by Dylann Crush
Sweet Tea & Second Chances
A Lovebird Café Novel
Dylann Crush
SWEET TEA & SECOND CHANCES
Copyright © 2019 by Dylann Crush
Cover Design by Megan Parker at EmCat Designs
Editors: L.A. Mitchell & Jolene Perry at CookieLynn
Proofreader: Hopey Gardner
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any means, or stored in any storage or retrieval system without written permission of the author. Violating these rights is forbidden and punishable by the fullest extent of the law.
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, persons living or dead, locales, or other status is entirely coincidental.
All brand names and product names used in this book are trademarks, registered trademarks, or trade names of their respective holders. The author is not associated with any product or vendor in this book.
Published by Dylann Crush
www.DylannCrush.com
To anyone who’s ever needed
a second chance at love.
Contents
1. Cassie
2. Cassie
3. Robbie
4. Cassie
5. Robbie
6. Cassie
7. Cassie
8. Robbie
9. Cassie
10. Cassie
11. Robbie
12. Cassie
13. Robbie
14. Robbie
15. Cassie
16. Cassie
17. Robbie
18. Robbie
19. Cassie
20. Robbie
21. Robbie
22. Cassie
23. Robbie
24. Cassie
25. Robbie
26. Robbie
27. Cassie
28. Robbie
29. Cassie
30. Robbie
31. Cassie
32. Robbie
33. Robbie
34. Cassie
35. Cassie
36. Cassie
37. Robbie
Epilogue
Acknowledgments
About the Author
Also by Dylann Crush
1
Cassie
The first time I saw Robbie Jordan’s penis we were five years old. He called it his fire hose and took great pleasure in showing me how he could spray the tulips in my Grandma Macon’s front flowerbeds from three feet away. I turned every shade of green with envy. Then I hiked up my skirt and tried to do the same. A hot stream of pee trickled down my leg. He laughed so hard he fell on the grass.
That was over twenty years ago. Now, seeing him lounging buck-naked on a patch of grass about fifteen feet away, only one thought flooded my rattled brain. Boy, has he ever filled out.
I gulped in a mouthful of fresh country air, pressed my hands to my hips, and stomped down a well-worn path to the spring-fed pond on the edge of my grandparents’ property. “Robbie! What do you think you’re doing?”
He grabbed a T-shirt off the grass, and held it over his crotch as he scrambled to his feet. Putting a hand up to shield his eyes from the setting sun behind me, he asked, “Cassafrass?”
“It’s just Cassie to you.” I hadn’t seen him in over nine years and the sight of his naked, chiseled chest plowed into me like a wrecking ball to the gut. “What are you doing here?”
“I was just clearing out some brush around the pond. I heard you were coming out to take a look at the place but didn’t think you’d be here for a few days.” His gaze raked over me, and his tongue slipped out to run along his scruffy upper lip. “You’re lookin’ good, Cass.”
The words rolled off his tongue in a Missouri country drawl as the sun’s rays bathed him in shades of gold and orange. Good God. Even after all these years, he still had an effect on me. I tucked an escaped chunk of hair back into my complicated up-do and attempted to clear the giant lump from my throat.
“Since when does clearing brush require naked sunbathing?”
“Aw, hell, Cassie girl, it’s hard work so I went for a dip. I was just drying off. When did you become such a prude?”
He bent down to grab his jeans, giving me a side glimpse of his magnificent sculpted ass. Michelangelo’s David didn’t have anything on Robbie’s glutes. I fanned myself and pulled my clingy rayon T-shirt away from my body. Air…I needed air. It couldn’t be more than seventy-five degrees where I stood in the shade of the giant oak tree. Why was it suddenly so hot?
“I’m not a prude. Just a little surprised to see you here, that’s all.” And so much of you. I dropped my hands to my sides, suddenly at a loss as to what to do with them.
He smiled, that same smug grin he’d always given me, like nine years hadn’t passed without a word between us. My stomach clenched, and I fought the urge to wrap my arms around him and nestle against his chest like I did way back when the world belonged to us. As he hopped around on one foot, he shoved one leg into a pair of well-worn jeans while still attempting to hold the shirt in place.
“For crying out loud, get dressed and then we can talk.” I spun around, knocking my teenage angst back into the past, and marched the twenty yards to my SUV.
“Lighten up, Cassie. You used to be fun. I remember you taking a bare-bottomed dip or two in this same swimming hole once upon a time.” His voice followed me up the path, pulling at the lid of the treasure chest of memories I’d slammed shut years ago.
Robbie-damn-Jordan. What was he doing here anyway? Last I’d heard he’d moved to Arizona or somewhere out west. I hadn’t counted on running into this particular blast from my past. I was a woman on a mission. A new life waited for me in Dallas: a business opportunity, a blossoming love affair, and a whole series of promising tomorrows. I just needed to fix up grandma and grandpa’s old place and sell it. That would give me the funds I needed.
