I only got a glimpse of the long war between the ex-Congressman and his son, Jett, from a few stories Nicholas shared with us on the ride here…but the described finale of their feud cracked my heart wide open.
The Ciphers are an amazing group of tamed animals. They talk loudly, joke at each other’s expense constantly, and laugh with all of themselves.
The Cockers, by comparison, are mild.
So as we sit here on foldout chairs amid rows of both families under twinkle lights and mystery, it’s fucking hilarious to see the collective and unexpected reaction to what Sofia just did.
She crassly swore, very loudly to Grams, and when she did, almost the entire Cocker Family shouted along with Grams, “Language!”
It was this cacophony of reproach said all in good fun.
The Ciphers, however, in their leather-accessorized suits, dresses and motorcycle boots, were and are still, appalled.
Shocked.
Speechless.
Dumbstruck.
Even embarrassed.
Which makes the Cockers laugh harder, Sofia Sol right along with them. She meant to do it. Probably even knew it would put her blood family at ease. From what I understand, she’s not as close to the Cockers as they’d like her to be, since she was raised so far away and in such a different form.
I suspect some of these milder folks from Atlanta, who love her dearly and long to know her better, were a little intimidated by the wild biker gang.
But no more!
The Cockers got the upper hand with this stunt.
Sofia gave them the key they needed to out-rebel the rebellious, and break the ice for good and for all.
Nicholas and I are laughing with them, because I got a taste of this “Language!” family tradition when I was at his grandparents’ house for lunch.
Denise, however, hasn’t a clue.
“What the…?” she whispers to me.
Even Michael Cocker is laughing from his gut.
Nancy is wiping her eyes, shoulders shaking.
These people are over eighty and they just cracked up at the word, Fuckin’.
May Cocker is the only one who looks quietly pleased with herself, hands primly on her lap as she sits atop those two cushions.
“I’ll explain later,” I tell my best friend.
As the wedding commences, it’s beautiful. Max Cocker, who just finished directing his first feature film, is officiating it. He got ordained to marry any of his cousins who asks. He already wed his Falcon Quarterback cousin Eric and his new wife Wren. This is his second round. He looks so handsome as he proudly recites his part.
When Sofia gives her vows to her gorgeous groom, there are tears streaming down her cheeks. He wipes them away with a thumb and makes the Ciphers sigh.
Matthew whispers to Nicholas, “Never thought I’d live to see it.”
“Me neither,” he smiles, subconsciously squeezing my hand.
F or the reception the men of both families work together to move chairs and bring in tables, joking as they go.
Denise slaps my hip as a handsome Cipher approaches us, and he’s not like the others. “Hey there, I’m Tonk Jr.” He extends his hand and she shakes it.
“Denise.”
“I’m Maddie, Nicholas’s girlfriend.”
He nods like he noticed that, and returns to Denise. “Would you like to dance when the music begins?”
She reacts with perfect eyebrows raised. “Yes, I would!”
He smirks, and heads off on a satisfied, “I’ll be back then.”
We turn to each other, excited for her because he is sexy, though very conservative compared to his gang.
She whispers with enthusiasm, “What’s his deal?”
“No clue, but he’s the only one with short hair and no leather.”
“I’m about to find out!”
Laughing I motion with my chin to Zoe, Nicholas’s sister, who’s approaching me with a shy smile.
“Madison?”
“Hi!” I self-consciously adjust my twilight-blue dress that I bought for the event, trying not to be nervous.
I’ve only been dating Nicholas officially for one week and a day. We’ve spent every one of those together—he’s worked on his computer from my apartment—but still, eight days is just eight days. His sister I know not at all. And I want her to like me. She looks like a fairy who’s never been hurt. Completely open and guileless.
Denise glances to me.
Leaning down in a pretty, cream-colored dress to pet Bucky, Zoe explains, “Mom and Dad are on the front porch and wanted to know if you and your friend, and your adorable dog—hi Bucky! I’ve been dying to meet you!—would like to join us for some wine while the guys do their thing?” She smiles up at me as if the answer is obvious.
