Everybody Falls (32 page)

I looked her over and she was still dressed for success, at least in her own mind. Daisy dukes, a crop top and a pair of Candy's two-straps was the ensemble for today. Only, instead of a muffin top, we were looking at a full loaf of bread.

"I told you, Lacey, you stupid bitch. I need money and I need it now," she screamed.

Two things hit me at once when her voice nearly blasted out my eardrums and hung in the still air.

I hadn't gotten the restraining order.

And she was completely off her meds.

Oh, shit.

I saw a figure moving way out by the mailbox at the road.

Jack.

I saw him stop and reach behind him.

"So?" I asked, moving my eyes back to my mom. "You need money? Why is that my concern?"

"I raised you!" she spat.

"No, I raised myself when I wasn't with Grandma," I countered.

"I gave you everything…" she stuttered, seemingly confused by me standing up to her. I was trying to remember, but I don't think I'd ever refuted any of her claims aloud before.

"You gave me nothing," I said slowly, wanting her to hear and understand my words completely. "You took, Mom. You have never once given. Not to me, anyway."

"You stole from me…" she started on a different tactic.

"I never took anything from you, ever," I shot back. "You took my things, though. Had no problem taking my stuff to get you high, now, did you?"

She shut up for the moment and I saw the cab on Sarge's pickup as it turned from the road onto the gravel driveway. The truck came to a quick stop and my grandfather hopped out of the driver's door before the large old beast had quit rocking.

"Belinda? Get your ass in the truck," he bellowed.

"Dad?" she said turning towards him.

"Now, girl. Ass. In. Truck," he said harshly pointing where he wanted her to be.

"I'm sick and I don't have my medication," she whined. "You know I need my pills for my disease."

"Shit, are you still trying to pull that tired crap over on people? Girl, you are no more bi-polar than I'm a goddamn polar bear. Get in the damn truck. Now." Sarge wearily shook his head as he moved. Obviously, my mom and my grandpop had gone through this scene before.

I watched her plant a hand on her cocked hip and tilt her head. "And just who the fuck do you think you are to order me around, old man?"

"I'm your fucking father, you bat-shit bitch. And the baddest motherfucker in your life. Get your ass in the truck or I swear, Belinda, I'll carry your ass there," he said firmly, feet planted and arms crossed.

"I'm broke, Daddy," she wailed, her tone pitiful.

"What happened to the money I gave you last month?" he demanded, moving towards her.

"It's gone. She doesn't understand what it was like being a single mother…" Belinda cried pointing my way and changing tactics since it was evident that her earlier ploys hadn't worked.

"You never did anything to act like the mother, you stupid cow," Sarge yelled back. "Don't you ever,
ever
fucking place blame on Lacey for how you are."

"But, Daddy…" she tried again.

"Only once more, Belinda. Get your ass in the truck now," he said, two feet away from where she stood.

I saw Jack move on the other side of the truck as he tried to maneuver around the man and his daughter.

Well, if I was going to play the 'crazy family' card, this was a damn good one for Jack to see.

"Back in the house, Lace," Sarge ordered, shooting me a fierce glance over his shoulder.

I obeyed, moving back to the front door, helping Edie move her walker around so I could close the heavy portal.

"I tried to make coffee like you do, Lacey, except I don't think I got it quite right," I heard Edie say as we moved down the hall to the kitchen.

"I'm sure it's good, Edie," I said, but my mind was on what I could still hear going in the front of the house.

"You okay, Baby?" Jax said, catching me around my waist.

I nodded against his sweaty chest and pulled away to grab my coffee.

Nothing else mattered at the moment.

I needed coffee desperately.

"So what do you think, Jax," Edie began. "Pancakes or french toast?"

I knew they what they were doing. They were trying to distract me from the scene in the front yard.

Two scenes within a couple of days all because of me.

I had dropped into one of the dining room chairs with my full mug but found the room too confining. So I hauled myself back up to the bedroom and closed the door.

Okay, I slammed the door, if I was going to be truthful.

Not about Jack or Grams.

Not about pancakes or french toast.

Just about my stupid, screwed up old life which was thrusting into my new one.

*.*.*.*.*

They heard the bedroom door slam and looked at one another.

"Is she going to be okay?" Grams asked, her eyes wide behind her glasses.

"I hope so," Jax mumbled. But even he wasn't sure. That was a pretty intense scene between the three out in the front when he'd come down the driveway. But, he had to admit he'd had a hand in it because he'd called Sarge, who luckily had been at the Bakery.

That Belinda was a piece of work and he was sure he was only seeing the tip of the iceberg of her craziness. The way she kept coming after Lacey was a problem, and it wasn't one he would put up with, not in front of Grams anyway.

His beautiful, loving, wonderful old grandmother was dying and there wasn't anything or anyone who could help. And every time, every fucking time those words hit his brain, his heart broke a little more.

"Why don't you show me how and we'll do french toast?" he said. "Just let me shower and then we can get to it, okay?"

"Sure, Hot Stuff," she said hesitantly, glancing at the stove and then out the window.

Aw, shit.

He had hoped that the outside wouldn't touch her, not now, yet he could see that she was worried. Worried about things that she couldn't help, things she couldn't do anything to change.

"C'mere, old woman," he said as he helped her step around the walker so he could hold her.

"You grab another cup of coffee and I'll take a shower. Then you'll teach me how to do breakfast and we'll surprise Lace, alright?" he murmured, his cheek pressed into the fluff of white hair at her forehead.

"Uhm, Jax?" she murmured.

"Yeah, Grams?" he replied gently.

