Grady Judd (Heartbreakers & Heroes Book 1)

by Ciana Stone

Cody Sweet looked over at her sister, Hannah Sweet-Weathers, who stood beside the bar with a tray of dirty glasses balanced on one hip. “Because?” Cody asked.

  Hannah jerked her chin in the direction of the door and Cody turned her gaze that way. “Lord, have mercy.”

  For a moment, they both indulged in a long look, then Cody snapped back to attention. “Okay, enough of that or I’m gonna have to leave early.”

  “Amen to that sister,” Hannah agreed. “But I’m serious. There’s a whole lot of single women here tonight and you know what happens when he shows up.”

  “Oh yeah, I do. But maybe we’ll get lucky.”

  “Or it’ll get interesting.” Hannah said and resumed her trek to the kitchen.

  Cody answered a call from down the bar, refilled a beer, and watched as the man at the door tried to make his way to the bar. He was stopped every few feet, by men wanting to shake his hand or give him a pat on the back, or by women who wanted to hug or kiss him.

  He seemed far happier about the handshakes, which Cody found interesting. When he finally made it to the bar, he tipped his hat and gave her a smile. “I swear you get prettier every time I see you, Cody Sweet.”

  “You are so damn good at that, you almost make a married woman want to forget her vows. What’ll you have, Grady?”

  Grady laughed. He’d known Cody and Hannah all their lives. They were a good ten years younger than he was, so when he first started coming to the Honky Tonk Bar and Grille, it had belonged to their father, Billy Sweet.

  Only in the last few years had Cody and Hannah taken over. Not only had they completely rebuilt the place, but they’d also changed the name from Billy Sweet’s to Billy Sweet’s Honky Tonk Angels.

  No matter what you called it or which Sweet worked behind the bar, the beer was always cold, the barbecue the best in west Texas, and the folks who owned it some of the best he’d ever had the honor to call friends.

  “Beer. Whatever’s on draft.”

  “So, you back for a spell or just stopping in?” she asked as she filled a mug for him.

  “Hope to spend some time working on the ranch.”

  “That fella you got working for you is a real nice man. Two weeks ago there was a brush fire at the McIntyre spread and he was the first one there, working like he was fighting back the devil to keep the fire from taking the house.”

  “Yeah, Al’s a good guy. I’m lucky to have him. So, what’s been happening since I saw you last? Still married?”

  “Yep.”

  “I heard from the ladies at the Sweet shop that you had a baby.”

  “I sure did. Little boy, William Jax. We call him Billy after my dad. He hasn’t said his first word and already has both of us wrapped around his finger, along with his big sister.”

  “You have a daughter?”

  “Yes, Bernice. We adopted her and she’s the sweetest girl in the world.”

  “Well, you seem real happy, Cody, and I’m glad. How’re your parents?”

  “Doing great. Mama still runs the sweet shop and Daddy’s officially retired, but works here at least three nights a week. KC just graduated high school and is getting set to head to San Antonio at the end of the summer to start college.”

  “And Hannah?”

  “Married to Bryson Weathers and happy as a pig in mud.”

  “Which is her way of saying marriage is making me fat.” Hannah’s voice came from the end of the bar.

  “Hey there, Hannah.” Grady greeted her. “And honey, ain’t nobody in possession of their faculties going to call you fat. Fine? Hell yeah, but not fat.”

  “Well, thank you, Grady. I see you haven’t lost your talent for flattery.”

  “Just call it like I see it.”

  She smiled and waved to someone at a table who was trying to get her attention. “Okay, duty calls. Hope to catch up with you soon, Grady.”

  “Same here, Hannah.”

  Hannah had just left when a tall, very busty redhead walked up to the bar, grabbed Grady, and laid a lip-lock on him. He had no more than pushed away when a voice shrilled from the end of the bar, “Oh hell no!”

  “Oh shit.” Cody knew as sure as she lived and breathed that it was about to get ugly. She pulled out her phone and called the police station. “Hey, this is Cody over at the Honky Tonk. I’m thinking we’re about to have us a good old-fashioned catfight. You wanna send someone over? Okey dokey, thanks.”

