by Marina Adair
Even the residents of Sugar, Georgia, weren’t above cashing in on his name, and that income source would dry up real quick if his sponsors bailed. Which was exactly why he took his responsibility seriously. The people of Sugar might live for gossip but they took strong exception to outsiders butting in on their business. They also protected their own—and that meant he had to do whatever it took to ride out the scandal.
He just wished like hell he were enjoying this ride half as much as the girl still gyrating on the screen.
The bartender came back, carrying a tray of beers and swinging her hips in the universal sign for I’m game. “Figured your friends would be thirsty, too.” She offered up three beers, a bowl of peanuts, and a seductive wink. “If you need me, you just let me know. I’m always available to whet your thirst, Mr. Brett.”
“Thank you, ma’am. Seems like you have some thirsty customers over there,” Cal said shoving his beer to the side and giving the waitress a polite kiss-off.
She puckered her lips up in a pout and mouthed for Brett to call her before heading off to the other side of the bar.
Cal glared and Brett didn’t see the big deal. He was upfront with women, always made sure they knew it was a no-strings situation, always left them more than satisfied, and always acted like a gentleman.
Bottom line—he loved women. And they loved him right back.
“Wipe that smug-ass grin off your face,” Jace said, sounding equally amused and pissed.
“The only reason you’re still standing is because Payton made me promise to bring you home in one piece.” Cal ran a hand through his hair and looked every bit the stressed, single dad of a teen girl.
Shit.
“Payton saw it?”
“No, I got her out of the room before it got good, but she’s already asking questions.”
“What did you tell her?”
“Nothing yet, but I have to come up with something. She’s twelve. Twelve, Brett. Do you think she won’t hear about it at school? Or from Hattie and her Bible group?” Cal leveled him with a glare. “Hattie’s already saying she’s going to tan your bare hide. Right below and to the right of that tattoo of yours.”
“Wait? Did you say home? As in Sugar?”
“Yup.” Now it was Cal’s turn to smile.
He’d rather face a whole course of pissed-off sponsors than that town. When Brett left for college it was on a scholarship set up by the good people of Sugar. When he made the PGA they threw a parade in his honor. After his first Masters win they’d named a highway after him.
At the thought of going home with this scandal surrounding him, Brett felt that familiar churning in his gut. It happened whenever he thought about letting people down. Which was why he’d kept his visits home short and sweet.
“Sorry, guys. I can’t go home.” Even the word felt wrong. It no longer referred to the aged farmhouse they’d been raised in. With his first Masters purse, Brett had built Hattie her dream home on the back side of the family property, which butted up to Sugar Lake. The ridiculous McMansion, with is marble floors and sweeping staircase, was situated right off the newly named Brett McGraw Highway and served as a painful reminder of all that had been lost. “I’ve got the John Deere Classic.”
“We already decided, you’re skipping Illinois,” Jace reminded him.
Cal put his hands up, effectively cutting off any argument Brett could have made. “What you need to be worrying about is Stone’s daughter, especially since she is getting married in a few weeks and tensions in the family are now probably running high. Let’s give Stone a chance to lie low. Cool down. Forget about you and his precious baby girl. And give your agent a chance to fix this without having you screw it up by parading around town with a herd of horny golf-bunnies in your wake.”
“Cal’s right. Giving it a few months to let the media frenzy die down wouldn’t hurt,” Jace added, and Brett felt like an ass. The earlier stress Brett was picking up wasn’t just for him, the stations were probably playing all the footage from Jace’s arrest. Every time his kid brother moved on with his life—new job, new town, new girl—his past always seemed to resurface and fuck it up. Brett’s career was a big reason it kept resurfacing. That Jace was crashing at Brett’s place in Atlanta only made it worse.
If he went home the hype would fizzle. No photos, no story. And in Sugar no one would make it easy on the press. Last time the media had come to town sniffing out a story the locals had, with a southern smile and a Bless your heart, rolled up the welcome mats.
