by Zoe Dawson
“Oh, Boone. I’m so sorry. Everything is such a terrible mess.”
“Geezus, Verity, I’m devastated that you had to go through all this by yourself.”
“Please forgive me. Please.”
He whispered, “Darlin’,” with so much warmth and love that tears threatened again. “I just need to know. Did you not try hard enough because you thought I was nothing but a fuck-up?”
“No. That’s not it. I thought you didn’t care and when you didn’t try to find me the next day, I was so disappointed. I didn’t know you didn’t remember. Then I missed my period and I knew I was pregnant.”
“I’m sorry I wasn’t there for you. I should have been.”
I held his gaze, trying to convey with my eyes how much I appreciated his response. I’d been worried for so long about how he would react. His anger I understood, and I was relieved that he had forgiven me. His understanding helped to close a large portion of that sucking black hole in me. Taking his hand, I laced my fingers tightly through his, my voice breaking as I whispered. “The situation was awful. I will admit that. I was so, so scared. I did feel all alone. I looked for you before I left, but I couldn’t find you. I wanted to tell you, Boone. I wanted you to know.”
Boone exhaled heavily, looking away from me, his profile set in troubled lines, his throat working. “I wasn’t there for you. I’ll always regret that.”
“I have to confess something more to you.” My voice was treacherously unsteady when I spoke, my heart pounding. “When I came back to Suttontowne, I had no intention of telling you about the baby. I was going to break the news to my parents about how I had skipped out of the mission and gotten a job as a designer, and then I was leaving. I was so angry at you for so long.”
“You’ve already apologized for that, Verity. You got caught in a bad situation, and there wasn’t a hell of a lot you could do about it.” He looked away, his hand tightening over mine.
Relief swept through me, making my heart pound even harder, and I closed my eyes, trying to manage all my pent-up emotion. I turned into his arms, closing the physical and emotional distance between us, my fear that he would blame me or reject me laid to rest. He just drew me more securely into the curve of his body. Thrown into emotional overload, I sobbed against his throat, my tears running down his chest.
He held me fast, pressing his thumb over my cheekbone, brushing away my tears, his chest expanding heavily. “What happened to the baby? Was it a boy or a girl?” he asked gruffly.
“Boy,” I said. “On February 22. That’s his birthday. A beautiful boy who looked so much like you, Boone. I only got to hold him for two hours. It still hurts so much.” The emptiness expanded until my whole chest felt hollow and achy.
“Ah, fuck,” he said, his voice unsteady, tightening his hold on me. “What did you name him?”
I bit my lip and squeezed his hand. “Duel.”
For a minute he just stared at me, and then his face crumpled and he swallowed hard, fighting the tears. He whispered, “That’s my middle name.”
“I know. I wanted him to have something of you, his daddy.”
His voice ragged, he said, “You gave him up?”
More tears fell. This was the hardest part. “Yes. I had to, Boone. I couldn’t keep him. The adoption agency took care of everything. I chose a really great couple.”
“You did what you had to do at the time, Verity. I understand how hard this was for you.”
The pain and guilt spread and tangled around me like briars. “I handled it the best I could. I never expected to fall in love with you, Boone. I can’t imagine my life without you now.”
“You don’t have to. Marry me, we’ll get him back and…”
“What?” I pulled away from him, fear and concern warring inside me, fighting with the joy at the thought of getting Duel back, but my fear coated everything in an ugly black. “No, I can’t. If my daddy ever found out…I couldn’t bear it. The shame…”
“I can’t turn away from my son, Verity.”
I didn’t know why this surprised me. After all that I had learned about Boone Outlaw, I knew courage was one thing he had in spades. “What are you saying?”
“Now that I know he exists, I have to go after him. I never gave up my parental rights. I made a vow that I would never do to my own kid what was done to me. My daddy left. He left us. I’m not abandoning our son. I’m offering you a future with me and our son, a chance at a family. It’s your choice, Verity. We can either do this together or I’ll have to do it alone.”
“Verity!”
I turned around to find Mrs. Outlaw standing in the doorway. Booker and Aubree close behind her. They swept into the room, and Aubree hugged me gently, but I looked back and sought Boone’s eyes. He looked so tortured, so hurt, so determined.
“Boone,” I said softly and he relented and kissed me. It was filled with longing and pain and such need.
“Aubree, take her back to her room,” his ma said.
Was it an ultimatum? I wasn’t sure, because our time to discuss it was over. I wanted to run away from everyone and simply be with Boone so that we could work this out. He’d asked me to marry him, promising we’d be a family. Minnie had offered me the dream of a lifetime. My head hurt as all my preconceived notions came crashing down into a million pieces. I looked at Boone, pleading, but he looked away, and my heart broke and broke and broke.
I had already sacrificed my son. Was I going to sacrifice Boone to my secret, too?
Chapter Eighteen
Boone
Days later, I had tried repeatedly to talk to Verity, but her parents blocked me at every turn. She’d been released from the hospital yesterday.
But when I went to her door to try again just before our final church appearance, the reverend was tight-lipped and angry. His protégé had disappointed him and tried to murder two people, one his daughter. That must have been very bitter for him.