Crossing my arms across my chest, I leaned against my SUV. Then I remembered I had on white linen capris. Shoot. I pushed off the car, taking a nice layer of dirt with me. I’d forgotten just how darn filthy things could get around here.
As I attempted to angle the side mirror to catch a glimpse of my dusty derriere, Robbie came ambling up the path, fully clothed and smiling from ear to ear. I jumped at the sight of him and brushed my hands across my bum.
“The spring should be good for a while now. Hopefully that top layer of scuzz will go away now that the water’s moving again.”
“One less thing to worry about. I suppose I should thank you.”
His Lynyrd Skynyrd T-shirt stretched tight across his broad shoulders and those faded jeans sat low on his hips. My heart skittered to match the beat that being around Robbie had always demanded. The last time I’d seen him without a shirt on, his chest hadn’t been nearly as defined. Of course, my own chest had done some filling out in the nine years since we’d shared an intimate moment. As his eyes flickered over me, a pleased-as-punch grin shone upon his scruffy, tan face. He looked different: older, dare I say wiser, somehow. But the green-eyed gaze boring into me was the same. The same one I’d lost myself in every summer from Memorial Day to Labor Day.
“You’re welcome.” He tossed a thumb over his shoulder and gestured to the pond. “Sorry about that. I didn’t think you’d be here until the weekend.”
I waved a hand in front of my face in
a pathetic attempt to wipe away the vision of his naked lounging bod that had been permanently etched into my mind. “Don’t worry about it. I thought you moved away?”
“Yeah, well I’m back for good now.” He pulled a baseball cap on over his thick, sandy blond hair. “You staying for a while?”
Back for good? All the air in my lungs whooshed out of me. I toed at a fist-sized rock with the tip of my heeled sandal while I drew in a calming breath. “Not too long, I hope. I just need to get this place fixed up and on the market.”
He shifted from one foot to the other, his voice going soft and quiet. “Sorry about your grandma. I didn’t hear about the funeral ‘til after it happened. I would’ve been there if I’d known.”
I nodded and sighed, tamping down the threat of tears at Robbie’s gentle reference to my grandma. “She was ready. She missed my granddad so much. It was time.”
“Mrs. Hayes said you’re gonna sell. I didn’t want to believe her.”
My breath caught in my chest. “What’s it matter to you what I do with the place?”
“Lots of memories here, Cass.” He hooked his thumbs through his belt loops and his gaze drilled into mine from under the brim of his cap.
I looked away.
He was right. I did have lots of memories of this place. It was a part of me. Had been since I was a kid, and I’d always have a special spot in my heart for this tiny wedge of land in southwestern Missouri.
As for the memories of Robbie Jordan, they could stay here and rot for all I cared. What happened between us was in the past. And that’s exactly where it would stay.
“I’m heading up to check out the house.” I opened the driver’s side door and climbed inside.
“I’ve gotta get going or I’d come with you. Let me know if you need anything. I’m staying at my dad’s place.”
“Really?” There had never been anything but bad blood between Robbie and his dad, Jefferson Barron Jordan Senior. He’d been the Nestor County Sheriff ever since I could remember.
“Don’t look so surprised. A lot’s changed since you were here last.” He covered the distance to my door in a few long, slow strides. I pulled my legs inside the car and settled behind the wheel as he pressed my door shut, leaving his hands lingering on the doorframe. “It’s really good to see you, Cassiopeia.”
He filled my open window, sending the scent of sunshine and fresh grass my way.
“Nobody calls me by my full name. Just Cassie, okay?” Unsettled, I turned the key in the ignition and slammed the gear shift into drive. I pressed on the gas and inched down the gravel road.
He pulled his hands away and yelled out after me. “Oh yeah? Well, I go by Rob now. Remember that.”
A lot had changed? That was an understatement. I glanced in the rearview mirror. Robbie stood in the middle of the road, arms at his sides, staring after me. I crested a hill and he was gone. So long, Robbie Jordan. Goodbye and good riddance. Seeing him again had stirred up all kinds of nonsense inside me. Nonsense like memories of warm summer nights spent in the back of his truck and skinny dipping in the pond.
As the white farmhouse where I’d spent so many summers loomed ahead, I stuffed all thoughts of Robbie Jordan back into the box I’d trapped them in years ago. The sooner I got started on my fixer-upper project, the sooner I’d get out of Swallow Springs, Missouri, and back to my real life. A life with no room for Robbie-freaking-Jordan and his glistening six-pack abs.
Robbie
Cassie pulled away, her fancy little SUV stirring up a cloud of dust in her wake. I hadn’t been lying when I told her she looked good. She’d always been easy on the eyes, especially when she was all worked up over something. The last time I’d seen her, she’d been hovering in between the sweet girl I’d fallen in love with at age five and a full-fledged woman. She was different now. Definitely grown in all the right places.
I climbed in my beat up, half-ton truck then made my way a mile back down the gravel road to the turnoff to Dad’s place. His fifty acres backed up to the Macons’, and the pond straddled the property line, putting half of it on their side and the other half on ours.