“You were thinking about helping Cletus host the Sugar summer golf program for the kids this year anyway,” Jace offered, trying to polish the obvious turd that was Brett’s predicament. Brett had been one of those kids. Actually he was the flagship student. As far as Brett was concerned, Cletus Boyle was one of the reasons he was a professional golfer and not in jail.
“So basically you two came here to tell me it would be a great place to lie low for the next few months?” Beyond a better grip, Brett doubted he had anything positive to offer these kids other than how to fuck up your life in one night.
“I came down here to kick your ass. Cletus came up with the idea of you helping out for the summer,” Cal said, piling on the guilt. “Full time.”
Full time? “Crap, he saw the video?”
“Called a few minutes after it broke. Thought you could use some time dredging the lake for golf balls and figuring shit out. I happen to agree,” Cal said.
Great, Cletus wasn’t looking for a mentor for the kids. He was looking for a way to save Brett from himself. Again.
“And Hattie said you promised to MC the Sugar Ladies’ summer concert in July.”
“I said I’d try to make it.” Which in Hattie terms meant she was free to leverage his name for a good cause. This time it was the Sugar Medical Center’s new pediatric ward. The town had spent the better part of the year trying to raise funds to finish the project—and Brett was their secret weapon.
He squeezed the bridge of his nose, not seeing any way around this. He was already here, in the great state of Georgia, with apparently nowhere pressing to be until the playoffs. Which meant that he had to go back to the one place that made him feel like that scared fourteen-year-old kid who’d just lost his parents, looking like a coward with his tail between his legs.
“Fine, ten weeks,” Brett groaned.
* * *
“Aren’t you even curious about what Wilson is up to?” Russell, the delivery boy for Big Wang’s, asked, leaning against the door frame of Josephina’s New York high-rise, a bag of takeout dangling from his finger.
“Nope.” Curiosity had faded the second Wilson’s jet had pulled away, leaving her half naked and stranded on a corporate tarmac. She was curious, though, about how long a woman, who was clearly wearing the same wrinkled slacks and chocolate-stained blouse from three days ago when she tried to leave the house, could live on Chinese food before she began to look pathetic.
“Because his Facebook status says engaged.”
“It’s said engaged for the past two years.” Two years, seven months, and eleven days. Josephina dug through her wallet and pulled out two bills.
“To Babette Roberts,” Russell threw out.
Josephina froze. Her eyes flew to Russell’s.
“How do you know?” she whispered, hating the way her voice shook.
“Sherman told me when he let me up.”
Sherman was the doorman. He took his job seriously, and his gossip to the bank. If he was telling the delivery boy about her disaster of a life, the entire co-op had been informed days ago.
Great. Just great.
It explained why Mrs. Goldstein had left a bottle of scotch and a collection of chick-flick DVDs on her doorstep yesterday.
“Well, good for them.” She shoved the money at Russell while reaching for the bag. She needed wine, grease, and a good cry. Immediately. And she wasn’t willing to show weakness in front of witnesses. Not again.
Bu
t Russell held on, tugging back. “Um, it’s actually twenty-seven, thirty-five.”
“It’s usually twenty-five with tip.” She should know. She’d ordered Chinese takeout every night for the past eleven days. The first night, Russell had forgotten her fortune cookie and she had cried all over his red BIG WANG’S: 24-HOURS SERVICE T-shirt. The next night he’d brought a half dozen cookies and extra napkins.
So when she, once again, let out an ugly sniffle, Russell took a small step back.
“This is all I have,” she whispered, hating how she’d once again managed to come up short.
“That’s all right,” Russell said. “How about you go freshen up while I set up dinner. Then after we can start the healing process.” He waggled his brows and—
“Ohmigod. Are you offering a ten percent discount to Big Wang’s in exchange for sex?”
“A little rebound nookie to go with the extra fortune cookies.” There went the brows again.
“No and no.” She slammed the door, but not before grabbing the bag of takeout.
“What about my tip?” Russell shouted through the door.
