**
As the rehearsal dinner was winding down, Callie’s parents made an announcement inviting all the guests to step outside on to the balcony. Once all the guests were assembled outside, waiters began to hand out crystal flutes filled with the club's best champagne and sparkling cider. Jax grabbed hold of Callie’s left hand and raised his glass in the air. “May we spend the rest of our lives as blissfully happy as we are tonight,” Jax pronounced as he clinked flutes with Callie and leaned in to place a tender kiss on her lips. The guests went wild in response to the romantic gesture.
Hunter glanced over at Olivia, sending her an apologetic look as their eyes met. He would have loved to be standing by her side and toasting to Jax and Callie’s future happiness. But, after the trouble with Marcus, both he and Braxon had stuck like glue to their older brother on the off chance that further trouble might erupt. The more Hunter was around Joshua the more it became painfully clear that something was eating him up inside, something that he'd gone to great lengths to hide from the family.
Joshua hadn’t been the same since he had returned home from military duty. It raised all kinds of questions with Hunter—ones he felt determined to find answers for.
As the guests raised their glasses in celebration, the pewter night sky filled with an explosion of colors and a cacophony of sound. As the fireworks exploded in a fury of light and sound, the guests reacted with wonder and amazement to the beautiful love letter Jax had written in the sky for his soon-to-be wife. Hunter caught a glimpse of Callie’s reaction—her mouth opened in surprise, tears misted in her eyes and she immediately reached out to clasp her fiance’s hand in her own.
As the first of the fireworks exploded, Joshua reeled backwards as if he'd been shot. Hunter turned towards him, his concern ratcheting up to full-fledged fear as he caught sight of him. His face had been leached of his warm brown complexion, his eyes were wide with a panic he'd never seen before on his brother's face. Strange, keening sounds were coming out of his mouth.
“Are you all right?” Hunter asked as he pulled at Joshua's arm. “Joshua, talk to me.”
Joshua flinched at the contact, his face shuttered, his eyes vacant. He didn't let on that he'd heard Hunter talking to him or speaking his name. At the moment he seemed to be in another zone, far away from the current place and time. It was as if he'd totally checked out.
“We've got to get him out of here,” Braxon said in an urgent tone, his eyes flashing warning signs.
“Have you seen him like this before?” Hunter asked, wavering between concern over Joshua and irritation with Braxon for holding out on him.
“Once or twice,” Braxon admitted with a sheepish look. “What?” he said in response to Hunter's steely glare. “He's only been back a couple of months. Things have gone south in the last few weeks.”
“Weeks?” he spit out. “And I'm just now finding out about this?”
Braxon snorted loudly. “Don't go there, bro. Joshua returned from the rehab hospital back in July. You could've paid him a visit and checked out the situation for yourself if you were so concerned.”
Hunter took a deep, calming breath. On some level he knew Braxon's words were right on the money. Although he'd visited Joshua at the Walter Reed hospital in Bethesda, Maryland, he hadn't made the trip back home to Savannah. Until recently, avoiding his
hometown had always been high on his agenda. Too many memories. Too many might-have-beens. But now, everything had changed, and he planned on being a presence in Savannah. Not just for Joshua's recovery, but for Olivia as well.
“We can talk about this later,” he conceded. “At the moment we need to get him home without Mama noticing there's a problem. Let her enjoy herself tonight.”
Luckily, Mae, along with all the other guests on the balcony, was transfixed by the sight of fireworks brilliantly lighting up the night sky.
Braxon grabbed one arm while Hunter took the other. Between the two of them it took every ounce of brawn to maneuver Joshua back through the ballroom, into the corridor and then out one of the side doors to the parking lot.
“Hunter! What's going on?”
He turned towards the sound of Olivia's melodic voice, an inexplicable feeling of joy bursting inside him at the sight of her. She'd followed them to the parking lot, clearly having witnessed Joshua's episode on the balcony. As always, she was thinking of others.
“I think the fireworks set something off inside Joshua. He had a strong reaction to them and he's been out of sorts ever since.”
“C'mon, Hunter. We need to get him home,” Braxon said impatiently.
“Let me come with you,” Olivia suggested, her face filled with compassion. “I want to help.”
