SLOW PLAY (7-Stud Club Book 4)

by Christie Ridgway

  “That wasn’t… My intention…” This time he sighed aloud. “Look, it seemed easier. I didn’t want to get into explanations.”

  Her mulish expression communicated what she thought about that.

  “Look, I had no idea you’d even heard of the engagement.”

  She glanced to the side. “My mom told me. Years ago.” Then she looked back to him. “In any case, you shouldn’t have let me go on so long. Why did you?”

  Christ, he didn’t have an answer.

  “Mad?” Fire shot from her eyes.

  “Maybe I felt foolish,” he said, then cursed himself for finding it hard to lie now, of all times.

  Harper stilled, her head tilted. “What do you mean?”

  “Maybe I felt foolish that another relationship hadn’t worked out.”

  Instead of eliciting some sympathy, her eyes narrowed and her arms folded across her chest. “Is that right?”

  “Yes.”

  One toe tapped. “Who broke up with who?”

  “Whom.”

  She sucked in a quick breath. “Whom, then, Captain Grammar.”

  “It was mutual.”

  She stared at him a long moment. “Nope, don’t believe it. You did. You broke the engagement.”

  He kept his mouth shut.

  “Fine,” she said, after another minute. Her arms flew out. “It’s not my business anyway.” She spun and began to walk away.

  This might be the last time he ever saw Harper Hill. “What about you?” he called to her retreating back. “You engaged? Been married?”

  “Not me.”

  “No surprise,” he said, his voice low.

  Not low enough, because her sprint slowed. She turned around, stalked back. “What was that?”

  “Keep on walking,” he said, his temper rocketing. “It’s what you do best, isn’t it?”

  Her body slowly drew up, adding another couple inches of height. Sparks flew from her eyes and her face infused with pink color. “I can’t believe you just said that.”

  She looked angry. But not as angry as he was at this instant, because of what she was driving him to do. He took a step forward. His hands shot out to grasp her shoulders.

  Then he yanked her body against his. From experience, he knew when she was on tiptoe their mouths would perfectly align.

  They still did.

  The kiss was anger for this moment, punishment for all the years of nightly dreams, heat because…because she made him hot. Then it softened to tenderness. Nostalgia crept in next. His chest hurt.

  Shit.

  He let her go, stepped back, and stared at her, his body thrumming with mingled resentment, desire, regret.

  “A mistake,” he finally choked out.

  “We always were,” she said, then ran.

  Chapter Four

  The next night after dinner, Harper’s mom sat on her bed watching her go through the boxes on the top shelf of the closet. Nestled in the first was a tiny pair of red cowboy boots. “Oh, cute,” she said, holding them up to show her mother. “When did I go through a cowgirl phase?”

  “Never,” Rebecca said. “Your great-aunt, the first Harper, sent them and they were already too small by the time you could walk. But I couldn’t bear to throw them out.”

  Harper frowned down at her big feet. “Well, their time has come now.” She dropped them into a garbage bag sitting on the floor.

  Wincing, her mother fished them out of the plastic. “I’m not ready to let these go yet. And no one is forcing you to do this, by the way.”

  “I’m heading out again, I told you. Tomorrow. The next day at the latest. And this time I won’t leave all these memories behind, just…just cluttering things up.”

  Her mother’s speculative look made Harper quickly turn back to the closet. In another box she found a photo and a withered wrist corsage. “Ew,” she said, dropping the browned flower. Then she peered at the old picture. “I can barely remember the dance. My date was five other girls. Is that sad?”

  “You never had your eye on any one particular boy until…”

  “Yeah, until.” Harper tossed the photo into the “Keep” pile because those besties had been great fun, which seeing Sophie again had reminded her. Maybe Harper had missed having them in her life.

  Maybe she’d missed them a lot.

  “I can’t blame you for waiting for Maddox and then getting stuck on him,” her mom said. Cradled in her hands was the framed photo that had been propped atop her nightstand. The picture showed the two of them on the beach, Harper wrapped in his arms.