  By the time she’d finished the call, the redhead and a shorter and miraculously bustier blonde were screaming at one another about who Grady belonged to. Grady wasn’t doing a thing but leaning on the bar, drinking his beer and watching.

  The redhead, Darleen Andrews, drew herself up to full height and challenged the short woman, Christine Bonville. “I’m about to get tired of looking at you, so I suggest you turn around and go back to whatever hole you crawled out of and don’t even think about coming on to my man again.”

  “Fuck you, Goliath,” Christine sneered.

  Apparently, Darleen was a mite sensitive about her height because she grabbed a handful of Christine’s hair and slung her around like she was a rag doll. Christine rammed into a couple, righted herself and came back at Darleen with teeth bared and hands in claw formation.

  “Whoa!” Cody yelled, but to no avail. The two women met like heavyweights on the mat and in seconds were rolling around on the floor.

  “Dixon!” Cody yelled for the bouncer.

  He hadn’t even made it to the fray before Darleen’s and Christine’s friends had joined the party. Dixon grabbed one of the women to pull her back and two others jumped him, biting and scratching.

  Cody looked at Grady and yelled. “You just gonna sit there and watch?”

  “Nope. I’m gonna leave. See ya, Cody.”

  With that, he plopped a twenty-dollar bill on the bar and headed away from the action. Cody lost sight of him as she watched the mob of women go at it. It was almost funny. Hell, it was funny. It wouldn’t be tomorrow for most of them when they got up with bruises, scratches, and aches from moving their bodies in ways they hadn’t moved in a good many years. But right now, it was definitely a sight to behold.

  She looked toward the door and saw Grady passing the new deputy who was on the way in. She smiled at the way they checked one another out. Now that would be an interesting pairing.

  Two seconds later, Deputy Charli Sampson yelled. “Enough!”

  That had no effect at all, so she grabbed hold of one of the women and pulled her back from the gal she was fighting. The woman drew back like she was going to take a swing at Charli. Charli shook her head. “You don’t want to do that.”

  But apparently the woman did. Bad mistake. Her blow never landed and less than a second later, Charli had the woman turned around with one arm wrenched up behind her, putting on wrist restraints.

  It took Charli about five minutes to subdue eight women and have them all in restraints, lying on the floor like a row of fish. She pulled out her radio and called in for extra cruisers.

  Then she read the women their rights. There was a whole lot of cussing, screaming, and feet kicking the floor in protest, but Charli didn’t seem bothered by that. She looked over at Cody. “What the hell started all this?”

  “A man.”

  “A man? Seriously? One man?”

  “Yep.”

  “I find that hard to believe.”

  “That’s because you never met Grady Judd.”

  Charli shrugged and looked toward the door, where deputies were entering. “Take these fine ladies, book them for public intoxication, inciting a riot in a public place, and let them spend the night in jail.”

  She then addressed the women on the floor. “And y’all behave for these officers or you and I are going to have issues, you hear me?”

  There was more than one “yes ma’am” uttered and Cody bit back a smile. Five minutes later, things were back to normal, there was something new to gossip about, and no damage had been done to the bar. />
  She handed Charli a bottle of water. “Thanks, girl.”

  “Just doing my job.”

  “You’re such a badass,” Cody said and was echoed by Hannah, who walked behind the bar to stand beside her.

  “You really are. Can you believe those gals?”

  Charli shook her head. “No. Cody said it was over some dude. Grady Judd?”

  “Yep. That man can’t come to town without getting every female within fifty miles worked up.”

  “He can’t be all that,” Charli argued.

  “You haven’t met Grady Judd,” Hannah argued.

  “Yeah, so I hear, but I’m not buying it. No man is that fine.”

  Cody and Hannah laughed and Cody raised her own bottle of water in a toast to Charli. “Well, I guess we’ll just see about that, won’t we?”

  “I guess so.”

  Cody looked at Hannah and grinned. “This could be real interesting.”

  “Amen to that, sister. Amen.”