“Here’s one,” she shouted back. “Offering sex in exchange for two bucks might be considered offensive.”
“It was a good offer.” The heavily accented voice came from behind her.
Josephina turned around and saw her mother’s housekeeper standing at the bedroom door clutching a stainless-steel coffeemaker to her bosom.
Rosalie shrugged one meaty shoulder. “He’s right, you need a man. It will help with the pain.”
“I don’t need a man.”
What she needed was a new life. She looked around what had been her house for the past few years and wondered when it had become so sterile. Clean lines, steel beams, and polished marble floors. Not a thing was out of place—except for her. Not that she knew who her was anymore, but Josephina decided that she’d like the chance to get to know the person she had been before—before the engagement, before the career-making-moment, before she let everyone’s expectations and lives snuff out her own.
“Well, that’s good because more of that,” Rosalie looked pointedly at the takeout and added a few clicks of the tongue, “and your thighs will jiggle. Men don’t like women who jiggle,” Rosalie said, as though she weren’t shaped like a squat pear with tiny legs that forced her to waddle everywhere she went.
“Now, what do you want me to do with this?” She held up the coffeepot. It was a roaster, foamer, Frappuccino maker, and carbonator all in one—and it was Wilson’s favorite appliance.
“You don’t have to help me pack, Rosalie,” she said, although she was secretly happy Rosalie had come. She’d boxed up more stuff in the past hour than Josephina had managed all day.
For three weeks, she’d stared at the door, thinking this had to be some kind of mistake and that at any minute Wilson would walk in and everything would go back to the way it was supposed to be. Then, last night, while watching Under the Tuscan Sun and inhaling a red velvet cake, she realized that she didn’t want to go back to the way things were.
Even scarier, no matter how hard she tried, she couldn’t pinpoint the exact moment she’d lost balance in her life and in turn lost herself. Which was why she was moving out. It was clear that Wilson wasn’t coming back—he hadn’t even called to see if she was okay or tell her that he was engaged to someone else. And every moment she stayed there, in the place she thought she’d grow old and raise babies, the regret ratcheted tighter around her chest, until breathing hurt.
No, she needed to leave—and pronto. Problem was, the only place she had to go was her parents’ house, where the couture décor and upstate judgment would be equally suffocating, just in a different way. Even thinking about it gave her hives.
“Your mother pays me.” Rosalie narrowed her eyes. “She says to come here and help you. You say you need to move. So I fill boxes. Now—”
She held up the coffeemaker again in question.
“Salvation Army box,” Josephina conceded, although every cell in her body was screaming to dismiss Rosalie and fix this mess on her own. But who was she to risk her mother’s wrath over a few stupid boxes?
“What about this?” Rosalie held up an old shoebox covered in stickers and glitter and enough memories to make her heart jerk painfully. Then jerk again until it somehow landed in her throat, creating a whole new set of problems. Because there, in Rosalie’s pudgy hand, was a part of Josephina’s past that she hadn’t thought about in years.
“Where did you find that?” Josephina gently took the box and walked over to the couch.
She’d cried so much over the past few weeks, she assumed more tears would be impossible. Yet as she slipped open the lid and saw the photo resting atop a pile of letters and keepsakes, her eyes went blurry. This pain was different, as though it originated from someplace old and forgotten, and it packed the kind of power that made breathing almost impossible.
Josephina didn’t know how her life had spiraled so far from center, but she did know that she hadn’t felt as free as the girl smiling back at her in years. She picked up the photo and traced a finger over the rolled edge. It had been taken the summer she’d turned ten and her parents had gone on one of their trips to Europe, leaving her, once again, with her aunt.
It was one of the best summers of her life, spent making mud pies and learning from Letty how to make real ones. Which was why she was standing on a wooden chair in pigtails, pearls, and a too-big apron, with flour down her front, a whisk in her hand, and a smile of sheer pleasure on her face.
