Total pages in book: 70
Estimated words: 70695 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 353(@200wpm)___ 283(@250wpm)___ 236(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 70695 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 353(@200wpm)___ 283(@250wpm)___ 236(@300wpm)
I growled low underneath my breath.
The man sounded like a piece of shit.
“He blames Marta and me for getting into that wreck,” she said. “I was throwing up at the time that she pulled out in front of that car.”
There was silence after that admission.
“Your father sounds like a piece of shit,” Lock said, repeating my words verbatim.
“I once got a ticket,” she said. “For jaywalking. When I contested the ticket, my father talked to the other judge that was the one to get my case.”
I didn’t know that I wanted to hear what had happened there.
“I’d been trying to save a stray dog from getting ran over by a car, and in turn almost got ran over myself,” she said. “He made the other judge throw the book at me. Gave me the maximum fine that someone can get for jaywalking in Texas.”
“What a dick,” I found myself saying as I made the last turn that would take me to my parents’ house. “My dad got me out of quite a few tickets. I can’t even begin to count.”
“Mine, too,” Lock agreed.
“He didn’t go to my high school graduation.” She paused. “But I saw him out at a restaurant having dinner with some of my friends that same night. He went to their graduation celebrations. I ate dinner by myself.”
I clenched my hand onto the steering wheel so hard that I felt my muscles strain.
“My graduation gift was him kicking me out of the house,” she continued, unaware of the tension in the front seat. “Oh, and there was this one time that he threw away all the clothes that I bought because they were too ‘trashy for a girl of my station.’ Then I had no clothes for like two weeks. Had to wear the same thing over and over and over again until I made enough at my part-time job to go shopping. That’s where Stratton came in. He took me under his wing. Helped me by giving me a place to live—the mother-in-law suite at his house—and work.”
My jaw clenched next.
I made a mental note to call Stratton later and make him an offer he couldn’t refuse on the business.
Even if it would put me into debt, and Royal didn’t stay as mine, I knew one thing for sure.
She deserved to have that place all to herself. And her asshole father deserved a special place in hell.
Chapter 14
Don’t ever judge a run by the first mile.
-Text from Royal to Justice as she walks half a mile.
Royal
I wasn’t really sure what I expected when I agreed—or was forced, depending on how you looked at it—to come to Justice’s parents’ house.
What I hadn’t expected was for them to welcome me in with open arms.
“You can carry more than that, can’t you?” Justice teased.
He’d been quiet since I’d admitted that I’d been kicked out after graduation.
Honestly, I probably shouldn’t have told them as much as I did.
But it’d been almost cathartic to admit some of the shit my father had put me through over the years.
Everyone thought he was this perfect judge. Perfect citizen. This hero of Kilgore, Texas.
But he wasn’t.
He was an asshole, and the more people that knew it, the better.
At least for me, it was.
It was hard seeing him be so loved and appreciated when he deserved anything but that to me.
Which was why I never beat around the bush when it came to my father. Everybody needed to know that he was a sneaky bastard, and if you fucked him over, he’d fuck you back harder.
“Here, take another one,” Lock teased, holding out another case.
Teasingly, I allowed him to give me one more, making that three. One in each hand, and one underneath my arm.
It was hard but doable. If I walked fast. And didn’t have to do anything but walk.
Putting them down might get tricky, though.
“I can do it,” I lied.
A crease formed in the corner of Justice’s eye as he tried to hold his laughter at bay. “I guess that means that you can take just one more?”
Consequently, that was how I ended up carrying four cases of beer to the door of Justice’s parents’ house.
I managed to ring the doorbell, barely, and not drop the cases.
Again, also barely.
Justice’s father answered the door.
And there was no doubt in my mind that the man was, indeed, Justice’s father.
The man had the same eyes, the same nose. The same build. The same steely look to him.
He was an exact replica of his son, just with a little extra silver in his beard and his hair, paired with a few more lines around his mouth and eyes that indicated decades more laughter than his younger version.
He took one look at me struggling with the cases of beer and took all of them but one from me.
“You must be Royal,” he said, holding the door open for me to enter.