Her eyes lit, she rolled up on her toes and slid her hand from beard to the back of his head to pull him down to her.

They kissed again.

After they were done, she murmured, “I need to start dinner.”

“Jussy, we had a late lunch,” he replied. “And it’s not even four o’clock.”

“I still need to start dinner,” she returned.

Her repetition of that was suddenly intriguing.

So he tilted his head. “What’s for dinner?”

That’s when her face lit.

“Prime rib sandwiches.”

Deke burst out laughing, doing it turning her, curling an arm around her shoulders, and he put her in a neck hold that was a lot like Rod’s and still totally different.

Then he walked his gypsy back to her brother, the warmth of her house…

And her preparations for prime rib sandwiches.

Chapter Twenty-Three

“Come to Me”

Justice

“Gordon wants me to go on the road with him. Be his assistant. But I got the offer of that gig from The Wash. They want me regular. The money’s better at The Wash, Jussy, permanent gig so it’s stable. But Gordo says that, even if it’s tough on the road, the money isn’t all that great, I’ll be meeting a lot of people, something I won’t do with a gig at a club. Need the money. But need the connections too. Fuck, I don’t know what to do.”

I was standing in the kitchen, listening to my brother talk in my ear, but I was watching Deke go to the door because someone just knocked on it.

And I was ecstatic Mav was asking me for advice.

It was now mid-December. Joss and Rod were descending a couple of days before Christmas to spend the holiday with us, all the way through to the New Year. Lacey had a long break from her tour and was spending Christmas with her folks, but coming out to my place for New Year’s.

Therefore, Deke and I were going to throw a big New Year’s party.

I couldn’t wait.

I’d offered Mav the invitation to come too, but he didn’t have the money to spare and I was vacillating on giving it to him.

He was getting his shit together, even though, suffice it to say, things did not go well (understatement) when he got home, told his mom about his trip, told her he was pulling the suit, no longer paying an attorney who only took the case to fleece them.

She’d lost her mind, unsurprisingly. She’d laid into Mav and then she’d laid into me and Joss.

I’d had a feeling that would be the end. He’d buy her bullshit and I’d lose him. Lose him in a way I wouldn’t get him back because Deke would not put up with him yanking my chain time and again. And I wouldn’t want to make Deke put up with my brother yanking my chain time and again.

Not to mention, it didn’t feel all that great when he yanked my chain.

Mav pulled a few shitty maneuvers after that. But through them he nearly lost a gig Gordon got him, and he’d shot a wad flying out to be with me, a wad he did not have.

In the end, he realized he needed to eat. He had a lifestyle he was accustomed to as well, one Dad, when he was alive, gave to him regardless of the fact he knew in doing it, he was also giving it to Luna. Mav had blown his chance to continue to live that way and definitely couldn’t be the conduit to give his mother the same.

So he sorted his shit out, saved the gig, and made peace with me.

He currently was not speaking to his mother because she wasn’t speaking to him.

She did speak to the press, airing all this shit bitchily, making another play.

This backfired very badly.

The fortunate part of that was, while that brief maelstrom hit us, including smacking Maverick in the face, my brother saw deeper into his mother’s black soul. The other fortunate part of this was that there was no way for Luna to spin it, no matter how hard she tried, to make her look like anything but the greedy, grasping bitch she was.

She’d been torn apart by the media.

Lacey had gleefully sent me YouTube tidbits of gossip shows ripping her to shreds.

Joss had done the same.

The unfortunate part was, we were all dragged along for the ride, even if it wasn’t big news, lasted what seemed like a flash and nobody’s reps took a hit that shouldn’t have (Mr. T saw to that, letting it slip to the press how “Justice Lonesome and her team” attempted to save her brother’s inheritance, this confirmed by a short interview Mr. T made Maverick give).

Being dragged along for that ride didn’t make Deke happy.

But as fast as that storm stirred up, it died away when Luna shut her mouth, tucked her tail between her legs and went dark.

So things were all around good.

Deke was working. I was in my music room a lot, fiddling with a variety of songs, all of them not songs I was going to sell.

All of them songs I was considering recording.

Deke knew this and he listened a lot to things I was doing.

He liked it all but then again he would. He was my guy and I hadn’t come up against there being anything he didn’t like about me.

We talked about it, not a lot but more than a little, and Deke listened. Through all this, he made it clear he was with me whatever way I went, back in the biz or just Jussy on the back of his bike.

Yep, he’d take me either way. He’d be beside me either way. He’d champion me either way.

That was Deke.

More good in my life, I had Dad and Granddad’s collection on display. I had their things on the walls and shelves. Dana and Joss had sent all my belongings to me.