The Wager

Chapter Seven

The madness had to stop. Grandma had only been staying with him a day—a DAY—and in the course of 24 hours she had thrown his life so off balance that he’d probably be in a mental institution come Friday.

Grandma woke him up at two a.m.

Her reason? She thought she’d seen a Huntsman’s spider. Right. A spider that, according to his Internet search, was native only to Australia. But when Jake brought that little bit of information up, Grandma had shouted that she’d been to Australia a few months ago and it was possible that a spider had crawled into her bag and hatched eggs.

Truly, it was Jake’s fault that he even engaged his grandma. His question had been simple—why the hell would a spider choose her bag? Out of all the bags in the world, it had chosen hers? Not likely.

Her response? Because it’s shiny and everyone knows spiders like shiny things. She then proceeded to thrust a flashlight in his face and make him search the house for said spider.

By four a.m., Jake was ready to cut off his own ears. Apparently, Grandma had a snoring problem.

Six a.m. was even worse. Grandma did yoga. Jake was given the opportunity to discover this firsthand, when Grandma proceeded to put on her yoga DVD, blaring it throughout the surround sound in the house. Which really wouldn’t have been so bad had she told him it was a type of stripper yoga for elderly woman, aka Cougars.

Her workout shirt had the picture of a cougar on it. Big shock there.

Finally. Jake locked his door.

But Grandma was relentless. After some banging and a loud clang, his door came off the hinges. “Jake? Oh goodness! I thought you’d died!”

“God isn’t that just. Believe me. I’ve begged.”

“Oh, Jake.” Grandma plopped on his bed. “Chin up! Think of me firing you as an extended vacation.”

“Except…” Jake growled. “It’s not. I’m jobless. I have no career, no money, I have nothing, and you’re downstairs doing damn cougar yoga as if the sun is still shining!”

Grandma paused and then went over to the window and thrust open the curtains. “But the sun is shining… and it’s a beautiful day. I think if you just go outside for a run, you’ll realize how nice it is to be on vacation.”

“Fired,” Jake corrected her.

“Vacation,” Grandma said sternly. “Now, I’m going to go shopping with that nice young girl from yesterday. She’s Kacey’s maid of honor and we only have two weeks to—”

“Wait.” Jake jolted out of bed. “Back up. Who’s Kacey’s maid of honor?”

“That nice young girl who saved your life yesterday. She and Kacey have been friends for ages! She was in Portland with her sister for a quick vacation and considering it was just family, except for your whore, at the engagement party, she wasn’t present.”

“But—”

“Now!” Grandma clapped. “Go enjoy your day off and I’m going to shop!”

“But—”

“And put some damn clothes on, son. You ain’t got nobody to impress in this house.”

With that, Grandma marched out of his room, leaving his unhinged door lying against the wall and Jake staring after her wondering if he’d in fact be arrested for assaulting an elderly woman.

Fired.

No more family money.

And he had to go to his brother’s wedding in two weeks.

With a woman he’d scorned not once, but twice in his life.

Maybe he’d carry some peanuts, just in case he needed an easy escape… or a new way to meet his maker, since apparently God was keen on keeping Jake on earth so he could torture him for the rest of his days.