My heart picks up speed. “Sure, yes, that sounds great.”
Denise and I exchange a look as we follow the ethereal Zoe Cocker while she happily chatters along.
“Isn’t this a beautiful place? Last time we came here I was so much younger. This back screen porch was in tatters! I overheard Grandma Nance telling my aunts that the Ciphers had it rebuilt just for the wedding. Did you know it’s the first thing they’ve improved since they added on the garage for all of their motorcycles, isn’t that interesting?”
In the mansion we pass a huge kitchen overflowing with an amazing feast, on our right. People are already picking at it, heavy in conversations, the sound bouncing off the walls.
To the left is a television room where all the chairs and couches are facing the screen. Today flowers adorn every flat surface, their fragrance mixed with candlelight from dozens of flames, is truly lovely.
Zoe leads us through a hallway with an ornate staircase lifting off from it. We curiously scan the second floor where antique doors to bedrooms are closed for privacy. Only one is open and even at this odd angle we can see signs that it’s a bathroom, welcoming anyone of the nearly hundred people who are here today.
“My brothers are having a laugh at the idea that our Sofia has actually tied the knot.” Zoe smiles as we enter the grand foyer. “If you knew what we knew, you’d be shocked, too!” Chipped walls give the space a ghostly feel, and gigantic, painted portraits of long-dead people watch us. Denise gives them the finger while Zoe’s not looking. “I’ve always looked up to Soph, so I have to admit, I’m a little disappointed.”
“Really, why?” I ask Zoe, stifling a smile at my friend.
“I hoped she’d be the one cousin who didn’t get married.” Scrunching her nose, Zoe shrugs, “She’s a superhero! Marriage is so…human.”
Denise smiles, “Wearing that gown was pretty super to me.”
Zoe whispers conspiratorially, “My jaw dropped. It was perfect!” as she turns an antique doorknob.
CHAPTER 41
M ADISON
A warm southern breeze embraces us, and Cicadas chirp from an endless canopy of oak trees that line the Ciphers’s driveway and stops at these white, front porch steps.
We head left to where Jeremy and Meagan Cocker are seated in chairs as old as most everything else here, twinkle lights and candles romantically spaced around the porch for the occasion. I’d briefly met them after we arrived, but now that I don’t have Nicholas as a buffer, I’m going to use Denise.
Under my breath I hum and she glances over with an encouraging nod, her look telling me, You’ve got this!
Jeremy Cocker gets up and meets Bucky halfway, squatting down to pet him with a huge grin, “Hey there boy! So you’re the dog my son saved,” he beams, dark brown eyes flicking up to smile at me. “If you knew my history, Madison, you’d know that’s kind of a special thing he did.” Patting the black ears, Jeremy murmurs, “At least one dog was saved. Maybe that evens the balance.”
Standing here next to him I gaze at Nicholas’s father, wondering what he means by the enigmatic statement, but instinctively knowing there’s a privacy to it, and I shouldn’t pry.
It’s impossible not to see the
family resemblance, even though Nicholas is taller than his father, and more sinewy where Jeremy is stocky. But the smiles, olive skin and dark eyes are the same. Mr. Cocker’s hair is speckled with white now, and again I can’t help but picture Nicholas in his older years.
Rising, Jeremy touches my arm and guides me to his chair, offering to my friend, “Denise, why don’t you sit next to my wife. Zo, take the last seat. I’ll stand.”
His daughter doesn’t argue, so neither do we. He crosses his arms as I glance to Meagan Cocker, a woman who’s aging well. Laugh-lines lightly crease her eyes, accentuated now on her happy yet curious smile. “What did you think of the wedding, Maddie?”
I honestly reply, “It was really funny,”
Meagan laughs, nodding to her glass of red wine. “Yes, this family is lots of fun.”
Jeremy lifts the bottle and pours into two empty glasses he may have brought out here anticipating our arrival. Only as I watch him do I realize there aren’t enough. As I’m about to remark on it, Zoe beats me.
“Dad! I’m old enough to drink.”
“Says who?”
“The Federal Government.”