Hunter's heart swelled up and he felt a tightness in his chest that made it near impossible to speak. He nodded his head at her, mesmerized by the grateful smile she sent his way. As he settled into the back seat of Braxon's truck with Joshua, leaving Olivia to sit in the front passenger seat with Braxon, turbulent emotions were coursing through him. Competing with his worry over Joshua was a nagging suspicion that he couldn't shake. If he wasn't mistaken, somewhere along the way Olivia Renault had wedged her way so deeply inside of his heart that he knew she would stay there forever.
“Lean on Him in times of trouble. He won’t ever fail you.” Mae Rawlings
Chapter Thirteen
It was close to midnight by the time Hunter was able to drive Olivia back to the Renault mansion. They'd managed to settle Joshua down, and after a brief period he had returned to his usual, jovial self. When his brothers had pressed him about his mood shift, Joshua admitted that he remembered almost nothing about the rehearsal dinner, including his scuffle with Marcus and the incident during the fireworks. Hunter and Braxon had seemed stunned by his admission. Olivia had fixed Joshua some herbal green tea and they'd played four rounds of Uno until Joshua had practically fallen asleep at the kitchen table.
By the time they'd left the house he was fast asleep on the sofa and Braxon was keeping a close eye on him.
During the car ride home Olivia was able to voice the concerns she'd been harboring about Joshua. She'd grown up with him, and although he'd been several grades above her in school, his kindness and gentleness had been legendary. One of her most indelible memories of Joshua occurred when she was eight years old and he'd won a pink rabbit's foot for her at the Savannah state fair. Although his friends had teased him something fierce about his kind gesture, he'd taken it with a grain of salt. Thoughtful. Sweet. A giant teddy bear. That was the Joshua Rawlings everyone in Savannah had always known and loved. His recent, erratic behavior was startling, particularly since it coincided with his tour of duty in a war zone. It wasn't something the Rawlings family could afford to ignore for much longer. Of that she felt certain.
“Has Joshua received any counseling?” she blurted out.
“He doesn't need counseling. He just needs time to heal,” Hunter said in a brusque voice, his jaw twitching with emotion. “He was pretty badly injured over there. When I visited him at that rehab center in Bethesda he could barely talk. His throat had been burned so badly in the explosion, along with his hands and arms.”
Hunter's tone sounded defensive. She knew better than to hold it against him. Olivia suspected that the whole family was in denial. They all seemed to believe that with time and massive doses of love, Joshua would heal. But did any of them know what he'd endured during his deployment? Had he confided in anyone the hell he'd been put through? There was no way Joshua could have made it through three tours of duty without having witnessed the worst acts imaginable. Memories like that, she imagined, were no doubt seared into his mind.
“There's all kinds of healing for veterans. Physical. Emotional. I think Joshua needs to talk to someone. A professional who deals with veterans' issues.”
She was trying to tread lightly, knowing that her suggestion might be met with open hostility. It was a difficult subject for her to bro
ach, but she felt compelled to add her two cent's worth. Too much was at stake if Joshua didn't get the help he so desperately needed.
Hunter turned towards her, quickly studying her face before he focused again on the road. She couldn't miss the look of stark pain etched on his face. He was hurting for his brother and clueless about how to help him. For a man like Hunter, who could access the best the world had to offer with a simple phone call, it must be excruciating not to be able to fix Joshua. He nervously tapped his fingers against the steering wheel and she knew his mind must be whirling with a million different thoughts. After a few seconds he said, “I know he needs help. He's been struggling ever since he came back.” He blew out a huff of air. “I just need a minute to figure out where we go from here.”
His face looked so vulnerable it made her want to lean over toward the driver's seat and kiss all his worries away. But she knew it wasn't that simple. Along with his physical scars, Joshua had emotional wounds that were remnants from his military service. He might have a rough road ahead of him before he got his life back. If he got his life back.
“Don’t forget to pray about it, Hunter,” Olivia said, reaching out and patting his hand as he clutched the steering wheel. “Lean on Him. It will make this whole situation less scary.”
Hunted nodded but didn’t say a word.
As they drove down the long, curved driveway leading to the mansion, Olivia was struck for a moment by its desolate appearance. The house was shrouded in darkness, illuminated only by a few lanterns circling the driveway and a light twinkling in the front hall. It looked lonely, she realized. Empty. What would this house be like, she wondered, if it was filled with a lively bunch of children? A family who laughed and loved and played? Joyful noises.
Hunter walked her to the front door, his hand resting at the base of her spine as she fished her keys out of her clutch.
