The Dirty South

by Penelope King

  THE DIRTY SOUTH

  A novel

  by

  Penelope King

  Copyright © 2014 Penelope King

  PenelopeKing.com

  This book is a work of fiction. The names, characters, places, and events are products of the writer’s imagination or have been used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, actual events, locales or organizations is entirely coincidental.

  All rights are reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission from the author.

  Cover design by Syd Gill

  Novels by Penelope King:

  The Demonbood Series:

  A Demon Made Me Do It

  Fire with Fire

  Curse of Shadows and Light

  The Spellbound Trilogy:

  Witchy, Witchy

  Kiss the Crystal Sun

  Dawn of the Morningstar

  Lovespell (prequel)

  In The South Series

  The Dirty South

  Southern Comfort (coming soon)

  ~THEN~

  Chapter 1.

  I hold out my glass so Stacia can pour me some more of her best break-up vintage. It’s a 2008 Cabernet Sauvignon from Napa worth over six hundred dollars a bottle. She must really be hurting.

  She fills my glass nearly to the brim, and then follows suit with her own. Her dark eyes sparkle as she holds out her hand. “Let me make a toast…”

  I smile at her and wait.

  She clears her throat and flashes a quick smile.

  “Fuck men.”

  Then she clicks her glass to mine and takes a long swallow before setting it back down on the ivory end table, the burgundy liquid sloshing around dangerously.

  I raise an eyebrow, my hand still perched midair. “Is that it? That’s your whole toast?”

  She waves her arm dismissively as she opens up another half-packed moving box. “Sure. Pretty much sums it up.”

  “Very eloquent.” I shrug to myself and bring my glass to my lips. “Okay then… Fuck ‘em.”

  I take a smaller sip than she did and watch her from the corner of my eye as she flits around the room, throwing random items in the cardboard box. I can see she’s trying to remain cool and nonchalant and keep it together, but she’s obviously stressed.

  I step around the random piles of her stuff and take a seat on the edge of the couch. “Want to talk about it? I’m so sorry I’ve had my head up my ass these past several weeks. Everything’s just been so crazy—”

  Stacia stops packing and holds up her hand. “Cadence Jane St. Claire, if you even remotely start to apologize for having a life, I’m going to—” She glances around the almost bare apartment and spies some of my own boxes against the far wall. “—I’m going to steal those black Jimmy Choos from you.”

  I raise my eyebrows again. “You wear a whole size larger than me.”

  She grins. “I gladly suffer for fashion. I’m a woman. If my quest for beauty isn’t excruciatingly painful on some level, then I’m obviously just not trying hard enough.”

  Chuckling, I shake my head. God, I’m going to miss her. I don’t know how I’m going to make it through this next year without her by my side. We’ve been best friends forever. She’s been my rock. My constant. My other half. Now I’ll only have Brandon.

  “So what happened with… Kevin, is it?” I ask, as I gaze out the panoramic floor-to-ceiling window. As usual, the picturesque coastline of the Pacific is a thing of mesmerizing beauty. But fortunately for me, even though I’m moving out of here in a few days, my new place has a view that’s even better.

  “Gavin. Gavin the Douchebag.”

  She wanders back to her wine glass and takes another big gulp before resuming her packing. After a minute she pauses to tie her wild ebony hair back in a quick knot and fans herself with a magazine from the coffee table.

  It’s Memorial Day weekend, and summer has come on strong this year. Like most places on the coast, our two-bedroom condo doesn’t have air conditioning, relying on the near-constant off-shore breezes. Thank goodness I finished packing most of my stuff days ago. Unlike Stacia, who, as usual, waited until the last minute. She’s leaving for New York tomorrow evening and only started putting stuff in boxes a few hours ago. And she has a lot of stuff. We’ve accumulated so much here over the past three years.

  “What happened with Gavin the Douchebag?” I ask.

