by Jill Gregory
A half hour later, Mia sat at one end of the table, finishing off a slice of pizza, and Travis was seated far at the other end, calmly eating a burger. He was seated beside Will Brady, Rafe’s foreman, and across from Tommy’s parents, who had driven in from Bozeman and were spending the night with Lissie, Tommy, and Molly.
“Was that an actual conversation taking place for a minute between you and my brother back there?” Lissie wanted to know.
“Not really.”
“I could have sworn I saw a few sparks there.”
“Lissie!”
“Okay, okay. But I know what I saw. “
Thankfully Sophie set the massive birthday cake, twinkling with candles, in front of Tommy just then and everyone joined in singing “Happy Birthday.”
Travis bided his time.
While the birthday cake was sliced and served and eaten, while coffee and more wine and beer were served, he listened to Tommy’s father’s account of his childhood in Cody, Wyoming, and to Will Brady telling him how his brand-new Chevy truck got rear-ended in Billings a few weeks back by a pretty, red-haired woman in a Prius, and how he’d taken the truck-smashing woman to dinner two days later.
Travis nodded and made the appropriate comments. He joked and talked and watched and waited. His sister and Tommy headed to the crowded dance floor. They were laughing and talking, dancing with abandon beneath the Happy Birthday banners.
Rafe and Sophie were already out there in the thick of the crowd, arms around each other’s waists, lost in each other’s eyes.
Travis studied Mia, stunning with that knockout classic beauty as she leaned forward, deep in conversation with his cousin Decker and Deck’s wife, Leigh. Then Decker and Leigh moved off to dance and he knew he didn’t want to wait a moment longer.
He stood and started toward her with long strides. At that exact moment Mia happened to set down her coffee cup, lean back in her chair, and glance his way.
Her gaze widened ever so slightly as he approached, and he saw her entire body tense and straighten.
“May I have this dance?”
Brilliant amber eyes seared him. “Are you crazy?” she asked in an undervoice, glancing wildly around her. “People are already talking about us after what happened before.”
“Good. Let ’em talk.” Travis’s grin was unconcerned. He held out his big hand. “Since when are you afraid of a little talk?”
“I’m not afraid of anything,” she said sharply. But she shivered as she put her hand in his and rose from her chair. “We’re both going to live to regret this,” she warned him as he led her onto the dance floor, forging a path through the crowd.
“Speak for yourself. I won’t regret one minute of it.” Gently, he swung her into his arms.
Oh, God. What was she doing? It was one thing to kiss Travis in the dark privacy of her own front yard, with the entire block asleep and no one the wiser. It was quite another to dance with him in the Double Cross, with all of their friends and family around.
Lady Antebellum’s “Need You Now” streamed from the jukebox. The song—and Travis’s nearness—soaked into every inch of her soul.
His muscled arms felt so right around her. Strong and gentle and…arousing. His very touch, every glance made her feel like she’d been infused with fire. His big frame moved easily to the music, his eyes gazing straight into hers. The sad truth was she burned with wanting him. Again. Still.
Whatever. It was all insanity. And he’d started it when he’d come to Larkspur Road to plead with her to tutor Grady.
“What in the world are we doing?” She tipped her head back, narrowing her eyes.
“We’re dancing. Getting to know each other again.”
“And setting every tongue in this town wagging again.”
“The only tongue I care about right now is yours,” he teased. “And if we weren’t surrounded by everyone we know—”
“Stop right there,” she murmured, though she felt a flush rushing through her cheeks and a laugh rising in her throat. She couldn’t choke it back in time and it burst out. Suddenly she couldn’t stop laughing.
Travis’s grin widened.
“Careful, people might think you’re having a good time.”
“I need to go home,” she said, just at the moment the music ended. “It’s late.”
“I’ll walk you out.”
“That isn’t necessar—”
“How do I know Hatcher didn’t come back here and isn’t waiting outside for you?” he interrupted.
