“She’ll be here with me and when she’s good to go back home, I’ll be there with her.”
“Brother, you got work,” Twyla reminded him.
Which reminded him of something else, he not only had to call Decker to activate him to find this Bianca bitch, he also needed to call Max.
“And that work’s at her place so I’ll do that work once the cops free up Jussy’s house, doin’ it with Jussy there,” Deke replied.
“Okay then, now we’ll look at the food situation and then we’ll go shopping. We’ll come back in a few hours to clean,” Laurie decided.
“He needs a coffeemaker,” Jussy put in. “If anyone has an extra or if one of you could go back to my house and get mine out of the utility room, it’d be appreciated.”
“I got a kettle,” Deke said to her. “Don’t need a coffeemaker.”
“Deke, you need a coffeemaker,” she returned.
“No I don’t.”
“Let me rephrase,” Jussy fired back. “I need a coffeemaker.”
Instantly, Deke looked to Lauren. “You got the time, bring her coffeemaker.”
And he watched Lauren’s eyes get so huge it looked like they’d pop out of her head, and she did this, he knew, because she was trying not to bust a gut laughing.
Deke ignored that.
It had not been lost on him in the last couple of hours what his response to Jussy’s attack, and more, Jussy’s response to his response, meant.
That was not for now.
They’d talk that through later.
He had his gypsy princess with a banged-up face, a fucked-up throat and a man out there who they didn’t know dick about intending her harm.
He’d lived through the shit that went down with Lauren and Tate, it being Deke who carried Laurie to his truck after she’d been kidnapped and stabbed and then he drove like a crazy motherfucker to get her to the hospital. It’d been Deke who’d taken Lexie’s back when the dirty, now-dead police chief Fuller had targeted Ty to plant shit in his house that’d get his ass back in prison. And he’d been one of the men helping dig Chace’s now-wife Faye out of the ground.
Shit for Jussy was not going to get close to being that extreme.
What happened happened.
And now for her it was over.
That was what he had to focus on.
After that, they’d sort out the rest.
“You all do the inventory and ask Jus what she likes. Make a list. Me and Deke gotta have words,” Krys bossed, shot him a glare then stomped out of his trailer.
“You better go,” Lexie urged quietly.
“Yeah, you better go,” Laurie agreed.
Deke looked to Jussy.
She was grinning at him, fucked-up face and all.
He didn’t get it, but from experience, it was always the way.
Inject the sisterhood in any situation, no matter one of their own had her house broken into, a knife held to her throat, strangled near to death, she had her girls around her, she was sitting in crazy-ass pajamas on a couch in a trailer and grinning.
He sighed and followed Krys out.
She was standing by her Camaro.
He did not speak until he reached her and when he did, he did it subdued so it could not be heard in case someone was listening.
“We are not doin’ this now and just to make it clear, we’re not only not doin’ this now, we’re not doin’ this ever.”
“When I told Chace she was comin’ to stay with us, he told me you wouldn’t care I was pregnant, you’d take me down I tried to get her from you.”
Deke said nothing.
Krystal didn’t return that favor.
“Bub says you two got somethin’, Jus’s all for it, you got your head planted right up your ass.”
Deke remained silent.
Krystal’s face softened.
Slightly.
“Brother, she just got attacked. Gonna be a tough row to hoe feelin’ safe after that. Takin’ on that row, she does not need to deal with the kinda hurt you can lay on her she feels one way, but you’re puttin’ in this effort just ’cause you two are friends.”
To that, Deke spoke.
“Not gonna lay any hurt on her.”
“Think you won’t. It happens no matter how cool you’re trying to be.”
“Not gonna lay any hurt on her,” Deke repeated.
She got closer. “I know you’re a good guy, Deke, but I’m not thinkin’ you’re getting me.”
“No,” he grunted. “You’re not getting me. I. Am. Not. Gonna lay any hurt on her.”
Krystal stared up at him and she was wide-eyed now.
“Go in, find out what she needs, round up your posse,” he ordered. “Got some calls to make and I’ll be back in. You guys hang until I’m back. Don’t want her alone.”
“Okay, Deke,” Krys agreed readily.
Krystal Briggs agreeable.
Deke blew out another sigh.
She gave him a shit-eating grin, kept on giving it and didn’t move.
“I got calls to make,” he reminded her.
“Right,” she said, still grinning and doing it as she moved around him and headed back to the trailer.
Deke leaned against her car, eyes to the road leading up to his property, pulling out his phone.
Chace first, see if it was good Joe Callahan started the work tomorrow that he should have done three weeks ago and see if someone could have access to the house to board up the window.