MOTY (The Lady Kingpin Series Book 1) Read online

  Four

  Natalee stopped at the supermarket on her way to the school for the PTA meeting and grabbed a box of premade candy cookies and a case of cold coffee drinks. Once she made it to the meeting, she set up the cookies and drinks on the table with plastic cups and napkins. She patiently waited for the rest of the ladies to arrive.

  As soon as the first parent walked through the door, the hushed comments started.

  “Seriously, she brought store-bought cookies? Again?”

  “What the hell was she thinking?”

  “What’s her excuse this time?”

  Natalee attempted to act as if she didn’t hear them, but her face growing red was a dead giveaway. Dana approached Natalee, heaving. “Natalee, are you fucking kidding me?”

  Natalee took a slow, deep breath before she responded. “What is the problem, Dana?”

  “Your so-called ‘snack’ is the problem.”

  “And what exactly is wrong with it?”

  “You brought this last month.”

  “Yes, and everyone enjoyed them last month, am I wrong?”

  Dana fidgeted with the rings on her fingers. “Well no, you’re not wrong, however, last month was an exception because it was such a last-minute situation. But you had all day to prepare this time. So, what’s the deal?”

  Natalee was taken aback, slightly shocked. “The deal is, everyone liked them last month, so what’s the harm in having them again this month?”

  Another mom, Rachel, approached them, with a sneer. “We all know you have nothing to do all day, you could’ve actually made a snack like the rest of us usually do when it’s our turn.”

  “So, you know what my entire day consisted of?”

  Rachel smirked, “Well I know you don’t do yoga, you don’t do jazz aerobics, you don’t partake in the rec center at all, which I don’t understand at all because residents get an immaculate discount, and everyone knows you don’t work because your oh-so-perfect husband leaves you alone for days at a time to pay all of your bills. Do you feed him microwave meals when he comes home or do you spend his money on more elaborate things, like carryout?”

  Natalee heard a few chuckles throughout the room, and her embarrassment quickly turned to rage. She stood up to come eye-to-eye with Rachel, “You leave my husband out of this. He appreciates everything I do for him, unlike any of you bitches. What I do all day is none of your damn business. I’m not sorry for bringing cookies. I’m not sorry for bringing cold brew coffee. Shit, I’m not even sorry that both of those are off-brands. However, I am sorry that your poor children are forced to grow up in such a judgmental environment. May peace be with you.”

  She nodded at Rachel, turned on her heel and headed straight for the snack table. She packed everything back up in their boxes and turned back to the room of women. “Rachel, I think you’re on snack duty today. I’m going to eat all thirty-six,” she noticed a mom munching on a cookie toward the back of the crowd, “thirty-five cookies with my husband while we wash them all down with a dozen cold brew coffees and then we’re going to have sex on every surface of the kitchen so it’s too dirty for me to cook in, and then I’m ordering delivery for Jonah so I can say he’s been fed. Enjoy your stupid-ass meeting where nothing ever gets solved, no one makes any changes, and all you do is bitch, bitch, bitch about every other child that isn’t yours.” She spun around and headed for the door, she balanced the cookies and drinks in one hand to flip off the group of snarky women behind her.

  She heard a collective gasp, followed but exasperated mumbling and she smiled to herself as she pushed through the door, into the hall. The moment her feet were out of the meeting room, she felt better. Her husband was coming home tonight, her son was in the semi-finals, her best friend was flying in from Russia in a couple days, and she wasn’t going to let anything else bring her down.

  She found Jonah sitting on the sidewalk just outside of the main set of doors. “Hey, my baby.”

  “Shut up, Mom.” He answered without looking up. He stood, but kept his face turned from her.

  “How was school?”

  “Okay.”

  She glanced down at him, curiously. “Just, ‘okay’?”

  He nodded, “Just okay.”

  She nodded, too. “Okay.” She didn’t feel the need to pry and figured he would talk whenever he felt the desire to do so.

  Once they were in the car, she held up the carton of cookies, “Hungry?” She smirked.

  “Are these the candy kind?” He asked, reaching for it excitedly.

  She pulled the box away quickly, “What the hell is that?”

  Jonah blushed and fell back into his seat. “Nothing.” He pulled the shoulder of his jacket up over his face.

  She gaped, “Did somebody punch you?”

  He rolled his eyes, his left eye noticeably swollen and red, the bruise forming above his eyebrow and near his temple. “Can I just have a cookie?” he waved his hand toward her.

  “Jonah, tell me what happened.” She held the cookies at bay.

  “I don’t want to talk about it, Mom.”

  She sighed, the adrenaline she felt from walking out of the PTA meeting wore off quickly. “Why not?”

  He took his eyes away from the treats and crossed his arms. “I just don’t want to.”

  She chewed the inside of her cheek, unsure of how to respond to him. “Well, will you at least tell me who did it?”

  He shook his head and kept his gaze away from hers.

  She took a slow deep breath and put the whole box of cookies in his lap. “Let’s go get Dad.”

  He rolled his eyes as he popped the lid off the cookie tray. “Great, now he’s gonna wanna know.”

