The Job (Auctioned) by Cara Dee (highly illogical behavior txt) 📕

He was right. I didn’t know what I’d been thinking. “Good call.” We didn’t want cops around asking questions, which they would once Lange’s estate had been robbed.

“I know. I’ve always told you, Case. You’re the beauty, I’m the brains.”

I barked out a laugh and opened my beer. “I’m the beauty and the brains. You’re just the brawn.”

He punched me in the arm, harder than he probably intended, and I hissed and rubbed the sore spot.

“Fuck you, I was trying to have a moment with you,” he chuckled.

I took a swig of my beer, then smiled back at him. He was comfortable now, that was easy to see, all lounged back in his seat, one arm along the top of the couch, eyes a little glazed over.

I missed him.

How could I not? We’d always been there for each other. I’d been two or three when Mom adopted me. She and my biological mother had been childhood friends, having met in Sunday school or something else related to church back in the day. Aunt Mary had been there too, though she’d chosen another path. She’d met her soldier, Uncle James, and my mothers had left their little Irish Catholic bubble on the East Coast and decided to try their luck in Vegas.

They’d drifted apart when my biological mother went from being an average weekend warrior to getting into heavier drugs that she couldn’t handle. Around the same time, Mom had given birth to Boone, and she couldn’t cope with being a single mom, full-time worker, and making sure my biological mother didn’t end up in a ditch somewhere.

She never did end up in a ditch. Instead, she dropped me off with Mom and Boone one day for a sleepover—I was about two, Boone had just turned three—and I was never gonna see the woman who’d given birth to me again. She overdosed that night. I obviously had no recollection of it, but throughout my childhood, Boone told me, “You’re my brother now. I got you.”

Toward the end of my twenties, we went through something similar again, and we were the ones who’d ended up with a toddler.

“Sometimes it feels like we’ve lived a thousand lifetimes together,” I heard myself murmur.

Way too unfiltered. I hadn’t meant to say that out loud. I cleared my throat and went for my beer again.

Fuck.

“Yeah,” he responded quietly. “I just… I guess I didn’t expect to wake up after my own funeral.”

I swallowed and kept my gaze fixed straight ahead.

I supposed that was where we were now. Post-funeral. Two guys, two living dead, carefully testing the waters of a brotherhood that hadn’t been resurrected.

“Fuck.” I scrubbed a hand over my face. “I forgot how nostalgic weed makes me.” It was just one of those things that’d gotten stuck. When we took on a new gig, we sat down and talked, smoked a joint, and made plans. “You wanna go get somethin’ to eat?”

“Sure.”

Four

“Time for bed, Aisley Paisley.” I dove for her on our bed and peppered her face with kisses. “You’re going to Gramma tomorrow.”

“Yay!” she squealed.

It’d been a rough day. As if losing her mother hadn’t dealt her the shittiest hand already, we’d said goodbye to her maternal grandfather today. Thankfully, our mother knew how to brighten Paisley’s spirit with board games and too much sugar. She was good at explaining to a three-year-old about death, too.

“Are you ready to say goodnight?” I asked.

She yawned and crawled over to Case’s side of the bed where we’d placed a photo of Tia. Paisley kissed two fingers and brushed them against the picture, like we’d shown her, then crawled back to me.

“Pop-Pop’s gonna sleep in heaven now?” she wondered. “Next to Nana?”

I nodded and pulled up the covers to her chin. “That’s right. You can still see each other in your dreams.”

“Hmm. Okay.” She cuddled up next to me, and I took my cue and ran my fingers through her hair. “I don’t remember Nana.”

No, she’d died before Paisley was born. “Pop-Pop will introduce you,” I murmured.

I caught Case standing in the doorway with a faint smile on his face.

Something settled within me, something I hadn’t even known was shaky.

“Can you two sit still back there?” Boone asked exasperatedly. “The whole fuckin’ van’s shakin’.”

Ace and I froze mid-dance move and shared a “Shit, we’ve been caught” look.

In our defense, stakeouts were boring.

“One more time, but we’ll be still.” Ace was ready to bargain.

“Can I be Barbie girl now?” I asked.

Boone snorted.

Ace hesitated. “I’mma be frank, Daddy. I don’t think you can pull it off.”

What the fuck?

“Sometimes you’re not nice.” I stole her soda bottle, which made for a much better microphone than the Slim Jim I’d been forced to use. “Boone, push play again.”

“Hold on. I think AJ’s down for the night. Lights just went out.”

Finally. We’d only been camped out down here on the street for two hours already. But at least we’d filled our bellies with pizza, and we were pretty comfortable in the back of the van. Plus, we had a cute dog wagging her tail whenever Ace and I goofed off.

It was probably a good thing we got this shit started soon. An unmarked van could only sit parked on a street lined with two-million-dollar homes for so long before someone became suspicious.

While Boone gave Ace her instructions again, I sang Aqua’s “Barbie Girl” under my breath and moved to the beat in my head as I put the leash on the dog. When Ace had asked Mom’s neighbor if she could watch their dog for a night, I bet they hadn’t thought their shaggy little pup would be part of a master scheme. Ace had sounded so sincere too, claiming she wanted to use the dog to convince her daddies to get her one. And the elderly couple who lived in the house next to Ma’s hadn’t been able to resist her. They adored our girl, and who could blame them.

Speaking of neighbors…