Page 76 of From Grumpy to Forever
When I didn’t answer, Jacob chuckled. “Shocking.” He rolled his eyes dramatically. “He disappeared as soon as the money dried up, huh?”
I hugged my arms around my waist to keep my hands from shaking.
“I guess I should give him some credit though,” Jacob continued. “He’s smart enough to know when to quit. The jig’s up, Avery. You should take a note from your partner in crime and hand it over. You lost. You’ve been exposed for the fraud that you are. And Reid’s absence today proves?—”
“It proves nothing, you jackass.”
My heart leapt in my throat at the familiar voice. Before I could turn to confirm it with my own eyes, Reid’s arm slipped around my waist and pulled me close. The heat from his body warmed me. Instinctively, I leaned in closer.
“Sorry I’m late,” he whispered as he kissed me on the cheek. “I came as soon as I heard what was happening.”
I looked up into his eyes, searching for the answers to every single unasked question I had. And I had many. But now wasn’t the time. “Thank you for coming,” I said instead. “I can’t tell you what it?—”
“Avery.” Reid turned me and cupped my cheek. “I need you to?—”
“Give it up already.” Jacob stepped forward, his sharp voice slicing between us. “We all know the two of you are full of shit. You’re just making fools of yourself now.”
Reid sucked in a breath and squeezed his eyes shut. I could see the effort he was putting in to keep his anger in check.
“Why don’t we just wait until we hear from Judge Baker.” William stepped forward and put a hand on Jacob’s shoulder but my cousin shook him off.
“We don’t need to wait,” he sneered. “We already know. This is fake.” He waved toward Reid and me. “And I can prove it.”
He couldn’t. No one could. Not really.
“I have witnesses that can verify you hired Reid to do the renovations on the inn, mere days before you got married.”
“That doesn’t prove anything, you asshat.” Reid had turned to face Jacob head-on. He’d released his hold on me to stand with his arms crossed over his broad chest. He looked formidable. “Except that you are grasping at straws.”
“I don’t think I am, hotshot.” Jacob’s smug expression soured my stomach. “I have proof that the day after your wedding also happened to be the day that you put the down payment down on your fancy new wood shop. Which leads me, and anyone else with half a working brain, to believe that my pretty little cousin here paid you to be her husband so that she could meet the terms of our grandfather’s will that required her to have a husband.”
Somewhere, someone behind me let out a gasp. It was only then that I realized we’d once again managed to draw an audience to our family drama. An audience that was very quickly learning the truth of our deception. Even if Jacob didn’t have any actual proof, I had to admit that hearing it from his lips, it all sounded pretty damming.
I took a step back, away from Reid. If I was going down—and it seemed that I was—I wasn’t going to let him go down with me.
“Without that husband,” Jacob continued his rant, “not only would the inn not go to Avery, but she’d also lose the cash inheritance that goes with it.”
“That money is for fixing up the inn, Jacob. It’s not for?—”
“It doesn’t matter, does it, cuz?” His voice dripped with poison.
When had he started hating me so much?
This wasn’t what our grandparents would have wanted. Everything was such a mess.
I shook my head and instinctively looked for an escape route.
There wasn’t one.
The crowd had only grown around us.
My stomach sank. I looked to William for guidance, but he was staring at his phone, typing quickly to someone on the other end.
I couldn’t bring myself to look at Reid.
It was over.
I shook my head, focused on my cousin, and took a step toward him. “You’re right, Jacob.”