  Her smile couldn’t have been brighter then. Looking at the two of them together, one tugged at her lips now. Then she frowned. “I didn’t get ‘stuck’ on him.”

  “Obviously not,” Rebecca agreed, “since you left six years ago and haven’t spent more than forty-eight hours at home at a time after.”

  Except for now. Harper resolutely pawed through the box of high school memories and then consigned report cards and frayed braided thread bracelets to the garbage bag.

  “I wanted to see the world, Mom,” she said. “Just like my father.”

  Her mother grimaced. “Maybe I made that sound too romantic.”

  “Or it could be it’s in my genes.” It was better to think she’d inherited her father’s wanderlust over her mother’s unrequited attachment to a man who didn’t feel the same level of emotion in return.

  “You did enjoy your travels, didn’t you?”

  Four and a half years of seeing the world had been wonderful in many ways. But the teaching assignments lasted nine months, so it was never quite enough time to settle in, to feel cemented in a group of friends who became true family. So many of her students and their families had given so much to her that she couldn’t regret though—knowledge of the world, other cultures, other foods, and finally the understanding they were all one humanity together.

  But when she’d found herself laid up in a hospital bed believing death was imminent, she knew she wanted to come home…or at least get closer to home.

  “I had a wonderful time until I realized I was too far for deliveries of Grandmom’s minestrone, even on a semi-occasional basis. That had to change.”

  “So you’re going back to waitressing then?” her mom asked. “You enjoy that as well?”

  Footsteps tripping up the stairs made any need for response unnecessary. “Sophie!” she said, as happy to see her friend as she was to avoid answering her mother. “What are you doing here?”

  “We haven’t had a chance to properly catch up,” the small blonde said.

  “Sit here then.” Rebecca popped up from the bed, allowing the younger woman to have her place. “I’ll see about getting you girls a couple of glasses of wine.”

  Sophie clapped in appreciation, then made small talk as well as helpful suggestions as Harper continued cleaning out her closet. Rebecca delivered the wine and clearing clutter was abandoned as Harper joined her old best friend on the bed.

  They clinked glasses as Harper’s mom waved and left them alone. “It’s so great to see you again,” Sophie said. “I’ve missed you.”

  “Really?” Harper beamed. “I was thinking the same thing. That I missed you. Everyone. Everything.”

  “Nothing much changes around here, though. You wanted more than that.”

  Did she? Harper wondered. Or had she been desperate not to end up like her mother, always waiting for some man to love her with the dedication that she loved him?

  “I’m very sure there’s been many changes,” Harper said, moving on from that thought.

  “Not as many as you might assume.” Sophie’s eyebrows wiggled. “You thought Maddox had married Courtney. Thank God we were spared that.”

  “She seems quite sweet, despite that memory I have of her shaving off Danielle Brower’s eyebrows at her twelfth birthday sleepover.”

  “Oh, she is sweet—now. Just not right for Mad.”

  Harper glanced down at her wine. “He was engaged t
o her though, right?”

  “For about ten minutes, around a year after you left.”

  Stupid, how that hurt. “I guess he wasn’t devastated by the loss of me.”

  “To be honest, at the time I was pretty much wrapped in myself and my terrible, newfound crush on Hart Sawyer.”

  “What?” Harper downed a big swallow of wine. “Hart? The boy who used to beg you to make him chocolate chip cookies and then mercilessly questioned any boy you dated?”

  “Worse than a brother,” she said, waving a hand. “And one day I realized I had fallen madly in love with him.”

  Harper stared. “But you’re not together? All this time and you haven’t made a move on him?”

  “No move.” Sophie took her own long swallow from her glass, then stared into it. “The time was never right.”

  “Never right? You’re not shy. And you have game, what with two older brothers, you are good with men. Plus being a fabulous cook and so adorable—”

  “Thanks, but the time was never right to convince him to see me as something other than a little sister. And then…” She shrugged. “And then he went to his college reunion weekend and came home engaged.”

  “Oh.” Poor Sophie. Harper thought back to the farmers market and didn’t recall seeing a woman attached to Hart’s arm. “But they’re no longer with each other?”

