Eat Crow (Cheap Thrills Series Book 6)

by Mary B. Moore

  Moving over to join Cole and me, Hurst patted my shoulder. “Don’t worry about it, that bullshit is just that—bullshit. My daughter-in-law is on the PTA, and when they were discussing your lecture on the book, they sent out a questionnaire to parents whose kids had been in the classes. All but two of the parents said they appreciated the comparison and the use of an old piece of satirical literature.”

  “And the two missing ones?”

  “They came in themselves to discuss it and concluded that they wanted to establish a classical literature after school club.”

  “So where did he get the complaints from?” Cole asked, looking through the groceries Kirkwood had left behind. “Oo, what do you think he uses this for?” he held up a bottle of lube to show the stragglers from the crowd who all wrinkled their noses at it.

  Glaring at his grandson, Hurst shook his head. “I dunno where we went wrong with this one.”

  I don’t know if I’d say they went wrong, but he was definitely unique.

  “Could have used this when Louis went through the wall,” Cole said, throwing it in the air and catching it again. “Squeeze some on his arm, and pop, it would have been easy getting him back out again instead of calling the Fire Department.”

  I couldn’t help it, I had to ask. Who wouldn’t? “Why was he in the wall?”

  “Father of the year here decided to put mattresses on the stairs and make a slide. His kid went down faster than he expected, and his arm went through the drywall and got stuck.”

  “It’s online,” someone shouted out. “Piersville Fire Department also released footage of them cutting him out. I think the moment he goes through the wall is a gif on social media, too.”

  “It is,” Cole confirmed. “He’s really proud of it.”

  How could I go from feeling suffocated to feeling uplifted?

  What had just happened to me was something every teacher was scared about. Added onto that was what he’d threatened to do to Pops? I’d covered my bases and explained in a lengthy letter to the parents why I was bringing in a piece of literature with that title. They’d had the option to either not allow it or for their kid to attend a study period in the library.

  “Don’t worry about it, Bexley. The PTA is very thorough with things, and you gave parents enough time to read through what you sent out and to look up the book and what it was about. No one reported any issues back to Colette, and she set up a special meeting online after the class just in case,” Hurst said as he picked up some spaghetti and threw it into his cart, almost like nothing had happened. “And Lawrence is just fine where he is. If someone tried to exhume him, I’d let my bull loose on them, and then I’d let my grandsons loose on them.”

  “Could they do that, though? What if a kid was affected by the book and class like he was saying?”

  “The answer to the first is no, and the answer to second is that I’m going to press him for copies of the complaints. I’ll also get Colette to speak to the principal to see if he’s had any complaints, and…” he trailed off, wincing at whatever had occurred to him. “Ah, hell. I’m going to have to tell Lindee I’m running for mayor.”

  “You’re a dead old man walking, Gramps. She’s going to be pissed,” Cole snickered as he walked up to us and threw a can of beans in my cart. “Saw the list in your hand and recognized it, but you didn’t have the beans for chili taco casserole. There you go.”

  Then, both men walked off like nothing had happened.

  “I wouldn’t worry, honey,” a woman called Evita, who I recognized as one of the parents who collected one of my eighth grade students, Cody, said softly as she walked past.

  “I know for a fact that if anyone had complained like that, you’d have been hauled into Ross Teller’s office and had your ass handed to you. He’s one of my neighbors, you know. We’ve only been living next to each other for almost three months, but even he said he was impressed with how you got through to those kids.

  “It scared the hell out of me when I heard about those two kids who tried to kill themselves. I’ve been lecturing Cody about not listening to crazy stuff online for years now, but short of changing the password to the internet, I had no clue how to get through to him.”

  She looked like she was close to tears. “Thank you for getting through to my son. For that, I’ll never be able to thank you enough, but I’ll try. If Kirkwood even goes near your grandpa’s grave, I’ll smack over the head with Cody’s baseball bat. Alex will probably give me hell for even saying that, but I’d do it for you and your family in a heartbeat.”

