Page 20 of Unstoppable Love

“Nothing!” He stormed over to the table and sat down. “I didn’t do anything.”

“It’s what he forgot to do.” I glared at my brother.

“This is ridiculous. So what. Now you have to stay in a mansion with a pool for two weeks. Who cares if Cameron’s there? He’s like our brother.”

I fought the urge to gag and resisted. Barely. There was nothing brotherly about Cameron in my eyes.

“I thought Cameron was in the Bahamas,” Mom said.

“He was.” Isaiah flipped his hand in a circle. “There was a storm, now he’s home. And he doesn’t care at all that Ava’s there. He was surprised, yeah, because I did forget to ask him if she could stay there, but he’d have said yes anyway, so there’s no problem.”

“Oh, that’s so nice of Cameron,” my mom crooned. “He’s always been so sweet to us. And it was so nice of him to bring you home this weekend. Saves you miles on your own car.”

My mom and cars. If she wasn’t quilting, she was looking at vehicles. Heck, she even changed her own oil even when Dad tried to take care of it for her.

“Yeah, he’s a real Boy Scout,” I muttered. I was doing that a lot lately, but if everyone would leave me alone about Cameron or if I didn’t have to spend so much time around him, I’d mutter a whole heck of a lot less.

“See?” Isaiah grabbed another pizza slice off the pizza stone in the center of the table. “No harm. No foul. Everything worked out perfectly.” He bumped his shoulder into mine. “I saved you miles off your vehicle. You should be thanking me.”

I sighed. There was no winning this argument.

“What time are you off tonight?” I asked instead.

“Ten. And then I’m off all weekend. It’s the last of my four days.” Unless there was an emergency, all the sheriff deputies worked four ten-hour shifts a week. They could be called in if necessary, but it wasn’t like a lot happened in Plum County, so that didn’t happen a lot.

“Lydia and I are headed up to Tom’s later if you want to join us when you’re off.”

My brother narrowed his hazelnut eyes at me. “Is that because you forgive me and want to have a drink with me? Or because you’re going to sit back and watch Regina poison me?”

Regina Tomlinson worked behind the bar. Her great-granddaddy opened it, and it was passed down from generation to generation. A few years ago, her parents took off, and she stepped up to run it. Folks said her parents split because they drank so much the bar was at risk of closing. They poured their profits straight down their throats. On the flip side, Regina stepped up and took it over. I’d never seen her have a single sip of alcohol, and no one had any idea why she hated my brother so much.

I flashed Isaiah an evil grin. “Feel like playing Russian roulette with your drinks at the saloon?”

“So help me. She poisons me, and it’s on your conscience.” He shoved to his feet, kissed Mom’s cheek, and clapped Dad on the back. “Off to save the town and rescue hapless maidens. Take care!” He lifted a hand in the air on his way out, and seconds later, the screen door slammed behind him.

Before Mom could warn me of the dangers of drinking too much, calling if I needed a ride, or any of the other warnings she’d given me every day of my life since I was fourteen, I turned to her. “I bought new yarn today. Wanna see what I plan on making?”

She’d taught me how to crochet and knit when I was a kid. I’d stopped when I was a teenager because it wasn’t cool, but now I found it soothing. I could keep my hands busy while watching TV at night, and sometimes, if I needed to work out a problem in my head, it was the gentle clacking of needles and the rhythmic motions of following a pattern that helped me work out the kinks in my brain.

Her entire face lit up with a smile. “I’d love to! I’m going to rush off to see Grams after I’m done eating. Want to come with and show us both?”

Grams was my great-grandma and almost ninety. My mom’s parents had died in a car crash in a winter storm when I was five, and my dad’s parents lived in Arizona, and I hardly ever saw them growing up. Grams was the only grandma I ever knew. She’d also lived alone until last year, and at the age of eighty-eight, she declared she was bored living alone and wanted to be with people.

Mom and Dad moved her into the retirement home in town as soon as a spot opened up, and now she was the home’s social chair coordinator.

The home had never been so busy, had so many events, or had such high attendance.

And Grams had never been happier.

Chapter 7

Ava

“Well, this is lovely.” Gram’s long, frail, and aging finger rubbed over the picture on my phone, swiping to see the blanket I’d decided to make. I usually preferred smaller projects I could complete quickly, but the pattern was simply too lovely to resist when I saw it.

Crazy how it’d been just that morning.

“You know what would keep you warmer than this blanket?”

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