Page 3 of Work It Out
Behind him, Pierce made a choking noise, but Jake didn’t take his eyes off the woman now glaring at his outstretched hand.
Slowly, she placed the magazine on the desk and rose to her feet. She was tall. Not as tall as his six feet and change, but she wasn’t as far from it as most women. Crossing her arms over a tank top that readButDid You Die?, she left his hand hanging in the breeze and somehow managed to look down her nose at him. “Obviously.”
He was trying to figure out what that meant when Pierce found his voice. “Play nice, Grace.” He squeezed Jake’s shoulder. “I said Rayah’s scary, not ball-shrivelingly terrifying.”
Grace bared her teeth at him in some approximation of a smile. “Bite me, Jersey Shore.”
“That’d be a sick burn if that reference wasn’t a thousand years old.”
Her answering eye roll was spectacularly disdainful. Jake opened his mouth to ask her if she taught a MasterClass in derision when he heard the last voice he expected. “Christopher Declan Moloughney, you get your backside over here and give me a kiss.”
No freaking way.
“Granny?”
“Oh, shit.” Pierce paled. “They should’ve been done an hour ago.”
Grace smirked like her birthday had arrived early. “They started later today. Scheduling conflict.”
Tired of waiting, Granny bustled over and hip-checked Pierce out of the way. She stood there, face upturned like a queen, until Jake bent down and placed a kiss on her wrinkled cheek. Then she turned to Pierce, waiting for the same treatment.
He dutifully bussed her other cheek. “Mornin’, Granny Jean. Don’t you look fine today?”
She slapped his arm. “Don’t try to flirt your way out of it this time, young man. You knew my grandson was coming home and didn’t tell me.”
“I— He—” Pierce sputtered.
Despite Pierce’s recent proclamation of premeditated defection, Jake jumped in to save him. “I told him not to. I wasn’t sure I’d make it in today, and I didn’t want to disappoint you.”
Now that the shock had worn off, he took in her appearance and bit his cheek to keep from laughing. She was decked out in a Pepto Bismol pink velour tracksuit circa Britney Spears and patting at her neck with a small white towel, despite a decided lack of perspiration. Jake blinked a few times, but nothing changed. If the word “Juicy” was written across her backside, he might have to run all the way back to California. Finally, he asked, “What are you doing here?”
A giant with a freaking man-bun ambled up behind her, sweat glistening against his overblown bare chest and a tapestry of scars. “Everything all right, Ms. Jean?” the shirtless wonder asked in a thick Georgia accent.
She grinned up at the dude, patting a bicep the size of a Christmas ham. “Blaine dear, this is my grandson, Christopher.” She turned back to Jake. “Christopher, this is Blaine.”
Oh, God. Please, no. He gave the guy a chin tip, because it couldn’t be what it looked like. No way had Granny turned sugar momma to this fool. “I still don’t—”
“Well, sweetheart, your grandfather, God rest his soul…” Her right hand drifted to her forehead.
Jake expelled a frustrated sigh and cut her off before she could finish crossing herself. “The man isn’t dead, Granny.”
She sniffed. “He’s dead to me.”
A glance around confirmed that the only thing their audience needed was a bowl of popcorn.
Though he knew he shouldn’t, Jake asked, “What’d he do this time?”
“He suggested I was getting too plump.”
His eyes narrowed. “Those were his exact words?”
“He said I needed to ‘get more exercise’,” she replied stiffly.
Oh, Lord. “He is still alive, isn’t he?”
That smile turned bone-chilling. “Of course, dear. Though alive and well are rather different things, aren’t they?” She patted her Betty White, cotton-ball hairdo. “Anyway, I took his suggestion to heart and decided the safest thing to do at my advanced age would be to hire a personal trainer.”
Jake rubbed his temple. He felt like warmed-over hell, and this conversation wasn’t helping. “You’re sixty-five.”
