And he didn’t feel at home in these halls either. Not years ago, and not now.
At least in prison there were no masks. You were who you were. No facades.
High school had been full of deceptions. People pretending. No one was honest. Except his teachers. They were pretty up-front, letting him know how little they thought of him and that they only expected trouble from him. With the last name Walsh, he was branded the moment he stepped into a classroom.
As for his peers . . . the guys either looked up to him or wanted to kick his ass because of his reputation. Girls? Well, they were always around. Always available. At least the ones that liked the bad boys like him . . . and there were plenty of those that did.
“Pardon me,” the female in his hands said in a gust of shaky breath.
He steadied her, his body still rocking from the sudden contact with hers.
“It’s okay.” His hands lingered on her arms as he stared at her. A slow warmth spread through him as he inhaled her clean, floral scent and assessed the brown eyes and the dark wavy hair. She wore minimal makeup. Brown freckles dotted her nose and cheeks. She was pretty in a fresh-faced girl-next-door kind of way.
His hands flexed on her arms. He should let go of her. She’d done nothing to invite his touch, and still his hands remained on her after it was clear she had regained her balance.
Since he’d been released from Devil’s Rock, he’d been with a few women. He had a lot of time to make up for, after all. Years of celibacy. Things hadn’t changed much. He might have been exonerated but he still had the bad boy reputation that women wanted. Certain women anyway. Certain women not like this one.
He knew that instantly from how wide her eyes grew as their staredown continued. She looked like a fucking Disney princess. He would never approach such a sweet-faced girl. He never had.
His gaze dipped, looking her over, trying to assess her shape beneath her boxy blouse.
“Excuse me.” She glanced at his hands still on her arms.
A sneaking suspicion began to grow in him. “Do I know you?”
It couldn’t be . . .
“Umm . . .” The way she dragged the word out hinted that they did know each other and she knew it. “No, not really. I mean, kinda. We graduated together. From here.” She waved vaguely around her.
Could it be her? What were the odds?
“Oh.” He studied her face, a strange tightness wrapping around his chest. Their graduating class hadn’t been that large. But it had been several years ago. A lifetime ago, really. He’d lived and died and been born all over again in that time. He couldn’t expect her, of all people, to still be here in Sweet Hill. She had been destined for great things outside of this town.
“It was a long time ago,” she muttered, color rising in her cheeks.
“Yeah,” he agreed, and glanced around the hallway he once roamed. This place felt like something from a dream. “A long time.”
“You’re probably thinking of someone else.” It was like she didn’t want him to remember her. She continued, “People change.” Her tongue darted out to moisten her lips. “Not that you’ve changed that much. Just older . . .” Her voice faded. The blush in her cheeks deepened, making her freckles stand out even more. All of a sudden, he wanted to touch them.
He knew. There was no doubt. The invisible band around his chest tightened until it finally snapped. He exhaled. Gabriella Rossi. “Can’t look eighteen forever,” he replied.
“Of course not. None of us can.”
Gabriella. His body had known, had recognized her instantly. It just took his brain longer to process.
“You’re . . . You sat behind me in health class.” It seemed safe to admit that. They had more than health class together, but he didn’t need to let on just how much of her he remembered . . . how much she had affected him back then.
She blinked thick lashes over her brown eyes. “You remember that?”
“Yeah.” He remembered everything that had to do with her.
She nodded. “We had a few other classes together, too.”
So that meant she remembered him. That meant she knew where he had been all these years and yet she was still standing before him, letting him put his hands on her. She was still talking to him like they were ordinary people. Like he was an ordinary person and not the man that had gone to prison for killing her cousin.
Something sank and twisted inside his chest. Everyone knew. He should be used to this by now. Most people in this town didn’t treat him like he had been exonerated. People still looked at him like he was a guilty man walking the streets. Like he had gotten away with something.
There would always be that. He’d always be marked and he needed to get over giving a damn about it.
Except she knew.
She would look at him the way everyone else did. Seeing contempt in her eyes shouldn’t matter. She shouldn’t matter. He wasn’t the same boy as before who cared about the same things. He grimaced. Hell. Did he even have it in him to care at all?
He quickly dropped his hands from her. “What was your name again?” As if he didn’t know.
“Gabriella. Gabriella Rossi.”
He nodded slowly as though the name struck a vague chord. “Yeah. You wore glasses.”
“Just readers,” she said, a touch defensively.
“You were smart. Always had the answers when the teacher called on you.” His gaze skimmed the fall of her hair. It was still the same shiny dark color. Back then it had been long and she always wore it in a ponytail. Now she wore it loose and it hung just a little past her shoulders in artless waves.
“We had art sophomore year together, too,” she reminded.
“Mrs. Henke,” he recalled. The teacher wore scarfs and flowery skirts and liked to play music as they worked. Sinatra.
“You were good. I still remember your drawings.”
He smiled. “Only class I got an A in.”
“Art was never my subject,” she said.
He had a vision of a freckle-faced girl with glasses sighing as she worked on a sketchpad. Every few minutes she would rip off the paper, wad it up and toss it aside in frustration.