"You're gonna need to pull out the brass balls, Hot Stuff, because if I know anything about women, Lace is going to leave," he heard his grandmother say, muffled on his chest.

"What?" he yelped, pulling his head up quickly and looking toward the stairs.

"She's going to try and leave. She's embarrassed, Jax," Grams explained. "She feels responsible and hates that we got to see her dirty laundry."

"You need to go upstairs and love her up. Make her see stars," she rushed on, pulling away and settling herself behind the walker. "Go up there and do the nasty, boy! Convince her that we still need her and that today was nothing. Go on! Get!"

Jax took a couple of steps back, eyeing the old woman like she'd gone completely doo-lollie.

She had never steered him wrong yet. Talked a little too plainly for his taste sometimes, yet her advice had almost always been dead on.

He took the stairs two at a time and eased the door open to see that Lace was, as predicted by the little powerhouse in the kitchen, packing her clothes.

"I've got to get back, Jack," she said slowly and turned to the drawers in the dresser he'd cleared for her to use.

"Why?" he asked, and realized the question was stupid even to his own ears.

"Because I'm losing money every day the Bakery is closed," she replied calmly, but Jax could see how stiff, how fragile, she was as she placed her tops in the suitcase.

"We need you here, Lace," he said, trying to echo her calmness but he was shaking from the inside out. How had the old woman known?

"I'm just bringing you and Edie trouble, honey," she said, moving to the closet. "Trouble neither one of you need right now."

"You're wrong," he said, moving to her, pulling her back into his chest, burying his face in her hair. "We need you now more than ever, Lacey."

He felt her still and lean into him.

"Stay with us. Stay with me," he begged and didn't care if she knew it. "I need you. Need you here with me. Grams needs you, too."

He felt her back move as his ears caught her sob.

Jax turned her so she was pressed up next to him, her head in 'her' spot, their bodies as close as they could possibly get.

"Please don't leave me now, Lace," he whispered. "Stay with me. Stay with us."

She was curled up against his chest, her hands tucked under her chin.

He moved a hand and used one of her moves, the chin-grab, to bring her face to his and brought their mouths together.

"Stay with me, Lacey," he murmured against her lips before slanting and taking the kiss deeper.

Eventually they moved to the bed, after Jax had shifted the old suitcase to the floor.

And he did exactly as his dear Grams had suggested.

He loved her up, helping his Lace see stars even in the daytime.

Leading the two of them in doing the nasty in the nicest, most loving way he knew how.

Chapter 27

"And this is Lacey, my grandson's fiancée. Lacey, this is Ida, the day nurse Dr. Lindstrom's office sent over," Jax heard Gram's introduction from somewhere in the kitchen. He was on the stairs in a pair of partially buttoned jeans, no shirt or shoes. In other words, not dressed to receive company. He'd gone downstairs to see what was taking Lacey so long. He had been thinking along the lines of them having a naked party for two in the shower.

"I'm just his girlfriend," he heard Lacey say in her honeyed voice, which caused his jaw to flex and he vowed to correct that misinformation in a later conversation with her.

"I prefer to be called Miss Ida, if you don't mind," the other voice announced with a sniff.

Just from the tone given, never mind the fucking sniff, Jax turned and headed back upstairs to grab a shirt and at least a pair of socks. Anyone asking to be called 'Miss' on their first day wasn't anyone to mess with, especially before coffee.

He was just coming back out of the room as Lace hit the top of the stairs.

"What she like?" Jax whispered, still buttoning up his shirt.

"Scary as shit," Lacey whispered back, moving past him into the bedroom.

Well, then.

He slowly walked down and arranged his face into a calm, slight smile. The same kind of smile he used to wear for press conferences and award shows.

"There he is! Miss Ida, this is my grandson Jax Wynter," Edie announced proudly.

"How do you do, Miss Ida," he said, moving to kiss the top of Grams head before going to the coffeemaker that was grunting and groaning from its perch next to the stove.

Hearing no reply, Jax glanced at the woman dressed in all white and saw she was staring at his arms, his tats, exposed by the cuffs he'd rolled back.

"You're that rocker fella," she said slowly.

Jax's eyes moved to Grams before going back to the bulkhead that was to be his grandmother's daytime caregiver.

"Uh, yeah," he answered, not really knowing if the nurse had asked a question or not.

"I don't like rock," Miss Ida announced firmly. "I don't like hip-hop nor will I listen to any of that nasty rap. I like country. You play country, boy?"

Holy shit.

Lacey had the right of it. This woman was one scary bitch and didn't mind anyone knowing it.

"No, ma'am," he replied and allowed his eyes to roam over her. She was a big ol' gal with salt and pepper hair which was pulled up tight. She had a humongous bullet-shaped chest which was balanced by extremely wide, womanly hips and thick legs. But it was her little waist, encircled with a slim, white, patent-leather belt that your eye caught on.

"Doc said that I was to only answer to Mrs. Edie here until she can't answer no more," Miss Ida proclaimed. "Then, and only then, am I'm supposed to answer to you."

Jax could feel his eyes do a deep blink at her words.

What kind of shit
was
this?

He chanced a glance at Grams and saw her staring up at the stalwart nurse almost in fucking awe.

"Uhm, okay," he said, not knowing what else there was to say. "Would you care for some coffee?"

"I do tea, and I brought my own, made just the way I like it," the battle-axe replied. "I'll take lunch with the family but will only do dinner if I have to stay past five."

Jax nodded, at a loss for words. This chick was more demanding than Denny had been about what the band needed to have on hand backstage!