Love Slave for Two: Reunions [Love Slave for Two 3] (Siren Publishing Ménage Everlasting) (17 page)

They got moving again. There were other sites they wanted to see in the Canyon area, but they would come back and explore them in the Honda after they parked the RV at the campground. Nevvie let Adam sit on the sofa with Andrew. He stared out the windows and took lots of pictures of the landscape.

“Momma, this doesn’t look like Florida.”

She glanced back at him with a smile. “I would hope not. It’s not Florida.”

“I noticed it all smells like Christmas trees.”

“That’s because of all the pine trees around. They’re different than the pine trees we have in Florida.”

“Is Daddy still behind us?”

She glanced in her side mirrors. “Yes, he is.” She suspected Tyler would be glued to her ass for fear of pissing her off if they got separated. The truth was, she was already over it. Finding out from Tom that Pete’s condition had already been upgraded had put her in a better mood. She knew damn well that was far more important than her having to take a shower after a shit bath.

They soon arrived at Fishing Bridge without further incident and after Tyler got them checked in, they parked the RV and got it set up.

She stared at it. “It’s nice to have a home port, so to speak.”

“If you want,” Tyler said, “Cody, Wyoming, isn’t very far to the east. We could drive there and go shopping for new shoes.”

She laughed and hugged him. “Seriously, I’m okay. I’m not mad at you. Anymore.” It was growing close to dark. “I had a reality check when talking to Tommy while you were gone.” She stared into Tyler’s blue eyes. In the back of her mind, she’d never be able to exorcise the image of him lying on their kitchen floor, eyes closed, not breathing.

Heart not beating.

Peggy jumping on him and starting CPR, screaming at Nevvie to call 911—

“It doesn’t matter, Ty,” she said, meaning it with all her heart and wanting to get that last image out of her mind. “It was an accident.”

He gathered her into his arms. “You are an extraordinary woman.”

“Yeah, well, you haven’t got the AMEX bill yet.”

He laughed. “I’ll treasure it always. Besides, I’ll take it to the CPA. Maybe we can deduct some of it as research.”

At the Everglades Correctional Institution outside of Miami, Florida, the group of men and women forming the parole board had convened that morning in the hearing room. The prisoner was brought in and seated at a table before them. With severe budget cuts and facilities closing, they were under state mandates to try to reduce the number of incarcerated inmates without compromising public safety.

A man seated in the center of the group spoke up. “Mr. LaRogue, do you have anything you’d like to say to this parole board?”

His lawyer, a public defender, did. “Mr. LaRogue has been a model prisoner while incarcerated. He has taken advantage of every opportunity to better himself available, including earning his GED and college credits towards a degree.”

The parole board chairman consulted his file.

The assistant state attorney, Jim Keller, spoke up. Only on week three of his job, he’d received the case file, along with twenty-four others, a mere two hours earlier. “Mr. LaRogue has a past history of arrests in three states for assault, usually while under the influence of alcohol. He tried to kill the victim in this case, Ms…” He had to stop and consult the file. “Ms. Nevaeh Barton. He viciously stalked her to her home, broke in, and attacked her.”

The head of the parole board consulted his notes. “Do you have any victim impact statements, or is there anyone here today who would like to testify in this matter?”

Keller consulted his file notes. “My office has been unable to contact the victim in this case, Ms. Nevaeh Barton. I can provide past victim impact statements regarding this matter. Based upon the facts in the case, and the severity of the crime, our office recommends no parole.”

“I believe we already have those past victim impact statements, Mr. Keller.”

After more back and forth between the attorneys and the parole board members, the parole board chair nodded. “We’ll let you know our decision within two weeks. As you can imagine, our caseload is rather heavy.”

Alex LaRogue sat quietly and didn’t say much unless he was asked a direct question. The advice he’d received from fellow inmates was to look contrite, be polite, and say as little as possible in as polite a way as possible.

