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CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

MASON

Mom laser focuses on Myles when we enter her house. “What happened to your face?” she asks, hands firmly planted on her hips and a scowl spread from one cheek to the other.

“I had an accident,” Myles lies. “I’m alright, Ma. Don’t look so put out.”

With spatula in hand, she asks, “Whose ass do I need to beat for marking up my baby?”

I roll my eyes at her theatrics because none of us have been babies in quite a few years. “Ma, they’ve been dealt with,” I state. While it wasn’t said by Hydro or Gunner, I presume Myles’ rescue and the subsequent trash day we had comes under the heading of club business. “He was trying to clean a hoof and didn’t move quick enough. Getting slow in your old age, huh, Myles?”

“You can kiss my ass, Mase,” Myles seethes, hissing through the front gap of his teeth.

“Language,” Ma snaps. “I’m a lady and you’ll talk in front of me like gentlemen, not neanderthals.”

“Yes, Ma,” we simultaneously answer. Over the years, we’ve become choreographed in responses when getting in trouble by our matriarch.

“Now, if you feel right about lying to your mother, then that’s on you and you’ll have to answer for it one day,” she says, looking at us one at a time, basically calling us out on our bullshit.

But we’re master’s at deception and always stick to our words. We will never , not in a million years, admit fibbing to her. There are things I’ve held to myself that go back to when we were in preschool. She’d still tan our hide all this time later if she ever found out how much trouble we got into that we never got caught doing. Our mom can hold a mean grudge and she’d hold it over our heads if we admitted half the shit we got into.

“What brings y’all by?” Dad asks, trying to defuse the situation before Mom starts her interrogation. She gives him a displeased look but allows him to shift topics.

“Ma,” Myles says, using the tone of voice that usually lets him get away with causing havoc.

“Yes, baby?” Mom asks, her tone cooing. I turn my back so she doesn’t see me roll my eyes at her. As the baby, Myles gets treated differently than Maverick and I do. She babies him and all but spoon feeds him. He’s a spoiled little shit, maybe him coming with us is a good idea. It’ll force him to grow up and find his balls.

“Mav and I wanna go with Mason back to Texas. How mad would you be at me if I went with him?” Myles bats his eyelashes at her which has Mav snickering.

“This is what you wanna do? Are you sure, baby boy?” Now, I’m snickering behind my hand because the man is in his twenties and she talks to him like he’s two.

“Yes, Ma,” Myles replies.

“What am I? Chopped liver? Are you even gonna ask me what I want?” Maverick whines.

“Of course, Mav. But you’ve been independent all of your life, I know you can take care of yourself. If you didn’t want to do this, you wouldn’t,” Mom reasons.

“You’re right,” Mav says, puffing out his chest. “I’m not a baby and I don’t need my mom making my decisions for me. I’m a grown ass man unlike somebody.” His eyes stray to Myles who’s now the shade of a beet.

“I’m grown, asshole,” Myles argues.

“I’ve changed my mind, they can stay here with you, Ma,” I murmur.

“Shush, you,” Mom admonishes me, leering at me from beneath her eyelashes. “If your brothers want to live by you, you’ll let them.”

“Yeah,” Myles scoffs. “What she said.”

“ She has a name,” Ma harrumphs, then starts waving her pointer finger at him. “It’ll do you good to address me properly, young man.”

“Yes, ma’am. Sorry, Ma,” he apologizes.

“That’s better,” she muses. “Now, I’m relieved in a way that y’all are wanting to forge a path for yourselves because the only reason we haven’t fully retired and sold the ranch is because we were saving it for the three of you.”

“What are you saying?” I inquire, noticing how old and tired they’re looking these days.

“We were going to discuss one of you taking it over,” Dad adds. “But if this isn’t a dream for any of you, we’d like to either sell it or find a manager to run it.”

“Manny and Estefano could manage it together,” I offer as an opinion.

“One of their families could move into our mobile home and we could buy another one to put near it. That way this house is available for us to stay when we come to check on things,” Maverick states.

“I don’t want to let the ranch go, not completely,” Myles mulls over. “It’s our legacy, our inheritance, and if we have kids one day, one of them may be drawn here and want to make it their future.”

“I agree,” I acknowledge. “I trust those two as much as I do one of us. They know the ropes and even pitch in with inventory and other paperwork. They know how to keep it running and if they run into an issue, we’re only a phone call away.”

