by Pippa Grant
Winery be damned.
I just want her to be safe and happy and loved.
“You’re a superhero to every single one of those animals you rescue,” I continue, answering the dubious wrinkle of her brows. “You nurse them. You give them a home. You fight for them. Even the ones no one else wants. Especially the ones that no one else wants. That’s more heroic than anything I’ve done in my life, and it’s inspiring. I’m so proud of you.”
She blinks like she’s on the verge of tears again. “I—thank you. I don’t…I don’t think anyone’s ever said that to me before.”
My head rears back. “You can’t be serious.”
“I’m a college dropout without a real job.” She makes air quotes around real job, and I want to punch whoever made her feel like college and a paycheck from someone else is all that matters in life. “That doesn’t count for pride points where I come from.”
“You stand on your own two feet and save more lives in any given week than most people do in a lifetime. You’re amazing. Don’t let anyone ever tell you otherwise.”
The door swings open, and a droopy-faced Kyle with hooded lids, wearing a rumpled suit jacket paired with a pair of bright green jogging shorts, stares stupidly at us. “Whaddya want?” he slurs.
Hope lunges for him, but I grab her before she can get her hands around his throat.
“We want the alpaca back,” I tell him. “Now.”
“You nasty, thieving, lying scumbag,” she adds. She pauses, and then she spits at his feet. “And that’s for every time you called him a llama.”
His barely-focused eyes sharpen. A little. “Whadder you talkin’ ’bout?” He points an unsteady finger at the ground and adds, “Thas gross. And unlady—” He burps. Loudly. Before finishing without a trace of irony. “Unladylike.”
Hope grimaces and rears back with a soft gag as the scent of him drifts out onto the porch.
Dude smells like he showered in stale whiskey while chugging a six-pack of cheap beer.
“Oh my god. Are you drunk? At eight in the morning?” she asks.
“Where’s the allapama?” He shakes his head, grabs the door frame to steady himself, and mutters, “Whoa.”
“If you hurt Chewpaca, whoa is the last thing you’ll ever say.” Hope waves a hand in front of her face, presumably to disperse the stench. I hold my breath, not certain any amount of hand waving will help. “I talked to the attorney yesterday,” she continues, “and he says he specifically told you two days ago that you needed to wait for the court date.”
“Not gonna happen.” He uses his forearm to wipe at his nose. “No court. No allapama jizz money. No happiness. Nothing but misery and…” He burps again. “Despair.”
Hope looks up at me. “Shit. He’s useless.”
“She’s gone. Gooooone. Gone.” He grabs a forty of malt liquor from just inside the door and tips it back, then lifts it higher and shakes, squinting one eye up into the bottle.
A single drop falls out and lands in his eye. “Pain, sweet pain,” he croaks in response. “And now I’ll never see ’er again.”
“Cara left you?” Hope asks.
“She had abraca-astigmakismata. Got new glasses yesterday. When she realized my dick was normal size, it was bye-bye Kyle Gaylord Jr.”
My forehead wrinkles as questions I can’t ask zip through my brain—couldn’t she feel what size his dick was? How blind was this woman? And how am I just learning that Kyle’s middle name is Gaylord? This is something he should have been tormented for the entire time he was growing up in Happy Cat, even if he was homeschooled.
“So you won’t win Chewy in court,” she says, voice tight with barely controlled anger. “Is that why you stole him?”
Kyle rubs his eye. “Not unless I drunk him while I was stole.” He frowns. Burps. Puckers his lips. “Stole him drunk I was while.” He waves a hand. “You mean what I know.”
“Then who has the alpaca, Kyle?” she demands.
He blinks at us with one semi-clear eye, and one disinfected-by-booze eye. “Hey, yeah. Where is he? What’s going on? You lost Gam-gam’s prize alpaca?”
“So Chewy’s really not here?” I ask, wanting to be one-hundred-percent sure before we expand our search.
He glances behind him. “I mean, we can look, but I didn’t put him here.”
“Damn it,” Hope murmurs. “I think he’s telling the truth.”
