

18

SLADE

T he trailer park is exactly the way I remember it. Crumbly gutters without sidewalks. Mrs. Avery’s well-manicured lawn and cheery flower boxes next to Mr. Jamison’s yard cluttered with rusted cars and weeds. The main difference is the husk of the house next to Quin’s where Georgina used to live.

They searched her place when I got arrested. The stuff the cops found was Dalton’s, but she took the fall. She wrote me letters from the women’s correctional facility outside Houston for three years before she got out.

I guess she didn’t return to the trailer park. The boarded-up windows suggest that no one’s been living there for a long time.

Quin’s house, with the wooden bench swing on the porch and the wilted shrubbery makes my heart ache. I can clearly imagine him standing next to the car I was fixing on his birthday, proudly telling me he was legal. I wasted too much time holding myself back from him. We could have been together long before our single night together.

I follow Quin up the front stairs. He’s no longer holding his ripped jeans behind him, which means I can properly see the “Easy Lay” on his ass. He glances down at the welcome mat, then hurriedly steps on top of it, but not before I read what it says: “Grandkids spoiled here.”

Quin didn’t mention having any nieces or nephews. That’s strange. He told me the names of all of Tin’s horses. Surely, he would have brought up any children his brothers had.

Before Quin can knock, the door swings open. His omega mother, with her dozens of bangle bracelets and earrings, smiles at us with a flushed face. “Here you are.” She glances down at the welcome mat and winces. “We were just getting things ready. Apparently, there were a lot of things that were… not ready. Hi, Slade. It’s good to see you. I don’t think we’ve ever formally met. I’m Ruby.” She holds her hand out to me, and I shake it gingerly. I don’t want to give her the impression that I intentionally intimidate people with my size.

His alpha mom crowds in behind her. “Slade! What a nice surprise. You’re much… larger than I remember.”

Quin glares at her.

Ruby opens the door wider. “This is my mate, Shae. Please come in.”

The only time I’ve ever seen the inside of this house was when I returned the plates Quin delivered his baked goods on, back when we were in high school. It was just as sparkly back then, with the large chandelier hanging from the ceiling and reflecting light along the walls lined with picture frames. I remember the frames fully covering the walls back then. There were hundreds of them. Some large, some medium-sized, but most small enough to fit a casual snapshot. Half of the frames are gone now, the wall a stark white where they used to be.

“What happened to all of your pictures?” I ask.

Ruby flashes me a nervous smile. “We’re swapping them out. Everyone’s getting older, so we have to update all the photos.”

“Would you like something to drink? We have water, sweet tea, milk, beer,” Shae says.

My mouth waters at the idea of anything besides the tinny water served at Sciff. Jake sent me money for the commissary often enough that I could afford to buy the instant coffee they sold, but sweet tea? I haven’t had anything like that for six long years.

“Sweet tea, please. If it isn’t too much trouble.”

Shae nods. “Sure thing.”

“Are you boys hungry?” Ruby asks. “How about I fix us lunch? I have some leftover cinnamon rolls or I could make sandwiches. We also have some of that ham Tin brought over and a little Swiss cheese. I think I have oranges in the fridge too.”

Homemade cinnamon rolls and fresh fruit? Between that and the sex with Quin, I’m starting to suspect that someone murdered me in my sleep at Sciff, and I’m in heaven now.

Quin shakes his head. “You don’t need to do that.”

I try to mask my disappointment, but Ruby waves his comment away. “Nonsense. I can feed my son if I want to.”

Quin and I follow his moms through the living room and down a hallway to a formal dining room with a large wooden table and eight matching chairs. The edges of the wood are scuffed and the ceiling above is cracked from the weight of yet another chandelier, but the space is very clean, and smells of cinnamon.

“Wait here. We’ll be right back,” Ruby says, and disappears with Shae through another door.

Quin sits down at the table and taps his finger nervously on the surface. I sit next to him. I’m tempted to take my hand in his and try to calm him down, but I don’t know if he’d want that here where his moms could potentially see. We wait in awkward silence for several minutes before Shae and Ruby return with the food and drinks. The cinnamon rolls are enormous and the sandwiches are easily twice the size of the ones at Sciff with fluffy homemade bread and thick slices of tomato. I wait with bated breath as the others take what they want and put it on their plates before I grab a sandwich, a cinnamon roll, and two oranges for myself. I really try to eat slowly, but it’s too good.