“Is that what y’all want to do?” Dad asks. “It’s a family decision, but what you three have come up with was our other alternative to selling it if none of you wanted to take it over.”

The three of us glance at each other and come to the same conclusion, but I’m the one who voices it. “That’s what we want.”

* * *

Mom and Dad are meeting with the men later today, but since they’ve given their blessing for Myles and Maverick to make this move, there’s no putting it off. My brothers want to come with us when we leave. It was a little sudden for Mom and Dad, but they understand how excited my brothers are for this next phase of their life. Outside of a few shed tears from Mom, they promised to come for a visit once they get things organized at the ranch.

Everyone pitches in, and four hours later, other than the kitchen essentials and furniture, Myles and Maverick are packed up. Mane and Ella went behind us and cleaned the rooms thoroughly so the mobile home was ready for someone to move into it.

“Are you sure you don’t want to bring any of your bedroom furniture or televisions?” Mane asks them as we load the last of the boxes in the back of the pickup trucks. I borrowed the farm's hauler and strapped my bike down to it.

“We’re sure,” Mav answers. “These things are replaceable. They’re almost as old as we are and needed to be put out of their misery years ago.”

“They’re actually in really good shape,” Mane argues.

“Maybe,” Myles says, shrugging his shoulders. “But this way, Manny won’t have to go buy anything for his kids to sleep on. Plus, they have this old box set for a television. I'd like to give them ours since they’re an update and will give their kids more options for gaming and whatnot.”

“You’re leaving your consoles, aren’t you?” I ask the two of them.

“Again, they’re replaceable,” Mav scolds me. “These kids don’t have a lot of things and Manny and Consuella work their asses off but still can’t afford certain luxuries for the boys.”

“I’m not getting onto you for it. If anything, it’s admirable and I’m happy you’re thinking of them,” I address.

“What do they need?” Mane asks. “What can we donate to the families here?”

“God, beauty,” I say, pulling her into my arms. “So much. They all have hand stitched clothes, hand me downs that have been patched so many times that the original material hardly exists. The parents refuse handouts any time we offer them so we buy yards of fabric and ask for bandanas and such but tell them to keep what’s leftover. It’s the only way they accept anything from us.”

“You buy over what you need for what you ask them to make for you, don’t you?” Mane asks, knowing damn good and well that’s exactly what we do.

“How close is the fabric store and shopping center?” Hydro inquires, and my heart triples in size because I know that our workers aren’t going to be able to say no to this man.

“The closest one is an hour away,” I divulge.

“We have time to do some shopping don’t we?” he asks, his eyes locked onto Mane and Ella.

“There’s always time for shopping,” Mane answers.

“Especially if it’s for kids,” Ella adds.

“I’ll hand you my credit card and let you do your worst,” Hydro offers. None of us men are shoppers, but we won’t let them go without a few extra sets of hands to hold the bags.

“I’ll go with you,” I tell her. “I know what the kids need.”

“We’ll go too,” Maverick states. “Myles and I have spent time with the kiddos and we know their wish list.”

“Hell, yeah!” Myles shouts. “I can’t thank you enough for doing this for them. They’re good people who have made it through some tough times. We’ve done what we can by housing them and giving them jobs, but other than that, they don’t let us do anything else.”

“It’s the least we can do,” Gunner says. “It’ll be because of them that you two can come with us.”

“We’ll tell them it’s an incentive for their sacrifice,” Mane inserts.” We’re going to look in the kitchen and see if there are any gadgets y’all don’t have that Consuela might like.” I snicker at the look of glee that crosses my woman’s face as she practically runs into the kitchen with Ella close behind, their phones open to the notes app so they can make sure they give Consuela everything she could possibly need to take care of her family.

“Good idea. Okay, let's get the show on the road,” I announce as we all gather our wallets. Since our trucks are loaded down with Myles and Maverick’s possessions, we grab the ranch’s SUVs from the barn and head toward Nashville.

* * *

Shopping was fun. We came back to the Triple M with both SUVs loaded down with toys, games, clothes, shoes, kitchen gadgets, and television sets. When we met with the workers, they tried to shoo the stuff away, but the way Hydro presented it to them had them accepting the gifts. I think the keywords of it being an incentive and promotion package had them feeling as if it wasn’t charity but well-earned for all of their years of loyalty and sacrifice.