If she closed her eyes she could almost smell the bite of lemons and hear Aunt Letty’s voice: “Careful, child. If you have to beat it that hard then you’re missing an ingredient. Might look perfect today but come morning that meringue will be a big pile of trouble, stinking up the fridge for days to come.”
Josephina placed the photo on the coffee table and carefully thumbed through the box. She dug past drawings and sketches—mostly in crayon and big swirly letters with hearts over the i’s—through magazine clippings and all of the ideas and dreams she and her aunt had cooked up for the old boardinghouse that Letty had called home, stopping when she found what she was looking for. At the bottom, postmarked six weeks before Letty had passed, sat a yellow envelope.
With a shaky breath Josephina opened the flap and pulled out the letter. The paper smelled like lilac and mothballs, and Josephina wanted to press it to her face and breathe in. A faded photo of Letty, standing on the front steps of Fairchild House in mud boots and a rain slicker, holding a jug of her finest moonshine, fell to the couch.
She remembered that last summer, sitting curled up in Letty’s arms while looking out the windows of the salon as a summer storm blew past and listening to Letty recount the story about how her great-great-aunt, Pearl Fairchild, came to call the magical boardinghouse home.
According to legend, Letty had said, the two-story Plantation-style house was built in the mid-1800s by the first mayor of Sugar, Jeremiah Sugar. It was a masterpiece designed to win the heart of the beautiful socialite Pearl Fairchild, who, moved by his romantic overture and promises of a life filled with adventure, left her family and New York behind to become Mrs. Jeremiah Sugar.
Even the name sounded perfect. But after two months of travel, first in a train and later in a horse-drawn wagon, finally walking the remaining eight miles to the house, Pearl realized there was nothing sugary about her husband-to-be.
The man whom she had defied her parents for, had given her heart to, stood in the foyer. His slacks hung around his ankles, his face blotched red, while his pale backside engaged in rapid undulation under the housekeeper’s smock, so engaged that he failed to notice her enter the residence or even pick up his beloved mayoral gavel.
Pearl never took his last name, the mayor’s body was never found, and the housekeeper—prone to gossip—never had to work another day in her life, instead spending the rest of her days as Pearl’s handsomely paid companion. Thu
s, the Fairchild House, boarding for the adventurous, was born.
Josephina turned the photo over and on the back, Letty had simply written: Come home, Fairy Bug. Your adventure is waiting for you.
Fairy, she remembered, clutching the photo to her heart to keep it from breaking, was because Letty swore Josephina was born to fly. The bug part was to remind her that sometimes she had to get dirty to really live.
And more than anything Josephina wanted to live again—really live. She tucked the photo into her pocket and looked at Rosalie. “I need a car.”
Chapter 2
It was official. Brett was exhausted. A little under two weeks back in Sugar and he’d already dredged the lake, helped out the local Booster Club with their yearly jog-a-thon, gotten the first set of campers settled, and agreed to play a friendly round of golf with the mayor—and local press.
He was in desperate need of some time on the course—alone, which was where he’d been coming from when he ran across—
“What the hell?” Brett swerved, narrowly missing a golfer decked out in cultured couture, stomping down the middle of the road. He pulled over to the shoulder of Brett McGraw Highway—which, in Sugar, was nothing more than two narrow lanes, one going in each direction, through the middle of a cattle pasture edged with oak trees and barbed wire—and rolled down his window
“Must have been some drive,” he said, leaning out the window and watching her approach. “The nearest hole is about eight miles back that way.”
He’d walked this same road more times than he cared to count as a kid, dragging a worn-out set of clubs, looking for an escape.
The leggy blonde, tugging what looked to be—a bunny on a leash?—stormed past his truck without sparing him a glance as the set of golf clubs, slung across her back like a samurai sword, nearly took out his side mirror. She wore some kind of skirt, silky and uptight and still somehow managing to hug every curve. Exposing a damn near perfect set of never-ending legs that balanced on the most ridiculous pair of heels he’d ever seen, which for some reason turned him on.