  “He’s a total schmuck. Good riddance, I say.” She shakes her head. “I don’t know what I was thinking even considering getting involved with him. I’m sure I’ll be meeting tons of great guys in Manhattan. Why would I want to get tied down to a guy on the opposite side of the country?”

  “But you really liked him…”

  She sighs and looks back at me, and I see the sadness in her big, brown eyes. “Yeah. I did.”

  “I’m so sorry, sweetie.”

  “Whatever. I’ll live.” She turns back to the mess on the floor, then bites her lower lip and gazes out the window for several moments, lost in thought.

  “I’m tired of boys. I need a real man,” she murmurs. “One who doesn’t run and hide at the thought of something real with a real woman.”

  I follow her into her bedroom and sit down on the bed, while she starts haphazardly loading clothes from her dresser into another box.

  I chuckle. “Does such a creature exist?”

  “They’re harder to find than an albino Loch Ness Monster. Pretty sure you managed to snag the only decent guy out there.” She cocks an eyebrow and looks pointedly at my left hand where the sunlight is reflecting perfectly off the 5.5 carat Harry Winston, casting a kaleidoscope of color.

  I glance at the ring, then look at my wine glass again and chug the rest down.

  If she only knew…

  I set the empty glass on the nightstand.

  “I’m so sorry you’re going through this crap right now,” I tell her. “I wish there was something I could do. I feel like I’ve been a bad friend to you lately.”

  Stacia gives me a crooked smile and heads to her enormous walk-in closet. “Well, sure. I mean, law school finals practically take themselves and planning the wedding of the century is a breeze, right?” She returns carrying another armload of clothes, and I stifle a groan.

  “Yes, thank God school is over. But I’d hardly call it the wedding of the century.”

  She dumps everything on the floor and sits down next to me on the bed. Then she picks up another copy of the same magazine she’d fanned herself with earlier and holds it right up to my face. “Sweetheart, when you’re posing in a custom Carolina Herrera gown on the cover of Modern Lifestyle with the Governor of California’s only son, it’s a pretty damn big deal.”

  I groan for real this time and flop down onto the mountain of fluffy pillows. “How did this even happen? How is this my life now? This is so not me. I’m not that girl.” I glare at the magazine and point my finger at my weird, wax-figure reflection staring back at me vacantly.

  We look so perfect…too perfect. It’s all so posed, so staged, so choreographed. Especially the ‘candid’ shots, with every detail meticulously planned out. It’s almost embarrassing to look at the glossy spread now. All about image and what people see. Forget what’s real.

  I focus in on the picture where Governor Jamison Hartford is gazing adoringly at his beautiful blonde wife. Does it matter that minutes before the photo was taken she’d been practically screaming at him for inappropriately flirting with his teenage intern? And this picture on page 117 where my golden boy fiancé is passionately embracing me on the beach as the sun sets behind us in an ethereal, amber glow. Does it matter that he hasn’t tried to have sex with me in almos
t two months? Or that he barely touches me at all anymore? But hey, we all look fabulous and happy and perfect. And that’s what counts, right?

  “Cady, what is it?” Stacia is looking at me closely.

  The wine, combined with the unusually warm weather and the stress of the past few weeks, is already making me a tad woozy. I shake my head to clear my thoughts.

  “It’s just… I mean, this just doesn’t feel like me,” I murmur. “It’s like I’m living someone else’s life, their fantasy. I always thought of myself as a simple dress, barefoot on the beach with just a few friends kind of girl. Not all this.” I cast another dirty glance at the magazine.

  “Well then, maybe you shouldn’t have chosen such a high-profile guy to marry,” she says with a little smirk.

  I throw up my hands in exasperation. “How was I to know his dad would be the stinkin’ governor one day? When we started dating, he was just a lawyer for Disney!”

  Stacia starts putting her shoes in smaller boxes, neatly facing them away from each other. “You gotta admit it’s pretty cool, though. I mean, how many regular law school students do you know get invited to black tie balls on the weekends and get photographed by the paps? I think Brandon was on TMZ at least twice last week!”

