“Bourbon,” Hop answered.
I pulled my head out of the fridge and turned to him to see he had a face like thunder. He was also opening the doors over my pantry where I kept my hard liquor.
“Is everything okay?” I asked, moving to the island.
Hop uncapped my Jack Daniels then threw back a healthy slug straight from the bottle.
I made a mental note to buy another for company and leave that one all to Hop.
He dropped the bottle and sliced his eyes to me. “Get this shit, Shy is doin’ Tabby.”
My mouth dropped open, my heart swelled, and the look on his face was the only thing stopping me from doing a girlie jump in the air, arms overhead, shouting, “Hurrah!”
Tabitha Allen was Tack’s only daughter. She was in her early twenties but when she was in her teens, she had a screaming crush on Shy.
I had no idea why Hop looked like he wanted to kill someone but maybe he didn’t know that Tab used to have a huge crush on Shy. Regardless, I thought it was cool. This meant she was healing from her loss. She had sunk so deep in her grief, we all feared for a while that she would drown in it. But she’d come back to her old self.
I wondered if Shy had anything to do with that and I hoped he did.
“Uh, is it Shy you want to kill and if so, why?” I asked and Hop just scowled at me so I gave him another option. “Or are you generally just pissed at the world because you had a bad day?”
“Did you hear me?” he asked.
“Yes, you said Shy and Tabby have gotten together.”
“Shy is Shy, babe. That means he’s doin’ her.”
“Well, yes, she’s past the age of consent and Shy is Shy. He’s hot and maybe it’s good she’s getting some.”
“From a brother?” he spat with disgust.
I decided to try silence for a bit to see if he’d share more so I’d know what the big deal was.
This didn’t work when Hop stopped talking and slugged back more Jack.
When he again dropped the bottle, I told him, “Hop, this is one of those times you need to remember your old lady is a fledgling old lady and you need to explain.”
“She’s Tack’s daughter,” he reminded me of something I knew.
I nodded.
“Off-limits, babe,” he declared.
“Well—”
“And he knows it.”
I moved to him, got close and lifted a hand to rest it on his chest before I said, “The heart sometimes doesn’t care about limits.”
Something in his eyes changed and I knew him well enough to know that change didn’t bode well for me.
This knowledge was confirmed when he stated, “They been at it a while, better at hidin’ it than you and me which, FYI, Shy knows about us. High you already knew, Hound was in the kitchen when we had our go ’round and Hound’s got a big fuckin’ mouth so Boz, Tug, Brick, Dog, Snapper, and Bat also know.”
Oh dear.
“And Big Petey took me aside and counseled me,” Hop went on. “No one told him jack but the old man’s got nothin’ to do but hang around and observe. Not much is lost on him.”
“Who does that leave?” I asked, not having a good feeling about this.
“Arlo, Roscoe, Speck… and Tack.”
He was making a point. I just didn’t feel like taking his point so I changed the subject. “Are you done slugging bourbon? Do you want a beer?”
He lifted a hand to curl it around the side of my neck. “Babe, Shy and Tab kept that shit from Tack and he’s seriously fuckin’ pissed. He’s got reason and, I’ll admit, it’s different, what we’re doin’, but not by much. Tab’s his daughter. Shy knows better but they lied. They hid. Tack wants him out.”
My lungs convulsed. “Seriously?”
“He says he loves her but this is Shy, and she’s fuckin’ Tabby.”
I stared at him, my lungs easing and my heart swelling.
“He says he loves her?”
“Babe, this is not Cinderella and Prince Charming.”
“Yes, it is.”
He blinked before he asked, “Come again?”
“She used to crush on him huge.”
“Lanie—”
I cut him off. “A girl, Hop, any girl who crushes on a boy like that, well… you aren’t a girl and thank God for me you aren’t. Still, that means you’ll never know. To have a crush like that and then have that boy fall in love with you, Hop, that’s a dream come true. Tabby lost so much, honey, she deserves to have a dream come true.”
His jaw clenched and he looked to the side, which was something else that didn’t give me a good feeling.
“What?” I asked.
He looked back at me.