Second Hand: A Tucker Springs Novel 2

couldn’t do that. Not yet.
I didn’t know what that said about me, and I didn’t want to look too hard. At anything right now, actually.
I went back to my bedroom, tucked the ring far into the back of my bedside drawer where no one would see it, and then I went to work, determined to lose myself in my new training until it was time to get my mother from the airport.

chapter 25
    E
    l would have skipped laundry night, but canceling without a real excuse would have raised more suspicion than showing up and letting Denver ask questions. He tried his only hope for an out, though, calling Rosa to see if she needed any more help getting ready for the party.
    She didn’t, because Noah had been over when El had been playing lovey-dovey with Paul, and he hadn’t just finished the cleaning, he’d appeared with a brand-new patio set. Complete with umbrella. In Rosa’s favorite color.
    And yet Rosa still talked about going out shopping for a new guy.
“Whoa,” Denver said when El came through the door of the laundry, oblivious, perpetually happy MoJo in tow. “Trouble in paradise?”
“Stuff it,” El snapped, tossing the end of the leash at him. “Watch her, will you? I’m going to go smoke.”
“Hey.” Frowning, almost glaring, Denver scooped up MoJo and scratched behind her ears. “What the fuck’s gotten into you?”
“Nothing.” El bit the word so hard it bled. “Nothing’s gotten into me. Can you watch the fucking dog or not?”
Denver lifted MoJo, his big hands making such a cradle for the little dog she probably thought she was on some kind of shelf. “Daddy’s got something sideways up his ass, pumpkin. You want to tell Uncle Denver what it is?”
El stormed out the door, went around the corner to the dark of the alley, and smoked until his lungs were practically butter.
His clothes were sorted and loaded into the machines when he came back, and Denver held MoJo’s attention rapt with a scrap of lunchmeat he dangled just out of her reach above her head.
“I’m trying to teach her to jump,” he explained when El sat down next to him.
El watched his dog stare in confusion at the meat. “She’s not going to jump. She’s going to sit there waiting for you to give her the turkey.”
“I disagree.” Denver made clicking sounds and bounced the turkey up and down a few times, MoJo tracking the movement as if it were the most important thing in her life. “She’ll figure it out eventually.”
Somehow the whole world seemed wrapped up in MoJo figuring out she should leap up off her hind legs and snatch that lunchmeat. El didn’t coo to her like Denver did, but he sat on the edge of his seat, gripping the plastic, teeth set. Go get it. You know you want it. It’s right there. Jump up and take it.
“Come on, girl.” Denver lowered the meat long enough for it to brush her nose, pulling it away as she tried to snap. “Come on. I won’t even hold it that high. Stand on your hind legs, honey. You can do it.”
Do it, damn it. You know you want it. Fucking take it!
MoJo continued to sit there, waiting patiently for Denver to move the turkey close enough for her to take it without leaping.
After ten excruciating minutes, El leapt to his feet like someone had put him on a spring. “I’m going to smoke.”
“I’ll have them get the iron lung ready for you when you get back,” Denver replied. “Come on, girl.”
Biting back an expletive, El headed for the door.
He didn’t need anybody, he told himself as his shaking hands fumbled with the lighter, as he coughed up some disturbing phlegm and his mouth ached in dryness. It didn’t matter what the fuck Paul did with his goddamned ring or if they were over before they’d even started. It didn’t matter, because he’d always known it would end like this, and it was just as well it happened now rather than later.
“I don’t need anybody, dammit,” he murmured out loud, then swore and tossed his lighter and then his last three cigarettes against the wall before shutting his eyes and resting his head against the bricks.

chapter 26
    I
    t should have been good, having my mom around to distract me while I tried to sort out why El had gotten so upset, why I still had no intention of taking that ring out of my bedside drawer, why part of me was devastated by his silence and part of me was relieved.
    Having her around should have helped, but it didn’t. She had my entire house cleaned by the time I came home from work the first day she was there by