“Call Cassie,” I say. “Tell her to get everyone to the sanctuary. We can organize a search party there. I’ll sober up Mr. Heartbreak, and meet you there as soon as I can.”
“Don’t wanna be sober,” Kyle says, nose wrinkling.
“You’ll love it,” I assure him, clapping him on the back. “My brother’s a bartender. Has all the best tricks to make it painless.”
“What are you going to do?” Hope asks.
I grin. “Whatever’s easiest.”
She shoves me out of the way. “Then I’m sobering him up, because I’ve always wanted to dunk him in a bucket of water. You call the troops. I’d probably break the phone anyway.”
“Remember we might need him to talk,” I call as I trail her into Kyle’s house, which is overflowing with evidence of a frat party gone wrong. Bottles of beer and whiskey litter the floor, half-empty pizza boxes sit open on the stairs, and for some reason a roll of toilet paper has unrolled itself across the kitchen island and left a trail of white into the living room.
I get on group text with my brothers, who all reply nearly instantaneously to let me know they’re on their way to the sanctuary. Then I take a quick tour of Kyle’s house to verify no evidence of alpaca exists.
When I get back to the kitchen, Hope’s squaring off with him again, but he’s dripping wet and significantly more sober.
“I don’t know,” he says, like he’s exasperated. “Who in their right mind would steal an alpaca? You and I are the only two people who know he’s worth anything.”
“Cara knows,” I correct him.
Kyle and Hope turn as one, and Kyle mutters a curse under his breath.
Hope drives a hand through her hair. “And she was at the sanctuary with us yesterday. Not for very long, but maybe long enough to make the dogs think it was okay for her to be poking around in the barn last night? I mean, it’s a long shot, but definitely worth checking into.”
“C’mon,” I say to both of them. “We’re going alpaca hunting. Kyle, buddy, you’re riding in the back. No offense, but you still smell like pickled whiskey ass.”
Twenty-Three
Hope
* * *
I’m trying desperately not to bite my nails. I’d really love to hold Blake’s hand again—it helped keep me calm on the way to Kyle’s house—but instead, we’re separated by the drowned and drunken rat between us.
Turns out riding in the back makes him sick to his stomach, which we learned halfway to Cara’s place when he wouldn’t stop banging on the back glass and turning green.
“Quit poking me,” Kyle hisses.
“Payback’s a bitch, buddy.” I poke his leg again, because it’s in my space. “Quit manspreading. Just because I’m a woman doesn’t mean I don’t deserve legroom. Especially since this is your fault.”
“This wouldn’t have happened if you wouldn’t have married an asshole to try to fight me for the beast,” he snaps back.
Then he oofs, which I assume means Blake got him with an elbow.
“That beast is worth more than just his sperm, and he deserves a happy life,” I retort. “You’re the one who told your wife what he was worth.”
“I didn’t think she was the type to steal a horse.”
“Alpaca. And you’re the one who hired an inept private eye to spy on me and my husband.”
Kyle grunts. “He caught you sleeping separately, didn’t he?”
“How much further to Cara’s house?” Blake interrupts.
“Two blocks. See that oak tree that looks like it has a big penis growing out the side? Turn ther
e.”
I smile. “Yeah, I can see where you’d be a disappointment, if that’s what she’s used to looking at every day.”
“Go on. Laugh. You’re right. I’m an idiot.” He hangs his head with his hand, and if I weren’t so worried about getting Chewy back before he gets hurt, I might actually feel bad for my cousin.
I get the sense he actually liked Cara, as much as the snootier side of the St. Claire bloodline is capable of liking anyone, anyway.
“There,” he says with a weary sigh. “The little house on the big lot.”
I gasp.
It’s an itty-bitty pink house that looks like it was ripped right out of the Candy Land board game and plunked down in the middle of Happy Cat.
And I do mean itty-bitty.
“She was on one of those home shows about going tiny after her house blew up in a gas explosion,” he says forlornly. “There are drawers under her bed that work the way they’re supposed to instead of getting off their tracks and sitting weird. And a table that folds out of the wall.” He sniffs. “She uses it as her desk too.”
