Page 23 of Out Of A Fix

“Thanks,” I said, grinning at him.

“What do you mean, crawling up his ass?” Griff was smiling tentatively.

“Oh, buddy, Chief Wilson is totally screwed.”

“He’s hit some of my friends before too.”

“Did you tell your father?”

He made a face.

“Since Mom left,” Tatum began, “he’s been so busy.”

Griff looked at her, and I noted his mouth was hanging open. Tatum pointed at me, and when his eyes were back on me, I smiled.

“Listen, we’re gonna normalize talkin’ about your mother, all right?”

“We are?”

“We are.”

“How are—what does—what does that mean?”

“That means I want to hear everything about her.”

“Nash knows all about WITSEC, so he can answer all your questions too,” Tatum informed him. “It’s awesome.”

“Really?” He sounded so hopeful.

“Of course,” I promised. Normally, I would have checked with the parents or parent first, but Luke Duchesne was not around, and his kids were falling apart. “And also, what the hell is with that front room? Do you guys ever go in there?”

Three sets of eyes locked on me.

“Has your father said anything about it?”

No one said a word.

“I need to know,” I insisted.

Griff cleared his throat. “When she left, Dad said we could change anything we wanted, but he would prefer if pictures of Mom stayed in our rooms.”

“Make sure I got this straight,” I advised them all. “So your father said, and I’m paraphrasing here, that if you want, you can move things around, but please keep photos of your mother out of his sight line.”

Tatum squinted at me. “Sight line?”

“It means he doesn’t wanna see her.”

“Oh, yes,” she agreed.

“Then I don’t get it. He said you guys could make the house how you wanted, but you’ve left it all the same?”

Tatum lifted sad eyes to me. “What if she comes back and doesn’t like what we did?”

I smiled at her. “I think your mother would approve of any changes you all made together, but…love, she’s not coming back.”

“I know,” she said, then wrapped her arms around my waist. I hugged her tight, squeezing a breath out of her, making her sigh.

“Okay, since you have your father’s permission, my vote is that you should mix it up a bit. I think some of the living-room stuff should go into your rooms, and some of your things should come out, and the crap nobody wants like, say, the useless bud vases, those can maybe get sold at a yard sale.”