Mort closed his eyes. “Roxy sick.”
Dropping his arms, Christopher tensed at Mort’s words. “What the fuck wrong with her?
“I don’t know what the fuck it is, Prez. I just know the shit bad.”
Christopher thrust his hands through his hair. In her own way, she’d become a mother figure to him, too. “Why the fuck she left? She need to be the fuck around us. She need our fuckin’ help.”
“Prez, I tried talking to her, but she got a head like a fucking brick. Stubborn as a motherfucker.”
Christopher got his cell phone from his cut, prepared to call Roxy himself. Fuck, he’d even ride to New Orleans and pick her ass up.
Mort’s voice stopped his dialing. “No, Prez. Don’t. Please. She don’t want nobody to know.”
“Fuck.” Christopher hesitated but finally returned his phone to his pocket.
“She keep calling me and crying,” Mort continued, “begging me not to tell Bailey and to take care of her if shit don’t turn out right. If Roxanne die and Bailey didn’t spend this time with her and she find out I knew her momma was sick, she’d fucking hate me.”
“Mort, this different from the shit I’m keepin’ from Megan. If Dinah was ever sick this way, I woulda told Megan.”
“She don’t want Bailey worrying.” Mort dropped his head. “I don’t either. Bailey adore Roxy.”
Christopher didn’t want to think about Roxy being dead. Life was filled with hard shit, though. “That’s your fuckin’ answer. She adore her ma. She wanna be with her if this her last days.”
“She with her other kids and her momma. She keep telling Bailey she coming back, then always reschedule for some bullshit fucking reason. Now, she supposedly coming back at the end of the summer.”
“Accordin’ to what Roxy tellin’ Bailey?”
“Yeah, but not what the fuck she telling me. She could be dead and buried by then.”
While Christopher understood Roxy’s need to protect Bailey, he didn’t believe she was going about it the right way. Where Megan was concerned, both Traveler and her fucking ma was already fucked up and buried. Her knowing the truth surrounding their deaths wouldn’t change a fucking thing. “I’ma have Riley see what the fuck he can find out before you talk to Bailey, brother.”
“Me and Roxy didn’t start off on the best of terms, but I really care about her. She one tough bitch and to hear her cry like she been doing. Prez, that’s just tearing me the fuck up.”
“I know. Fuck, watchin’ the way Fee had been mopin’ and cryin’ for fuckin’ days tore me and Zoann up.”
A guilty look crossed Mort’s features. It had been almost a month since Megan brought Fee home with Mort at their side. As usual, Mort knew what the fuck was going on, but the motherfucker protected Megan as much as he protected Kendall. Unless threatened with death, he’d keep their secrets. Christopher respected him for that. If he were ever killed, Megan would be safe.
Who the fuck was he kidding? Johnnie wouldn’t let another motherfucker near Megan, if something happened to Christopher. He’d want to do it all. He might even destroy his marriage in his quest to care for Megan. That was kind of fucked up, but to Christopher, his brother was still…lost. Until Kendall found her happiness, Johnnie would search for his.
Another reason for Christopher to fucking hate that bitch, when he had more than e-fuckin-nuff already. He didn’t know how fucking much was need on both their parts, and how fucking much was really love. Sometimes, he felt if Kendall really fucking loved Johnnie she’d sit the fuck down and fucking listen. Other times, he felt she had some type of fucked up glitch that kept her unhappy, unless she was fucking unhappy. What the fuck ever it was, she was the reason for Johnnie’s demeanor. He seemed so alone, more so than he’d been before he’d met Kendall and had only mourned the loss of Megan, not been so fucking stupidly bitter over it. That hostility led Johnnie to hand his fucking nuts over to Kendall, in the misguided belief that giving Kendall her way would aid his happiness.
He flicked his cigarette on the concrete and crushed it beneath his boot, then rubbed his eyes. “Think I should fuck-up Kendall?”
“John Boy love Red, Prez. I know she hard to handle, especially now being pregnant again.”
Fuck, he’d forgotten about that. “I ain’t meanin’ now. I mean once she get his kid outta her. Johnnie so fuckin’ unhappy.”
“Killing Red the way to make him happy? C’mon, brother, you know that would never happen. He’d grieve to death.”