Chapter 22
Unlike Curtis, who had no qualms about making a scene, she was the type to exact her revenge in whispers and shadows.
After all, they were guests in the Perez family, and causing a ruckus wouldn’t reflect well on their hosts. Jennifer would certainly chew her out for not calming things down.
She had barely taken a few steps when Curtis pulled her aside with a firm grip around her waist. “Stand back.”
The kid’s mother had arrived, wailing and lunging forward like a scene from a soap opera, only to be stopped by Billy. She shouted, “Murder! Help! Save my boy!”
The crowd was buzzing with concern and admonishment. “Mr. Curtis, come on, he’s just a kid. What are you trying to prove?”
“Yeah, let’s talk this out, man.”
Jennifer’s face was a storm cloud of disapproval. “Curtis, what the hell are you doing?”
Curtis arched an eyebrow with irritating nonchalance, swinging the little brat by the collar. “Isn’t it obvious? I’m dispensing a bit of rough justice.”
Seeing not even Jennifer could rein him in, the parents turned to Hubert, the eldest elder, with tear-streaked faces. “Mr. Hubert, you have to help us, please!”
Hubert shot Curtis a harsh look. The nerve of the man, picking on a child and doing it so unabashedly.
Hubert’s stern face didn’t crack as he spoke, “Curtis, he’s a child. Whatever he did, put him down.”
Curtis smirked, his voice dripping with sarcasm. “Mr. Hubert, I’m a big kid, too. Kids will be kids. There’s no need for you to step in. Just sit back and enjoy the show. But watch your step around the pool. We wouldn’t want you to slip and break something at your age.”
Curtis was always a loose cannon, you could never pin him down or control him.
At the time, with a few more years under his belt, he might have looked the part of a mature and steady man, but deep down, he was still the same old troublemaker.
Red-faced and at his wit’s end, Billy scolded his son. “Apologize, damn it! Just say sorry, and he’ll let you go.”
The kid, a bully at heart but a coward in the face of a bigger bully, realized no one there could touch Curtis. Sniffling and sobbing, he relented, “I’m sorry, sir!”
Curtis feigned deafness. “Sorry, I didn’t catch it Who are you apologizing to?”
The kid quickly corrected himself. “Ma’am, I’m sorry!”
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11.16
Chapter 22
“Ma’am? Whom do you mean, huh?” Curtis was still not satisfied. “My wife is a young lady, and you, a smelly little teenager, what should you address her?”
Leanne wanted to interject that at twenty-five, soon to be twenty-six, being called ‘ma’am’
wasn’t far off.
“I’m sorry, Mrs. Richardson. I shouldn’t have done that to you. Please forgive me!”
Curtis prodded further. “And what did you do wrong?”
“I sprayed you with my water gun because you’re pretty; I shouldn’t have done that,” the kid epitomized docility, totally subservient to Curtis, “I’ll never do it again!”
“Again? Next time you see me, you’d better run. Otherwise, I’ll toss you into the pool and let you out only when you’ve drunk all the water.”
“I won’t do it again, I swear!”
Only then did Curtis set the kid down, and the kid’s mother rushed to embrace him.
Rubbing his wrist, Curtis mused aloud, “What’ve you been eating to get this heavy? You’re over the weight limit, kid.”
When the kid’s feet touched the ground, his mother’s fury reignited. She burst into a tirade like a mad woman. “You’re a grown man picking on a child. Got any shame?”
Curtis hummed dismissively, hands in his pockets. “So what? Does it bother you? Feel free to hang me up there. I won’t fight back. Want to give it a try?”
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