Players to Lovers (4 Book Collection) by Ketley Allison

Author:Ketley Allison [Allison, Ketley]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Ketley Allison LLC
Published: 2019-10-01T04:00:00+00:00

* * *

Apple juice.

“Finish your sippy cup, love,” Mom says as she rounds my chair. “Your last snack before bedtime.”

“But I don’t wanna.”

“Well, ya hafta.” She lays a wet kiss on my cheek, squeezing my shoulders until it tickles and she gets a giggle out of me.

“Then I get a story,” I say through my laughter.

“Of course. One story.”

“Two.”

“No bargaining tonight, son,” my dad cuts in. He shuts off the TV in the den and comes over. “Daddy’s got an important meeting tonight. No kids allowed.”

“But I’m a great kid,” I say.

“That you are.” He tousles my hair as he passes, goes to the fridge, and bends to find a beer. His muffled voice continues, “But it’s boring big boy talk. Actually…”

Dad straightens and shuts the fridge, brown bottle in hand.

“Rose, that might be just the thing to get him to sleep. Have him stay up and listen to all the crap these guys have to say. Ry’ll be asleep in seconds.”

“Don’t say crap,” Mom admonishes him.

“CRAP!” I scream.

I get a gentle thwack across the side of the head for that one.

“He’s having enough nightmares already,” Mom says above my head, as if I can’t hear. “Having strange men come around and sit in this living room, talking about things he can’t understand … Lord knows what kind of night terrors that’ll bring him.”

Dad shrugs. “It was a thought. But read the same story to him five times over instead, then.”

Mom chuckles, pushes Dad playfully when he walks by, then pecks his cheek.

“Come on, honey,” she says to me. “Time for bed.”

“But noooooo.”

“But yes.”

“I wanna meet Daddy’s friends.”

“Another time.”

Mom lifts me, and I curl my limbs around her soft body, always warm, always fragrant from soap. I cling to her neck as she hums a tune down the short hallway and drops me off in bed.

My favorite story, Green Eggs and Ham, is ready on my nightstand, next to my emergency nighttime sippy cup of more apple juice, in case I wake up and need comfort, instead of running to Mom.

Mom reads to me, and I chatter along with the parts I know, pointing and laughing. In the middle of round three of the book (because I always win), my eyelids go heavy.

Last thing I remember is Mom’s lips pressing against my cheek, and she rubs the spot with her fingers when the scent of her drifts away. “Night night, Ry-Ry…”

Peace. Until…

STOMP.

BANG.

Breaking glass.

My eyes snap open in the dim light, my Slimer from Ghostbusters nightlight lending small clarity. I blink, rising on my elbows, the sounds of my parents’ voices hitting my ears.

“Please! We didn’t—” CRACK.

“Oh! Oh, God, Tim, no! What did you do to him? What—?”

“Shut up,” an unfamiliar, male voice says. “Just shut the fuck up.”

“Let’s do her,” someone else says.

“In a minute. We need to talk to this guy first, and something tells me knocking his woman around, maybe fucking her in front of him, will get him to talk.”

“Please! Leave her alone. Let her go, I’ll tell you everything—”

I creep out of bed, toward the door and the shaft of light underneath.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.