Blake and I make eye contact around him.
I can’t believe I actually feel sorry for my cousin.
But I’ll buy him a beer later.
After we rescue my alpaca.
I hop out of my truck, Blake and Kyle on my heels. But I don’t even get halfway across the half-acre lot to the ten-foot-wide structure before the door opens and Cara steps out.
“I’d throw something dramatically, but I’m a minimalist and don’t have anything to spare to throw,” she says. “Next time, don’t tell a girl your dick is bigger than your house, especially when the house is as big as yours. I thought you cared about the earth, and instead you’re taking up as much space as an entire football team, however many people that is. I’m sure it’s a lot.”
“We’re looking for the alpaca,” I explain, not wanting to get sidetracked by the relationship drama.
Cara blinks. “Then shouldn’t you be at your place?”
“You didn’t take him?” Blake asks.
She huffs. “Of course not. I would never force a creature from his home. I know how terrible that feels. Believe me. And I don’t exactly have a spare bedroom. I had to give my fish away when I moved in.”
“The fish didn’t die in the explosion?” I ask, a little buoyed by the news.
She shakes her head. “No, I got him after. When I was living with my parents.” Her gaze shifts to Kyle, her eyes narrowing. “Also, I don’t make love like a giraffe anymore. Someone ruined that experience for me. Forever.”
“I can try harder,” he tells her.
“You’re a spoiled man-child who doesn’t realize the dick is the frosting on the cupcake. The only thing that could improve your cake is another seven to ten years of honest to god personal development.” She crosses her arms with an eye roll. “I’m never marrying a man again before I see his sock drawer. Now go away. I have to drown my sorrows in kombucha, and I don’t want an audience.”
“Can I verify that you don’t have our alpaca, first?” Blake asks. “Have a quick look around? And then we’ll leave you to your mourning.”
She flips a hand at the house. “Oh, please. Be my guest. Spread your mistrust all over my personal sanctuary. Would you like to ruin armadillos for me while you’re at it?”
“They carry leprosy,” I say, hating to be the bearer of bad news, but…
“Hope,” Blake mutters beneath his breath.
“But they’re really adorable otherwise,” I add hastily. “I love their armor.”
We make a quick trip around the house, verifying that Chewpaca isn’t sunning himself in the backyard or lounging inside on Cara’s bed.
Actually, I can’t even see the bed. Maybe it’s hanging from the ceiling?
These tiny houses are really something else.
“Maybe your alpaca decided to go find a bigger herd?” Cara suggests when we get back around front. “Don’t they like to have five or six buddies around for socializing and things?”
“No, he didn’t leave on his own.” I shudder at the memory of what I found when I went to let Chewy out this morning. “Someone sawed through the padlock and left tire tracks from the barn, and Too-Pac was very upset.” I shake my head. “But if you two didn’t take him…who did?”
“How should I know?” Her shoulders bob. “I’m a forensic statistician. If you want a private detective, hire that goofball Kyle uses. He caught you two sleeping apart, didn’t he?”
“He was cheap too,” Kyle says. “You could probably afford him.”
“Great.” Blake snags him by the collar and starts dragging him back to the truck. “Then you can call him and pay him, because this is still your fault.”
“How is it my fault?” Kyle yelps.
“Because you wanted Chewpaca for all the wrong reasons,” I say. “If you’d wanted him because you loved him and cared that he had a good long life, then we could’ve worked something out. Instead, you hired a PI to make everything worse than Gram’s will made it in the first place.”
“Good luck finding your llama,” Cara calls after us.
“Alpaca,” Blake and I call back together.
Cara laughs. “I know. I was joking. Geez…the way you’re all behaving, you’d think someone had died. I’m sure whoever took the little guy will take care of him, right? Probably just wanted something to love.”
I don’t dignify that with a response. Cara knows Chewy is worth a lot of money. Love had nothing to do with this. It was greed. Plain and simple.
Blake pushes Kyle back to the truck while he grips my hand. “We’re going to find him,” he promises me.
But how?