  She put the car into drive and headed for the highway, “Well dads are easier to talk to about this kind of stuff anyway.”

  He shook his head and pushed a bite of cookie to one side of his mouth, “I doubt it.”

  After a few moments of silence, she pressed the steering wheel button for the radio and tuned into a 90s pop channel. Within moments, Jonah was digging into his bookbag and plugging his headphones into his mp3 player.

  Natalee let out a deep sigh when she knew he was absorbed into his own music. She fought back tears as she veered onto the toll road. Once she knew she had a clear shot to the airport, she set the cruise control and relaxed a bit in her seat. Her eyes shot to the rearview mirror and locked onto Jonah. She took a second to peer at his blackening eye and wiped away a tear burning the corner of her eye.

  She pushed down the crazy part of her that wanted to lash out at every single student in the school. She reasoned with herself about pulling Jonah out of school and never letting him leave the house again. She knew she was being irrational. She knew she was going to have a very long talk about this with Judah that night. She knew she was going to flip out and he was going to find a hundred different ways to calm her down. She could hear him in her head now, “My beautiful wife, knock it off.”

  She smirked to herself and let out a little chuckle. He was right. Her mental rendition of him was right and he was going to be right that evening when they spoke about it. That’s one of the reasons she loved him and missed him so much when he took those extra flights. He was her voice of reason, even when he wasn’t around.

  As they pulled into the airport, traffic picked up heavily. The exits were backed up, both entering and exiting the airport suddenly turned into a level of chaos only the professionals were prepared for. Natalee groaned, tapped the phone button on her steering wheel and requested a call to her husband.

  “Hey babe, where are ya?” Judah asked, excitedly.

  “In traffic,” she groaned.

  “Yeah, there’s like four different SWAT teams here.”

  “Oh my God, for what?”

  Judah shrugged, “No idea, not my plane, not my problem.”

  She smirked, “I suppose you’re right.”

  “Oh, I am.” He mused.

  “Well, I’ll be there when I g
et there.”

  “Can’t wait. I love you.”

  “I love you,” she chimed. “Bye.” She hit the disconnect button and smiled. Her husband had such a way with words. It made him even more desirable to her. She sat through the traffic, daydreaming about having him take a vacation. Even if just for a solid weekend, a week would be better, but even in her daydream, she didn’t want to push it. She wondered briefly if she would be able to coax him into taking a day or two off when Svetlana landed, but she knew with it being such short notice, it was going to be a very farfetched possibility.

  The exact moment she caught a glimpse of Judah, her emotions skyrocketed. Her heart pounded and her palms began to sweat. She pulled up in front of him and rolled the passenger’s side window down. “Hey stranger,” she purred.

  She put the car in park and hopped out, racing to him. She wrapped her arms around his neck and planted a kiss on his lips. He lifted her off her feet and kissed her back as he spun her around in a circle. “I am so happy to see you, my beautiful wife.”

  “And I, you, my handsome husband.” She giggled. “How was your flight?” Once her feet returned to the ground, she pulled the passenger’s door open. Judah held her hand as she lowered herself into the car.

  “Nothing crazy happened, so it was unamusing yet successful.”

  “I’m glad you made it,” Natalee smiled sweetly.

  Judah nodded to Jonah who nodded in return and then headed to the driver’s side, slipping into the seat and adjusting it accordingly.

  “Why didn’t we buy one of those cars with the preset adjustments?” Judah asked every time they switched seats.

  “Because the sales guy was too pushy.” Natalee mused.

  “Well, maybe it was for good reason,” Judah claimed.

  Five

  While the ride home was exciting, it was mostly uneventful. If Judah noticed the shiner on Jonah’s eye, he didn’t mention it. He didn’t even imply it. Jonah jumped in on their conversation a few times, so Natalee knew Judah looked at him at least once, but still, no indication of a conversation starting.

  “If we just stay on the toll road, we should make it to the competition a little bit earlier than expected.”

  “I don’t want to go,” Jonah interjected.

  Natalee spun around in her seat, “What do you mean you don’t want to go?”

  Jonah sighed heavily, “I just don’t feel like it tonight.”

  “But this round determines the final teams to go to the state competition. I think your team would be pretty upset if you didn’t show.” Judah stated.

  “I just don’t see the point, we haven’t met since the last tournament and I’m already sure we’re going to be demolished and I don’t want to see that happen to this stupid robot we worked on all summer.”

  Confused, Natalee raised an eyebrow slowly. “Why haven’t you had any meets in two weeks?”

  Jonah shrugged, “Everyone stopped showing up.”

  Natalee gaped, “But I dropped you off three times last week, Jonah.”

  “Yeah, everyone but me, Mom. I’m the only one who showed up, all six times. I don’t want to be the only one to show up to an entire competition.”

  Natalee turned back around and let out a heavy sigh. “Oh, shit,” she mumbled.

  Judah took a few slow breaths as well, thinking on his words before he spoke. “Did anyone tell you why they weren’t coming to the meetings anymore? What about Tyler?”

