“You son of a bitch,” Janie Mae Lewis snarled as she stormed into the room with Darla’s three other sisters behind her. “You bastard, murdering son of a bitch!”

“Janie Mae!” Darla snapped, scrambling to her knees.

“Shut up, Darla Mae. Let me handle this.”

“Handle what? What the hell is wrong with you?”

Ignoring Darla, Janie pointed at Eggie. “Taking advantage of my sister?”

“I did no such—”

“Was she even conscious when you had your dirty, disgusting way with her?”

Before Eggie even had a chance to be insulted by that—and he would have been insulted—Darla Mae roared out, “That is enough!”

The She-wolf took several breaths before she looked down at him. “Eggie, why don’t you go deal with your brothers downstairs. I need to talk to my sisters for a minute.”

If they weren’t all kin, Eggie would never leave Darla alone with a crazed She-wolf, especially a pregnant crazed She-wolf. But at the end of the day, they were all kin and it wasn’t Eggie’s place to get between them.

He slipped off the bed and walked out of his room and down the stairs. His brothers were just coming through the back door when he stepped into his kitchen.

He nodded at them. They nodded back.

It was a typical Smith boys’ morning greeting.

Once Eggie had gone downstairs, Darla faced her sisters. “What is your—”

Darla’s question was cut off when Janie suddenly grabbed her and hugged her tight.

“You poor, poor thing,” Janie said, her hands brushing down Darla’s hair. “Should we get you to a hospital?”

“Hospital?” Darla pulled away from her sister. “What are you talking about?”

“You don’t have to lie to us, darlin’,” Francine soothed. “Or be ashamed. This was beyond your control.”

“What are y’all talking about?”

“Just tell us if he”—Roberta glanced back and forth between the others—“hurt you.”

“Hurt me? Why would Eggie hurt—”

Again cutting off her sister’s words, Janie yanked Darla back into her arms, pressing Darla’s head to her big chest and annoyingly patting the side of Darla’s head.

“Shhhh, darlin’. Shhhh. Everything is going to be all right. Let’s just get her out of here,” she said to the others. “We’ll deal with Egbert Ray Smith later.”

Darla pulled away from her sister again, this time moving out of arm’s length. “You’ll do no such thing.”

“Darla—”

“Eggie Ray saved my life and he has been a complete gentleman.”

“Yeah,” Janettemuttered, “he seemed real gentleman-like on his bed with you two all twined together like that.”

“There’s only one bed in the entire house.”

“And a couch.”

“Did you see that couch? I couldn’t let him sleep on that thing. Might give him nightmares.”

“You and your thing about ugly furniture,” Roberta sighed.

“The man saved my life. I’m not about to allow him to spend the night on ugly furniture.” She snapped her fingers. “That reminds me. I need to help him take that ugly furniture back to his aunt. I’m afraid if I don’t help him, he’ll just let her get away with it.”

“Listen to yourself,” Janie ordered her. “Helping him return furniture? Not telling us the truth about how he took advantage of you last night?”

“He didn’t take advantage of me last night!”

“Poor thing,” Roberta said sadly, patting Darla’s shoulder. “You’re just so innocent.”

She slapped her sister’s hand off. “I am not innocent.”

“You mean that loss of virginity story?” Janette asked.

“Yeah,” Francine sighed. “None of us really believed any of that. But it was a nice try.”

Fed up, Darla asked, “Did you bring me clothes?”

“Your bag is downstairs but—where are you going?”

“Away. From you.”

Her sisters followed behind her, Janie Mae leading the way.

Just before she reached the stairs, Janie caught Darla’s arm and swung her around. “Now wait one second, little miss—”

“I don’t report to you, Janie Mae.”

“I’m trying to protect you.”

“From who? Eggie?”

“You don’t know anything about him.”

“I know enough.”

“Let me guess,” Janie said with the tone that always set Darla’s teeth on edge. “You looked into his soul and saw he was pure of heart.”

Her sisters snickered and Darla took a moment to get a little bit of that Southern control she was so proud of. “I know y’all don’t believe me when I say that Great Aunt Bernice taught me the way of—”

“Blah, blah, blah,” Janie cut in. “We’ve heard this all before, Darla Mae. But you can’t see people’s souls, you have no fancy mystical powers, and you are not going to spend another second around that murdering hound dog!”

Darla pointed her finger in her sister’s face, something she knew for a fact Janie hated. “You will not talk about him like that,” Darla warned her. “Not around me.”