  “Right.”

  Harper brightened. “Then maybe—”

  “She died.”

  Pain stabbed Harper’s chest and her hand flew up to cover it. “Oh, God.”

  Sophie’s tear-filled eyes belied her casual tone. “A brain aneurysm, just weeks before the wedding.”

  “Oh, God. Poor Hart.”

  “Poor Hart.”

  Stricken, Harper put her wine aside to take her friend into her arms. “It’s a terrible thing.”

  “Truly terrible,” Sophie said, her voice muffled by Harper’s shoulder. “And I liked her. I even liked her for Hart.”

  “Wow.” Harper pushed her a few inches away. “You did?”

  “And I was so happy he was happy.” A tear fell down Sophie’s cheek. “Now he’s not happy at all.”

  “Oh, Soph.” She brought her friend close again, squeezing. “This has to be so hard for you. And God, for Hart.” Harder than it had been for Harper to imagine Mad married, that was for sure. Even though he’d worked in law enforcement, she’d never considered he might get physically hurt. Again, that stab to the chest.

  She might have been thousands of miles away when Mad was hurt, or worse.

  “What are we going to do about this, Soph?” she asked, feeling like they both might break.

  Then a shout from downstairs had them separating. Their gazes met. “What is it?” Sophie asked, wiping her wet cheeks.

  “We better find out.”

  They raced down the stairs only to enter the kitchen to find her mother helping Grandpop into a chair while Grandmom stood ready with another and holding a pillow.

  “Eugene Hill, sit down, prop up your foot, and we’ll put an ice pack on it. Should we call the paramedics? The doctor?”

  Harper moved in to steady her grandfather as he lowered onto the seat. “What happened?” she asked.

  “Nothing,” Grandpop grumbled. “I just need a short rest.”

  Grandmom was attempting to lift his long leg. “On the pillow. Ice. I can call the nurse hotline, Eugene—”

  “I don’t need the nurse hotline, Mary,” Harper’s grandfather said. “Rebecca, tell your mother to stop fussing.”

  “Stop fussing, Mom,” Rebecca said obediently. “Dad, get your foot up. Here’s the ice.”

  Harper tried again. “What happened?”

  Her mom glanced at Grandpop. “Your grandfather got it into his mind-—”

  “Rebecca.” Grandpop looked at his daughter. “We don’t need to bother Harper with that.”

  “Bother me with what?” she demanded. “What is going on?”

  Grandmom put her hand on her husband’s shoulder. “We’re family, Eugene.”

  “And I have to go,” Sophie said, with a wave for all. “Take care of yourself Mr. Hill.”

  “Sophie, let’s meet up later, okay?”

  The small blonde blew her a kiss. “We will.”

  When her friend disappeared, Harper propped her hands on her hips and faced her relatives. “Okay, come clean here, Hill family.”

  And funny, how nice that sounded.

  It didn’t take long to get the story. One of their farming neighbors had told Grandpop earlier that day that he suspected thieves were creeping in under the cover of night with picking poles and clippers and stealing avocados.

  “They’ll hit us next,” said Grandpop darkly. “I need to be out with the trees tonight.”

  “No,” Mom and Grandmom said together.

  “You don’t see well in the dark,” Grandmom added. “Why do you think you just tripped and sprained your ankle?”

  “That’s a damn gopher’s fault,” Grandpop said. “I have 20/20 vision.”

  “In the daylight,” Grandmom said. “At night—”

  “I’ll take over guard duty,” Harper said, to prevent more arguing. “That way Grandpop can rest easy and rest his sprained ankle too.”

  “It’s not sprained,” her grandfather said. “It’s just twisted.”

  Her grandmother began fussing over him again, putting on a kettle for tea then pouring him a brandy. Harper’s mom grabbed her at the elbow and towed her toward the pantry, then pushed her inside.

  “We have Oreos?” Harper said, glancing around. “And Nilla wafers?”

  “If I make you a care package of them right now, will you pretend to guard the avocados overnight? I’d do it, but I want to keep an eye on Dad and Mom too. She’s working herself into a state.”

