Oh no. I’d seen that look a lot last night. She was going to blow.

“Damn,” I muttered and Tack’s arm circled my chest from behind pulling me to him which was the wrong, wrong, wrong thing to do because Lanie’s eyes dropped to his arm. Her lips quivered and then she burst out sobbing, twisting a bit so she wouldn’t face plant in her maple syrup plate, she face planted in her arm on the counter but her hair went into her maple syrup plate.

“I think the pancakes wore off,” Tack muttered in my ear.

I yanked free of Tack’s arms, whirled and glared at him.

His eyes caught mine but my eyes caught his mouth twitch before he asked, “What?”

I slapped his arm, lifted up on my toes to get in his face and hissed, “You don’t make out like that in front of newly broken up people! In fact, you don’t make out like that in front of anyone.”

His face moved to within an inch of mine and he whispered, “Wrong, baby, I do. I make out wherever the f**k I want which means you do too.”

I squinted my eyes at him, whirled back around and ran to Lanie.

I put my hand on her back and carefully extricated her hair from the maple syrup.

“Honey,” I whispered, “you got your hair in the syrup.”

She sat back abruptly and looked to the ceiling, crying out, “I don’t care! Who cares! I can shampoo with maple syrup. There’s no one to care!” Then she flopped back down on the counter and I had just enough time to grab the plate and get it out of range.

I lifted my eyes to Tack and skewered him with a look at the same time I held the plate up and jerked it at him. He sauntered to me and took the plate while I pulled Lanie off her chair.

“Let’s get you into the shower,” I murmured to her.

“No shower. No work. No nothing. I’m going to eat Tack’s pancakes until I weigh nine hundred pounds and die and they’ll have to cut around your door to get my carcass out of your house.”

I so totally told you that when Lanie let a drama rip, watch out.

“You’ll feel better after a shower,” I told her, guiding her out of the kitchen.

“I’ll never feel better, Ty-Ty,” she told me and I sighed. Then I guided her to her bedroom. I dashed to the bathroom and did my business quickly. After I was done, I went back to her bedroom and guided her with her toiletries and clothes stuffed in her arms into the bathroom. As I was doing this last, I heard the knock on my front door. I focused on Lanie and got her situated and as I was exiting the bathroom to see who on earth was at the door, I saw Tack was there before me.

“Hey, Tyra!” Tabby called chirpily.

“Yo, Tyra,” Rush called after her.

I stood in the hall outside my bathroom in my drawstring pajama shorts and camisole with my wild bed hair staring at Tack and his kids in my living room and heard the bathroom door click behind me.

“Uh… hey,” I called, stunned.

“Dad texted, said it was an impromptu Allen Pancake Morning so we came right over,” Tabby stated.

“Nothin’ better, not even his fajitas,” Rush put in.

“Babe, get your ass in the kitchen so I can feed you and my kids and get on the road,” Tack ordered while sauntering toward my kitchen.

His kids followed.

I stood in the hall and stared. Then I blinked. Then I stared some more. Then my body came unstuck and I motored into the kitchen to find Tack at the stove, Rush on Lanie’s barstool and Tabby’s head in the fridge.

I went direct to Tack and got close to his side seeing he was pouring perfect, silver dollar pancakes on my griddle.

“Can I talk to you?” I asked quietly.

His head turned and he looked down at me.

“Yeah,” he answered but otherwise didn’t move.

“Elsewhere,” I defined my request.

“Then… no,” he said through a grin.

I opened my mouth to make my request sound more like a demand when a loud banging came at my door. It was so loud, my body jerked in surprise and Tack’s head whipped around.

“What the fu –?” he started to mutter when we heard, “Open this motherfucking door!”

Ohmigod! It was Naomi.

More loud banging, so loud and violet I was uncertain my door could withstand it and I wondered if some of it was kicking then, “I know you’re all in there! I saw you go in there! Open this goddamned motherfucking door!”

Through this, Tack crashed down my fabulous, pink, Williams Sonoma mixing bowl with the little pouring thing-a-ma-jig in the lip, shoved the griddle off the burner, turned and stalked out of my kitchen.

Oh boy.

I hurried after him and I felt Rush and Tabby at my heels but we weren’t fast enough. Tack had the door open and he was standing in it. My body stuttered to a stunned halt when I saw Tack’s torso rock back because Naomi shoved a hand violently in his shoulder to push in. She took three steps in, turned to me, Rush and Tabby and I fancied I saw her head split right down the middle and fire pour out, such was her fury.

“You stupid, skank, whore!” she shrieked then came right at me.

I braced and she made an “oof” noise and bent double at the middle when Tack caught her at the waist and pulled her back at the same time Rush’s arm went around my waist (a fair bit more gently, I might add), and he pulled me behind him.

Tack positioned himself between Naomi and me and planted a hand in her chest.

“Have you lost your f**kin’ mind?” he growled.

“Get out to your car!” she screeched at Tabby.

Tack was shoving her toward the door and she was fighting it but losing.

“Get the f**k outta here.” He was still growling, his voice low, deep, the gravel had turned to ice shards and it wasn’t directed at me but I still felt my skin rise in goose bumps.

“You do not spend time in that f**kin’ bitch’s home!” Naomi screamed, again, for some reason, at Tabby.

“Oh God,” Tabby whispered and her words were not filled with ice. They were filled with embarrassment.

Naomi landed against the door, Tack’s hand still pressed into her chest and his face got into hers.

“You follow them here?” he asked, his voice still scary.

“Fuck you!” she shouted in his face.

“You follow the kids here?” Tack barked in hers.

“They are not spendin’ time with your latest piece of tail!” she yelled.

“You’re tellin’ me you slunk out to your f**kin’ car and followed your kids to my woman’s house,” Tack stated.