Food is precious at Sciff, and if it’s not eaten immediately, it gets stolen.

Ruby gives me a warm smile. “It’s okay. My brother enjoyed my home cooking a lot more after he was incarcerated, too. You eat as much as you want, okay?”

I’m taken aback by her kindness. I expected Quin’s moms to be cold and reserved with me. Of course, they don’t know their son put his paws on me yet.

Quin’s eyes widen. “Uncle Dagger was incarcerated?”

“We all make mistakes,” she says.

“What did he do?” Quin asks.

“That isn’t my story to tell. Now you said you had something you wanted to talk to me about, and I don’t think it was your Uncle Dagger’s criminal record.”

Quin takes a deep breath. “I… did something six years ago that I never told you about. I’m really sorry I didn’t say anything before. I was worried what you would think of me.”

His mothers glance at one another meaningfully.

“What did you do?” Shae asks. “You know we’ll love you no matter what.”

“Yes, I do know that. But I want you to be proud of me.”

Ruby reaches across the table and places her hand on Quin’s. “We are proud of you. Very proud.”

“I… put my paws on Slade,” he stammers, lowering his gaze to his lap. “That night you caught me sneaking in. It was right before he went to jail, and everyone was leaving, and I went off to Aunt Emerald’s because I didn’t know what to do.”

Ruby presses her lips together. “I wondered if that’s what happened.”

“What? Really?”

She nods. “The way you talked about him made me suspect there was something deeper going on, but I couldn’t be sure.”

“We also wondered why you never dated,” Shae says.

Quin’s eyes become glassy. “I should have told you.”

Ruby squeezes his hand. “You are telling us. It’s okay, Quin. We still love you. We’re still proud of you. Yes, I wish you would have told me earlier, but like I was just saying, we all make mistakes.”

I try not to take it personally, but I’m the mistake Quin made. That does hurt a little bit.

“Our bond never formed properly,” Quin tells her. “But our connection never faded either. We… wanted each other this whole time. And now I’m not sure what we should do. Have you ever heard of something like that happening?”

Ruby’s gaze darts between Quin and me. “Really? For six whole years? That must have been unbearable for the two of you.”

“Yes,” Quin says.

I’m not as eager to respond. I don’t know what Ruby would think if I told her that I found my connection to Quin comforting. Yes, I yearned for him, but there’s a softness in yearning for someone. It only happens if there’s sweetness there to miss.

“As far as I know, there isn’t a set time for a bond to settle between a raccoon shifter and the person they put their paws on. It usually takes a month or two, but sometimes it’s shorter or longer, depending on the couple. I’ve heard of it taking six months. Six years is a stretch, but if you still feel connected to one another, that probably means the jury is still out on your bond. It will either form or fade.”

Quin eyes her warily. “But Aunt Emerald said something must be wrong if it’s unresolved after all this time.”

“You told your Aunt?” Ruby asks.

Quin swallows hard. “Yes. I’m sorry.”

“No, that’s good. I’m glad you confided in her. She might be right about there being something wrong with your bond.” She turned to me. “But you just got out of Sciff, didn’t you? How long ago?”

“I went to pick him up this morning,” Quin admits.

“Whatever is wrong might be fixed by simply spending time together.”

Hope blooms in my chest. Does that mean I still have a chance with Quin?

“Do you know of any experts on raccoon shifter bonds?” Quin asks. “I was sort of hoping to ask someone who might have seen something like this before.”

Ruby considers that for a moment. “Maybe. Kaleidoscope’s Grandpop is a healer. He might know something about bonds.”

I hear a door open on the other side of the house.

“Quin?” A male voice calls out. “We’re back!”

Quin’s eyes widen.

A pitter patter of small feet echoes through the hallway until a little girl with two long braids comes bouncing in the room. “Daddy! You’re back!”

She throws her arms around Quin.

All the pieces fit together. The welcome mat mentioning grandkids, the missing pictures on the wall, and the shape of the little girl’s face. She’s a spitting image of Jake, with eyebrows that curve in the exact same shape, and a short nose that looks identical to his when he was a child.

That little girl is mine. I’ve never been more sure of anything in my life.