corner of the tarp back and lifted a one-gallon pot with a beautiful stand of catnip. My cat yowled inside me.
“I thought I could plant it near the back of the little planting area behind your pool.”
He was absolutely right about it being the perfect place for it, but since when does he get to buy plants for my yard?
“You’re annoyed. I’m sorry. I thought you’d like it.”
Fuck, I didn’t mean to make him feel bad.
I rolled my eyes at him. “It’s kinda like weed for cats. She gets goofy.”
He grinned, and I lost my irritation. “You’re right. It’s the perfect place for it. We can plant it now, but they die back in the winter and come back in the spring. I’m not sure it’ll have time to get established if we plant it now.”
“You can supervise while I dig.”
“Gil says lunch went well. The kids are in the house doing homework. Spaghetti bake with chicken is in the oven. They’re going to find this hilarious.”
He kissed me on the forehead, then the tip of my nose, and then he tilted me back. His lips landed on mine, and I’m sure I forgot to breathe for a while. When he stood me back up, the world tilted, and I held on until I found my equilibrium again. Cats always know which direction is up, but I was no match for my owl.
I ignored the fact I’d called him my owl and said “Fuck, I can’t smell horny when I go back inside.”
He leaned into the truck, grabbed another gallon container of catnip, and waved it in front of my face. I smelled more under the tarp, too.
“Damn. How much did you buy?” No wonder I’d smelled it from so far away.
“It was on sale. I bought all they had. Nine containers. I wanted enough so your kitty can roll around in it.”
I glared at him a few seconds and then rolled my eyes. Again. “You know the gate code. Take it around back and then come inside. I need to turn plain bread into buttery garlic bread.”
I had no idea what I could buy for his owl. The first thing that came to mind was those candy-filled suckers. How many licks does it take to get to the center?
But that would be a joke. I wasn’t aware of anything in particular that owls liked.
Dinner went better than I expected. Frost is really good with kids.
But then Nora went through the whole, “Kalie says that her dad says that you’re, like, a major bada… ummm, that you can fight. Will you teach me how to fight?”
“I don’t teach anyone to fight until I’m certain they’ll use what I’ve taught them responsibly. That means you need to show me you have self-control. Let’s see how you do in the coming months. If I teach you to hurt people, and you cause harm to someone who didn’t deserve it, I’m accountable. Not legally, in this case, but morally.”
The twins wanted him to teach them as well, of course.
“It’s good to be able to defend yourself, but it’s even more important to learn how to avoid fights, when possible. I have a feeling I know who Kalie’s father is, and if I’m right, he and I were in a place where avoiding fights isn’t an option, in most cases.”
“He met you in jail.”
He nodded. “I’ve only been in one little scuffle since I was out of jail. Not even a full-on fight.”
With their dad, but they didn’t need to know that.
“But you had to fight a lot in jail?”
He shrugged and glanced at me, clearly wanting me to change the conversation.
“I think he had to fight a few times when he first got there to show people they should be afraid of him. After that, sometimes new people needed to fight him because they were bigger than him and thought they could take him. So, he had to fight them to show them. I don’t think he fought as much in jail as you’re probably thinking.”
“Exactly right. It was a strategy. Speaking of which, I’d love to play chess with ya’ll.”
None of them had ever played chess, and the look he gave me when he found out told me he clearly thought Gil and I were lacking as parents.
And since I don’t own a chess board (horror of horrors), he was forced to explain the rules and then play the first game with them on one of the gaming consoles.