Keeping What's His: Tate (Porter Brothers Trilogy 1)

In his mind, he had seen Sutton getting out of Cash’s truck, and his pride had been stung. Truthfully, it still was. Now he realized how selfish he was being; she had only been seventeen, and he had been her first boyfriend.

Sutton had been the best part in the shit hole his life had become. She deserved to leave Treepoint and follow her dreams without him holding her back. She had probably figured that out for herself, which was why she had cheated on him with Cash.

Seeing Holly crossing the street with Logan, he got out to hold the door open for her, watching with a smile as Logan climbed inside. He ruffled the boy’s red hair when he succeeded.

“I did it all by myself,” Logan boasted.

“Yes, you did.” Tate chuckled as Logan sat down in his carseat.

“I’m getting too big for this. Can’t I just sit on the seat like you?” he complained, buckling himself in with nimble fingers.

“You have to gain a few more pounds for that to happen.” Seeing the frown of discontent, Tate winked at Holly. “How about we go to the store and see if we can find the next size up? If Holly tells me you’ve been good at your grandmother’s, I might even buy you that new bike you’ve been wanting.”

“I’ve been really good, haven’t I, Holly?” Logan looked anxiously at the woman sitting in the front seat.

“Yes, you have,” she said, throwing Tate a furtive look.

When he was back in the truck, Holly lowered her voice. “I thought we couldn’t afford it right now.”

Tate shrugged. “Came into some extra money.”

“I don’t know how I feel about you using your drug money to buy him a bike.”

Tate’s mouth firmed. “It’s a good thing it’s not up to you then, is it?”

Holly crossed her arms over her chest, turning to stare out the window.

Tate drove them to the store, letting Logan pick out his bike after they found a booster seat for the truck. Tate ignored Holly’s disapproval.

“Holly?” Logan’s face fell when she didn’t return his excitement.

Her expression softened as it always did where Logan was concerned. “It’s a nice bike.”

His excitement returned as they wheeled it toward the cash register. Tate ignored Holly’s holier-than-shit attitude as he paid for the purchases. He felt no guilt over how he and his brothers earned their money. If they didn’t purchase the weed from them, their customers would buy it off someone else. The money was better off in his wallet than the Hayes’s or the Coleman’s, and their clients damn sure were better off not smoking the weed they sold.

As they were going out the door, Tate saw Lyle Turner, the town drunk, coming in and throwing him a glare, which Tate forced himself to brush off. The case had been thrown out of court. If Lyle wanted to start a fight, he could do it with the store cameras on him. Tate wasn’t about to spend a night away from home with the sense of danger he had felt lately.

Tate loaded Logan’s bike into the bed of the truck and switched out the car seats before he climbed in. Logan fidgeted with excitement on the way to his grandmother’s house.

“How much longer are we going to have to stay with Mrs. Langley?” Holly asked.

“Just a few more days.” Tate took his eyes briefly off the road. “I figured you would prefer Mrs. Langley’s house over ours. It’s a hell of a lot bigger.”

“It’s not home.” Holly glanced away, avoiding his gaze.

“It won’t be much longer,” Tate promised as he pulled into the driveway.

Tate climbed out while Holly opened the back door to let Logan out. The anxious boy could hardly wait as Tate pulled his bike out of the truck.

He stayed and watched him for an hour until Dustin showed. Then Tate left them alone for some private time.

Logan and Dustin had developed a close relationship, but Tate noticed an expression of sadness appear in his brother’s eyes when he wasn’t aware someone was watching. His young, devil-may-care attitude hid the pain Samantha had left behind. Dustin had loved her. He had never discussed it with him or Greer, but both brothers felt Dustin’s pain.

Their father had warned them when they each turned sixteen that a Porter loves only once. He had often told them how he managed to catch their mother. He had loved her on first sight. Tate still remembered rolling his eyes when his father regaled them with his past. His mother had been engaged to Cash Adam’s father at the time.

“I knew she was meant for me the first time I set eyes on her.”

“She belonged to someone else,” Tate had reminded him.

His father had shrugged. “I knew Mattie would catch on to him cheating on her. Your momma ain’t nobody’s fool.”