  Then, not giving me a chance to say anything, she walked away.

  Pulling my phone back out, I rang my dad to warn him about the mayor's threats and ended up holding the phone far away from my ear while he ranted down it.

  Because the alarm system was fixed, school was back tomorrow, but I wasn’t sure I could face it. I felt like I’d failed the kids and let down my family.

  “I know what you’re thinking,” Dad yelled. “Put this phone back to your ear this instant, young lady.”

  Doing as I was told, I stared blindly into my cart, preparing myself for a lecture like when I messed up as a kid.

  Instead, he blew out a breath to settle himself. “I’m so angry right now, Bexley, that I’m struggling to find the willpower not to go over to Kirkwood’s and punch him in the face.

  “I know what you’re thinking, and you’re wrong. You’ve got a gift with kids and teaching, one that you knew in your heart and went after. I don’t believe for one second that you described it in a way that made rape sound good or took away the power of how grotesque it was.”

  My lower lip started shaking, but I was determined not to cry in the middle of the store.

  “Now, Logan will be able to confirm this, but I know for a fact that Kirkwood’s in deep shit right now, so he’s trying to take everyone down with him. He’s hoping that if he upsets us, we’ll distract Logan away from his part into the investigation into him.”

  Looking cautiously around me, I whispered, “What are you talking about?”

  “Right, he can’t talk about it,” Dad murmured to himself. “But I guess I can. So, the Kirkwoods and Ingleston are in shit. Something about bribes, drugs, and shootings. He’s hoping to buy himself time to hide whatever they could find on him, so he’s trying to distract everyone. Well, how do you distract a young man from his job? You go after his woman.”

  Holy shit. Drugs? Shootings?

  “Is this about that man and woman on the news? The ones who were shot?” I hissed, looking around me again and relieved when I didn’t see anyone.

  “Think so, they’re the only shootings I’ve heard about. Anyway, somehow it all leads back to the Kirkwoods, and now they’re saying Ingleston’s been in on it for years, too.”

  “How do you know all of this?”

  Clearing his throat with a cough, he rasped, “Never you mind—” My betting was that Hurst had told Logan’s grandfather, Bill, who’d then told Dad “—but I’m betting his goal was to distract Logan with you and us with Pops’ grave. Well, we’re too smart for that.”

  “What if there were complaints against me?”

  “You hear from Teller yet?”

  “No?”

  Dad sighed impatiently like I was being dense. Maybe I was, but I’d just been thrown into a situation that made no sense to me and scared the ever-loving God out of me.

  “If he had complaints about something like that, trust me, you’d know by now. Ain’t no way he’d be letting you near the students tomorrow, and he’d have to tell you that and why. Now, no news is good news, so you get on with what you were doing and leave the rest to us.”

  And then he hung up, just like that, leaving me open-mouthed in the middle of the store.

  Somehow I managed to get everything else I needed—and a lot I didn’t need and didn’t remember putting in the cart—and got back to my car. My baby had arrived this morning along with the boxes of stuff I’d brought with
me that were now neatly stacked in the last available spaces in the garage.

  I’d only just turned the engine on when a shrieking noise sounded, scaring the shit out of me. The Bluetooth connection between my car and phone had synced automatically, meaning that my phone was ringing through it—and the volume on it was all the way at the top.

  With my left hand, I hit blindly at the button to answer it on the steering wheel while lunging to lower the volume with my other hand.

  “Hello? Hello?”

  “Why do you sound like you just got caught doing something?” Logan’s deep voice asked, sounding amused.

  Explaining what had happened, I managed to smile for the first time in ages as I listened to him laugh. I was going to have to ruin his day by telling him what else had happened, but just for one minute, I wanted to enjoy this moment of calm before the shit hit the fan.

  “I was just calling to—” A voice behind him said something, cutting him off. “One second, baby.”

