I'm Not Your Enemy (Enemies 2)

Personally, I was on any side that drove tourists outta here.

“Lookin’ good.” Dad nodded at the fence.

I eyed the fence and thanked him.

Was he gonna say something about the other day? He hadn’t said anything that day either. On the other hand, he hadn’t stormed out or cried. It wasn’t in his nature to react outwardly to much of anything. He had a smile reserved for every grandchild, a gruff laugh for every inappropriate joke, and as long as Ma wasn’t in the room, he didn’t hesitate to cuss at the TV. But that was it.

Dad came to a stop in front of the fence and stuck his hands down into the pockets of his jeans.

“When my daddy told me not to go to war, guess what I did,” he said.

I furrowed my brow. “You enlisted.”

He nodded once. “When he told me not to buy my own ranch…”

Same story.

I didn’t remember my grandfather. I’d just heard stories of him being a mean old dick. Paraphrasing from Mom’s recollections. Dad wasn’t one to bitch.

“As you know, my family didn’t stay together,” Dad stated. He was uncomfortable talking about this. He didn’t normally get personal. “My sisters are in Texas, Danny’s in Milwaukee, Gob in Denver…”

Where was he going with this?

To make it easier for him, I went back to work. It worked for me anyway. When all eyes were on me, my walls went up.

“When I met your mother, that was all I wanted,” he went on. “A big family that stayed together.”

That worked out well, didn’t it? The perpetual screw-up, aka me, was the only one who’d stuck around.

“That’s why I stole a foolish idea from my daddy,” Dad revealed. “Back in the day when I helped out at his law firm, I didn’t get paid a nickel. Yet I always had money. I came home to a warm bed, Mama put food on the table, I had new clothes, a nice car… I wanted to keep y’all close, you see?”

Yeah, I was familiar with the concept. I drove a brand-new RAM 1500, I lived for free in one of the guest cabins, and I could put every expense on a black card.

It made me feel like a goddamn child, despite that I would be forty next spring. I’d worked full time my whole adult life, and I had nothing to show for it. Most of it was my fault—I couldn’t blame my folks for my career mishaps and shitty behavior—but it still stung not to earn a paycheck from this place. I’d helped my father build it.

“When your brother was eighteen, I started noticin’ some strange expenses of his,” Dad admitted with a twitch of his mustache. “He was writing checks that made no sense. Why on God’s green earth was he buyin’ a lawn mower? What did he need tires for? They didn’t even fit his truck.”

Oh shit. Oh fuck. I suddenly had an idea of what this conversation was about.

Blake screws up again.

I kept my stare fixed on the fence and drew a wire to reconnect the net with the post.

“Turns out,” Dad chuckled gruffly, “he was paying for crap his friends needed. In turn, they gave him cash.”

I was very familiar with that concept, too. It was David who’d given me the idea. My uptight, do-everything-right big brother. Even he had limits, and he’d never wanted to live here longer than necessary. So whenever a buddy was buying something that cost a bit more, David would offer to cover the charge with a check, and they would pay him in cash, slightly under the asking price. Everybody won—except Dad, who was footing the bill. But we’d thought he was oblivious. It was a huge ranch, a big business. Between cattle and horse breeding and the bed-and-breakfast and some other shit, it was impossible for Dad to keep track of it all. He had an accountant in Atlanta, for chrissakes.

“So when you asked him how he’d been able to secure a deposit for his first apartment in Nashville, you already knew,” I said.

“’Course I knew,” Dad huffed. “I just didn’t see the point in sayin’ it. I already knew my plan had failed. None’a y’all were destined for a life here, least of all Soph.”

I didn’t wanna think about her. It only reminded me of another string of failures. I’d let her down. I’d let Teddy down. And it made me think about Sebastian. I’d let him down too.

“I reckon you can cut to the chase, sir,” I said and straightened again. “You’ve caught me doing the same thing David did.”

“Several times over the years.” He inclined his head. “It’s so much easier today too. Did you know I get a text message on my phone every time you charge somethin’ over two hundred dollars on the card?”