He lifts an eyebrow. “Don’t know if you noticed but they don’t come around these parts. Or when they do, they’re retired.”
“Dad!” Zoe laughs.
Frowning he mutters, “Huh, just realized Elijah isn’t here. He would have been the only one who could have pleaded your case. Sorry, Zo. I’m not serving you wine until you’re thirty.” To me he smirks, “She’s my only daughter. Poor thing.”
Meagan shakes her head, explaining to Denise and I, “You should have seen when she was born. Jeremy wouldn’t let her go. I had to nurse her—oh my God, I was aching, and she was hungry—but he kept her swaddled little body in his arms, rocking in a hospital chair that wasn’t meant for rocking.”
“Any chair is meant for rocking,” he counters.
“He was singing to her, too. And he can’t sing.”
“You sang to me?”
“I can too sing!” Jeremy chuckles. “I just do it badly.” Locking eyes with me, he says, “My son tells me you’re a nanny.”
“Dad, you sang to me?”
He smiles at Zoe. “I did.”
She melts, her body tilting to the side. “Aw!”
Jeremy looks back to me so I answer, “I am a nanny, yes. Looking for work at the moment, but Nicholas cleared the way for me to apply.” Tentatively I ask, because it appears they know more than I think they do, “Did he tell you about what he did?”
His parents chuckle like devils, and Jeremy crosses his arms. “I wish I’d been there. Told my boys they should have called me!”
Meagan rolls her eyes on a smile, “That would have been a disaster.”
“Why?”
“You’re too old for that stuff now!”
He snorts, “Bullshit!”
I relax. So does Denise. Both of us sip the wine with amusement.
Returning to me, Meagan asks, “What happened after that, do you know?”
I take a deep breath. “I went to their school to say goodbye, and apologize because I’d told them before, that I wasn’t going to leave. They were really hurt. I explained to Skylar that she’s very strong, much stronger than she knows, and she needs to watch out for her little brother—his name is Kyle. It was very cute—she puffed up her chest a little. I think my opinion matters to her now, so she was able to hear that. When they left, she held his hand, and she never does that.”
Zoe whispers, “That’s so sweet.”
Meagan nods, “Have you always wanted to work with children, Madison?”
“I discovered it when I was in college.” To Denise I ask, “Did you ever think I’d work with kids?”
Her eyelashes flick up toward the porch’s chipped ceiling as she taps her glass with a blue fingernail. “No, I never saw that coming. You were like me in school, didn’t really like it.”
“I liked it!”
“No, you didn’t.”
“You’re right. Not until I found subjects that actually interested me.”
Mr. Cocker squats to give my dog more love. “I hated school,” he admits, volume quiet like he’s talking to Bucky. “One of the reasons I went into the military. Needed discipline. And a purpose. Had no idea where to find that but I believed in this country and none of my brothers had gone in, so it was something different, and mine exclusively. Made my father proud, I know that. I have a sneaking suspicion he wished he had served when he was young.” Glancing up to us, Jeremy smiles, looking so handsome as his eyes sparkle in the candlelight. “But learning about algebra when I wasn’t planning on becoming a mathematician? No, thanks.”
Meagan light-heartedly argues, “You have to try the subject first, though, to learn if you have a taste for it. Otherwise we’d have no scientists if there wasn’t biology for all.”
He thinks about it while rubbing behind Bucky’s soft ears. “It’s time for us to get another dog.”
“We just retired, Jeremy!”
“A year ago. And we haven’t travelled nearly as much as we thought. The kids can always dog sit, too.”
Zoe shakes her head. “I can’t, Dad. Our cats do not like dogs.”
“The boys then,” he shrugs, returning to my happy pooch. “I miss having a dog.”
Denise and I glance over to see Meagan watching her husband with love in her eyes. She doesn’t submit to his request just yet, but she will. On a deep inhale, her warm eyes lock onto mine. “Madison, Nicholas likes you very much.”
My lips part, then shut. I swallow hard and take the plunge. “I’ve liked him ever since the first time I saw him.”
Her eyebrows rise. “You have?”
