Mess Me Up

by Vale, Lani Lynn

  I stared at his home for hours, thinking about the beautiful little boy it housed, and then I’d walked around aimlessly for what felt like forever.

  It was only after I’d gotten to my Abuela’s house that I realized what I was looking for.

  Knocking on her door at six that evening wasn’t something I usually did…but I knew she’d be awake.

  She owned a bakery which was attached to her house. She was up every morning baking cookies, cakes, breads, and other goodies for the crowd of people that would rush into her place looking for their fix. She would do prep work in the early evening and be in bed by eight.

  I knew that she would open the door to me.

  And she did just that moments later.

  Her eyes missed nothing as she took me in. “What’s wrong, baby?”

  I swallowed past the lump in my throat. “That little boy that I get the cookies for is dying.”

  Abuela’s eyes fell. “Oh, no.”

  Her accent thickened, and she didn’t hesitate to pull me into her arms.

  I found myself sobbing all over again.

  And for me to sob in the first place, my Abuela knew that he meant a whole hell of a lot to me.

  Isadora Solis did not cry. Isadora was a survivor. A hellcat. A woman who refused to do what society said she should do.

  Crying was one of those things, so Isadora Solis didn’t cry.

  At least not since her father had beaten that urge out of her.

  Crying got me nowhere, it accomplished nothing.

  It was pointless to cry over my problems. The only way to fix them was to face them head on and do whatever it took to resolve it. But this? This was a problem with no solution.

  Not now, and not ever.

  “Come help me make bread.” She squeezed me one last time. “Just don’t let your tears fall into my bowl. I have the perfect amount of salt already in it.”

  I laughed a watery, garbled laugh and followed her into the bakery, stopping when I reached the table where she’d been kneading dough.

  Knowing exactly what to do, I washed my hands and then started to pound out my frustrations.

  The one thing that my grandmother did was make everything she sold in the bakery by hand. There was no industrial mixer for Abuela. Nope, everything was done manually, or it wasn’t made at all.

  “Harder,” Abuela ordered.

  I laughed half-heartedly but did what I was told.

  It wasn’t until about two hours later that I was finished with everything that she ordered me to do, and my eyes were drooping.

  “Now, go up to my bedroom, and sleep. In the morning, go speak to your parents and tell them that you’ll need a month off,” she ordered.

  I opened my mouth to argue, but she only raised a brow, waiting for whatever pitiful excuse I would try to muster up.

  She was right.

  I had plenty of money. I had no pressing jobs, nothing that required it be done by me alone, and honestly, I’d earned the time off.

  I was taking it.

  “Thank you, Abuela,” I whispered. “I love you.”

  She touched my cheeks, flour hands and all, and pressed her forehead to mine. “I love you more, precious girl.”

  I swallowed past the lump in my throat, then turned to head into her bedroom where I had four hours of fitful sleep—mostly because my parents and Oscar wouldn’t stop calling me.

  After turning the ringer off, I fell back asleep, and this time it was dreamless.

  ***

  I stared at my angry father, waiting to see what he’d do.

  “You can’t just leave, Isadora,” he snapped. “You have a duty to the family. If you leave, that leaves us down an employee.”

  I didn’t say anything.

  At least not at first.

  Then he had to go and say more stupid stuff, stuff that I’d been hearing for my entire life.

  “You’re such a disappointment.” He shook his head. “Just when I think that you’ve turned your life around, you turn back into that wild thing who cares only about herself.”

  I narrowed my eyes. “I’ve worked for you since I was a child, Papa. I’m asking for some time off now because a little boy who means a lot to me is dying, and I’d like to spend some time with him before he passes. Is that so hard to understand?”

  My papa shrugged. “I don’t care. If you stop working, that means your mama will have to work.”

  I honestly didn’t give a flying shit.

  My mama could work. My father could work.

  I didn’t care anymore.

  They didn’t care about me, so why should I care about them?

  Honestly, I was sick and tired of their games.

  They didn’t appreciate me.

  All they saw were the requests they got for me and the dollar signs those requests meant.

  “I’m taking the time off,” I said as I pushed away from the wall. “If you want to reschedule my appointments, I’ll be more than happy to take them when I get back.”

  “You won’t have a job with us when you get back,” he growled.

  I felt something in my chest snap.

  Turning, I narrowed my eyes at him. “If that’s how you want it to be.”

  I’d take half my clientele with me, and he damn well knew it.

  He was a stubborn old goat who had always thought of himself first, everybody else second.

  “Isadora…” my mother called.

  I looked over my shoulder a second time, but I didn’t like what I saw.

  “What?”

  “Don’t do this.”

  I shrugged. “I’m not doing anything, and you know it. It’s acceptable for a person to take a vacation. I haven’t taken one in years. I think I’m due.”

  With that, I walked out of their house, and straight out of their life.

  I had a feeling that I’d never be welcomed back.