Kyle doesn’t have him. Cara was a long shot, and she doesn’t have him.
Or one of them is lying.
Or someone else wants Chewpaca.
My eyes water again.
I’m so tired of crying.
But Chewpaca’s missing, and we don’t know why or how.
I don’t know if he’s terrified or if he’s comfortable or if he’s alone or if he’s been stolen to be sold off on the alpaca black market. I don’t know who took him.
Or how.
“The dogs should’ve barked. Even if it was someone they’ve met before,” I say as Blake wraps one arm around me and points Kyle into the truck with his other hand. “Why didn’t the dogs bark? I didn’t leave the house the entire night or morning. Maud brought over the cinnamon rolls. I would’ve heard the dogs bark.”
“We’re going to find him,” Blake says again.
“But what if we don’t?”
“Hope. Look at me.” I blink up at him, fighting to hold it together, but the fear fingers are so tight around my neck now that I can barely breathe.
“We are going to find Chewpaca. All of us. Together,” he insists. “You and me? We’re family. That means you have all of the O’Dells, and the rest of Happy Cat behind you. Trust me. Okay?”
“Okay.” I lean in, hugging him tight.
I don’t know what I did to deserve this man in my life, but I’m so, so grateful that he’s here.
Twenty-Four
Blake
* * *
I don’t have a fucking clue how I’m going to find Chewpaca.
But I made my wife a promise, and I’ll be damned before I let her down.
Unfortunately, after dropping Kyle off at his house to cry into half-empty pizza boxes, we arrive at the sanctuary to find my family isn’t the only crew assembled.
I make eye contact with Clint, who’s corralled the O’Dell contingency on the porch, separate from the pant-suit-wearing trio standing rigidly in the shade beside the farmhouse. Before I can get more than a grimace and a shrug from my brother, however, we’re spotted by the suits.
“Finally. Hope, this sham comes to an end right now.” An older woman who looks like Hope iced-over, dolled up, and aged thirty years marches over to us in low heels and a pale gray suit, two me
n on her heels. She motions to the taller, prune-faced guy with a moustache behind her—ah, must be Hope’s father, he of the judgmental, ’stache—and then the shorter, red-cheeked Santa Claus look-alike. “Hope, this is our attorney, Mr. Tweedleton. He’ll be drawing up the annulment paperwork.”
“Charmed,” Tweedleton says with a dimple-popping grin.
“Mom, you’re home early.” Hope’s eyes go wide as she glances between her mother and the impish lawyer. “Wh-what? No. Chewpaca is missing, and we have to—”
“Get an annulment,” her mother repeats with exaggerated patience, making my fists curl. What the hell? “It’s a process by which a marriage can be declared invalid if—”
“I know what it is,” Hope says, cutting her off. “But I’m not getting one. I told you in the message I left you the other day that Blake and I—”
“Are attempting to perpetrate fraud,” her prune-faced father cuts in, his voice as brittle as glass crunching beneath heavy shoes. “In order to profit from your grandmother’s will.”
“Hold on a minute—” I start, but Hope interrupts me.
“That’s not true. Our marriage is legal. Ask Judge Maplethorpe. Or look at the records in the courthouse, everything’s in order.”
“Marriage fraud is a very serious charge, young lady,” her father continues as if she hasn’t spoken a word, his thick brows forming a disapproving V above his cold blue eyes. “One that could end with a prison sentence.”
“That’s only if you’re paying someone to marry you for citizenship,” Hope says with a tight laugh. I start to speak again, but she cuts me an I’ve got this look. “And I would never do that. Obviously. I’m already a U.S. citizen.”
“But the man from Atlanta you were ready to pay five thousand dollars to marry you isn’t,” her mother states, her words making Hope shrink inside her clothes.
“You know about that?” Hope whispers while I flinch.
I don’t like to think about her marrying someone else.
“We know about that,” her mother confirms. “Frederick Boucher is Canadian and was only too eager to forward your emails to our private investigator. I imagine he’d be just as eager to hand them over to the authorities. It’s a disgrace to the family. On top of everything else you’ve done. Or rather, not done.”