Free Yours to Keep by Shannon Stacey

like a criminal being marched into the courtroom to face the judge. This judge, though, would whack the shit out of him with kitchen utensils if she didn’t like his answers.
    He was already exhausted and a confrontation with his aunt was the last thing he wanted. The clock on Emma’s bedside table had read one in the morning when a sound had penetrated his sleep. A sleepy, sexy and definitely feminine moan wasn’t a bad thing to wake up to, except when the female was sleeping on a couch across the room. Alone.
    She’d quieted after that single sound, but his body sure as hell hadn’t. As a result, he’d drifted in and out of a tortured sleep and woken up on the wrong side of the bed.
    Aunt Mary was in the kitchen—as usual—when he arrived and right after pointing him in that direction, Uncle Leo disappeared into his den and closed the door. Chicken.
    She started in on him the second he crossed the threshold from the living room. “I was wrong about you all these years. I always thought you were a smart boy, but you don’t have the brains God gave a jackass.”
    “Aunt Mary, I—”
    “Don’t you Aunt Mary me, Sean Michael Kowalski. I should go get my wooden spoon and thunk some sense into that thick head of yours.”
    Sean sighed and tried to school his expression into something closer to contrition than belligerence. Not that she wouldn’t see through it, but he made the effort regardless. “I’m just helping her out for a few weeks so that—”
    “Helping her lie to her grandmother, you mean.”
    “I know it sounds bad, but—”
    “Because you were raised better than that.”
    He’d known this wouldn’t be easy, but he’d been hoping to at least finish a sentence or two. “Can I talk? Please?”
    “When you have something sensible to say.”
    He gave himself a few seconds so none of his frustration would show in his voice. Hopefully. “Remember after high school when I dumped my bike and I told you I had a bruised elbow and a little road rash?”
    She pinned him with a look that made him want to squirm. “Yes.”
    “Well, I dumped my bike because a truck hit me. I also had a bad concussion. And four broken bones.”
    Her expression froze for a few seconds, but then he saw the comprehension in her eyes, followed by an unholy gleam of pissed off. “You little bastard. Why would you do that?”
    “I didn’t want you to worry. You wouldn’t have believed I was okay without leaving your family to come take care of me and Lisa was so pregnant she was going to pop any day.”
    “You’re my family, too, and don’t you forget it.”
    “You would have been stressed out for no reason because there was nothing you could do. I didn’t want that for you so I talked the others into lying for me. It’s the same situation Emma found herself in, more or less.”
    She glared at him, her arms folded across her chest. “Protecting weak, old women from the truth, you mean?”
    Oh, hell no. “You are not weak or old, Aunt Mary, and neither is Cat. I know you’re upset about this, but I bet you’ve hedged around the truth a time or two to keep somebody you love from being unhappy.”
    When she didn’t respond right away, he thought maybe she was softening. “I don’t like this at all, Sean.”
    “I gave her my word.” That was the bottom line.
    Her mouth tightened. “And?”
    “And…” He took a deep breath. “If you can’t back me up on this, I’ll have to keep Cat away from here. And she knows you’re nearby, which means I’ll have to say we had a falling out.”
    “Don’t threaten me, young man,” she said, but her tone was a little softer. She of all people knew Kowalski men were stubborn and meant what they said.
    But the last thing he ever want to do was have conflict with this woman. He loved her too much. “I’ve seen them together and Emma was right. Cat’s a lot happier now, thinking we’re engaged, and that’s all Emma’s trying to do. Please, Aunt Mary. I gave her my