My Sister Is the Warlord Queen novel · Chapter 16 of 24

Chapter 16: No Trade

Roisin went past me before I could stop her.

She turned the lock and opened the door and stepped out onto her own top step in her robe and slippers.

Cold air came in off the avenue.

Thayer straightened up so fast he almost fell over.

"Roisin."

"Say it again," she said. "So I'm sure I heard it."

"I want my kid."

He spread his hands, bottle and all.

"That's fair. I'll give you my mother, everything, on the record. I'll sit in front of a judge."

"And in return."

"My name on the birth certificate. Weekends. Christmas." His voice cracked. "I'm not a monster, Roisin. I'm just a guy whose mother runs his life."

Across the avenue a window went up.

Then another one.

The old landlady's door opened at the side of the building, and she came out in her housecoat with her reading glasses on the chain.

"You don't get a kid for a story," Roisin said.

"It's not a story, it's the truth..."

"You don't get a kid for the truth either. You don't trade for her. She's not a thing you get."

He blinked at the "her."

"It's a girl?"

"I don't know yet," Roisin said. "And you'll find out the same day the rest of Dorchester does."

Somebody across the street laughed.

Thayer heard it, and his face went red and ugly, the face from the terrace when he went to his knees.

"You think you're better than me now?" he said. "Because your sister has an army? You think I'm the bad guy?"

"I think you're drunk on my step."

"I paid for one brick!" he shouted. "One! My mother paid for the paint!"

The avenue went silent.

For a second even Thayer didn't seem to know what he'd said.

Then he did.

His mouth stayed open.

Cal came out of the doorway behind me in his socks, slowly.

"Say that again," Cal said.

"I didn't say anything."

"You said you paid for a brick."

Cal came down one step.

"I've had your receipt in a bread bag since last Monday."

"That's not..." Thayer backed up a step. "She said it would scare her home. She said nobody would get hurt, it was a window..."

"My sister was on the floor holding her stomach," I said.

"I didn't know she was inside!"

"You didn't ask."

Roisin came down the steps.

All the way down, onto the sidewalk, in her slippers.

She held out her hand.

Thayer looked at it, confused, and then gave her the bottle.

She turned it upside down over the gutter and emptied it.

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