  “That’s just because of Christian’s DUI and assault and battery arrest. They just stalk Brandon to try and get to him.” I reposition my legs under me and face her. “Hey, are you sure you don’t want me to help you—”

  She waves me off. “No… I told you, I have a system.” She looks around for the mate to one of her favorite blue heels and positions it in its box. “Still, even if his best friend wasn’t a Hollywood superstar hottie, you two would make waves. You guys’ll be like the next Prince William and Kate Middleton. I just wish I had Pippa’s fabulous ass.”

  I shake my head at her and chuckle again. It’s clear the wine has already hit her, too, but at least she seems to be in much better spirits now than when I got home from my lunch date with Brandon to find her moping on the couch feeling sorry for herself.

  “Normal. Low profile,” I mumble. “That’s what I want. I just want us to be us. Not on TMZ or in Modern Living magazine.”

  Stacia rummages through her dresser and tosses a shirt at me that she’d borrowed months ago. “Yeah, good luck with that. You know Madame Melanie has your social life all planned out. She probably already knows when you’ll pop out your first baby. A son, of course. Named after his father and with three middle names.”

  I grimace, as the thought of my fiancé’s mother flashes through my mind. She’s been more than a minor source of irritation between Brandon and me lately, what with her desire to control almost every aspect of the wedding and our ‘image’ to the press.

  It was she who insisted we do the magazine shoot, even though I wanted to keep our engagement low-key. In the end I’d finally relented to make her happy. But her controlling and demanding behavior would put even the most vicious bridezilla to shame. And she does it all with a sweet, sunny smile. She isn’t about to let this golden PR opportunity pass her by. Her husband may already be the governor, but there are whisperings that Melanie Hartford won’t be happy until she’s entertaining her guests in the White House.

  “At this point I feel like it’s not even worth fighting about,” I tell Stacia. “If she wants to dominate and plan the wedding, I’ll just let her. It’s less for me to worry about, anyways.”

  “That’s such crap, though. It’s your day. It should be how you want it.”

  I give her a small smile. “All I want is to marry Brandon and be his wife. I don’t care about any of the rest of it. Daisies or tulips. Fish or chicken. Chocolate or vanilla. I don’t care. I just want to be Mrs. Brandon Hartford by the end of it. The rest is inconsequential.”

  Stacia studies me for a moment and then finishes off her wine. Without a word, she strolls into the kitchen and returns with the whole bottle.

  “Yeah… that almost had me convinced,” she says with a knowing look in her eye, as she pours the rest of it into my glass.

  I quickly glance away and out to the water. Sometimes I hate that she knows me so well. I swear it seems like she can see right through me.

  I slowly sip my wine until it’s almost gone.

  “Am I making a huge mistake?” I finally whisper.

  She comes and sits beside me. “Why would you think that?” she asks quietly.

  I blink away the tears coming to the surface, then shake my head. So many times I’ve had that thought, and been too afraid to vocalize it— to anyone, and for many different reasons. The biggest one being I didn’t want to wake from this dream I’ve convinced myself I’m living.

  “Cady… come on, girl. You know you can tell me anything. Anything. You know that.”

  Perhaps it’s the heat and the wine. Perhaps it’s Stacia’s soft voice, or the fact that almost everything I own is packed up and ready to be moved into the new condo where my shiny new life awaits. Or maybe it’s because now that I’ve finished the stress and drama of school, what this all really and truly means is actually beginning to sink in.

  And I’m terrified.

  I quickly swallow the last few swigs of the Cab and take a deep breath.

  “I love him. That’s a given. He’s my best friend, other than you.”

  “But…?”

  I bite my lip hard, ashamed of letting the words pass from my mouth. The thought is so selfish, so childish, merely thinking it makes me hate myself a little.

  “But what if it’s not enough? What if he’s not the one? I’ve only been with him… and sometimes I can’t help but wonder if I’m missing out.

