Page 14 of Badd Daddy
I laughed. “Sure as hell have.”
She made a grossed-out face. “You ate roadkill?”
I nodded—I had a feeling she was envisioning something a bit different than the truth, and decided to play with her a bit. “Yep. We was down to the last of our vittles, see. Nothin’ in the pantry ’cept a couple cans of beans and some Spam. So, when Pa ran over a big ol’ coon, he pulled over, tossed it in the back of the truck, and we took it home and threw it on the grill. Li’l bit of barbecue sauce? Tastes just like chicken, only mebbe a mite gamier.”
She stared at me for a long moment. “You’re pulling my leg.”
I held a straight face. “Nope. Grilled up coon is actually pretty good.”
She tilted her head to the side, glaring. “Lucas. Please, tell me you’re kidding.”
I couldn’t hold back the laughter any longer. “Yeah, I’m just playing you.” I arched an eyebrow. “Sort of.”
“Sort of?” she asked, and then sipped at her iced tea.
“Well, it was when the triplets were just, oh god…nine? Ten? I was still comin’ to grips with the fact that their mom wasn’t coming back, and keeping food on the table was…challenging.” Mostly that had been because I’d been spending most of my income on Evan Williams, but I wasn’t quite ready to say that to Liv. “So, I was drivin’ ’em home from the store. Sorta late, like just past sundown. A big ol’ doe jumped out right in front of my truck. Smashed the hell out of my front end, too. Well, I went to check on her, see if she was dead. I mean, I ain’t gonna leave a poor thing lyin’ on the road suffering, you know? Turned out, she’d taken the worst of the impact to her head, smashed her brains to goo.”
Liv shuddered, gagged. “Really? I hardly think graphic details are necessary.”
I chuckled. “Sorry. Anyway, point is, it was only her head that got wrecked, rest of her was fine. So, I tossed her in the truck bed, took her home, cleaned her up, and we ate nice fresh venison for weeks.” I grinned at her.
She rolled her eyes at me. “Well, that’s not what I imagined when you said you’ve eaten roadkill.”
I laughed again. “I know. I had a feeling you were imagining me scraping flattened squirrels off the road.”
She laughed. “I was, I admit it.”
“I’ve been desperate, but not that desperate. Close, a few times.”
“Really?”
I nodded. “Yep. When I took off and left Alaska, I had twenty-six bucks to my name and half a tank of gas in a truck I didn’t even really own myself. No food, and just the clothes on my back. I drove till I ran out of gas, found a fella a few miles down the road who needed some chores done, and got a fill-up out of it. Worked my way south that way—doin’ chores and odd jobs in exchange for gas and maybe a bite to eat, or sometimes just cash. Things got real thin a few times. If it was a choice between putting miles between me and Alaska and eating, I’d often pick the miles. So, yeah. I’ve been hungry enough that I’ve thought of going back to grab roadkill to cook and eat.”
Her gaze was speculative, interested. “I can honestly say I’ve never been that hungry.”
I shrugged. “Lucky you. It ain’t fun.” I waved the topic away with a swipe of my hand. “Anyway. I think I’ve told you a bunch of stuff nobody knows. Your turn.”
She sighed. “My turn.”
“Yep. You gave me a look when I started eatin’, and I’d like to know what it meant.”
“I didn’t mean it as a judgment on you, Lucas.”
I tilted my head and squinted. “Liv, I may be country, but I ain’t stupid. Tell the whole honest damn truth, at least.”
She winced, rubbed her cheek. “Lucas…”
I arched an eyebrow. “Liv?”
A long sigh. “Fine. I told you my husband died of a heart attack.” She paused, thinking. “It was avoidable. His doctor warned him he was at risk, and that he had to adjust his diet, but Darren wouldn’t listen.”
“Sothis—” I slapped my belly, “is a sore spot for you.”
She nodded. “Yes. He…” She licked her lips, stared off to the side instead of at me. “We were active. We hiked, we did yoga, we rode horses, we took long walks around the neighborhood. I suppose he assumed—or, really, I know he assumed, as he said as much—that he was active and healthy, and he was going to enjoy his food.”
“Only he wasn’t as healthy as he thought.”
She shook her head. “No. Clearly not.” Her eyes were downcast, her shoulders hunched. “I did everything I could think of to get him to eat more healthily. Tried to sneak veggies into things, didn’t buy certain things, bribed him, begged him. But he just had a weakness for certain kinds of food.”