Inside, he seethed.
Next time I get my hands on that fucking bitch and her two fag boys, none of them will walk away able to testify against me.

The next morning, after checking in with Tom and finding out Pete’s condition was still improving, Nevvie made a conscious vow to herself to try to not be a bitch to Tyler, no matter how much of a dumbass he was.

He hadn’t meant to dump shit all over her. She never should have had him help her. That was her first mistake. And she couldn’t blame him for the puppy, either.

Although leaving her and Dad in Mitchell was totally his fault. But she had forgiven him for that.

After eating breakfast and cleaning up, they packed the kids into the Honda and headed north to explore. Today, they would spend the day exploring the northeast quadrant of the park. Tomorrow, the southeast, including an extended stop at West Thumb Geyser Basin.

By the time lunch rolled around and they stopped to eat at Canyon Village again, she was in probably the best mood of the whole trip.

Tyler noticed. He looked across the table at her from where he was trying to get Mikey to eat a banana. “Are you enjoying yourself, love? You seem less stressed today.”

“Yes, Ty, I’m enjoying myself.”

“I’m enjoying myself, too, Mommy!” Adam chirruped.

Andrew smiled. “I must say, this has been fun. I’m not going to want to return to England.”

“Do you have to, Grandpa?” Adam asked.

“Yeah,” Nevvie blurted out. “Do you have to?”

“What?”

She looked at Tyler, then back at Andrew. “Move over here, Dad. Permanently. You’re retired. We’ll pay for it. Right, Ty?”

He nodded. “Of course we would, Dad.”

“And,” Nevvie continued, hope building in her heart, “we’ve sort of talked about building a bigger house. Or we can help you find a place of your own, if you want.”

“I couldn’t impose on you like that,” Andrew said.

“What imposition? Dad, we love you and we want you here.” She looked down at Adam, then Mikey. “I want my kids to have a grandpa in their lives.”

Andrew quickly brushed at his eyes with his hand. “Well, we can certainly discuss it when we finish our vacation. But why don’t we just enjoy the trip first before we even think about that.”

“Yay!” Adam said. “Grandpa Andy gonna live with us!”

Tyler smiled. “Let’s hope so, son.”

* * * *

Tom grabbed a cloth grocery bag from the house and headed over to the post office. He’d stop by Eddie’s house and walk their dog, Tom-Tom, on his way back home.

When he opened the post office box, he softly swore. It was packed full. Without bothering to look at any of it, he pulled it all out, jammed it into the bag, half filling it, and closed the box again. He tossed it onto the passenger seat. They could deal with it all when they got home. Most of it was likely junk or fan mail for Tyler anyway. Nevvie had set up all their bills to be paperless and paid them all online. So any mail they received while they were gone didn’t need their attention.

Tom-Tom greeted him with a happy bark at the front door when he let himself in with the spare key Eddie and Pete had given them. Tom spent a moment petting him. “Guess what, buddy? Your daddy’s going to be okay, the doctors say. And it looks like we’ve got a new pal for you to play with.” The yellow Lab plopped his furry butt down on the tile, his tail incessantly wagging.

“Let’s get you walked.” Tom took him out on the leash, taking him down to the end of the street and back and making sure to pick up after him. Then he took him out onto their screened-in lanai and played fetch with him for a few minutes. “Okay, I need to get back to your other daddy. I need to take him lunch.” He got the dog settled.

Their lives would be changed, that’s for sure. Nevvie had sent him several pictures of their newest addition. The little bugger was adorable.

He stopped by his house next, just a few minutes away, to dump the bag of mail. He noticed the answering machine light was blinking as well.

Tommy thought about playing it, then decided not to.
Fuck it. Anyone who needs to get hold of us has our cell numbers.
After quickly checking the National Hurricane Center’s site to see where the storm was and to view its current forecasted track, he headed back out the door.