A beat of silence passed between them. “And are you still Gabriella Rossi? Or have you married and started having babies like everyone else?” He posed the question casually, like her answer didn’t matter.
“Me?” A shaky laugh spilled out of her. “Oh, no, no, no. I’ve been building a career.”
She said it like it was such an unlikelihood. She might not be for him, but this girl was exactly the kind you brought home to Mom. Cute, clean, fresh-faced . . . and she had a hell of a rack. Even better than he remembered.
He was trying hard not to notice, but then he had always noticed. He was aware that under her boxy blouse she hid a considerable chest. He’d been aware from the moment she ran smack into him and he got a bounty of soft breasts cushioned against his chest.
“Me either.”
“Yeah. I know.” Her eyes widened as soon as the words slipped out.
He stiffened. So he had confirmation. “I figured you knew. Who doesn’t in this town?”
She swallowed. He actually saw her throat work. “I just—”
“It’s okay. Anyone with eyes and ears in this town knows about me.” He nodded.
“I—I—”
He left her stammering and walked around her, continuing on to the auditorium. Really, there was nothing else to say.
For a moment he’d felt normal talking to her. A mistake. He wasn’t normal.
Nothing about his life would ever be normal.
She closed her eyes and wondered if that couldn’t have gone any worse.
She’d come face-to-face with Cruz Walsh. The man had been convicted for a crime he didn’t commit and she knew that people in this town weren’t going easy on him. She knew that firsthand.
Various members of her family still thought he had been involved in Shelley Rae’s death. The ones that didn’t
believe the right man was now in prison for the crime, but that Cruz was responsible for the delay in justice. If he hadn’t owned up to the crime in the very beginning, then the true killer would have been caught sooner.
She simply didn’t see the sense in still blaming Cruz. Even if she hadn’t crushed on him all through high school, even if he had been a complete stranger, she couldn’t fault him. She couldn’t hate him. The facts were all there. He hadn’t killed Shelley Rae and he had suffered more than any man should for a crime he didn’t commit. How could she hate him after all he’d been through? Seven years in prison . . . God. She couldn’t even imagine the horror of it. Maybe she should write that article just so the world could see things from his side.
She returned to the auditorium. Her brother’s voice droned on with the aid of a microphone. The ceremony was well underway. At least she wouldn’t be cornered by Natalie now.
She slipped inside the cavernous room and flipped down a seat in the back row, easing into it. She tried to focus on the students seated on the stage, easily identifying her niece . . . but her gaze drifted over the crowd, searching until she found him.
He was seated facing forward, his gaze fixed on the stage. A man and woman sat beside him: his sister and her new husband, the sheriff of Sweet Hill. That had caused a good amount of a stir. Those two getting hitched was unexpected. A Walsh and the good sheriff. It was scandalous and every gossip in town was agog with the news.
No match could be more shocking.
It was almost as unimaginable as Gabriella and Cruz hooking up. That would rock this town . . . and get her disowned by her family. Good thing nothing like that would ever happen.
At least not again.
Three
She wouldn’t have gone if it wasn’t graduation night. If her parents hadn’t looked at her with the full expectation that she would go—that for once she should party like every other teenager.
As if that didn’t make her feel like a loser. Her parents actually wanted her to party. They probably wouldn’t even mind if she got into a little trouble. Nothing too serious, mind you. Just minor shenanigans. Something that would make her more like other kids. More like her brother and sister. Tess had been a cheerleader. Her brother had lettered in every sport: football, basketball and baseball. To say that Gabriella was the odd duck was putting it mildly.
Don’t get her wrong. She was celebrating inside. She’d graduated. She was leaving Sweet Hill. Finally. Going to college where she could start fresh. Where she could be anyone she wanted to be.
Her mother even forced her to wear a skirt tonight. It’s a party, Gabriella. Put on makeup. Dress up a little. Look festive.
So here she was. Showing more leg than she liked or probably should. It wasn’t like she had the body for skirts. She wasn’t tall and she was too curvy. That’s what her mother called her. Curvy.
The kids at school just called her fat.
The student population of Sweet Hill High School had made it abundantly clear over the years that Gabriella Rossi was not one of the pretty people, and the pretty people are the ones who mattered.
“C’mon, Bri. Let’s dance.” Kari grabbed her hand and dragged her out into the living room where a few other girls they knew danced. The furniture had been pushed to the far walls to make room for a dance floor.
All two hundred and nineteen members of their graduating class were crammed into the house and trickled out onto the lawn—along with a scattering of the more popular underclassmen.
She wasn’t cool. Not by a long shot, but every graduate was invited, so she didn’t have to meet that criterion for once.
The couple of drinks she’d consumed in the back seat of Kari’s car on the way here had helped loosen her inhibitions. She let herself dance with wild abandon. She’d be gone soon. Who gave a damn what anyone thought of her anymore? She didn’t have to care about these people for the rest of her life. My, what a freeing thought! God knew they had never cared about her.
Kari watched her bad dance moves, laughing in approval. “There you go. Shake it!”
“I’ll be back,” Gabriella shouted to Kari over the music. Apparently those drinks had gone straight through her. She exited the living room and got in line for the bathroom.
