Total pages in book: 81
Estimated words: 77018 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 385(@200wpm)___ 308(@250wpm)___ 257(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 77018 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 385(@200wpm)___ 308(@250wpm)___ 257(@300wpm)
“Holy shit. You guys aren’t just fucking! What the hell happened in Europe?”
And the answer to that was I was pretty sure I’d fallen stupidly, hopelessly in love.
Chapter Twenty-Two
VANCE
I checked my phone as soon as the plane touched down in Alabama. Betty had messaged to relay that Grandma had only suffered a minor heart attack, but the doctors wanted to keep her for a few days of observation. Which would go down like flies on shit.
My last year of high school, Grandma had hit a telephone pole head-on. When she’d come to in the emergency room, she yanked out the IVs, told the doctors, “Healing was all in the head,” called a cab to pick her up, then left—still wearing the hospital gown. So, it didn’t surprise me when the first thing I heard after stepping off the elevator and into the bitter smell of antiseptic was my grandma giving someone hell.
I passed the nurse’s station. I didn’t need to ask where her room was because her fiery voice rose above the beeps and whirs of machines. God bless whatever medical professional was in her suite.
Grandma’s tirade hadn’t let up by the time I’d slipped into her room.
“Ain’t no reason to keep me in here like some kind of lab rat. Poking and prodding me.” She sat in the hospital bed, glaring at the blonde nurse replacing her IV bag. “Just trying to make me suffer.”
“Grandma, be nice.”
A smile replaced the scowl on her wrinkled face when she noticed me in the doorway. “Well, I’ll be. My grandson’s here.” She shook a finger at me, the frown returning when she redirected her attention to the nurse. “And he’ll tell you ain’t no reason for you to be keeping me up in this place. Smells like bleach and urine.”
The nurse pressed a button on the machine. “Mrs. Morgan, the doctors just want to keep you for observation for the next few days and—”
Huffing, she crossed her arms over her the faded-blue gown. Her gaze swung right back to me. “Would you tell these doggone people I’m fine?”
“Grandma, if they say they need to keep you,” I stopped beside the bed and leaned down to kiss her forehead, “They need to keep you.”
“They need the money from my Medicaid, is what they need. Bunch of crooks.”
Ever since my grandpa had passed away, she’d loved to refer to them all as crooks.
The nurse moved to the bedside, checking the taped-over canula in Grandma’s hand. “We just want to make sure you’re better before we discharge you.”
Grandma hmphed at that.
I sat on the edge of the stiff bed and mouthed “sorry” to the nurse before she left the room. “They’re trying to help you.”
Her cold hand clasped mine. “Sorry I ruined your trip, sugar.”
“You didn’t ruin it.” Had I needed to, I would have turned around the minute we’d landed in Paris, without complaint, for that woman. She was the closest thing to a mother I’d known, and she meant the world to me. “You scared me, though.”
“Yeah.” She chuckled. “Gotta keep you on your toes, I guess.”
I sat and talked to her for the rest of the evening, mostly listening to her tell stories about my grandpa. About two hours in, she came to her favorite story. Grandpa had walked into M and M’s BBQ wearing a leather jacket and greased-back hair and had stolen her heart. “You know, I was engaged to another man when I met him.”
That was something my grandfather had been proud of. Stealing her out of the clutches of another guy. “Grandpa always said his doing a wheelie on that motorcycle made you find him irresistible.”
“I wouldn’t so much call it a wheelie. He was trying to show out. Lost control of the dad-blast-it thing and nearly ran into the billboard.” She chuckled. “Wasn’t even his motorcycle.”
That was a new bit of information I’d never heard. “Whose was it?”
She fiddled with her hospital gown. “No idea. Pretty sure he just hopped on one in the parking lot.” A sentimental smile shaped her thin lips. “Oh, your grandpa… There was just something ‘bout him. It made no sense, but it felt like I’d known him my whole life.”
“Of course, it didn’t make sense, Grandma. You married him after two weeks.” And they’d remained married for sixty years.
“Because we knew.” Her gaze met mine. “You know, I always say, nothing about love makes sense. And if it makes sense at first, it ain’t no good.”
“I believe that…”
She perked up at my comment, shifting in the hospital bed with a grin. “You got your eye on somebody?”
I had more than my eye on Blake. “There’s a really nice girl I’ve started seeing.”
Her smile widened. Probably because I hadn’t “seen” a girl since I’d left Alabama, and she had stayed on me about settling down. “You gonna bring her down to meet me?”