Total pages in book: 152
Estimated words: 156146 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 781(@200wpm)___ 625(@250wpm)___ 520(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 156146 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 781(@200wpm)___ 625(@250wpm)___ 520(@300wpm)
“Because you’re hooked up with a stubborn Oakley man?”
“Indeed.”
“Just to say, I knew my great grandad. He died when he was ninety-eight. His father, and brothers, were gone long before that. So sometimes stubborn isn’t bad. Like, say, when you meet a beautiful woman and she’s dead set on holding you back, but you don’t give up.”
I rolled my eyes.
When I rolled them back, he was grinning.
“So your dad is going to wrest hold of the family home?” I inquired.
Sadly, his grin faded.
“Apparently it, everything in it, and every head of cattle, horse, and structure on the land around it, Granddad has put up as collateral for some deal that should have earned him a whole new fortune. But it fell apart, and he’s scrambling to piece it back together. It’s not looking good, and the people he promised a cut, people who gave him the cash to make magic happen, aren’t thinking good things.”
“So your dad is going to close in.”
Judge nodded.
“Can I make a suggestion?” I requested.
He nodded again.
“Don’t get involved.”
“Chlo—”
I pushed up and over my knees so I was on my belly and closer to him. There, I reached out with my fingers and touched his mouth.
“They should have worked together to take care of you,” I said. “Your grandfather should have been your father’s eyes and ears here. Your dad having to fight your mom and his father, at the same time struggling to figure out what was best for you being caught in the crossfire would have been far easier if his father was not a point of that triangle, but instead had been at his side. He was not. Jamie made bad decisions, but it’s easy to see that now considering the man you’ve become. He couldn’t know you’d be this smart, this strong. He erred on the side of protecting you. I understand that. He still erred. And he knows it. Let him do what he must to work out those demons.”
I paused and then stated my last.
“And your grandfather deserves it.”
Judge wrapped his hand around my wrist and pulled it away from his mouth, starting again, “Chlo—”
“He does.”
“He’s an old—”
“He does,” I hissed.
Judge fell quiet.
“He knew how bad she was, he was right here,” I explained. “He made moves to keep you in that situation so he could keep you in his sights. He behaved entirely selfishly. And that isn’t okay for a grandfather, it isn’t okay for a father, it isn’t even okay for a human being. Your dad did not push him to make bad financial decisions. He is, on all accounts, reaping what he’s sown. It’s simply that his own son is handing him the sickle. Let it happen.”
Knowing me, Judge did not push it.
Instead, he replied, “Remind me not to get on your bad side.”
“That would be impossible, Judge.”
I said that, I meant it, and I very much liked the consequences of it.
Those being, Judge pushing up and reaching out to me.
He then dragged me up his chest and we collapsed so I was on my back and he’d pinned me.
He had a look on his face that was familiar, and I adored it, but we weren’t done.
“Before you get busy,” I started and his gaze went from my mouth to my eyes, “that scene in the house—”
It was my turn to be interrupted.
“We had it, we let it out, it’s good.”
He was avoiding again.
“Judge—”
“Although he threatened it, he’s not going to make Granddad move there,” he shared. “Mom didn’t have a will. Not that we know. So the property goes to me. Dad’s going to hire someone to go through it to see if there’s anything that needs keeping, or if there’s important paperwork we should know about. Then he’s going to hire someone to come and fix it up. We’re selling it. And I’ll get the money. The deal, though, is that he insists on paying for all of that. I don’t like it, but I agreed because I think it will help him put some closure on what we saw, and what happened when we did.”
“Will that be closure for you too?”
“Sure.”
That was a lie.
Judge didn’t lie.
He cheated (not the bad kind, the adorable kind, or the sexy kind, but he did it).
He didn’t lie.
“You threw things through a window, breaking said window,” I reminded him cautiously.
“I haven’t been home in a decade. I didn’t know it had gotten that bad. It was a thing. It happened and I’m over that thing.”
He so was not.
“Darling—”
“Chloe, honest to God, I’m okay.”
He wasn’t that either, but I wouldn’t help him by pushing him to process things he wasn’t ready to process.
I’d be there when that time came.
For now…
“You’ve not once mentioned your maternal grandparents,” I remarked.
He sighed, but it wasn’t an impatient-let’s-stop-going-through-painful-history-and-have-sex sigh.
It was something else.
I would find out what it was when he answered.