“It’s yellow gelatinous goo,” Gramps stated.

There were a number of gasps, none of them louder than Gram’s, even if this statement was inarguably true.

“Take that back, Audie Campbell,” she snapped.

“Woman, I did not marry you for your cooking abilities, and that’s a good thing, since, if you got ’em, you been hidin’ ’em for near-on fifty years,” Gramps told her. “I’m getting chicken.”

Before Gram could react to Gramps’s latest comment, I quickly said, “We already got hamburger meat so we could have burgers, Gramps. Preacher and Tommy really like burgers.”

Gramps turned to Preacher and then Tommy, who were now flanking him, both looking like they wanted to bust out laughing.

“You boys like chicken?” he asked.

He got two, “Yes, sirs.”

“We’re having chicken,” Gramps decided.

He then took off to go buy chicken.

“That man,” Gram groused, and she took off too, probably to go give more stick to Gramps then ride with him to go get chicken so she could talk him into hitting up the DQ after to get dilly bars.

I got up, grabbed my guy and took him to the mudroom.

When we were away from the others and I’d situated him so his back was to the dining room, shielding us, I asked, “How did you wring that miracle?”

He grinned smugly. “Told you it’d go great.”

“How did you wring that miracle?” I repeated.

He got serious and said, “I told him he had a meeting with a firm of lawyers in the city on Tuesday and they already have a court date to win back custody of Julia. I also told him the lawyers, and Tommy, had hired private detectives who were digging into your dad, and because of that, Julia would be home soon.”

It was my hands that landed on his chest then when I couldn’t hold myself up because of what he said and all it meant.

Preacher took my weight, and for good measure, slid his arms around me.

Even feeling all I was feeling, which was a lot, I said, “That’s not it because Gramps is proud and that sounds like a handout.”

“This isn’t about pride. This is about family and getting Julia away from that dickweed and back to hers.”

Okay, I could see that.

But…

“Preacher—”

He dipped his face close and his voice low. “Baby, before Tommy joined our conversation, I also told him you were a virgin and you were gonna stay that way.”

I blinked.

“I told him the way I had to court you, bein’ on tour, might not be conventional, but I’m courtin’ you and I would not disrespect you, or him and who he is to you, what he’s done for you, by bein’ that guy.”

I kept blinking, just more rapidly.