“More likely if he is waiting outside, it’s for you,” she countered.
“I should be so lucky.”
He looked like he actually wished Hatcher would come back for him. Mia sighed and shook her head.
Another song came on the jukebox and somehow they were still dancing. Despite her words, now that they were on the dance floor, hand in hand, their bodies touching, swaying, she wasn’t certain she wanted to stop.
“You didn’t bring me those textbooks,” she reminded him, trying to steer the conversation back to neutral ground as his big hand pressed warmly at her waist and she resisted the urge to close her eyes and lean her head on his shoulder like some lovesick fool.
“Sorry, I meant to. I got hung up on a few things.” His tone had turned serious. “Grady and I have been hauling our gear over to the cabin—we’re moving in this week. And in the midst of all that…” He paused. “Val called.”
The ex-wife. Mia watched his eyes darken with a controlled anger.
“I take it that didn’t go too well.”
“She wanted to talk to Grady, to see how he was doing. Before I had a chance to discuss it with her first, he told her that he was going to be tutored to help him pass that proficiency test. And according to Grady, she started sounding all funny, said she wanted to talk to me. And then…” He frowned. “You won’t believe what she said.”
“Try me,” Mia said softly, worried about the tension she saw in his face.
“She told me not to waste my time getting him a tutor. Because she and Drew have come up with their own solution. My guess is it’s really Baylor’s decision and Val’s going along with it to please him. At least I’d like to think that,” Travis added darkly.
Mia listened, bracing herself.
“They want to send Grady away to boarding school.”
“What?”
“Drew’s already made inquiries. He has a friend whose son supposedly got ‘straightened out’ at boarding school. In Richmond, Virginia, of all places. It’s called Broadcrest Academy. The perfect answer to all their problems. Grady would have to repeat fifth grade, but he wouldn’t have to endure teasing by anyone about having failed. Because no one enrolled at Broadcrest Academy would know. The staff is excellent, according to Val, and the program is highly structured, whatever the hell that means. Drew Baylor is apparently making arrangements for Grady to get intensive private tutoring and monitoring to prevent any further ‘problems.’ In other words they want to just ship him off and get him out of their hair. Needless to say, it ain’t gonna happen,” Travis added flatly.
“That’s awful.” Indignation seared her as she tried to take it in. “Boarding school for a ten-year-old? What’s the matter with them? What kind of a mother—” Mia broke off, realizing she was out of line. “I’m sorry.” She drew in a breath. “This is none of my business.”
“It is your business. Because you’re Grady’s tutor and nothing is changing that. I told Val to go to hell, though not in so many words. But I made it clear that boarding school is out of the question.”
“How’d that go over?”
“Val practically had a meltdown. Told me she’d talk to Drew.” His mouth twisted as the song came to an end. “The woman I married was stronger than this. Ditzy sometimes, but she was totally devoted to her son. Val used to be a very committed mother. Now…she seems committed only to one thing. Pleasing the rich asshole she married.” Travis looked down into Mia’s eyes. “She doesn’t kn
ow it yet, but I’m planning to have a few words with Drew myself.”
“I wouldn’t want to be him when that happens,” Mia murmured.
“Drew won’t want to be him either.”
Mia realized the party was starting to break up. People were making their way to the doors and when she and Travis headed back to the table to say their good-byes, Lissie and Sophie both smiled widely at her. But neither said a word about her dancing with Travis.
Rafe winked at his brother. Decker gave Travis a thump on the back.
Mia felt herself tensing as Travis walked her out to her car.
“See what you started? I expect you’re going to be grilled like a scorched steak when you get home,” she said with a half laugh as they reached her Jeep.
“Fine with me. I’m a hard nut to crack. And besides, I’m moving out in a day or so.”
Her lips tilted in a smile as he opened the Jeep’s door for her and they stood there together in the soft, cool night. Just looking at each other.
The sound of doors slamming, of people calling good night to each other, echoed through the parking lot as Travis smoothed a pale strand of hair that had blown across her eyes.
