Badger to the Bone (Honey Badger Chronicles, #3)

by Shelly Laurenston

Shen walked out, carrying Kyle with one arm the way he might a sack of potatoes. Behind them were Max and Zé, and Charlie ordered her sister to text her teammates the details for the party. Max stopped walking. “Why the hell would I do that?” “Just do it.” “Oh, is it so the kid will have people at his party?” “It’s like you want me to start screaming.” “Calm down,” she said, pulling out her phone. “I’m sure they’ll come.”

:)

Slowly Max turned her head to look at him. “Now do you see?” “Cocaine?” he asked, assuming that would explain the woman’s risky behavior. “Nope. Sprite. Maybe Pepsi.” “Actually,” Blayne said, dropping to the ground and gliding to a stop in front of Max, “none of those things. Shirley Temples. Six of them.” She pumped her fist into the air and screamed out, “Woooooo-hoooo!” Then she grabbed Max’s hand and dragged her out onto the dance floor.

Oo

You know, since Devon was trying to kidnap me to use me as leverage to get the money back.” “Yeah, I don’t really know anything about that. But this all seems awkward now. I feel awkward.” She weakly gestured to some random spot. “I’m gonna . . . walk away now.” Livy scurried around Max but before she could get away, Max called out, “Wait.” “God, are you going to make this more awkward?” “No. I just have a question.” “What?” “Would your mother do the same thing to you?” Livy thought a moment before replying, “Probably.” Then she shrugged. “But that’s the way of the Yangs. Let me rephrase. That’s the way of the Yang women.” “Would you do that?” “No. But I’m an artist and according to our aunts, my life choices just make me an idiot they’re all ashamed of.” Max shrugged. “But I wouldn’t do it either.” “In all honesty, Max, you were raised by different people.” “You were raised by Yangs.” “But I’m also half Kowalski. No. Wait. Forget that. The Kowalskis aren’t any better. In terms of who really raised me, though . . . that would be the Jean-Louis Parkers. Kyle’s family. When I met Toni, my life changed. I changed. That’s why my mother hates them with the fire of a thousand suns.” Livy smiled, laughed a little. “She blames them for my being a—and I’m quoting here—‘loser that takes pictures.’ Aaaah. A mother’s love,” she joked. “But don’t worry about it. Your mother isn’t doing anything ultra-weird. She’s just being a honey badger.”

:(

Charlie was sure that her seventeen-year-old self would have stuck his head in one of the school toilets and flushed. Still, there had to be kids he could hang with. Kids who got him, even if they weren’t necessarily geniuses themselves. She just had to find them. Until then, though, she could continue to watch out for the ego-driven little bastard she’d come to like so much.

;)

“Okay!” Nelle cut in before it became nasty. “That’s it. We’re all in this. We’re going to do this to support a woman that at least four of us are absolutely terrified of. But we’re going to do it because she had Mads’s back when she didn’t have to. So we do this together,” she said, swinging her forefinger in a circle, “because we are . . .” She prompted again as they all gazed at her continuing to make that big circle with her fingers. “Because we are . . .” “What?” Max finally asked. “Girlfriends!” Streep clapped happily in agreement. Tock looked again at her watch. Max and Mads just made sounds of disgust until Mads suddenly said, “Uh-oh.” “What?” “We’re not alone.”

Oo

Zé jumped again, this time hissing a little. “Sorry ’bout that,” the woman wearing a Tennessee Titans baseball cap mocked. “I always forget how nervous y’all are.” “You’re not a cat,” he told the woman sitting next to him. “Definitely not.” “Pitbull then?” Her yellow eyes narrowed. “Gray wolf. And a Smith.” “I don’t know what that means.” “Dee-Ann Smith’s the name.” “And howling is your game?” Those eyes narrowed even more. “You really didn’t know all this time that you were a cat? Because you sure as hell sound like one.”

:)

“We should just get Natalie out of here,” Shay said to his brothers. “You’re not taking our sister anywhere,” Max said and she suddenly had the full attention of the Malone brothers. They locked on her the way those lions locked on that gazelle in the documentary he’d watched. “She’s not your sister,” Keane snarled. “She is now. She’s already been through the gauntlet.” “The gauntlet?” Finn asked. “Yeah. The Dad-gauntlet. Where he does something so ruthless and shitty that you realize you’re stuck being his child. At least this time he didn’t sell her.” “Sell her?” “Yeah. Once he sold me to a family. Indentured servitude, I think it’s called.” Stevie nodded sadly. “He sold me to lots of people. The most infamous, though, was the Peruvian drug lord.” “Yeah. Charlie and I dealt with that situation.” That’s when Max smiled. The smile said it all, and Zé knew he was in real trouble with this girl. He was no longer falling . . . he’d fallen. Because she was a nut. And he liked it. He liked her lethal nuttiness. “Whatever,” Keane finally snapped. “You’re not keeping our sister.” “You can’t raise her,” Max argued. “You giant house cats don’t know what to do with a honey badger.” As the two families bickered, Zé saw Natalie roll her eyes and wander off. She studied the trees and the house, then looked into the glass door of the garage and disappeared inside.

:)