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Uncle Dale chuckled, then laid down four tens.

All eyes came to me, then my dad called out, “She’s about to hand y’all your asses.”

That was the moment I smiled.

“Fuck,” Uncle Cotton muttered.

Dale smirked, “That’s my girl.”

“She was mine first,” my dad growled.

Uncle Walker leaned back in his chair and winked at me.

Uncle Cooper sighed, “Damn.”

I showed them my hand.

“In your honor, a royal flush.”

Age 13

“Should have known when I saw your last name; you’re the spitting image of him. But don’t you worry. You won’t sweet-talk me as your father did,” Ms. Hampton said.

That was the first class I failed.

Age 15

I threw my backpack down on the floor and turned to glare up at my dad, “Really?”

He winced, “I’m sorry, sweetheart. I didn’t know she would be rehired.”

Ms. Hampton had been fired after I failed that class two years ago for her actions.

But somehow, she had been rehired, and I was back in her class.

However, to help combat the she-witch, my dad had found me a tutor.

She was the sister of Uncle Xavier, and she had just left after our second session together.

“I like her, Dad,” I shared.

He looked down at me with all the love he felt for me shining in his blue eyes, “Yeah?”

I nodded, “Yeah.”

He winked, then nodded, “Good.”

Oh yeah.

I knew what that meant.

I kept my face as expressionless as his, but inwardly, I was squealing like a cat who ate the canary.

***

It’s been a few weeks since Ms. Strickland started tutoring me, and I can’t believe how much I’ve grown.

I was working on my math homework when a cell phone rang.