Natalie, the party’s host, was in line in front of her, whispering loudly to her friend, oblivious to Gabriella standing behind her. Thankfully. Gabriella had suffered enough of her attention over the years. Indifference was the kindest treatment she could expect from her. If Natalie wanted to play her usual role of bully, Gabriella would have gotten out of line. As it was, she hung back, arms crossed over her chest, trying to remain unobtrusive.
“I told him I’d meet him in the boathouse but that’s before Jack showed up. Can you believe it? He wanted to surprise me.” Natalie rolled her eyes as if a hot college boyfriend popping up unexpectedly was such a bummer.
Everyone knew Natalie was still dating a guy who graduated last year and went to college in Oklahoma right now. Everyone also knew that she was hooking up with other guys while he was away at college. Apparently she had made other arrangements for the night and her boyfriend’s arrival had ruined those plans.
“So what are you going to do about Cruz?”
Gabriella’s ears perked up right along with her heart. There was only one Cruz and she had been achingly aware of him for years.
He might have a bad reputation and be a troublemaker by everyone else’s estimation, but he’d never bullied her, and that was saying something since she’d endured a lot of that over the years. No, Cruz had left her in peace. Occasionally, he even smiled at her. The bullies had been the good kids who came from good families and, ironically, went to church. Her parents were friends with their parents. They attended PTA fundraisers together.
Gabriella knew to look past the outer shell. She had learned that before she learned to finger-paint.
“Well, I can’t go out there to talk to him now. Jack is in the next room.”
“So you’re going to just leave him out in the boathouse?”
Natalie shrugged. “Maybe I can sneak off after a little while when Jack starts talking football with the other guys. That won’t take long. It’s all he talks about.”
The other girl laughed. “Oh, you are bad, Nat. You would sneak off to hook up with Cruz Walsh with your boyfriend nearby?”
Natalie and Cruz Walsh were hooking up.
Gabriella felt an irrational pang in the center of her chest. They were both beautiful. It shouldn’t be so surprising. Beautiful people flocked together. And it shouldn’t feel like such a betrayal. She had no claim on Cruz.
“What can I say? Cruz can do things with his hands and mouth, and oh my sweet heaven, his dick . . .” Her voice faded with a sigh. “Well, let’s just say boys like Jack are missing that gene or something.”
“Yeah. I guess being raised in a gutter gave Cruz a leg up or something.”
“Or something.” Natalie giggled. “You have no idea.”
“Oooh. You do like the dirty ones.” The two girls high-fived amid further laughter.
Natalie’s friend sobered enough to say, “Yeah. Well, what makes you think he will wait for you?”
“Have you seen me tonight?” She motioned to her body. “And don’t forget he’s had a taste before. He’ll wait for this.”
Gabriella glanced from Natalie’s tight little body to her own and back at Natalie again. Natalie wore a skin-tight dress that left nothing to the imagination. It showed off her narrow waist and long legs. Every line, dip and curve of her body was on full display. Gabriella wouldn’t be able to squeeze a thigh into that dress.
The girls entered the bathroom together and shut the door, sparing Gabriella from the rest of their conversation.
She stood there for a few moments until they exited. They paused when they spotted her.
“Gabby! I didn’t know you were coming,” Natalie exclaimed, eyeing her up and down.
“You invited the entire c
lass,” she reminded, hoping this wasn’t going to be one of those moments where Natalie decided to make a scene, singling out Gabriella for attention.
She smiled slowly, looking genuinely pleased. There was so much deception in that smile. “That’s right. I did. But you never come to any parties. I didn’t expect to see you here.”
She resisted asking if Natalie really thought about her at all—when she wasn’t in the act of bullying her.
Natalie stepped closer and draped a slim arm around Gabriella’s shoulders. “Have you found the buffet yet? We had Sammy’s BBQ cater. I’m sure you’ll love it. There are so many ribs and just slabs of brisket.”
From anyone else the comment would have been harmless. But not Natalie. Her eyes danced spitefully and she took a deep sniff of air. “I’m sure your nose can lead the way.”
Her friend laughed, and Natalie preened, proud of her cleverness. Slipping her arm from Gabriella’s shoulders, she moved away with an air of “my work here is done.”
Gabriella hurried inside the bathroom and shut the door. She breathed deeply, despising Natalie, despising being made to feel so awful—so very small.
Somehow it was all compounded with the knowledge that Natalie was going to make out with Cruz in the boathouse. She shook her head. It was wrong that she should even care.
As she leaned on the sink, head hanging, she realized Natalie wasn’t even with Cruz right now. Right now, Cruz was alone in the boathouse. Waiting. Being stood up. Unless, of course, Natalie managed to slip away and see him. Then she would be with Cruz. The idea of that . . . the image of them together . . . made her sick. And angry. Why should awful girls get dreamy boys like Cruz Walsh?
She lifted her gaze to the mirror, staring at herself. She felt ridiculous, dressed up in a blouse and skirt. She’d never made such an effort with her appearance before, but Mom had talked her into it. The makeup on her face was subtle, but that too felt over the top. She lightly rubbed beneath both eyes, collecting any mascara dust.
Beautiful Sinner Page 2
