Page 15 of Amaze Me

Chapter Eight

~ Judd ~

Nothing could get me down. Not even my mother, who’d trekked out to the west field to find me while I was working on the irrigation system. Watching the familiar green truck approach, I figured that, at least, she was bothering me and not Mimi.

I smiled again as I thought of my wife, my pregnant wife. I hadn’t left for work as early as normal this morning. The clear choice had been to stay in bed with her until she planned to head over to the coffee shop. In a way, I felt bad that I had my commitment here on the farm, leaving her to walk into the middle of the work I’d done on the shop.

Mimi assured me, it would be fine. Yesterday afternoon, she’d set up a call with Sable about moving the business closer to opening. She also intended to go over the business plans, blueprints and other documents, which were frankly a mess. I didn’t envy her sorting it out. She’d also mentioned looking at my maze paperwork, which instilled a little guilt in me, but didn’t stop me from eagerly shoving everything into a folder and handing it to her this morning.

Unfortunately, the sound of a truck door slamming heralded the arrival of my mother and dragged me from pleasant thoughts of last night and this morning.

“So…” my mom said, her arms crossed much as they’d been last night. “Mimi is back.”

“Yes.” I turned to face her, wiping my hands on a shop cloth. My chin notched up, my expression daring her to start something with me. I crossed my arms to mirror her stance. “And…?”

“Do you think that’s wise?”

“Wise?I love her. She’s my wife. She’s been in my life for at least ten years—”

“She’s a spoiled brat,” she interrupted.

I bristled. Family or not, no one had the leeway to speak poorly of Mimi. Especially when their words were untrue.

“Excuse me?” I grated.

“She’s lazy and has no interest in helping out with the farm. She throws temper tantrums, and you give her whatever she wants. Just look what happened. As soon as you indulged her, she came running right back here.”

“You’re talking about the coffee shop?”

She gave a curt nod, her lips sourly pursed. “Among other things.”

Her words were stiff and pointed. I could only imagine what theseother thingswere, but I had zero inclination to ask her to elaborate. Mimi wasn’t the things my mother claimed her to be.

“Mimi never asked for the shop. She didn’t even know about it until yesterday. Further, her parents funded a great deal of it. At least half. It’s a means for her to express her creativity and use her talents to support our family.Our family—Mimi and me.” And our baby, but Mimi and I had decided not to tell anyone about that for now. Even family.

“She won’t do it. She’ll start the work at her little coffee place, lose interest and quit.”

As far as I could remember, Mimi had never done that. Our freshman year, she’d been a cheerleader and hated it, but she’d gone to every practice and every game. She’d always worked hard at everything, whether it was classes or extra curricular activities. She regularly volunteered in the community, having no problem getting dirty when needed, even though she believed she didn’t do anything special. God knew she sometimes drove me crazy with her tenacity toward growing my maze business—our business, if I were fully honest.

My eyes narrowed. “I’m sure I don’t know what you’re talking about. And before you go on, Wilt and Morrie have filled me in on some of the things you’ve said to Mimi—things that Mimi never told me about, by the way. What you’ve said and how you’ve made her feel unwelcome and useless here.”

“I’ve never! I tried to teach her to cook, so she can feed you. And showed her how to do things here on the farm, so she can fit in.”

“But only the things you deem that she should do.” I wouldn’t even bring up the cooking. I didn’t give a rat’s butt end about that.

“Watch your attitude. I amstillyour mother.”

I bit my tongue when I would have retorted in sarcasm. “Yesterday, I talked to dad. I’m ready to move away from the farm so Mimi and I can get some distance from…the bubble of the family enclave. If we leave, I’ll continue to work here. But part time only.”

She gasped. Yeah, my dad hadn’t told her about that. “She is not taking my baby away from here!”

“Mimi has had no part in this—not directly. In fact, she’ll probably try to dissuade me. She’s been part of this family for years, whether you want to admit it or not. And she knows how important family is and won’t want me to step away. But I will. She won’t be taking me anywhere.I’llbe taking her. Protecting her. Even if we have to leave Sweetville.”

Ma stared at me, and I saw thousands of words flying across her features, held back behind her compressed lips, but clearly shown through her stare. She was weighing each word, every argument and the outcome of any given action. I knew that about her. It was one of her strengths—a strength she’d apparently left tucked away at home while she’d been interacting with her daughter-in-law.

“What do you want from me?” she finally asked.

“Maybe, you could treat Mimi like she’s your daughter, and not an interloper. Your own daughter—not some stranger who’s supposedly pulling your baby boy away from you. Mimi doesn’t want to come between me and the family. It’s why she never told me any of what was going on.”

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