Noah (The Mitchell/Healy Family #1)(9)
Author: Jennifer Foor

I pulled away and smiled. “You made it hard at times, Mom.”

“I had no idea. This was a complete surprise.” We both looked around the room at how many of their friends and family had shown up to celebrate their big milestone. “It still feels like I just met your father. I can’t believe it’s been twenty years.” She looked directly at me. “It’s still hard to accept that you’re a grown man. I still remember when you were that little boy with his father’s eyes.”

“I was just thinkin’ about that, and about the impact that you’ve had on my life.” For some reason just standing there with my mother reminiscing was getting to me. “I’m real glad I’ve got you in my life, Mom. Thanks for puttin’ up with Dad for so long.”

We both laughed.

“He’s not hard to deal with.” I looked over at her wondering why she’d take up for him. Then I noticed her winking and giggle. “Okay, maybe he has his moments. He’s still a good man, though. I wouldn’t trade a single day with him, or with you for that matter. We are so blessed. I know you don’t always see eye to eye, but your dad loves you, Noah. He loves all of you kids.”

I looked over at my father, who was laughing about something with my two uncles, Ty and Conner. He’d always lightened up when they were together it seemed. It also could have been that he just wasn’t on my back about things while they were around.

I turned to give my attention to my mother, who was watching my aunt Miranda approach. She wrapped her arms around me and I leaned down to let her kiss me on the cheek. “I thought boys were supposed to stop growin’ once they reached eighteen.”

Her comment was overused, but I still managed to smile and act like it was some kind of compliment, for my mother’s sake. “It must be from all Mom’s cookin’.”

I caught her smile and winked back at my mother. “If you ladies will excuse me, I need to go talk to Bells.”

I found my cousin sitting on the couch looking down at her phone. She was texting that ass**le again, I just knew it. “We’re supposed to be havin’ a good time.”

She looked over at me. “If I’m really goin’ to consider movin’ in here, I need to tell him. He deserves to know that I’m done with him.”

I sat down next to her and looked around the room. My cousins were standing in their regular clicks. Christian was by herself, while Josh, Cammie, Callie, Cassie and my sister Addy were all together. Jake and Jax were approaching my sister and I noticed that they were doing it so she wouldn’t notice them coming. Before I could realize what was about to happen, I watched a cupcake full of icing smashing into my sister’s face. I stood up immediately. “Those little f**kers.”

Bells followed behind me as I started hustling toward them. “Noah, hold up. They’re just playin’ around.”

Jake wasn’t as close as his brother Jax. I was able to grab him by the shirt and pulled him back towards me. “You think you’re funny?”

Out of the corner of my eye I saw a white haired lady coming at me. She grabbed my hand and removed it from my younger cousin. “I’ll take care of them, Noah. You go back over there and sit down.”

“Gram, they need to apologize to Christian.” When I pointed to my sister I noticed she was steady wiping the icing off of her face.

Red and blue icing had already smeared all over her light yellow dress. “It’s ruined. They ruined my favorite dress. Assholes!” The look on her face let me know that she wasn’t going to be satisfied with any kind of punishment our sweet grandmother could make. They needed to learn a lesson and I was going to teach it to them.

I looked right at my sister. “You want me to take care of them, sis?”

She wiped her dress with a napkin, making the stain worse. “Kick their ass, Noah. Brake their damn legs if you want. I hate them so much.”

I kissed my sister on the top of her head. “I got this.”

I grabbed Bells and pulled her out on the front porch of my grandmother’s house. “What now?”

“Your little prick brothers are about to get their asses beat.”

“Seriously, Noah, that ain’t goin’ to stop them. You can’t have a repeat of last time. You promised me.” She may have been right, but I wasn’t about to deal with her arguing with me. I was sick of them bullying my sister. Of all the people in our family, she was the least to deserve their antics.

“They need to learn a lesson. You’re either goin’ to help me, or keep quiet about it. Before you decide you need to know that I can’t promise this will be easy for you to watch.”

She put her hands on her hips and raised an eyebrow. “Noah, you can’t just stand there and tell me you’re goin’ to hurt my brothers and expect me to be cool with it. They may be little dickheads, but I’m their sister. We’re supposed to be settin’ a good example.”

“So you’re in?” I taunted her. “Come on, Bells. I need ya.”

A smile formed in the corner of her lips on one side. “Fine. What do you want me to do?”

I chuckled as I explained the plan to her while we drove a golf cart to my place. I needed something from the kitchen drawer and I didn’t want to have to hunt for it at my grandmother’s house.

Bells reconsidered being a part of my plan several times. Finally I had to stop to calm her down. “Jesus, Bells. You were a lot more fun when we were kids. Stop actin’ like a mom. It ain’t like we’re hurtin’ anybody.”

“I know. I still have a bad feelin’ about it, though.”

I look at her the same way I always did. She knew me too well to be able to bullshit her. “Would you chill out? It’s fine.”

Armed with what we needed, we pulled back up at my grandmother’s house and went inside to find everyone lined up for dessert. Very carefully, while Bells went over and distracted them, I pulled out the super-glue and spread it across two forks. I grabbed two more and held them in one hand, while holding the spokes of the other two. One at time I handed them to the boys, who’d forgotten to grab one.

My aunt stood up and started giving a speech to my parents. The best part about it was that everyone stood still while she spoke, giving the glue ample time to dry.

It took a couple seconds after that for them to sit down and notice that the forks had adhered to the skin on their hands. One before the other, they began to yell about their dilemma. I leaned down in between them, catching their attention temporarily. “That’s what you get for f**kin’ with my sister, you little shits.”