Which worked for all of us. We were happy that she’d never have the possibility of getting out again.
Our child would be safe from her forever.
“Uh-oh,” Mercy said. “She’s getting up.”
I turned my eyes from my wife’s face to find the girl practically bowling through the tables to get to Foster.
“Hey! You!” The girl yelled.
Foster froze, and slowly turned to face the girl.
“Yeah?” Foster asked, his stoic features not giving a single bit of his feelings away.
Foster’s hands went to his hips as he took in the girl.
“Do you know anything about my grandfather’s car getting fixed?” The girl accused.
Foster didn’t move.
Mercy leaned closer, her arm going around my shoulders to get more comfortable as she listened.
Her belly pressed up against my arm, and I felt the life we’d created stir underneath her skin.
I smiled, looking down at her belly as I lifted my hand to rest on the small swell.
“What time do we have to go to the gender screening?” I asked, turning to study Mercy’s face.
She’d put on some weight since I’d met her all those months ago, but in my opinion, she looked just as good now, as she had then. If not even better.
I was partial to the ways the baby had changed her.
Especially when it came to her ass and tits.
The belly wasn’t a letdown, either.
“Shhhh!” Mercy hissed, covering my mouth with her hand.
I rolled my eyes and turned back to survey the altercation taking place in the middle of Catfish Charlie’s like the rest of the place was doing.
“Well, if it was you, I don’t want to accept charity, so I took the tires off the car and sent them back to the retailer. If it wasn’t you, then, whatever,” the girl said, turning on her heel and stomping off.
Foster watched her go back to the table before turning around and making his way to us.
His face was what I would describe as ‘thunderous.’
Pissed was only a fraction of what was on his face right then. Gone was his new, cool composure. In its place was the old Foster. The one who was hotheaded and emotional.
One that I missed.
One that I was happy that girl had just pulled forth from him.
The moment Foster sat, I smiled at Mercy.
“He bought her the tires,” I said to her.
Mercy’s laughing eyes turned to me.
“He bought her the tires,” she confirmed.
“You can both go fuck off. Maybe join that snotty woman when you go,” Foster muttered angrily.
Literally, how could he expect me not to laugh? That was what brothers were for, right?Chapter 24I like your outfit…did it come with the stripper boots as well?
-Mercy’s secret thoughts
Mercy
“Alright, alright, alright,” the announcer, which happened to be Bennett, yelled through the microphone.
I winced as his voice hit a particular high note, but nonetheless hefted my big ass up and started to clap.
The firefighters and the cops of Kilgore were competing to see who could raise the most at the auction.
I, of course, had to be here out of moral support for my husband.
Husband.
That still felt so weird to say, even now, five months later.
It felt like just yesterday that we’d met, and now here I was, nine and a half months pregnant with our child at an auction that he’d made me promise to win so he wouldn’t have to go home with some weirdo.
“Alright ladies,” Foster boomed. “It’s time for everyone to get a look at what they’re getting. This first thing we’re going to do is give y’all a sneak preview. Please, ladies, do not grab the men inappropriately. Any of you ladies that break that will be escorted out of the premises. Understand?”
Does that mean me, too? I mean, if I was the one to touch my husband inappropriately, I wouldn’t be escorted out, would I?
I’d like to see them try.
It’d be quite funny for them do that without touching me. Something that, if they did, Miller might just lose his shit like he’d done last week when we’d gone to the police station.
He’d asked me to wait out in the hall while he went in to review some tape of a crime that he’d witnessed the previous night. Since I’d been on the phone when he’d gone in, I’d chosen to stay outside the door so as not to disturb him. When I’d finished, I’d looked up to find a newer officer barreling down on me. He’d explained to me that he’d have to escort me out since I wasn’t accompanied by authorized personnel.
When I’d tried to explain to him that I was waiting on Miller, he’d gently taken my hand and started leading me away.
I’d gone willingly enough, but wasn’t surprised to hear that Miller had not only caught the entire thing on the video feed, and had flipped a switch on the poor, just trying to do his job, man.
I’d just stood back and shook my head in awe at the way Miller reamed the poor guy out.
I swear it was like the bigger I grew with the baby, the more and more protective he became.
“Now, please give our men a round of applause!” Bennett yelled, moving his arm in a dramatic fashion, kind of the way a magician would do as he revealed his big ‘ta-da’ at the end finale.
I’d say that the men were magical in their own way, though.
They started walking down the ‘T’ in the stage one by one.
When Miller finally made his way down, women started screaming and yelling.
Oh, they’d been screaming and yelling already, but Miller had become sort of a local celebrity with the way he’d saved that woman and child from their rapidly sinking car that’d crashed in the river last week.
When he got close enough to me, I yelled, “I volunteer!”
He grinned devilishly at me, blowing me a kiss before turning around.
He didn’t do it gracefully like a model would. Instead it was all Hulk-ish, turning around in a stomp and walking back with his booted-feet stomping against the stage’s floor.
“You’re a dork,” Memphis teased, nudging me with her elbow.