  Unfortunately for them, I’d be taking my Abuela and my brother with me—at least the one that was in prison. Oscar was too much of a kiss-ass to ever defy my parents. He liked his cushy, air-conditioned desk job that allowed him to provide for his eighteen children (ok, so it was only seven) from the comfort of his office.

  Not only did he get everything he wanted paid for, but he could also escape his horde of crazy children, his wife, and all the responsibilities that came with them by saying he had to work.

  I didn’t have high hopes of ever talking to Oscar again, either.

  Not when he liked his job too much, and his parents gave him everything he ever could want.

  Oscar had the exact opposite of the shitty childhood that I had. He, being of the male persuasion, hadn’t had to worry about the things that I’d had to worry about.

  Getting the woman who was now his wife pregnant at sixteen hadn’t been anywhere near the big deal it was when I got pregnant out of wedlock. And, when his second child came along, thankfully with the same woman, at age seventeen and a half, they still didn’t care.

  It was the exact freakin’ opposite reaction with me.

  “Are you fucking crazy, Isadora?” Oscar hissed from his chair as I walked past.

  I looked over at him. “Whatever do you mean, Oz?”

  Oscar narrowed his eyes. “All of this over a kid you don’t even know all that well?”

  I looked him straight in the eye and nodded. “All of this over a kid I don’t even know all that well.”

  On that parting comment, I walked out of their lives and didn’t look back.

  Breaking free of their hold on me felt exhilarating.

  The entire time that I’d been working there, I’d felt like I’d owed them. But I didn’t owe them anything, they owed me something.

  Half of my paycheck every week went to “this or that” they’d say. What it really meant was that they didn’t feel that I was worth what people were paying for my services, so they kept half of it for themselves.

>   That was why I’d started cleaning on the side in my spare time, and slowly but surely, my side business had started picking up steam over the years. Now, I had more than enough clients to allow me to branch off on my own.

  And, I smiled deviously, I also had clients through my parents who only wanted me.

  They loved me. Adored me, really.

  I had each and every one of them programmed into my phone, and I’d have to call them quickly before my parents tried to call them and spin a different story.

  Which was what I did for the hour that it took me to walk to the mansion on the hill.

  When I finally arrived at Rome’s front walk, I was breathless from talking to everyone, but happy nonetheless.

  All but one of them had agreed to come over to the dark side—meaning they’d switch to my company instead of staying with my parents’—and they also agreed to be flexible with me after I’d explained more of what was going on.

  Which led me to now, standing in front of a door, wondering if I should knock.

  I didn’t get my fist halfway raised when the door was wrenched open, and his tired blue eyes were on me.

  He didn’t say a word, he just wrapped his large hand around my wrist, causing my heart to race for multiple reasons, and gently pulled me inside.

  I was in the living room when I realized I’d forgotten the cookies that I normally brought with me.

  “Shoot.” I snapped my fingers in frustration. “I forgot the cookies.”

  Rome’s smile did nothing to hide his exhaustion. “It’s okay. He hasn’t been able to hold anything down today, anyway.” He looked over at his son where he was laying on a pile of blankets that were covering the couch. There was a large, silver pot on the floor—I assumed for easy reach—and Matias was laying there in only his underwear with his arms sprawled up over his head.

  But the kicker? He was smiling in his sleep.

  “I’ve never seen him smile as much as he has over the last few days,” I told the silent man at my side.

  “I’ve never cried as much in my whole life as I have over the last few days,” he mumbled.

  I wasn’t sure that I was meant to hear that, but I had.

  I turned, and, without thinking, walked forward and wrapped my hands around the man’s middle.

  The moment I touched him, my entire body locked.

  I hadn’t touched a man who wasn’t related to me, at least willingly, in a very long time. And Rome? Well, he was most certainly a man. A big, thick, hard-all-over man.

  I’d intended it to be a quick but sweet hug. Then he wrapped those muscular arms around me and pulled me in tight.

  I never knew what the heroines meant when I read in my books about feeling protected in a man’s arms. But now, with the way that Rome felt surrounding me? Yeah, I finally got it. I now knew what that protection they described felt like.

  We stayed like that for a very long time. So long, in fact, that I wasn’t sure he was capable of letting me go.

  Not until his son started to stir on the couch.

  Only then did he drop his arms from around me and head to the chair beside the couch.

  Leaving me to feel like I’d just lost something precious.

  Chapter 6

  With enough caffeine I can dress myself and use my big boy manners.

  -Rome’s secret thoughts

  Rome

  The beginning of the end.

  That’s what they say, anyway.

  We—or I, since Tara was no longer around—knew that this was going to happen.

  When the leukemia was diagnosed, the doctor was brutally honest and told us that his prognosis wasn’t good. But, he did say that kids were the most resilient patients and that if there was anyone who could fight this disease and beat it, it was Matias.

  So, I didn’t give up hope. I tried my best to stay positive and strong. Until today.

  Until I woke up this morning to a son who couldn’t even lift his head.

  It was as if once I’d given him permission to stop fighting so hard, to let me take on the battle, he’d degraded exponentially.

  It started with him not even waking enough to make it to the bathroom.

