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Gram on the way. “I just woke up not too long ago. I got a deadline to make on some parts that need delivering before I cross the state line home.”
    The line went eerily silent. I knew exactly why, but I didn’t dare break it. Gram hated me on the road and that I took this job.
    “Brody, I don’t like you traveling for work.”
    I lifted my eyes to the heavens. I called that one. Opening the doughnut case, I grabbed a couple of cream-filled doughnuts and a cake one with sprinkles. I wondered if Alex liked those.
    “It’s not safe. You could get robbed or something.”
    “I haven’t yet, Gram,” I told her, selecting more doughnuts with tissue paper. “And you know I can handle my own.”
    Not only did I grow up in a house full of men, one in which all of us boys were rowdy as hell, but I’d been in a bar fight or two. I blamed that on my stupid days. All of which occurred in my late teens and early twenties. It was back when I thought the girls I met in bars were worth fighting over. I was twenty-five now and didn’t have time for that shit. In more dangerous situations, I had my firearm. Gram knew that. Fuck, she showed me how to use it. My pop could shoot like the best of them, but my gram, she knew a gun like the back of her hand. She had to. It was just she and my Aunt Robin living out on a small ranch by themselves. My grand pop died a few years back and since then, it’d been only the two of them out there besides the ranch hands.
    “I know you can; that doesn’t mean I want you to,” she continued.
    I closed the box of doughnuts. I’d gathered a dozen or so inside. I wanted Alex to have choices, as I didn’t know what she liked. I was filling two cups with coffee when Gram spoke again.
    “Don’t you think this is silly? You could just be working for your dad.”
    I gripped the cup I’d just sealed with a plastic lid. My gram made a mistake. I wouldn’t be working for my pop. His name might have been on the construction business he just launched late last year, but it wasn’t his. Not really. Besides, I didn’t need the handout. I took care of myself. I always brought in money and put it back toward the family when it was needed; whether it was a fence that had to be mended on my Gram’s ranch or even just a utility bill to make things easier on my pop. I worked the most out of all us kids growing up, even more than my older brother, Hayden, when we worked with Pop all those years at Carter’s Construction . Working was something I was good at and took pride in and I liked the feeling it gave me to give back to the people who raised me. I’d always been able to do that. I’d always been able to help out.
    That was until earlier this year.
    I sealed the other cup with another lid, placing both coffees in a cardboard cup holder after I did. “I like what I do, Gram. And I’m safe doing this job. I promise.”
    I was only mostly sure on both things I’d said, but I couldn’t worry my gram. Mostly was enough in this case.
    “I hope so. Are you coming to dinner Friday?” she asked.
    I smiled, walking my items to the counter to purchase. “Of course.”
    “Good. Your pop will be there.”
    I held my smile like she was here to put it on for. “Perfect.”
    Gram filled me in on the list of grub she was making for Friday while I paid for the coffee and doughnuts. I ended up using my debit card, as I was running low on cash after last night. The list of food on my Gram’s agenda had my mouth watering by the time we finished up the call. I was actually happy to come home for a bit and relax a minute between routes to see her and my aunt.
    I exited the truck stop and the sight of Alex sent an unexpected jump into my heart.
    She stood outside my truck, her hand pushed into her short hair. She’d been wrapped up in my sheets earlier so I missed the image of her in a shirt way too large for her, framing only the most developed parts of her body. The shirt was so long it nearly covered, what I