I was still healing, but the slices to both my torso and face were manageable.
He told me that Verity was still convalescing and wasn’t receiving visitors, but I knew she was, because Aubree and River Pearl had been there to see her. Her friend Minnie was also still here. At least she had a support system, but I was at loss about what to do next. I had meant what I said. I would not abandon Duel.
I told no one that I had fathered a child. I wanted to talk to Verity, to find some common ground, but it would all be in vain if she didn’t come clean with her family. That’s what was holding everything up.
But even as I tried to think of Verity negatively, I couldn’t. She had endured this whole thing by herself, and now I understood why she had ended up in New York City instead of the Kenya mission. She had told me bits and pieces, and now I almost had the whole picture.
I wanted to hold her again, kiss her, make love to her. No, I couldn’t think negatively of her now that my anger had drained away. I couldn’t judge her. She had found herself in a terrible situation and I had been in rehab. But even if I hadn’t and Verity had found me, what would have happened? How would I have responded back then? I still didn’t know.
The child I had conceived with Verity was as much my responsibility as it was hers. But she had carried the full burden because we really hadn’t known each other. We hadn’t had the courage to fight for what we wanted back then. But I had the courage now. Because, no matter what, I loved her.
I wanted her so desperately. The girl she had been, and the woman she was now. My heart hurt every day that I woke up without her in my arms.
When we walked into the church, our jaws dropped. It was standing room only. The place was packed to the stained glass windows and rafters.
I turned to look at Booker and Brax.
Booker muttered, “Holy shit.”
Brax just smirked.
“I guess they like our brand of worship music,” I said. I searched the pews for Verity, but she wasn’t there.
We settled in the sanctuary, but the revere
nd didn’t look at me. I felt disappointed in him. He was a preacher, and mercy and forgiveness were two of the things he held most dear. But he was also a daddy. I understood that. Verity wasn’t a child anymore, though, and she had to take the step forward and make her own decisions about her life.
Her daddy couldn’t do that.
I couldn’t do that.
Only Verity could do it. I only hoped she had the courage inside her that I believed she did. I could only hope that, when she emerged, she could give the three of us the chance we deserved to make a future together, in spite of all the obstacles that stood in our way.
I knew it wasn’t going to be easy to take Duel away from the couple who had adopted him. They’d had him for more than five months. I wasn’t immune to feeling guilt over that. But, I hadn’t been given a choice. And the fact remained that I couldn’t and wouldn’t give him up.
We started out with “Grace Like Rain,” and the lyrics burned in me as I sang, my voice taking on a quality even I hadn’t heard before. It was knowledge of what redemption really was that made the message in the song move not only me, but the people who listened.
As the service progressed and we went through all the musical selections, I saw so many people appreciate us. It was a strange experience. This town was unforgiving, but somehow it and the Outlaws had finally kinda met in the middle.
Who the fuck would have thought it would be in a church, and that we’d be singing gospel music?
My hope that Verity would appear so that she could hear the last choice I’d made was dashed as the preacher finished his sermon and we prepared to close the service.
#
Verity
I pushed through the crowd. I couldn’t believe how many people were here. They spilled out of the doors. I wended my way to the front of the church, and my eyes met Boone’s. As I stood there staring at him, seeing his eyes so bruised and miserable, my heart cried out.
It had been a terrible week of indecision and wrestling with myself. If it hadn’t been for the support of Aubree, River Pearl, and Minnie, I wasn’t sure I would have gotten through it.
I could leave Suttontowne with Minnie and return to New York to continue as I had before, while Boone got our son back. When he fought the adoption and went to court it would become a matter of public record. I wasn’t naïve enough to believe that no one would find out. There was no doubt word would reach my parents’ ears eventually.
I switched my gaze to my daddy’s. I’d told him about last year and that I hadn’t been in Kenya. I told him about Minnie and my dream-come-true job. My momma backed me up. My father was disappointed, and that hurt.
But I still couldn’t make myself come clean about the pregnancy and birth of Duel.
My daddy was angry that I was here in church staring at Boone. He was already ashamed of me. I saw it in his eyes and it hurt a lot. He would never be able to look at me again and see that perfect preacher’s daughter, but did I have the courage to take it even further?
Did I?
I clenched my hands into fists and tried to get a grip on the crazy flutter of nerves in my chest as a fresh bout of shakes hit me.
Boone’s gorgeous voice echoed across the church with the song I’d heard a dozen times. “Need you now.” It was about praying, asking for help. It was about strength. Boone looked directly at me. Unable to drag my eyes away, I met his electric blue eyes, a swell of love and pride and unexpected longing filling and expanding my chest.
Every word he sang was steeped in emotion so intense that I heard it in every note. It reached out and wrapped around my heart and squeezed.
He loved me.
My heart flipped over and I came face to face with the stark truth. I loved him and wanted to be with him.
Boone Outlaw, singing his heart out to me, urging me to trust in him, trust myself. Let go and give it all up to Him.