  Then it degenerated from there.

  Now I was on the phone with the doctor, keeping my end of the bargain that we’d made the day I left.

  “We suggest palliative care,” the doctor had said. “As of right now, his body is too weak for any more treatments, and to be honest, the treatments haven’t been helping in quite some time. When he shows signs of deterioration, call me, and we’ll get him started.

  Izzy, who’d kind of moved in since she came the first time so I could go to the doctor a week ago, was on the couch talking to Matias while I was speaking with the doctor about the hospice care in the other room.

  Some of my club brothers were also over, but they were holding down the fort in the kitchen. I think they were here more for me than for Matias.

  Even though they loved Matias, they didn’t know him well. It was hard to be around a kid knowing he was so sick. Plus, the fact that his immune system was compromised making it difficult to be around other people. A simple cold for them could be a deadly illness for Matias.

  They never had a chance to know my boy.

  But, as was my boy’s nature, he’d welcomed them all with open arms when he was allowed.

  He already knew Liner, the hard-ass of the club, fairly well seeing as he’s lived next door to him for over a year now.

  Bayou fascinated my boy with his hulking nature and brash personality.

  But it was Castiel with his beard that truly fascinated my boy.

  Then there was Wade, Carver, Rhett, and Ezekiel.

  Seven men in total—at least currently in the state and not off working or roaming—were at my house, keeping watch.

  Tyler had been and gone, unable to stay away from his job for long.

  Reagan had stopped in without Tyler as well.

  But it was Izzy, with her constant vigil at my son’s side and the taking over of almost every other duty—except for getting me to bed—that had been my lifeline through it all.

  “I’ll contact the hospice,” Dr. Zapata promised. “They’ll probably call within the hour, and most likely, they’ll come right out within a few hours. They’re very good and discreet, I promise you. If you need anything more or have questions, I’m only a phone call away.”

  After saying my thanks, I hung up and then shoved the phone back into my pocket, double-checking to make sure it was set to ring since I had been leaving it on silent lately so as not to disturb Matias’ sleep.

  Once I entered the living room again, Izzy’s eyes found mine.

  She raised one brow at me in question.

  I nodded, knowing what she was asking me without her voicing it aloud.

  We’d gotten good at non-verbal communication lately, too.

  “Daddy, are you going to work?” Matias asked.

  Was it me, or did his voice sound weaker, too?

  I swallowed past a lump in my throat and shook my head. “No, Ty-Ty. I’m not going to work today. I have the next two weeks off.”

  Matias didn’t ask why.

  He knew why I had the time off just as well as I did.

  It didn’t make it any easier to swallow, though.

  My boy, my beautiful little boy, was dying.

  The doctor said within the next three to four weeks.

  But from the way Ty-Ty was rapidly declining, I knew that it wouldn’t even be that long.

  A week and a half if we were lucky. Maybe even less.

  I just knew that he wasn’t fighting to hold on anymore.

  He’d already fought a long, hard fight. A fight no child should ever have to fight.

  And his little body had given up.

  “When is Uncle Tyler coming back?” he asked, sounding sleepy.

  He had just woken up from a two-hour na
p, and it was only eleven o’clock. He shouldn’t be that tired yet.

  This was all just so fucking unfair!

  “He’s going to try to come back after work, but he caught a case this morning. Do you know what happened?” I asked, trying to find something to distract him from falling asleep.

  I wanted him to talk to me for hours. I wanted every single second with him that I could get.

  But one look at his drooping eyes, I knew that wasn’t going to happen this time. He was just too tired.

  I walked over to where he was laying on the couch and lifted him up in my arms.

  Once he was settled in deep, he sighed and moved to lay his little bald head on my chest, tucked underneath my chin.

  “Daddy, do you think dragons are real?” he asked, sounding wistful.

  I pressed my lips to his smooth scalp. “I think that if they’re real, they’re very, very good at hiding so I don’t think we’ll ever know if they’re real or not.”

  He let out a breath of sound that was close to a laugh. “You’re right. I think they’re real, though. How else would anybody have any idea what they might look like?”

  This kid never failed to astound me with his insight.

  How had he gotten so smart? I know that he didn’t get it from his mother or me. Granted, both of us were smart…but the kind of intelligence that Matias had was something of genius levels.

  And I knew neither Tara nor I had that.

  At least not from what I was aware of.

  There were times that I wondered if Tara even realized that she was an adult, so I doubt she registered high on the IQ scale.

  “Daddy?”

  “Yeah, Ty-Ty?” I slumped down farther into the couch, feeling my own eyes get heavy.

  “Do you think that it’ll hurt?”

  I knew what he was talking about, and I felt yet another freakin’ lump lodge in my throat.

  “No, buddy,” I answered immediately. “I called your doctor today. He has someone calling me today to discuss how we can manage your pain over the next few weeks.”

  Few weeks.

  God.

  It was hard to think about the fact that my son would no longer be here in just a few weeks.

  My entire life had revolved around him for so long that I wasn’t sure how the hell I was going to function without him.