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He was new, too.
He was about Murphy and Madden’s age and looked like he had seen a hard life.
Apparently, according to Fran who had the inside scoop, Haggard Beauregard went way back with both Taos and Madden.
Though where Taos and Madden went police when they got old enough, Haggard had gone…not police.
He’d gotten into a little bit of trouble with the law, straightened himself out, then joined a motorcycle club around the age of twenty-two.
From there, though they stayed in touch, they didn’t continue to be best friends like Taos and Madden did.
Then Sophia, Madden’s daughter, came home with a little girl who turned out to be her best friend over the next couple of years. And it was found out that Clementine, Sophia’s best friend, happened to have Haggard as a father. Though, Haggard didn’t have full custody of his kid. Only partial custody.
Over the years, as Clementine and Sophia’s friendship grew, Haggard was slowly pulled back into the fold.
Now, Haggard was working at the gym—at least during a few classes of the day—to help Madden and Taos until things settled down.
I still didn’t know what Haggard did.
I knew that whatever it was, he was pretty secretive about it because not even Taos knew.
I did know he was still in a motorcycle club, and Sophia had a crush on him.
“What are your eyes doing that weird back and forth thing for?” Murphy asked.
I blinked, surprised to find that I was staring at Sophia across the room.
Johan, Soren’s brother, was in the gym working out with us as well, and he was, apparently, Sophia’s last crush.
That crush was now out the window, because Sophia, with the two options in the room with her, chose the bigger and badder of the two.
“You know, during a CrossFit workout is the only time a woman can hear ‘nice snatch’ and it not be offensive.”
I blinked, surprised to find my sister there when she was supposed to be watching my kid.
And no kid in sight.
“Where’s Vlad?” I asked.
Fran jerked her head toward the office where I could see Taos working with the door closed.
“In there,” she said. “I left him with my phone and Taos. Between the two things, he should stay out of trouble mostly. I just wanted to come watch. Heard what was said from across the room, and thought I’d put my two cents in. Oh, and tell you that our grandmother is coming to dinner at our house tomorrow, and you’re required to be there, so I don’t kill her.”
I blinked.
“I have to work tomorrow,” I replied immediately.
I didn’t have to work tomorrow, and she knew it. I’d just come off of a triple twelve-hour shift. She’d kept my own kid for me for all thirty-six of those hours.
At this point, Vlad was just as much her kid as he was mine.
“Why is she coming over?” Murphy asked curiously.
“I at least invited her over to my house.” Fran ignored the question.
“Fran,” I said through clenched teeth.
Geez, but I seriously couldn’t stand my grandmother.
In all this time, she hadn’t once called to check on me.
“Get your last set done and I’ll explain,” Fran promised.
I sighed and loaded another five pounds onto the bar, then did as instructed, making sure to fix the things that Murphy pointed out were wrong—at least I tried anyway—as I did.
When I was done, and we were cleaning up the weights, Fran sat down on the pile of weights without helping and explained.
“So Vlad and I were doing some errands today,” she started. “And I ran into our grandmother at the hospital. She was there on her foundation business or whatever, so it looked really, really bad when we rolled up in there and Vlad had not the first fuckin’ clue who she was in front of her board members.”
I snorted, but ultimately didn’t say a word.
“Then it got awkward as hell because one of the board members brought up the fact that your husband was in the hospital for open heart surgery, and she didn’t even know.” She paused, scrunching up her nose in pain. “So I made a snarky comment, and then she got this look in her eye. You know how we let it slip that one time who Vlad’s father was? Well, Grandmother knew who was just transferred back to our hospital, because that’d been who they were going to see. The sperm donor is now in the burn center she funds in what she calls ‘her ward.’ Her words, not mine. And I just knew that she was about to announce to the world who Vlad’s real father was, and so I all but lost my shit on her, and the price we have to pay is that now she’s coming over to dinner. You’re supposed to be there. And if your husband can make it, all the better.”