  Chapter Four

  Grady felt like he was repeating a chapter of a book he’d already read when he pulled into Roscoe’s gas station to fill up his truck. He hoped Kacey wasn’t working today. The last thing he needed was to catch hell from her.

  He’d been gone for five weeks this time and wondered if it was even worth the effort to come home. The last time he did, he was home a week before he had to leave. He sure hoped this time his promised six weeks off was genuine. He needed to unwind and get his head straight again.

  After filling up his gas tank, he walked inside to pay. This time, Edna Cole was sitting behind the register. “Well, looky here. I thought you’d cut and run for good.”

  “No, ma’am. How are you, Mrs. Edna?”

  “Any better and I’d need a keeper. How about you, Grady?”

  “Ready to be home for a while.”

  “Well, I was thinking we’d see you the first of the summer after you stopped by here. Roscoe said he thought you were gonna be home a while, but then you upped and hightailed it outta here.”

  “Yep, business, you know.” Grady handed her cash for the gas.

  “No, I most surely don’t. Heck, none of us do, but I reckon when the day comes that you want to tell folks what it is you do when you disappear, you’ll do it. Until then, I’ll just say it’s good to see you and I hope you get your wish and get to be home a while. And if you do, let me know and we’ll have you to dinner.”

  “I’d like that, Mrs. Edna. Tell Roscoe I paid my respects and you have a good day.”

  “You too, Grady. And welcome home.”

  “Thank you, ma’am.”

  He headed back out to his truck and just as he got in, his phone buzzed. He opened the text and smiled. Johnny, a teammate, had returned home just in time to be present for the birth of his daughter. He’d sent a photo.

  Grady looked at the smile on Johnny’s face and the tiny baby cradled in his arms. Would he have been a good father? Chances were, he’d never know, and he shoved those thoughts away. You could bring yourself down and cause a lot of dissatisfaction by focusing on what you didn’t have instead of paying attention to what you did.

  There’d been a lot of folks he’d known that had allowed that to happen to them. He had always been determined not to make that mistake. His phone rang again and since his phone was synced to his truck, he pressed the Answer button on the steering wheel. “Judd.”

  “Hey, it’s Al. Remember me telling you that Cannon was having some problems? Well, I got the vet to check him out and he said it’s time for Cannon to be put out to pasture. The arthritis in his hip isn’t getting any better and he’s having a hard time being ridden. Long and short of it is, we need to get another cow horse—and sooner rather than later.”

  “I’ll call JD and see if he has anything or can tell me who might.”

  “Okay. When you headed back this way?”

  “On the road now. Will be there by dark.”

  “Want me to throw some steaks on the grill?”

  “That’d be good.”

  “Okay, see ya.”

  “Yep.”

  Grady ended the call with his ranch foreman and then placed a call to JD Weathers. As hoped, JD had a horse for him to take a look at, so Grady headed for the Weathers’ ranch instead of home.

  JD was waiting when Grady climbed out of his truck. “How’s it going, Grady?”

  “Can’t complain—well, except for needing a new cow horse. Cannon’s time is done.”

  “You gonna have him put down?”

  “Naw, just put him out to pasture and let him enjoy the rest of his days being a lazy, fat old boy.”

  JD smiled and gestured toward the paddock. “Your man Al is doing a good job for you. I stop by every couple of weeks, just to say hello.”

  “I appreciate that, and yeah, I’m lucky to have him. So, how’s the family? The twins still kicking ass in college?”

  “Yeah, they’re juniors and have quite a few scouts nosing around them. They both hope to go pro.”

  “And you?”

  “I just hope they get an education so that if a sports career doesn’t pan out, they have something better to fall back on that rodeoing and ranching.”

  “I hear you. They’ll do fine, and between you and me, I’d love to see them go pro. I got to see one of their games last year and I was impressed. They have skills.”

  “And aren’t shy about telling you,” JD said and chuckled. “But they’ve both become fine men and I’m proud. So, what about you? You gonna keep doing what you do until you’re too old or ten toes up from the doing?”

  “Probably. Don’t know I could cut it being a fulltime rancher.”

