Heartless People

THREE

Theres nothing that makes you more insane than family. Or more happy. Or more exasperated. Or moresecure.

~ Jim Butcher

VERONICA.

"You did what?"

She turned back to me as she casually said, "Camila asked me to poison Lauren's mouthwash before you all came home. What did she do?"

My mouth dropped open and for some reason, my mind could not process this. "Wait. You help Camila poison my sister and ask what she did wrong?"

"You and I both know Camila loves Lauren more than she loves anything in this world. Shes torturing her a little bit because again she must have fucked
up. So what did she do?" She came over to me and pushed me onto the edge of the bed as she pulled off my tie. I held onto her waist.

She was right. "But still. Shes never been the poisoning type. I expected her to take a bat to his ribs or something."

"Yes, because thats more civil." She giggled as she unbuttoned my shirt. I loved it when she giggled; her nosed bunched up and her brown eyes sparkled.

Pulling her closer to me, I rolled us both over onto the bed.

"I missed you tonight. Everyone had their wives beside them and meanwhile, I was surrounded by bitch ass cops and Ethan, who is so much like Lauren, its kind of scary," I said and she reached up to brush my hair.

"Someone has to hold the fort down. And besides, you survived, it didn't you?"

I rolled my eyes. "You're supposed to say you missed me too, Lucy."

"Am I? Honestly, I was so busy with everyone I—"

Grabbing her wrist, I rolled on top of her and pinned her hands down. Her dark brown hair fell in waves cropped at her shoulders. Gravity pushed her breasts up higher, and I kissed the top of them both.

"Veronica—"

"Say you missed me," I said above her.

"Make me, baby."

"Gladly—" We both paused when we heard the baby monitor go off. Damn it.

Sighing, I got off of her, helped her up and she kissed my lips softly. "I'll be right back."

She moved around me and towards Juliens's nursery. He was only two years old and yet he was an expert at cock-blocking me. Taking out the cotton pajama bottoms she'd brought me, I changed and put my phone and wallet on the nightstand before following her into the nursery. Julien was wide-awake. The grin on his face and the way his hazel greens were staring at his mother were contagious. Moving to them, I reached out for him and he stared at me before trying to grab my nose, as he always did.

I kissed his light brown fingertips, "You and I are going to have to work on your timing. I  was about to—Ahh." Lucy punched my side. "He can't understand me."

"You don't know that." She crossed her arms. "For all we know, Ethan is so much like Lauren because you all kept talking about your work in front of him as a baby.

"He's like Lauren because he's like Lauren. He could have been born deaf and still been the same way. He went on the job with Lauren today

"He what? Does Camila know?"

"She does now."

"That explains the poison," she muttered, running her hands through Julien's thick curly hair. When he was first born, his hair looked almost blonde, even his skin was very light, but with each passing day, he got just a little more color to him. He was just as gorgeous as his mother and had her smile, too. Helen, our daughter, even though she was adopted, took after me. She was always breaking things and tearing them apart just to see how they worked.