  Harper clutched her mom’s forearm. “Isn’t it just a twisted ankle?”

  “He’s not getting any younger.”

  “I wish you’d stop saying that,” Harper whispered. Then she cleared her throat. “And of course I’ll guard the avocados tonight.”

  “Pretend to guard them,” Rebecca corrected. “If I truly was worried about thieves I’d call in Mike.”

  Mike was their foreman who was married with five kids. She’d been told his evenings were full and his nights rarely uninterrupted by a crying baby or thirsty toddler.

  “Aren’t you worried about the avocados, Mom?”

  “Jerome Cochran—you remember our neighbor—let’s just say he’s a little paranoid.”

  “Oh?”

  Her mom swiped the air with her hand. “It’s too long to explain.”

  “So what do you want me to do?”

  Rebecca’s lips pursed. “Go out for a couple of hours? Long enough for your grandfather to finish that brandy. Along with the ibuprofen, he should be asleep by eleven. Come back at eleven fifteen, eleven thirty, and in the morning we can assure him that you averted the crisis.”

  “I’ll be a hero,” Harper said with a smile, thinking how good it would feel to give Grandpop peace of mind. He’s not getting any younger.

  “Pack up those cookies, Mom.”

  Mad sat with poker buddy, Rafael “Raf” Rodriguez, at the roll-up windows of the Fun & Games brew pub, the moneymaking baby of their other friend Cooper. They were kicked back with beers, overlooking the comings and goings on Sawyer Beach’s Main Street. Several of the businesses remained open—a couple of restaurants, another bar, Harry’s for those who needed coffee and pastries—but it was heading toward nine o’clock so the kid from the hardware store was sweeping the sidewalk outside the entrance and Gifts for Girlfriends, the trendy boutique owned by another friend, was dimming its lights.

  “Nice night,” Raf said.

  A salty breeze set the market lights crisscrossing the street swinging, the cool waft a welcome addition to the unusually warm evening. “Yeah, nice,” Mad agreed, feeling nothing was nice at all.

  Raf gestured toward him with his glass. “Bee
n hearing a lot of talk about you.”

  Raising his beer instead of answering, Mad took a drink.

  “You made some sort of scene at Harry’s with the ever-hot Harper.”

  Mad turned his head to stare at his friend. “What?”

  “Ever-hot. She’s still got it. Before, some of us might have been waiting until she was legal, you know. But boom, she turns eighteen, and you moved in so fast that we didn’t get our own chance with her.”

  “You never had a chance with her,” he said, frowning.

  “Because you permanent-inked her calendar right away.” Raf shook his head. “Not very sporting of you, by the way. You’re supposed to give it a few dates before you tell everybody you’re going steady.”

  “I never told anyone we were going steady and you were never getting a chance with her.”

  Raf shrugged. “Maybe I have a chance with her now.”

  Realizing he was being needled, Mad turned away from his friend and drank more beer. “If you must keep flapping your lips, don’t you have something else to talk about? Like some family drama you want to rehash?” Maybe that was needling too, because Raf’s father had maintained two families on the sly for years. Not until junior high when Shane’s mother had moved to town with him, had the truth finally been revealed.

  But the half brothers had taken the situation in stride. Since high school they’d been joined at the hip and even built their roofing business together while attending the same local college.

  “Sorry, Raf,” he said, because cop, guilty conscience.

  “You’re not wrong,” his friend said on a sigh. “It’s September and I’m already dreading Thanksgiving. Dueling turkeys, the battle of the sides, pecan versus pumpkin pie, the taste-off.”

  Mad laughed. Both women had dumped the bigamist husband, but thought holidays required a blending of families.

  Glancing around, Raf suddenly went still, then set his glass aside. “Who is that?”

  Mad followed the direction of his gaze. A woman, curvy, with a ton of hair and a bright smile for— “I don’t know who she is, Raf, but she seems to be here with your brother.” Shane had his hand on the small of her back as he ushered her toward the bar.

  “I’m in love,” Raf declared.