Family Ties

Part 3

At five on Saturday evening his doorbell rang. Opening it, he smiled at Tilly standing there with someone else, about their age, with dark skin, brown eyes and a goofy grin on his face.

"This is Hector. I hope you don't mind, but he also needed a break from work." she grinned at him.

"No problem," he grinned holding his hand out to Hector, who immediately grabbed it in a firm handshake.

"Everybody's been saying that you looked like a high schooler, but how old are you exactly?" Hector gawked at him, surprised that Raymond looked so young.

"Don't worry about that," he grinned back. "I'm old enough to drink, and that's about all that counts."

"True," Hector nodded with a slow smile. "Come on, let's get going. We have to make up for lost time."

Grabbing a table at a local pub, they ordered beer, with Hector also getting a bucket on sticky wings.

"I hope you don't mind that I ordered for all of us, but this is the best way to have beer." Tilly said as Raymond sat down. "It's also the best way to forget about those assholes at work. And by assholes, I mean your current  boss!" he scowled, thinking of Jackson who'd made everybody's life at work a misery.

They were well into their fifth order of beer, when Raymond's phone started ringing. With a sigh, he took it out.

"Does this man ever lay off for a minute? he asked, before answering the call.

"Cook!" Jackson's voice boomed, making him yank the phone from his ear. "Get here right now!" he snapped over the line, cutting the call immediately.

"Seems like I have to go and babysit again." he grimaced at them, getting up.

Do you want me to take you?" Hector offered, also getting up.

"No, it's fine. You enjoy the rest of the evening, I'll see you at work." he waived at them, rushing out of the pub, calling a cab.

"What took you so long?!" Jackson looked irritated at Raymond, who'd just arrived.

"Do you want the real reason, or do you want to tell me what the emergency is?" Raymond looked at him calmly. He knew that being snarky wasn't part of his brief, but he may as well have some fun while investigating things at the company. Also, Jackson was being such an ass, and he still felt the buzz of the beer, so there wasn't any harm in pushing his buttons.

"What?!" Jackson was speechless for a moment, almost forgetting why he'd called Raymond over.

"Do you want to know the real reason why it took so long for me to get here, or do you want to tell me what you wanted." Raymond repeated slowly.

Jackson almost laughed at what he'd said. This little kid was really pushing his buttons, but he supposed that he probably deserved that.

"Okay kid, no need to get all snarky. I need you to get me a gift for my mother." he looked at Raymond when he said nothing. "Is there a problem?"

"No, no problem at all." Raymond turned around and headed into the study, returning a few minutes later with a gift wrapped box in his hand, holding it out to Jackson.

"What's this?" Jackson looked at the box as if it was offending him.

"The gift you wanted for your mother." Raymond almost laughed at the expression on Jackson's face. He could almost see the smoke as the wheels ground to a halt in his head.

"Is this a joke?" he snapped, the sour look on his face again. "What's in there?"

"You can either open it up and then gift wrap it yourself again, or you can give it to your mother when she arrives tomorrow." Dropping the box on the table, he turned around and started moving toward the door.