  Backing out of the spot I’d parked in, I went to take the turning that would take me home but decided to go left instead, which would take me past P.V.P.D. where he was. I was using the extra time to figure out how to tell him what’d happened, and maybe if I was in front of him, it would make a difference?

  Not once in all of it did I think that in small towns, news traveled quickly. I really should have, though.

  “Are you fucking kidding me?” Logan’s voice roared into the car, making me squeak. “He threatened you? He threatened Pops?”

  I was three minutes away from his building, but I needed to calm him down now. “Only a little?”

  “A little?” he snapped, sounding incredulous. “He tried to imply that you’d advocated for everything to be cool and well with rape.” Eh, that was about right. “And then said he was exhuming Pops out of his final resting place, and he couldn’t be buried in the town limits. Are you seriously telling me that’s a little?”

  Hitting the indicator to pull into the parking lot in front of the department, I wiggled my head from side to side, like I was thinking about it. He was right, but we couldn’t figure this out if he was heated.

  “From what I can tell, he can’t do anything,” I told him as I cut the engine and picked up my phone now that the call wasn’t coming through the speakers. “I know you can’t talk about it, but—”

  Another voice called his name. “One second, baby. Mark needs to tell me something.” He was back almost instantly. “You have a Prius?”

  I’d just been getting out of the car when he asked it, so I looked up expecting to see him, but he wasn’t there. “Where are you?”

  “Please tell me you don’t drive a Prius.”

  “It’s good for the environment and drives like a dream,” I said defensively, rubbing the top of the car. “Plus, I got it in black, so it looks badass.”

  When he didn’t say anything back, I checked the screen and saw he’d ended the call.

  “Well, that wasn’t nice.” Yes, I spoke to my car.

  “Why didn’t you tell me you had one?” Logan asked, making me jump until I saw his reflection in the window of my car.

  Spinning to face him, I crossed my arms over my chest. “What difference does it make? It’s environmentally conscious, and I’m afraid to have an electric car in case I forget to charge it. Do you know how many times I forget to charge my phone? What if I left a light on by mistake when I parked it? So I did the best I could and bought Ho-Baggins.”

  “Ho-Baggins?”

  Pointing at the object the argument was about—my car, a Prius called Ho-Baggins–I nodded once. “Yeah, because it suits him, and he gets a lot of attention, so he’s a ho.”

  Rubbing his face with both hands, he glared at the car and then aimed the full force of it on me. “For the record, I don’t approve of your vehicle. Also, for the record, I will never refer to it as Ho-Baggins. And finally, let the record also note that no matter what color you got it in, it’s definitely not badass.”

  Then, grabbing my hand, he gently pulled me into the building. Going from the heat outside into the air conditioning felt amazing, but I was also glad I’d worn a slightly padded bra. Hey, my nipples chose the life they lead, not me.

  As we walked over a specific area, I had a vivid memory recall of the time I booped Logan on the nose and then knocked on his head and felt my cheeks start burning. Why must I do dumb shit like that?

  Glancing over his shoulder, the grin Logan shot me showed he remembered it as well. “Think about it every day when I walk right here.”

  Damn it. Could I not be remembered for something that wasn’t embarrassing?

  Apparently not, because as we walked past the desks, the officers that could make a show of eating bananas did just that.

  Figuring that keeping my head down would be a better option, I looked down at the floor, not realizing where I was going until Logan started speaking again.

  “Okay, guys, she’s here. Mark’s going to take her statement while we do Hurst and Cole’s. Alejandro says he’ll deal with talking to the people y’all said witnessed it. We need to get every single detail of the incident, and then—”

  “We’ve done this before, Richards,” DB interrupted, sounding amused. “But I get it—it’s different when it’s your woman.”

  Pulling me next to him and putting his arm around me, I got to see the occupants of the room. DB, Hurst, Cole, and Mark all waved at me like nothing was going on.

  Then, Logan said something that made my mind go blank.