  Tyler was Jonah’s best friend, but thinking back over the previous two weeks, Natalee hadn’t seen nor heard much about him. There seemed to be tension between him and Jonah at the last tournament, but she figured it was just the stress of the competition getting to them and their overloaded minds, trying to balance school and fun. She recalled acknowledging the thick air, but never mentioned it to Jonah or Judah. Just a thought she had kept to herself, until now.

  She spun back around quickly, “Is that who punched you?”

  “Natalee,” Judah hushed her.

  Jonah chose not to respond, but instead, his eyes darted from streetlight to streetlight.

  “Jonah, answer me!” she pleaded.

  “Leave him be, Nat,” Judah demanded.

  Natalee scoffed and crossed her arms. “Are you kidding me?”

  “No, I’m not kidding you. There’s obviously something going on. Something he doesn’t want to talk about. So, don’t push him. Leave him alone.” Judah stated sternly.

  Natalee submitted, not wanting to stir up a fight they had no control over. Natalee always thought the toddler years were hard. The poop-coated crib rails, the temper tantrums, the everything-smeared-on-the-wall phase. Crayon, chocolate, feces, if it could get on his hands, it would be on the walls. Natalee had a closet stocked full of antibacterial wipes for the first five years of Jonah’s life, and she went through every single one of them.

  Jonah tended to scream at the top of lungs, sporadically. Whether he was happy, mad, elated, or exhausted, the boy would just scream until his heart was content. Natalee debated which she detested more, the incessant screaming, or the never-ending silence she was experiencing now. It seemed that everything she had known about her son had completely changed, just within the last month or so. She hoped Judah was right, and they didn’t need to pry.

  She always heard that the kids who decided to take their own lives were the ones the parents just managed to constantly brush under the rug. She never wanted Jonah to feel as if he weren’t the most important person in her and Judah’s lives. She wanted him to know that without a doubt, both his mom and dad were there for him one hundred percent of the time. She decided Judah was probably right, and silently willed Jonah to explain everything to his father in their own private conversation. Perhaps she would leave them alone for an hour or so tonight, just to coax them into talking to one another.

  Once they pulled in the driveway, Natalee was convinced she was the whole reason Jonah didn’t want to talk, so she needed to temporarily remove herself from the picture, in hopes that he would talk. She rushed to the kitchen, turning on the oven so she could whip something together for dinner. Judah followed her inside, pausing behind her for a moment.

  “I am the luckiest man alive.”

  Natalee blushed, as she usually did when he complimented her. She turned around slowly and smiled sweetly at him. “I am even luckier,” she winked at him.

  As he stepped forward, her body tensed, then relaxed the moment his hands snaked around her waist. He pulled her close, pressing his lips against her forehead. “Don’t worry about Jonah, I think is a Dad-job.” He whispered in her ear, as their son rushed through the house to his room. They knew when he had made it when the door slammed shut with a slight rattle.

  She nodded and laid her head on his shoulder. “I think you’re right. I feel like I only make the situation worse.”

  He took a slow breath as he squeezed her. “Absolutely not. We wouldn’t be where we are without you.”

  She snorted into his neck, “Please, you did all of this.” She waved her hands behind his back.

  He pulled away for a moment to look into her eyes, “But I only did all of this, because I wanted to do it for you.”

  She smiled as she pushed herself up on her toes to kiss him once again, “I don’t know what I did to deserve you, but I’d love to do it again.”

  “I’d love to do you again,” Judah smirked.

  “Over and over again?” Natalee giggled.

  Judah smiled, pulled away from her and opened the fridge. “I don’t think they’ve invented that number yet.”

  She reached around him and pulled out the thawed chicken breasts she had prepared for the night before, but they never managed to make it into the oven, “Maybe we could invent it.” She winked then smacked Judah on the butt on her way back to the oven.

  He pulled a beer from the bottom drawer and cracked it open with ease. “That sounds like a good time.”

  “Doesn’t it though,” She mused.

/>   “So, what happened with Svet today? Why such a sudden trip?”

  Natalee shrugged, “I have no idea. It sounded like she’s had this planned for a much longer amount of time, but she was incredibly vague about it. All I know is that her flight comes in at three forty in the morning on Sunday.”

  “Whoa, she couldn’t find a better flight?”

  She shrugged again, “I have zero details, babe.”

  He nodded, “Gotcha. We’ll just wait for more details then, I suppose?”

  She nodded, “I suppose.” Her lips broke into a wide grin. “But isn’t this exciting? I can’t wait to see her. I can’t wait for you to meet her! And oh my God, Jonah!”

  He chuckled, “Yeah, this is going to be an adventure, that’s for sure.”

  Once dinner was ready, they sat down as a family to eat together. It was a rare moment they weren’t rushing around to get somewhere or to get homework done or catch the newest episode of their favorite shows. They sat together, took their time making their plates, and enjoyed each bite, as a family. Natalee and Judah shared a couple glasses of wine and discussed some of Judah’s new-to-him antiques, the possible stories behind them, and his plans to restore and resell them.