“It’s going to be worse for you. I’d say I’m sorry about that, but I’m not. I enjoyed our dance, Mia. Dances,” he corrected with a grin.
Searching his eyes, emotions swirled through her. She saw fierce heat in those dusk blue depths. A heat and wanting that matched her own. She and Travis weren’t touching, but he might have been stroking his hands down her body, caressing her breasts and exploring all of her intimate places, for the warmth that swept through her.
Time to take a step back, she thought, panic beginning to seep in.
“I enjoyed them, too. And…maybe the talk won’t be so bad. Maybe everyone will realize…we’re just friends now.”
His hand gently snagged her arm. “Whoa. Is that what you think? That we’re just friends?”
“Are you saying we’re not?”
Travis smiled a slow, sexy cowboy smile that turned her heart upside down and inside out. “Word games,” he murmured. “That’s the English teacher in you. Me, I’d rather play kissing games.”
He tugged her close.
She could have said no. Could have moved away.
But she didn’t.
Her heart skipped several beats as his arms went snug around her and then she was wrapped in the warmth and strength and scent of him.
Every one of their friends and family were gone now, though the parking lot was still half full. And they were alone outside the Double Cross, alone beneath the pale twinkling of the stars. She ignored the warning voice in her head, lifted her arms to twine them around his neck, and tilted her mouth up to his as he bent to kiss her.
It was a long, slow, searing kiss that made her brain crash like a meteor slamming into the earth. His tongue teased and caressed hers and she felt her legs wobbling, her self-control flying off in the wind. Her hands slid through the thickness of his hair as she pressed closer, needing the heat and taste of him. No—needing more than that. Needing him. Travis.
She forgot where she was. She lost herself. In that kiss. In that moment. In Travis.
“Who won the kissing game?” she asked at last, shakily, when they broke apart, both of them breathing hard, staring into each other’s eyes.
“I’d call it a tie.”
She laughed, her whole body aching for him as she traced a finger along his strong jaw.
A tie. Equal. No winners, no losers.
It sounded so easy.
But Mia had lost before.
A rowdy group of people were bursting out of the Double Cross, singing and laughing, swarming toward them.
“I’ll see you Monday,” she said, feeling as if she were yanking herself out of a lovely dream; then, before she could change her mind, she pulled away from him and stepped up into her Jeep.
“Count on it.” Travis closed the door.
She peeled out of the lot. In her rearview mirror she saw him, all tall and brawny and handsome, watching her drive away. His words echoed in her head. She could still taste his kiss on her mouth.
Count on it.
Could she? Could she count on anything where Travis was concerned? Anything other than that he could still make her heart race and her pulse tingle and her whole body come alive?
Proceed with caution. That’s the answer.
But like most things in life, Mia thought, it was a lot easier said than done.
Chapter Fourteen
Early the next morning, Mia planted herself at the kitchen table with a cup of coffee and a bagel and pondered her Starry Night quilt design. She closed her eyes, imagining the midnight blues and the golden stars and swirls of light. If she did it right, it would be beautiful. Perhaps her best quilt ever. For a moment she wished Gram was there to see it and a flicker of loneliness washed over her.
Sometimes she thought that moving back into this house after her divorce had been a huge mistake. Yes, it was her childhood home and yes, she’d been happy here. Happy to open it to Gram and to share it with her in her last years. But now…
Now she occasionally felt that she was trapped in the past in some way, unable to move on. However warm and charming and cozy the house was, even with all of the renovations she’d done, she lately still sometimes felt that she didn’t belong here anymore.
But if not here, she asked herself, setting down her pencil, then where?
For a moment she thought back to last night, when she’d stared into Travis’s eyes after Hatcher staggered out of the Double Cross.
Standing there with Travis, the rest of the world forgotten, just as it had been the night they kissed in the front yard, she’d felt something she hadn’t felt in a long time.
She couldn’t put her finger on it. But it had opened a longing deep inside her.
