I shuddered. “Grams, you taught me how to put on a condom using an actual dildo. Then, when I was fifteen, you taught me how to smoke weed.”
Grams’ lips kicked up at the corners just as my son came screaming out of his room. “Daddy!”
I bent forward and caught Micah up in my arms, burying my face into his recently washed hair.
God, the smell of his shampoo, paired with his unique scent, made me feel like my chest was going to explode.
“You’re going to be good for Grams, right?”
“No!”
I snorted and let my mirth-filled eyes lift up to Grams’ amused ones. “You deserve this,” I told her.
Grams shrugged. “I’ve raised you, boy. Nobody can be as bad as you were.”
I rolled my eyes. “I was the best kid out of all of us. You’re just lucky that I’m not an asshole now, or you’d not have any great-grandbabies to keep you young.”
My brother and sister both had kids, but none of them allowed Grams the free reign that I did.
Grams was Grams. She was brash, took zero bullshit, and honestly didn’t give a shit what anyone thought of her.
Which was what irritated my brother and sister.
Grams was very vocal with how poorly my brother and sister treated their children—as if they were commodities to do whatever pleased them.
The last time Grams had been there, the kids had been glorified gophers for them all.
She’d explained it like this: All those kids. All four of them, all sat with anxiousness because they never knew when they’d be called upon to go do something. Kid one, go get me a beer. Kid two, take the trash out and go get me a bottle of wine while you’re out there. Kid three, bring me the remote. Kid four, I think I dropped my phone on the floor. Can you look to see if it’s there? Seriously, I felt sick leaving those kids there. But I have no claim to them whatsoever, and your siblings treat me like I’m senile. The next time I go over there I’ll be telling them they’re written out of my will, and all of my money is going to their kids when they turn twenty-five.
She loved that Micah was a wild child. That he got to grow up and just be a kid. Something that Wrigley and I had both agreed on. Though he did get disciplined—even corporal punishment if it warranted it—he was genuinely a great kid. He knew right from wrong. He knew what buttons he could push without getting in trouble, and he pushed boundaries. However, when he did it, it wasn’t disrespectfully. At least, at this age, it wasn’t. Maybe in a few years. if he said the same thing to me as he just had, I might have a different reaction. But for now, I just thought it was hilarious.
“All right,” Wrigley breezed out, Lucy right on her heels. “I’m ready when you are.”
The view from the front was even better than the view from the back.
The dress she was wearing was one that I’d seen before. She’d worn it out one time before Micah was born. We’d gone out to eat at a fancy place in Vegas that sold nothing under a hundred and thirty dollars.
The steak I’d ordered had been almost two hundred bucks.
The bottle of wine—a deep red, almost maroon—had matched her dress.
She’d called it a red grape color.
I hadn’t cared what color it was.
I’d only devoured her with my eyes.
The way it seemed to hug her hips, to the way the neckline plunged down her breasts.
Now, that fabric seemed to hug her even more snugly around those luscious hips.
And don’t even get me started on her breasts.
I knew she still breastfed Micah before bed. I also knew that she had milk in those luscious breasts.
I gave Micah a kiss and stood up, walking him over to my Grams.
“All right, kiddo,” I said to him, ruffling his hair. “Be good for Grams. I don’t want to hear that you were bad for her.”
“Yes, sir,” Micah agreed almost immediately.
I grinned and winked. “Love you, baby boy.”
“Love you, too, number seben.”
I just shook my head instead of replying.
That kid of mine was hilarious.
When he’d started calling me ‘number seben’ I couldn’t tell you. But it’d been his thing for a while now.
“Ready?” I turned to Wrigley.
She nodded, then walked to the kitchen table and picked up her purse. A tiny ‘grape red’ that matched her dress.
My eyes trailed down her body, taking in everything.
She’d curled her hair and it flowed in soft waves down around her shoulders. She’d gotten it colored recently, adding lighter blonde highlights to her hair.
Her eyes were shaded in a deep, smoky gray. And she had sparkles on her eyelids from her eyeshadow. Her lashes were long, and her lips were glossy.