  “She’s not my woman, DB, she’s my everything. Nothing hurts her, nothing upsets her, nothing gets to her, and I’m going to make sure of it.”

  Forgetting people were watching us, I grabbed the collar of his uniform and pulled him down so that his mouth was above mine. “I fucking love you.”

  Unfortunately, with the hail of emotions from what’d just happened clashing with the feelings what he’d just said had brought forward for me, it came out loudly. So loud the desks closest to the door heard it, and it sounded aggressive, like a threat.

  One day I’d have a memory from here that didn’t make me wake up in the middle of the night.

  But today was not that day.

  I wanted to kiss him properly, but I’d already embarrassed myself enough, so I kept it PG and pulled away quickly. It was only as I took a step back that I noticed the state of his uniform.

  “Um, did you go pig wrestling?”

  I’m not at all ashamed to admit I had a mental image of Logan rolling around in the mud naked as I asked it.

  It was a fabulous fantasy, but the gruff tone of his voice when he replied told me it wouldn’t be happening anytime soon. “Something like that.”

  Chapter Nineteen

  Logan

  I hadn’t gotten to say the words back to her yesterday, but Bexley needed to know she wasn’t the only one who felt that way.

  When we’d gotten home last night, we’d had to finish packing up our bags to move into the motel while her floors were being done, and even though we didn’t have a lot of stuff, it’d still taken time.

  We were packed now, though, and a majority of it was in our cars, so we didn’t have a lot to do this morning except take the last bags and the animals out and drop it all off at the motel.

  Plus, I’d set the alarm to go off two hours early, meaning we had time to do that before we got to work, and we had time to have a shower together.

  And that’s why I was currently moving in and out of her, her body braced against the tiled wall with the spray on my back. My movements were slow and measured because I refused to rush through this moment with her.

  It was different.

  Feeling her walls starting to clench, I sucked her nipple hard, moaning around it when she spasmed around my length.

  “More,” she gasped, digging her nails into my back.

  Knowing now was the time, I lifted my head and waited for her to open her eyes as I gave her a hard thrust. The second
I had them on me, I stopped moving.

  I wanted her attention. I wanted her focus. I wanted everything from Bexley Anne Heath.

  I also wanted to get the words right the first time because I’d never said them before in my life.

  “I love you,” I told her earnestly, enjoying how shocked she looked. “I feel like I’ve loved you my whole life. When you left, I felt like part of me was missing, like there was a hole somewhere that I wouldn’t ever be able to fill.”

  Dropping her head down, so her forehead was on my shoulder, she whispered, “Logan.”

  “I don’t have that empty space anymore. Now I feel like everything’s in place, and I’m finally happy, Bexley, all because of you. I love you more than I’ll ever be able to put into words, and I promise I’ll show you how much every day for the rest of our lives.”

  Pulling out of her slightly, I pressed back through her tight walls, groaning as they squeezed me.

  “I love you,” she whispered in my ear as she lifted her head. “I love you more than the tide loves the moon, and I promise I’ll show you how much every day for the rest of our lives.”

  Turning my head to meet her mouth, I kissed her as I started thrusting back into her until she was crying out and I’d joined her.

  It was a turning point in our relationship, but it felt like everything we experienced was a turning point in it. Did couples ever stop having those moments? It felt like they built the relationship and like they anchored it in place.

  I wanted to have more of them so that we were a solid unit.

  As the feeling came back into my body and my legs stopped feeling like they were going to give out, I nudged her jaw with my nose and kissed her slowly.

  “Nothing’s ever going to hurt you,” I promised her, and I meant it. “I’m going to make sure of it.”

  “That wasn’t a proposal, was it?” she mumbled into my mouth, twisting her hips to show what she meant and making me smile.

  “No, baby. You’ll know it when I do it.”

  “Thank God,” she sighed, leaning back against the wall again. “If I got married—and that’s a big if because I don’t feel the need to do it—there’s no way I could go around telling people that story when they asked.”