Page 4 of Knockout (Whiskey Dolls 2)

I couldn’t remember a time in my life where I’d fit in with any of them. I’d always been the odd one out, never really belonging. I didn’t care about the money or the status that came with it. I’d actually wanted to go to college to learn, not to get some meaningless diploma that would look good in a frame, hanging on the wall. I’d actually wanted to work for what I had, not live off a trust fund. When I proposed to my ex, it was because I’d stupidly thought she was the one, not because she was a trophy who would look good on my arm for photos.

If it hadn’t been for Gram, my whole upbringing would have been incredibly lonely. She’d been my saving grace. I spent most of my time in this house, so much so that I eventually just decided to stay. I was sure my parents were totally fine with getting rid of me. I was a problem child, after all. Or at least that was how I felt on a regular basis. So I didn’t mind in the slightest when Gram and Gramp suggested I move in with them permanently.

I’d lived with them from twelve to eighteen, when I finally left for college. Gramp died when I was twenty-three, but Gram had remained an intricate part of my life all this time.

Moving to her, I took the stack of Post-Its from her hand and placed them on the desk. “Well, we can’t do that today. I’m taking you to the beauty shop for your weekly appointment to get your hair set. Or did you forget?”

She planted her hands on her hips and skewered me with a look that, in my childhood, had scared the shit out of me. “Of course I didn’t forget. I might be old as dirt, but my mind is sharp as ever. Despite whatsomepeople might hope.”

Every week for the past three years, I took Gram to get her hair set at Pure Elegance, a salon one town over in Hope Valley. Her mind might be sharp as a tack, but her vision was a different story.

Despite threats of bodily harm and bribes to put their children through college, the people at the DMV office straight-up refused to renew her license. Which was a good thing, considering the premium on her car insurance had gone through the roof because of what she referred to as her “whoopsies.” She’s had more whoopsies than a teenager who’d just gotten their license. There wasn’t a mailbox or trashcan in Grapevine that had been safe from my grandmother’s wrath when she was behind the wheel of a car.

“All right, Gram. Why don’t you tell me what happened.”

She threw her arms out on a harrumph. “What happened is those good for nothing fruits of my loins think it would be “for the best” if I were to move to an old folks home,” she said, using air quotes and a snarky tone. “What they really mean is they want to lock me away so they can forget I exist and take all my stuff for their own. Like those ingrates deserve any of it.”

I held up my hands and shook my head, trying to wrap my brain around everything she’d just said. “Christ, Gram. First of all, if you could never say “fruits of my loins” to me again, I’d seriously appreciate it—”

“Oh, get your panties out of a bunch, Joodle Bug,” she scoffed, using the endearment she’d given me when I was just a baby. “Everyone has sex. Even me.”

“Ah, Christ!”

“Seeing as your waste-of-space father is one of my two kids, you know damn good and well your granddad and I—”

I held up my hand to stop her before my ears started bleeding. “All right, I get it.”

“The realsurprise is how I could raise such unappreciative hooligans.That’swhat I want to know. Where the hell did I go wrong?”

I’d wondered that myself a million times. It didn’t make sense how a woman as incredible as my grandmother raised my father and uncle to be...how they were. I’d been raised by Gram and Gramps since I was twelve years old, so it made no sense to me that her own kids turned out to be complete and total shitheads. It was a puzzle I’d tried for years to figure out before finally giving up. Some families just had a few bad eggs. Unfortunately for Gram, hers had more than the average.

And if that wasn’t bad enough, each one of them had married someone just as grubby-handed as they were. Then they’d bred—an unfortunate occurrence for the entire planet—and passed that entitlement down to their kids, creating a whole new generation of worthless assholes. My cousins were even worse than the ones before them, which was a fete I hadn’t imagined possible. AndIwas considered the outcast for not being a flaming prick who expected to have the world handed to me on a silver platter. Talk about irony.

“Look, Gram. There’s no point in getting worked up about this. We both know they have no grounds to get you out of this place. And if they push the matter, I’ll step in and handle it. You have my word.”

She reached up and patted my cheek. “I know you will, Joodle Bug. Because you’re a good boy. Despite being born to those pit vipers you call parents. Which is why I’m leaving everything to you when I finally lie down for that long dirt nap.”

She snatched the Post-Its from me and marched over to one of the paintings to tag it as mine.

“Gram, I appreciate that, but what the hell am I going to do with a six-foot tall painting of birds, for Christ’s sake?” There was no way in hell that thing was fitting inside my apartment. Then of course there was the fact it was the ugliest painting I’d ever seen.

She stopped in her task and lifted her hand to the offending piece of art—and I used the termartloosely. “Do you have any idea how expensive this ugly thing is? Your grandfather got it during that horrible bird-watching phase of his. You remember that?”

I did. It was an unfortunate time in his life when he’d walked around everywhere with a pair of binoculars strapped around his neck and one of those ugly-ass khaki boonie hats on his balding head.

“I nearly took it out back and set it on fire. Then he told me how much he spent on it, and I nearly sethimon fire. He talked me around to keeping it, but I only caved because I knew I could leave it to you when we both bit it. You could take years off of work for what you’d get for that hideous painting.”

“You know I don’t care about the money, Gram. Ilikeworking. I love my job.”

She gave me a tender smile, the lines on her face that had come from age and living her life balls-to-the-wall softening just a touch. “I know you do, honey bear. And that’s why I want to make sure you’re taken care of when I finally go. Out of everyone in this God-forsaken family, you’re the only one who actuallydeservesany of this.” She held out her arms to encompass the entirety of the big house. “And you earned it by not expecting anything to be handed to you.”

The sweet moment was over in the blink of an eye. With her face taking on a mask of determination, she tossed me a pack of Post-It notes, ordering, “Now hurry up and help me tag the rest of this shit. I want to take pictures of everything so I can text them to my ungrateful-ass kids.”

Of course she did.

3

Jude

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