  I glance up at Stacia’s face. “I know how lucky I am to have him,” I quickly add, “and I’m not saying that there are tons of other guys out there who are way better. It’s just that… when we started dating, I was only sixteen. It never crossed my mind that he would be the only guy I’d be with for the rest of my life.”

  Stacia nods. “It’s completely understandable. Honestly, I’ve wondered about that myself. But you never said anything so I figured it wasn’t an issue.”

  I wipe away the small tear that sneaks down my cheek. “Because I feel horrible for even thinking it! I have this wonderful, sweet, gorgeous man who loves me and wants to take care of me for the rest of my life, and here I am wondering if there’s something out there better. How awful is that?!”

  Part of me is disgusted at hearing my deepest, darkest fears spoken aloud. But part of me is relieved to have the pressure lifted from my soul.

  Stacia puts her hand on mine and squeezes. “It’s not awful… it’s totally natural. This is a huge commitment you’re about to make.”

  I shake my head and let out a long breath. “I love him, and I know he loves me. I know how lucky I am to have him. But sometimes I just wonder… sometimes I have serious doubts…”

  “What kind of doubts?” she asks, when I don’t continue.

  I blurt it out before I can stop myself. “We don’t have passionate kisses anymore. We used to, sorta, at first. Years ago. But not anymore, and not for a long time. We fit so well, and we’re great friends. But everything feels so routine, so safe. And when I see these pictures of these glowing brides with all this passion for their groom, I think, shouldn’t that be us? Shouldn’t we be like that too?”

  I pick up the magazine again and point to a particularly romantic picture of Brandon dipping me in front of a waterfall, his lips locked on mine. “This is all fake. Not real. I don’t feel that and neither does he. I know he doesn’t.”

  Stacia pauses a moment, probably surprised by my admission, but still keeping her expression neutral. Despite our closeness, we rarely speak of my sex life. There isn’t much to say. Besides, her stories are entertaining enough for the both of us.

  “Passion can fade though,” she says. “It doesn’t last forever. What’s important is the foundation that your life together is built on.”

  I gulp and nod. “Yes, I kno
w,” I say quietly. “But it’s like… our passion was never there. Not like how I’d dream it should be with the one who is supposed to be the love of my life. The kind of passion where I can’t keep my hands off him, and he can’t get enough of me and we want to stay in bed for days and days.”

  “But that can be just lust. And that can burn out quickly. Love is so much better.”

  “Why can’t I have both? Am I just supposed to go through my whole life never having the blood-churning, heart-pounding, toe-curling type of excitement and passion that I see so many other people having?”

  Stacia shakes her head. “It can be an illusion… a dangerous lie. You’re talking about TV and books and magazines. In real life that may come and go, but it’s too volatile to rely on.”

  “I’m not saying it’s the only thing I want. Just that I’d like it to be part of the deal.”

  She lets out a long, low exhale. “And you really don’t feel like that with Brandon?”

  I look away from her and out the window again. How many times have I had this internal argument with myself, over and over, that nobody has the perfect relationship and what I do have is pretty damn good and any girl would be grateful. I’m living the fairy tale. Why should I complain if my prince is less-than-romantic at times?

  I finish my wine and set the glass down. “We hardly even have sex anymore.”

  She narrows her eyes. “Define hardly.”

  I search my mind. “Maybe once every two to three months. Sometimes twice.”

  Her eyes fly open. “What? How long has it been like this?”

  “Since college… sometime during freshman or sophomore year, I think.” I lower my head, ashamed. Saying it out loud makes it real.

  “Oh my God. Over five years? What… how have you never mentioned anything to me about this?”

  I shrug, still unable to meet her gaze. “Because at first I didn’t even really realize what was happening… he was just saying he was stressed with school or too tired. Our schedules were really crazy, and both of us had so much going on. I just thought it’d pass and go back to normal again.”