  “Afraid you’d get bored?”

  “Yeah, I guess. And it’s not like I have a family waiting on me to get home, so it doesn’t really matter.”

  “You could. Plenty of fish still swimming the waters around here, buddy, and you ain’t ever had a problem hooking your share.”

  “Just never hooked the right one.”

  “There she is.” JD pointed to a pretty paint in the paddock and for the next ten minutes talk was of the horse, her training, breeding, and price. At the end of those ten minutes, a deal had been struck.

  “There’s a shindig at the Honky Tonk tomorrow night,” JD mentioned as they walked back to Grady’s truck. “Me and Jo are headed over with Bryson and Hannah. You wanna join?”

  “I don’t know. Last time I was there it got a little—rowdy.”

  JD laughed. “Yeah, and from what I hear you missed the best part of the show.”

  “Oh? How’s that?”

  “The new deputy showed up and single-handedly kicked all them gals’ asses and had ‘em restrained and lined up on the floor when the rest of the department showed up to haul ‘em to jail.”

  “He fought women?”

  “She.”

  Oh, her. He remembered seeing her as he was leaving. Now that was a woman.

  “So, she’s a scrapper?”

  “She’s a freaking Amazon, man. Built like—well let’s just leave it at built and yeah, she’s a badass. It’d take a big fella to hold that one down.”

  “Anybody tried to do that yet?”

  “Whole lot of ‘em, from what I hear but she’s having no part of it.”

  “Lesbian?”

  “Not according to Jo and they’re pretty tight. She’s just not much interested in getting involved. In fact, you might say she’s a female version of you, my friend.”

  “Then God help her.”

  JD laughed and clapped Grady on the shoulder. “Tell Al to come by any time tomorrow for the horse.”

  “I’ll send the money with him. Thanks, JD. I’ll be seeing you.”

  “My pleasure and I hope so. And if you change your mind about tomorrow…”

  “Thanks. See ya.”

  Grady once more got in his truck and this time, he finally headed home. As he drove, he thought about the female Deputy he saw that night at the H
onky Tonk. She was indeed a lot of woman, but a lot in a sexy, makes a man want to claim and tame her kind of way.

  He wondered if he’d see her around. The idea definitely appealed to him.

  A lot.

  Chapter Five

  “Oh, my Lawd.” Debbie Durbin’s words had everyone in the diner turning to look. It was a Wednesday morning and the breakfast rush had cleared out, leaving plenty of space for the folks volunteering to help with the Founder’s Day festival to meet and discuss plans.

  “He’s back. Oh my God, Grady Judd’s back in town.”

  Festival plans were momentarily forgotten as half the women present got up to hurry to where Debbie stood at the front window of the diner. Cody looked at her sister, Hannah, who shrugged and gestured to Charli, who was curiously watching the others. “Come on,” Hannah said.

  With a shrug, Charli rose and followed them. They didn’t stop at the window, they headed right out the door.

  Three other women followed, including Debbie, who pointed down the street. “See. Oh my Lawd.”

  “Oh my Lawd is right,” Cody commented.

  “Cody Mae, you’re a married woman.” Hannah said, but kept her eyes on the sight that had everyone’s attention.

  “Yep. Married, not dead and damn, have you ever in your life seen anything sexier?”

  “Nope. What about you, Charli?” Hannah asked.

  Charli couldn’t seem to find her tongue at the moment, but she figured that was okay. There seemed to be an epidemic of speechlessness going around. Only Cody and Hannah were protected from the force that had the rest of the women standing mute and gaping.

  She’d seen a lot of men in her life and some of them hot enough to start a fire without a match, but as God was her witness, she’d never seen anything that could come close to being as sexy as the man who crossed the street in a long, powerful stride and headed down the sidewalk toward them.

  He was a big man. From the way he towered over other people he passed on the sidewalk, she’d guess he was at least six, four. And from the way those long, muscular legs of his filled out his jeans, and the brawny chest and arms on display beneath that tight T-shirt, she’d estimate him to weigh in somewhere north of two-fifty.