Emma Chase

When you mean what you say and say exactly what you mean, there’s rarely a need to raise your voice. Yelling is a sign of desperation, an indication that you’re out of options, with nothing behind your back but volume.

Noblecky laughs. “Someone actually let you watch their kid?” He glances at the boy. “My condolences.”

Because the rumble of feet, like a stampede of rhinos, booms over our heads, cutting me off. Chelsea and I eye the ceiling—like it’s about to fall down on us—as the sound travels, getting closer.

And there’s screaming. The atom-splitting, banshees-from-hell kind of screaming.

“I’m gonna kill you!”

“I didn’t do it!”

“Get back here!”

“It wasn’t me!”

Even the two-year-old looks concerned.

“I couldn’t help myself!” she pleads.

And I unconsciously nod. That’s it, kid—go with insanity. It’s all you’ve got left.

“The lipstick was in there, calling to me . . .”

Voices. Voices are good. Always an easy sell.

I can’t keep the horror out of my tone. “There’s two of him?”

Chelsea grins. “If that’s your way of asking if Rory has a twin, then the answer is yes.”

I don’t know if it’s because I have a hard-on for his aunt or because he reminds me so much of myself, but if anyone wants a piece of that kid they’ll have to come through me first.

“I should go before they start eating each other.”

“That might not be a bad thing. There are enough of them to spare.”

I chuckle, thinking of a Liam Neeson movie. If some idiot criminal tried taking one of the McQuaid kids, it’d be an hour, tops, before he’d be begging to send them back.

Raymond adjusts his glasses and jumps into the conversation. “Are you guys talking about the best way to off somebody?”

Four and a half hours of screaming girls later, I can’t hear jack shit.