Slipping Through My Fingers | John B Little Sister

Chapter 6

"Red's gonna stay with us for a while okay?" His dad mumbled down to him, voice rough. And the way he held him in that moment would haunt John B for years to come. Like he precious and fading all at the same time. Like he was the treasure that kept slipping through his fathers fingers. 

"What? For like a week?" John B asked, fingers tangling themselves in his dad's shirt. 

His dad sniffed harshly, and then he pulled him back by the shoulders to stand by his side. The two of them watched Peterkin as she crouched in front of Lu, talking to her in a hushed tone and with a fiercely kind smile. 

"For a while." Was all he said. 

***

John B had never liked Katherine Bennett. 

She always pinched him too roughly on the cheek whenever she saw him and she had this tsking sound she would always make whenever he swore. 

John B didn't like Katherine Bennett before she knocked three of his sisters teeth out and he definitely didn't like her afterwards.  

But God didn't care what John B liked. He just did whatever the fuck he wanted. 

Like drop the most gorgeous girl on the planet in John B's arms and then push him off a wooden tower during a thunderstorm. Like give him the most loyal and loving group of friends and then sink his dad like a heavy stone in the ocean. 

The 'Good' Lord really just gave and took whatever he wanted, all the fucking time, and it was giving John B a severe case of vertigo. 

He had just been... adopted? By the richest man on the island? While his sister. His sweet, timid, twitchy little sister who he adored so much was probably rotting away in some ghettoass crack house in the deepest pit of the Cut.

And it was for the sake of said sister that John B was looking so far down his million dollar gift horse's throat he could practically see the lobster Ward Cameron ate for dinner last night.

"Listen I know its a lot to ask-" John B started but was cut off by an oblivious Ward who continued to grumble on like some kind of weary detective in a gritty crime series. 

"You're lucky kid, fall any other way you don't hit that sand?" He mused in his deep gravelly voice, brows furrowed, the picture of fatherly concern. "You could've broken both your legs and your back."

"Yeah, yeah I'm super lucky," John B acknowledged briefly, thoughts still on Lu, "Thanks for sticking up to the DCS for me and all, but you see my siste-"

"Don't even worry about it, happy to do it." Ward cut him off smoothly, smiling charitably.

For fucks sake, the Good Lord was testing him again. He couldn't really be that thick. 

Ward paused for long enough for the room to gain and awkward air and John B was about to inject again, when he started up again. 

"And don't worry about your sister," He placated, raising a hand and patting the air as if he were smothering out John B's fears, "If you want I can pull some strings for a visit, but until then I'm sure her mama's gonna take good care of her."

John B made a strangled scoff of protest at the back of his throat and roughly wiped his hand over his mouth.

"Sir if you just hear me-" John B began to explain, unsure of where his sentence would end. And he would never have to find out, because Ward was off again.