“But he didn’t know I existed.”
“Well, he does now,” she smiles, reaching over to touch my knee. “Nobody comes to a Cocker Family BBQ unless they’re important to this family.”
Denise frowns, “Is this a BBQ?”
Jeremy stands up, shakes out his slacks. “If we’re all together, and there’s Mom’s fresh ginger-ale and chili, it’s a Family BBQ.”
The screen door opens and Nicholas walks out with Matthew. He takes in the group of us and smiles to me, “There you are. You want to take a walk?”
My eyebrows twitch. Setting my wine down I say, “Sure,” and rise up to go to him.
Denise stands, too. “I have a dance partner waiting for me, so I’m just gonna take this wine for a walk of my own, if you don’t mind.” With a comical saunter she heads back inside.
Nicholas asks his parents, “What’re you guys doing? Grilling my girl without me?”
Zoe smiles, “I’m the referee. And don’t worry, they played nice. Except Dad won’t let me drink, so I’m outta here. Matthew, you coming?”
He nods, dips his head to Nicholas’s parents as he leaves.
Now it’s just the four of us, and Bucky. Nicholas has my hand, and his thumb is lightly caressing mine as he tells his parents, “Food is a free for-all, but there’s enough for two weddings so no rush.”
We start to head off with Bucky happily trotting at my side.
“Nicholas,” Meagan says.
He turns, “Yeah?”
“We’re happy for you.” She’s got emotion in her eyes as she adds, “We like your girl.”
A grin of pride and confidence flashes from him. “Thanks Mom.” He locks eyes with Jeremy. “Thanks Dad.”
They watch us go down the steps onto a gravel driveway. Heading left for the side of the house, pass them and smile. As we disappear into the shadows around the side of the great house, out of earshot I whisper, “Where are we going?”
CHAPTER 42
N ICHOLAS
“Where no one can see us,” I smirk, leading my girl past the warehouse-sized garage for all those Ciphers motorcycles.
We slip by the building unseen, muffled voices coming from inside.
Surrounding the main house in every direction are woods filled w
ith ancient oak trees draped in Spanish moss, some with trunks so gnarled and thick that you can hide behind them without a problem.
Madison laughs, “The one time I don’t wear flats.”
“You complaining?”
“Oh no, never,” she returns with a funny face. Losing the smile she says, “Actually I’m having the best time.”
“My folks treat you right?”
“You know they did.”
A grin flashes. “Yeah. They’re good people.” With a more serious tone I add, “I think Zoe likes you a lot. See how she teased dad and left to go and do what she wanted?”
“Yeah?”
“That’s a new thing. You didn’t see the look in my Dad’s eyes? The surprise?”
“I didn’t notice.”
Giving Maddie’s hand a squeeze, I glance over. “She wanted to impress you.”
“But I didn’t do anything that would inspire that.”
“I told her your nickname is Slugger.”
Madison’s eyes widen and she laughs, “You told her about the fight with Marla?”
“Yup! Everyone was giving me credit for beating up Dane Schweis so I had to tell them you’re a badass in your own right.” Scanning the darkness I back my girl into the seclusion of a thick oak, pulling up the hem of her dress. “Still sore from last night, Slugger?”
She whispers, “Let’s find out,” tilting her head for a kiss as her fingers hungrily unbutton my pants.
As she takes my length and strokes it, a guttural sigh breaks free from my lungs. My fingers slip into her g-string and find her already damp, slippery, and ready. The sex we’ve had is constant, and I can’t get enough of her.
We kiss as voices from the wedding drift on a warm Louisiana breeze. Madison and I tease each other into a fever. I flip her around and she moans with anticipation, clasping the tree trunk with both hands, dress hiked. I drag her panties down her thighs and groan at the dark outline of her round ass. “Remember when I said I’d pay for this?”
With a sexy laugh she confesses, “I so wanted you that night.”
My eyebrows fly up as I give her butt a light spank. She arches it higher while I chide her, “You gave no sign of that.”
Nicholas Cocker (Cocker Brothers Book 16) Page 19