A longing for Travis?
Not for the boy he’d once been, she realized. Or for the teenaged lovers they’d left behind.
For the man he was now.
A man who was harder, tougher in many ways, and yet gentler. Who just about set her body on fire whenever he looked at her, let alone when he touched her. A man who was a committed father, trying to be there for his son.
A man coming home out of the blue to settle again in Lonesome Way.
And unsettling her heart.
She set down her second cup of coffee with a thump and narrowly missed spilling it all over the table just as Brittany padded in from the guest room. The girl was wearing gray cotton sleep pants and a faded red tank top and rubbing sleep from her eyes.
Britt had been home and out like a light when Mia returned from the Double Cross shortly after midnight. With a mumbled good morning, she headed for the fridge, and Mia had to smile when Samson stopped eating his kibble to run over and jump on her in greeting.
“Morning, sweetie. How was the party? Did you have fun?”
“Mm-hm. I guess.” Lifting out a carton of orange juice, Britt poured herself a glass. Her hair hung in her eyes, hiding them, and Mia couldn’t see her expression, could only hear the subdued tone of her voice.
“Everything okay?”
“Yep.”
“How about some scrambled eggs? And a bagel.”
“I’ll just take a granola bar.”
She plopped down with her juice and bit into an almond granola bar, pushing her hair out of her face, and for the first time, Mia saw that her eyes were red. She’d been crying.
“Britt…” Mia felt the stirring of alarm. “What’s wrong, honey? Did something happen at the party?”
“It was…okay…well, at first.” Britt set the granola bar down and stared at it.
Slowly she lifted her gaze to Mia’s face and Mia plainly saw the misery there, a misery she was trying very hard to hide.
“And then what? Something happened. Honey, tell me.”
A rush of concern filled her as still Britt said nothing.
“Whatev
er it is, you can talk to me about it. Was it Seth? Did the two of you have an argument?”
“No. Seth’s great.” Brittany’s voice began to quaver. “He’s really nice. It’s just…I feel so terrible.” She shoved back her uncombed hair and took a deep breath. “Someone spray-painted his truck last night while we were all in Jackie’s backyard.”
Her gaze slid away.
“Spray-painted his truck?” Mia drew a breath. Apparently she wasn’t the only one who’d had a run-in with trouble last night. “Who would do that? What did they write?”
“They didn’t write anything. They just sprayed all this purple and black paint all over, including the windows.” Britt’s tone was subdued. “They must have used up ten, maybe fifteen spray cans of paint. It was a huge mess.”
She took another gulp of juice. “Seth was so upset. He said his parents would be furious.” Her eyes filled with quick tears. “I feel awful about it!”
Mia reached across the table, took her hand. “I understand, but, honey, it’s not your fault.”
“I…know. I know it isn’t…but…” She swallowed, for a moment looking wildly confused. “It’s just that…we were all dancing in the backyard and the music was turned up really loud. Maybe if we’d just been paying more attention…we—someone—maybe I would have noticed that there was somebody out there on the driveway….” Her voice trailed off.
Something that felt like fear turned over inside of Mia. Britt looked truly distraught. And also like she was holding something back. But what?
Unsettled, Mia walked to the coffeepot, thinking hard as she poured herself another cup. Lonesome Way was a pretty quiet town. Of course, teenagers everywhere acted out sometimes, and this town was no different. But here, misbehavior was usually in small, harmless ways. Without much destruction. Serious vandalism was pretty rare.
“I can’t imagine who would do something like that,” she murmured, her gaze resting on Britt’s face. “Can you?”
“N-no.” Britt grabbed up the half-eaten granola bar, took another bite, and hastily began to chew. “Seth can’t either. We didn’t know anything about it until Dan and Lacey went out to Dan’s truck to head home—they were the ones who spotted it. No one could believe someone did that right in Jackie’s driveway. Jackie’s parents were totally freaked out. They called the sheriff and everything.”