My eyes adjusted to the darkness as I entered the house. The smell of antiseptic and stale cigarette smoke hung heavy in the air. Wouldn’t kill him to open up a window or two every once in a while. My work boots left a dusty trail on the hardwood floor as I moved across the room and lifted the shades. The late afternoon sun poured in through the wavy glass of the aged windowpanes.
A rerun of The Andy Griffith Show flickered on the TV. Dad sat in the cracked leather recliner, his oxygen tube resting under his nose, a cigarette burned almost down to the filter between his fingers. Sound asleep. I grabbed the cigarette and stamped it out in the overflowing ashtray in his lap.
“What are you doing, Pop? You trying to blow up the whole damn house?”
He lifted an eyelid and stared at me, the whites of his eyes tinted with yellow. “Whadda you care? You’d be better off without me.” His voice cracked.
He may be right, but I wasn’t going to let him go out like that. Not on my watch. The pack of cigarettes sat on the table next to him and I crushed them in my fist. “You’re on oxygen. Doc said no more smoking.”
A coughing fit racked his frail body and he hawked something into a tissue. “You afraid it’s gonna kill me?”
“Nah, you’re already doin’ a pretty good job of that yourself.” I turned away, taking the cigarettes and ashtray with me to dump into the trash can under the kitchen sink. “Where’d you get these, anyway? Dewey been to visit you again?”
“It’s not like I drove to the store and got ’em myself.”
That was for sure. He hadn’t left the house for the past three months unless I’d driven him into town for an appointment. The doc had given him another six months before the cancer and cirrhosis finished him off for good. I wasn’t going to be responsible for helping him along, no matter how much easier things might be without him around.
“Dewey stopped by, said the Macon girl is back.” The words left his mouth in a growl as he rubbed a bony hand over his sparse beard.
“She’s not a Macon. That was her mom’s maiden name.”
“She’s got that Macon blood. Once a Macon, always a Macon.” He spat the words and leaned over to lower the footrest, grunting with the effort.
I grabbed onto the handle and flipped it down for him. “Let me help you with that.”
“I can still do some things myself, y’know.” He swatted at my hands.
Yeah, like drink and smoke yourself to death. As much as I’d like to see him try to rally, it was too late for that.
“So you seen her yet?”
“Who?” I didn’t want to talk about Cassie with my dad. Not until I figured out what I wanted to do about her being back in town.
“The Macon girl.”
I shook my head. No sense arguing with him about a name. “Yeah, I saw her on her way in.”
“That girl was trouble when she was younger and she’s still trouble now.” He grabbed a can of Tab off the table and took a long sip. “I hear she’s sellin’ the place. Dewey’s gonna take a look.”
“Cassie’s not trouble.” I was the one who’d always gotten into trouble. She’d just usually been standing next to me.
He tried to focus on me over the rim of his bifocals. “You stay away from her. She’s bad news, just like her mama was. You got a good thing going with that Caroline. Don’t you go and fuck it up.”
“I told you, Dad. Caroline and I are taking some space. I’m not screwing anything up. Besides, I don’t think Cassie will be here very long.”
Something bad had gone down between my dad and Cassie’s mom, but it had happened years before I ever came along, and no one had ever been willing to talk about it.
“Caroline Hayes is the best damn thing to ever happen to you.” He pointed a shaky finger at me. “God only knows what the hell she sees in you.”
That was the one and only thing m
y dad and I could agree on. I had no idea what Caroline saw in me either. She was practically Swallow Springs royalty. Not only was her mom the most successful realtor in the county, her dad owned what was left of the downtown. She’d also been the Homecoming Queen, Dairy Duchess, Pork Producers Princess, and for the past several months, most folks considered her my girlfriend. At the ripe old age of twenty-seven, all of her friends had already tied the knot with their high school sweethearts. Caroline had given me the summer while she was teaching English in South America to figure out what I wanted from our relationship. Come August I’d either be sliding a ring on her finger or be shut out of any construction jobs within a fifty-mile radius. Her dad had been perfectly clear about that.
“I can use the work. I’m gonna offer to help Cassie fix the place up.”
Dad hadn’t earned a real paycheck in over two years since he’d been forced into early retirement from the sheriff’s department. When I moved back to town to take care of him, he told me they’d shut him out of his pension because he was getting sick. I’d heard rumors that twenty years of drinking on the job had finally caught up with him, and he’d officially been fired. Didn’t matter now.
Growing up as Sheriff Jordan’s kid hadn’t been easy. He’d ruled the county with an iron fist and lorded over his household with a leather belt. Hell, that’s part of the reason I’d spent so much time at the Macon place. John and Doris Macon always had a friendly smile and something fresh out of the oven waiting for me. They also had Cassie every summer from June until August. The cookies were good, but she was the real reason I spent the majority of my summers crossing the back pasture between us.