* * * *

By that afternoon, the doctors were happy to report Pete seemed on the mend. While still weak and not completely out of the woods, his vitals were strong, his blood work indicated he was responding to the antibiotics he was receiving, and he would most likely be moved from ICU into a regular room the next day.

After finishing their lunch, Eddie and Tom returned the ICU. Pete was propped up in bed and teasing a nurse about her bedside manner.

“Hey, you’re looking even better than this morning,” Tom noted.

“I feel a little better, too. They won’t let me eat anything yet though. Said I’m on a clear liquids diet for now until my gut heals.”

“And clear diet doesn’t include tapioca pudding,” the nurse interjected.

Pete snorted. “Can’t blame a guy for trying, sweetie.”

“Listen,” Tom said. “Now that we know you’re going to be okay, I’m going to get our houses boarded up. I don’t know what the storm is going to do, but that way, you don’t have to worry about ours. The storm shutters can stay up on ours until we get back and I can take them down.”

Pete grabbed his hand and squeezed. “Thank you, man.”

Tom didn’t miss the emotion in the big man’s voice. “Hey, you’re family. God knows you both were there for us, and for me, even when I didn’t deserve it. This is the least I can do.”

“So you guys haven’t killed Ty yet, huh?”

Tom smiled. “No, but Nevvie might.” He related the dump tank story and by the time he finished, tears of laughter and pain rolled down Pete’s face as he held his gut and tried to stop laughing.

“Holy…fuck! I can’t believe… Wait, it’s Ty, I can believe it.” He finally got himself under control. “You need to get your ass back out there before she drops him down one of those geysers or something.”

Tom waved the suggestion away. “I’m not going back until I know for sure you’re okay. Ty’s a big boy. If he gets to be too much of a pain in Nevvie’s ass, she’ll put him on a plane to Seattle and come back with Dad and the kids.”

“Poor Nev,” Pete said. “She’s a real champ, you know that?”

“Tell him about the puppy,” Eddie said.

“Puppy?” Pete asked. “What puppy?”

Tom nodded. “Hold on to your gut…”

By the time he finished that story, Pete had reached for his morphine button and hit it for a dose of pain medication. Once he managed to stop laughing, that was. “Holy fucking shit!”

“Did you tell him about Mitchell?” Eddie asked.

Tom laughed. “Maybe I should wait until his morphine kicks in.”

“What happened?” Pete asked. “Tell me. I want to know.”

“It’ll hurt.”

“Fuck that. It’s worth it. This is hysterical.”

Pete’s howls of laughter rang throughout the ICU as Tom told the story. “So…let me get…this straight,” Pete gasped through peals of laughter. “Ty left Nevvie and Dad behind, had a surprise puppy waiting for her when she returned from airport…
and
gave her a shit bath?”

Tom nodded. “Yep. That sums it up.”

“Fuck…me…” More laughter rolled from him. “He should write a fucking screenplay about this.”

Tom smiled. “No one would believe it.”

“We’d believe it,” Eddie said. “We all know Ty.”

* * * *

Tom left the hospital later that afternoon. Eddie promised to call him if Pete’s condition changed for the worse. Otherwise, Tom would come back at dinner time and bring food for Eddie.

He stopped by Pete and Eddie’s house to walk and feed Tom-Tom. He’d stop by again before he returned to the hospital.

At home, he changed into work clothes and started pulling the storm shutters out.

Should’ve fucking got the automatic ones.

At the time, he couldn’t force himself to justify the additional expense when he knew he could easily put the shutters up by himself. Now, they could easily afford the cost, and he wasn’t sure how the hell he would finish putting up their shutters, much less Pete and Eddie’s.

He dragged the corrugated metal shutters from their storage spot and, based upon numbers written on each shutter, deposited them at their proper window. With that done, and starting with the smallest windows first, he began installing them. Two hours later, he was almost done and ready to collapse. He’d tackle Pete and Eddie’s shutters tomorrow.