Scorched(34)

“Molly, sweetheart, it’s okay. Take care of Mannie. With any luck, tomorrow he’ll be Nick’s cross to bear once again. Then, you and I can pick this up again and finish what we started.”

“Mollllyyyyy!” they both heard Armando whine outside their bedroom door. “Are you okay in there, chica?”

“I’m fine, Armando. I’ll meet you in the living room in five with that pill, sweetie. Promise!” Molly called back, trying desperately to keep her voice calm and patient when she felt anything but that. Nearly sobbing when she heard their baby begin to squall, she felt her heart lighten when Devil chuckled.

“When it rains, it pours, huh, Sweetheart?” Devil asked gently.

Molly nodded and caught her breath as Devil leaned forward to steal a long, sweet kiss from her lip before leaning his forehead against hers. “Tomorrow night, baby,” he whispered to her. “Tomorrow night, we’re taking back our life. Until then, I’ll handle the little baby while you deal with the big one, okay?”

Smiling through her own tears, Molly nodded. “Nothing has ever sounded better to me, Devil. Absolutely, nothing.”





Chapter Eight


Devil

Less than twenty-four hours later, Devil stood at the bay window of his formal living room, ready and waiting for the battle to commence. Behind him, he could hear his Nana humming softly as she tapped her wooden spoon against the arm of the rocking chair she favored when she visited them. Glancing over his shoulder, his lips twitched as he saw her. “Is it really necessary for you to carry your weapon everywhere you go, Nana? I hardly think you’ll need to come to blows to defend Armando’s honor today.”

“You know I like to be prepared for anything, lad,” she replied in a deceptively mild tone, her keen gaze never wavering from the picture window in front of her chair as she waited for their so-called guests. Yeah, he knew it probably wasn’t the right word to use in relation to Nick’s parents. As far as he and the rest of their clan was concerned, the ‘guests’ were the enemy, but he knew he had to at least make the effort to be the gracious host. Molly would kill him otherwise.

She’d told him so.

Repeatedly.

Devil watched as his grandmother tightened her wrinkled hand around her preferred weapon of choice and turned her coiffed head toward him, her only biological grandson, and offered a nonthreatening smile. Her twinkling eyes, however, were anything but benign. Oh, no. Those bright orbs promised one hell of a tussle to anyone that would threaten the family she’d built and ruled for the last eighty plus years of her life. And that included that flamboyant manchild, Mannie, that she’d adopted into the clan when he’d married his wife. “Oh, I know, Nana, but try to remember that Molly considers it poor form to attack guests in her home,” he teasingly reminded the elderly woman.

“That bonnie lass of yours knows that I’d never draw me spoon without provocation,” Nana scoffed, lifting her slim shoulders in a careless shrug as she settled herself more comfortably in her chair. “The lass also understand that as matriarch of this family of ours, it’s me job to defend the honor of any member of it. Nick and Armando be members, Willy. Ye’d do well to keep that in the front of ye mind today,” she ordered, lifting her spoon and waving it menacingly in his direction.

Grimacing at her use of his childhood nickname – the one that only his precious grandmother dared call him – he sighed. “Aren’t old women supposed to be feeble and frail at your age?” he asked irritably, hissing in a breath as the spoon caught him sharply on his elbow. “You seem pretty damn spry to me,” he complained, rubbing his offended joint and wondering where the hell his wife was.

“Me body can still pull off a surprise or two when it needs to do it,” Nana returned, leaning forward as a Mercedes Town Car turned onto their street, slowly sliding toward their driveway.

Snorting as the car kept going, passing their driveway by, Devil watched his beloved grandmother subside back into her chair, her lips pressing together the same way they did when he used to get in trouble for playing in the holy water during mass. Yep, his Nana was growing more impatient by the second. Not that he blamed her. He was more than a little ready to get this little reunion   on the road, too. The sooner these irritating morons arrived, the sooner Nick could prove to Mannie that it wasn’t that he hadn’t loved Mannie enough to introduce him to those bigots he had for parents, but rather that it was he loved his lover too much to inflict them on him.

Shooting a look toward where Nick sat stiffly on the couch on the other side of the room, he wondered if he should offer the poor bastard a drink. Given the fact that the miserable shmuck would need every single one of his brain cells to navigate a reconciliation with his lover this afternoon, Devil decided to keep the offer of booze to himself. It was a pity; Nick looked like he was waiting for his execution. The moment he’d arrived, Armando had fled for the kitchen with Molly, refusing to offer so much as a hello to the man he loved. By the look on Nick’s face, that behavior had stung. There was good news, though. Molly had managed to persuade Armando to stay for lunch and at least listen to what Nick and his parents had to say. He still wasn’t sure what his lovely wife had used to coerce his executive assistant into staying put, but whatever it was would be a small price to pay if it meant that ultimately they’d have Nick and Mannie reunified into the happy couple they had once been.