Rough Edge (Tannen Boys 2)

“Not sure I know what you’re talking about.” I absolutely know she’s referring to my forgoing family dinners in the evenings in favor of seeing Erica damn near every night for the last two weeks.

At this point, I’m battling exhaustion, working myself to the bone with the cattle and driving back and forth to Morristown. We went to the races again, just to watch, and have spent just as much time curled up in one another talking as we do fucking. I can tell something’s changed between us, the connection getting deeper and filled with more than orgasms, but Erica has made it a point to repeat her early mission statement of casual-only, and though I’m nervous the lady doth protest too much, I’m following her lead.

“Brody, don’t lie to me with your lying mouth. Tell me the good stuff.” The order is emphasized with another stomp of her foot against my floorboard.

“Quit kicking my truck or you’ll be walking home.” The growled threat would shrivel most people to goo, and the fire in my eyes would singe their soul. Shayanne suffers no such weakness and merely scowls at me in return. I’m not even really mad about the truck. It’s a truck, after all, not some prissy import, but getting on to her about the truck is safer than admitting she’s getting too close to something I don’t want to talk about. She’s like a bloodhound and won’t let that go for anything until she gets what she wants.

“Fine. Then I’ll tell you what we all think and you can grunt along and tell me if we’re right or wrong.” She smiles that sassy grin that says she already knows how this is going to play out.

“What the fuck? Y’all talking about me behind my back? That’s some fucked-up ‘family’ shit there.” I spit out the word ‘family’ as if it’s a curse, which makes Shay’s eyes narrow. I realize a breath too late that I just gave her the first bullet to kill me with.

“We are family, Brody. The four of us Tannens and the Bennetts. Blended Brady Bunch family with a spoonful of redneck and a cup of country thrown in.”

Grunt. Agreement or disagreement, I’m not sure, but I really don’t want to go into analyzing our family dynamics. Now or ever.

“Moving on. Are you going to Rix’s at night when you’re not at home?”

Silence. I’m not playing this game, am most definitely not talking about my sex life with my baby sister.

“So that’s a yes.” I cut my eyes in her direction, knowing I didn’t give away anything that would confirm or deny her question. “We figured, just making sure you hadn’t started going to a fight club or something.”

I give her a rumble of disapproval this time. It’s not much, but I basically just agreed to her game.

“I like Rix, not that it matters.” It does and she knows it.

“You barely know her.” And now I’ve gone and done it. She knows she’s got my ear, knows that despite my protestations, I care about what she thinks of Erica.

Shayanne and I have always been close, just like Bobby and Brutal. We’re a family of four, but the connections between us all are squiggly lines of twisted knots. And as the oldest, I took care of Shay, even when she was literally taking care of all of us, cooking and cleaning while we all worked in the fields.

“Pshaw, I know more than you think I do. I know that Rix caught your interest enough that you talked about her with Sophie before even going out with her. I know that she didn’t freak out when confronted with all of us unexpectedly, and that speaks volumes about her courage. We’re an intimidating bunch.” That’s an understatement and a half. Tannens are known for being one step shy of hooligans, though it’s more because memories are long in this town than because we’ve gotten up to anything rowdy in recent years.

She’s not wrong, and now I’m curious what else she thinks she knows, so I let her go on without interrupting her with an argument we both know would be a lie.

“I know that you smiled the entire time at Hank’s when you were giving each other shit and when you were teaching her to dance. I know she was smiling the whole time too. I know you two look like Tom and Jerry, this big grump of a cat and this tiny mouse, but damned if she’s not leading you around by your tail.” Her smile is smug. “And by tail, I mean your dick. Whatever magic her vajay-jay is rocking has got you running off to get another dose every chance you get.”

“Shayanne!” I growl, but my warning tone is met with a palm.

“Don’t want to know. I just mean that she makes you happy. You’re smiling even though you have purple circles under your eyes that are worse than back when we had more month than money.”