Boone, who had been the sexiest boy in high school, with that aura of bad boy steeped in masculinity and sexual intensity that only magnified his physical presence. But it wasn’t just Boone’s drop-dead looks that made him stand out in a crowd, or the stunning blue eyes and dark, silky hair. It was the strength of character that had shaped and molded his life. There were no half measures with Boone. He was his own man. And always had been.
Something shifted inside me, and a warmth filled me up to bursting, playing my heartstrings like a master, a sensual and loving recognition of the man he was, and a bedrock belief in that man. And I knew. Without a doubt, I knew. Boone and I would have happened. Regardless of the X, regardless of the pregnancy. We would have found each other.
I needed him. I’d always need him.
He wasn’t just my strength. He was everything that mattered.
Transfixed by that one staggering revelation, I turned and pushed my way out of the crowd. Breaking free from the church, I saw a little boy sitting on his mother’s hip as they walked away from the service.
As the last notes of the song died, I saw a tiny blue bootie fall off the little boy’s foot. I surged forward and snatched it up and went to call out to the mother, but she was already in the car and they were driving away.
I looked down at the tiny bit of yarn in my hand and doubled over with the pain. I ran blindly away to the gazebo that Boone had built and I folded down on the bench seat, still clutching the bootie, sobbing like my world was ending.
But it wasn’t. I had so much!
I had Boone. I had Duel.
I had my friends.
I had the courage.
Fear cracked through the other emotions that were thick in my throat. I wrestled with the secret and my own needs.
Stop it. I ordered, as I reined in the irrational urge to panic. Dammit, I wasn’t an irrational person. I was logical and sensible and practical. Wasn’t that what had saved me when I was growing up in that house?
Wasn’t that what had saved me this past year? Everything I did was methodical, as I buried all my emotions out of sight, running on pure practicality and adrenaline.
I’d been so clear in my mind about what I had to do, completely convinced that it was the best and only solution.
Then Duel had blindsided me. When I held him in my arms, he became real to me. So real I hadn’t been able to stop needing to hold him again. That black hole had consumed me until I thought I was going to die.
I wanted him back. The longing expanded and encompassed me.
I wanted my son back!
But I had been determined to give him up. Because I was reacting to what I had always reacted to. My fear. The threat of shame.
No more.
No more. I was done.
Suddenly Boone was there gathering me against him. “Darlin’. Geezus, Verity. Don’t do this to yourself.”
I closed my eyes against the wild surge of emotion that made me shiver. With a low moan, I turned blindly into his arms, sliding my hands up his back in a desperate hold. Emitting a ragged groan, he found my mouth with a gentle kiss that comforted me.
Boone’s chest expanded as I inhaled raggedly. He crushed me against him. His jaw flexed beneath my hand as he moved his mouth hard against mine, the thoroughness of his hot, wet kiss soothing the frenzy in my chest.
“I love you, Verity. I love you so much.”
My breath caught on a rough sob, the surge of longing making my lungs falter. He tightened his arms around me, holding me with the same fierceness as I was holding him. Our needs merged, and I went all soft and pliant in his arms.
I drew from his strength.
His breathing harsh and labored, he buried his hand in my hair as I pressed my face into the hollow of his throat.
Trembling from the impact of that single kiss, I closed my eyes and hung on to him.
“Verity, you’re making a spectacle of yourself.” My daddy’s voice sent my heart slamming against my ribs. “This is all your fault, Boone,” he continued. “If it wasn’t for you—”
I broke away from Boone and turned to fac
e my daddy, and I knew my eyes were blazing. “No it isn’t his fault! He isn’t to blame for anything. No one is to blame.”
My mother’s stricken eyes softened at my tone.
She knew. Somehow, she knew.
“I made a mistake last year during the graduation party and trusted someone I never should have trusted. That person slipped me Ecstasy and I had sex with Boone. And I got pregnant.”
My mother closed her eyes as tears seeped from beneath her lashes. She rushed up the stairs of the gazebo, and Boone stepped to the side as she took me into her arms.
“My girl. Oh, my God, what you must have gone through all by yourself. Why didn’t you come to me?”
Something eased in me as she held me against her. Something hard and painful unraveled.
“I had boy.” I whispered. “A perfect, perfect mistake.”
It felt so good to finally get it out in the open. But when I broke the embrace and looked at my daddy, he just glared at me and stalked away.
“Elijah!” My mother called. But he didn’t stop. “Verity, come with me. It’ll be okay,” she said.
I met Boone’s eyes and he looked so hopeful. But I had to explain everything to my daddy and make him understand. I didn’t know if I would ever get his forgiveness. I just knew that without Boone, without my son, I would only be half a person.
I squeezed his hand and turned to go with my mother.
#
Boone
I wasn’t sure what had happened, and I went home just wrung out and heartsick, at a loss to understand what Verity wanted or didn’t want. I tried to keep it together, tried to tell myself that she wasn’t going to leave me.
But I wasn’t sure.
I had a fleeting inspiration to grab my guitar, but I had broken it across that fucker Billy Joe’s fucking head and didn’t have an instrument to play. I took a moment to mourn that fine, beautiful instrument.
