Tangled Up In You (A Savioe Family Novel) by Ginny Atkinson Page A

bag.
    “I hope you can come by again. Like I said earlier it was so nice having another female in the house.” She gave me a hug and squeezed my shoulders. “Have a safe trip home, Honey.”
                                                            *****
    Luke
    My knuckles ached in pain. I really should have listened to Marie and put the gloves on. If Charles would have just kept his mouth shut at the table, I would not be hurting right now. Compare me to a child, what the fuck. So what if after the talk with dad I went up to my room to chill out for a bit. I wasn’t pouting that’s for sure.
    Charles lay on the padded flooring breathing hard. I walked back to my corner and glanced over to where Roxy sat only to see the twins instead of her. With a frown, I jumped out of the ring and jogged into the house. “Momma, where’d Roxy go?”
    She walked in the living room motioning me to come to the kitchen. “I expected you boys to be at it a little longer. Now sit.” I sat on the stool at the center island. She grabbed my hands and inspected the damaged I did fighting bare-knuckle. “You should have worn those gloves. Your little friend went home when you two started fighting. I think the sights and sounds of the fight upset her.” She dabbed a cotton bal l soaked in alcohol on my hand.
    I hissed at the pain. That burned like the devil. I wonder if I could catch up to Roxy. “How long ago was that?” I asked her.
    “Five maybe ten minutes tops. You can wait to talk to her when she gets home though.” She wrapped my left hand in a bandage. “Done. Don’t think about going after her. Your daddy still has your keys.”
    I nodded and got up from the counter. My phone was still in the foyer on the table. I picked it up and turned it back on. Phone in hand I went back up to my room and locked the door. Damn, I had six voicemails, eighteen missed calls and over thirty-eight new text messages. All of them were from Christie.
    Christie: How dare you hang up on me!
    Christie: Where are you really going?
    Christie: I don’t believe that family crap for one minute.
    Christie: Luke? Please text me back or call.
    Christie: Are you there?
    Christie: Baby?
    Christie: Hello?
    Christie: Baby, come on talk to me. I’m getting worried.
    Christie: Fine be that way! If you are just going to ignore me then I’ll find someone else.
    If only I could be that lucky. I stopped scrolling and deleted the rest of them. Come on man you can do this. I pulled up Roxy’s number and called.
    “Talk to me.” She answered.
    I closed my eyes and unloaded. “Hey Roxy. It’s Luke. I just wanted to apologize for acting like a bit of an ass today. I don’t know what the hell my problem was I just ask that you don’t hold it against me.”
    Her radio played in the background. I heard her take a deep breath and sigh. “Why are you apologizing? You had a bad day. That happens. I actually had fun hanging out with all of you today. Oh and your mom is now my god. I have decided to worship her culinary prowess. A shrine will be erected in her honor when I get home.”
    “Ha-ha. I’ll tell her that. If you had fun then why did you leave so early?” I asked stretching out on my bed.
    “It’s going to be getting dark soon and my parents don’t like me driving in the dark . See, the deer population around here when the sun sets look at my car and conspire to jump in front of me. ” She explained.
    I looked out the window and saw that the red haze of the sunset. “Yeah, please be careful. Don’t need you wrecking your car because of a few suicidal deer.”
    She sighed. I could almost see her rolling her eyes at me. “Yes dad. I’ll be careful.”
    “So did you get what you needed from Beau?” I asked trying to keep the hostility out of my voice.
    “Yeah, I took a bunch of pictures of his face so I could take my time capturing his eyes. I was just going to sketch them but he cannot sit still