“Thanks for the ride,” she murmured as she pulled the keys out.
“Thanks for helping out. It means a lot that you'd want to step in and help Joshua.” Hunter looked over at the driveway then back at the darkened house. “Where's Jack? He should be home by now, shouldn't he?”
“He's probably still at the party with Mae. Or maybe they decided to make it a late night at one of the jazz clubs downtown.”
Hunter's face looked puzzled. “Wow. They really enjoy themselves together, don’t they?”
Olivia couldn't help but smile at Hunter's dumbfounded reaction. He looked so adorable and confused. “They really do. I think their relationship is sweet. You haven’t seen them together much, but they’re a great team.”
Hunter scratched his jaw. “I saw them in a whole new light tonight. They really love each other, don’t they?”
“They really do,” she murmured.
“Then it makes sense that they commit themselves to each other. If they love each other so deeply, getting married is the right thing,” Hunter said with a nod.
It warmed her heart to think he had his own opinions about love and marriage. Something low in her belly contracted painfully as the realization hit her that Hunter might settle down and get married himself in the next few years. She shook her head to rid her mind of the image of Hunter exchanging vows with a beautiful bride. The notion of Hunter sharing a life with another woman was too agonizing to contemplate.
“Come inside for a spell. I still have some of that peach cobbler from the other night, if you're interested.” She tossed the invitation out casually, although she felt anything but casual. It felt as if she was holding on to lightning in a bottle. Soon Hunter would be leaving Savannah and heading back to his fabulous life in New York City. Until then, she was going to hold on as tightly as possible.
He rubbed his stomach and flashed her a wolfish grin. “You don't have to ask me twice. That peach cobbler rivals the one mama makes, although you're sworn to secrecy about that. Mama swears her peach cobbler is the best in Georgia.”
“Your secret is safe with me,” Olivia answered with a grin as she led him into the house and down the hall toward the large, brightly adorned kitchen.
The kitchen had been her mother's creation, from the gleaming copper kettles hanging from the ceiling to the white teak cabinets, marble countertops, the burnished hardwood floor and the fire-engine red kitchen table. Her mother's collection of roosters—cups, pot holders, tea kettle, tiles—were evident in all areas of the kitchen. A small black and white sign reading “Gigi's kitchen” hung proudly on the wall.
Hunter took a seat at the kitchen table, gratefully accepting the generous slice of pie Olivia doled out to him along with a tall glass of lemonade. She joined him at the table after cutting herself a smaller slice of pie and pouring herself a glass of milk. As she dug into her cobbler she felt the heat of Hunter's dark gaze on her.
With her fork in mid-air, she asked, “What? Why are you staring at me like that?”
He shook his head and chuckled. “I love the way you eat. It's very polite.”
Olivia snorted. “Polite? How?”
“Hmmm...let's see. I could eat this in two bites while you are tackling it in a very polite, ladylike manner. I guess it just shows the difference between men and women.”
Olivia frowned. It made her sound so boring and cautious. “You make me sound like a priss. I’ll have you know that I can devour this cobbler in seconds,” she said, determined to show Hunter that she wasn’t a proper, prim woman. She dug into her last few pieces of cobbler and pushed it in her mouth all at once. She raised her glass of milk to her mouth and drank half the glass. Some cobbler had dribbled down the side of her mouth, so she scooped it up with her finger and ate all the remnants of the peach cobbler. “Mmm,” she said. “That was delicious.”
Hunter gaped at her, his fork held mid-air. “Wow. Who knew you could eat like that?” he asked with a chuckle.
“Don’t you remember that time I won the pie eating contest at the fair?”
Hunter slapped his palm on the table. His smile was effusive. “How did I forget that? You won a year’s worth of ice cream at the Dairy Barn.”
“I sure did!” Olivia said, grinning at the memory.
“I have a confession to make.” Hunter stared at her, his brown eyes twinkling. “There was this one night when I was full of romantic ideas and I came here at midnight with an armful of roses. I stood underneath your window, with one foot on the ground and the other on your trellis. Needless to say, I chickened out…or came to my senses.”
“To tell you the truth, I'm surprised that you didn't shimmy up the trellis. Back in the day you put the r in rebel,” she said with a chuckle. That would have been right up his alley as a teenager. He'd always been rebellious and full of mischief. Shimmying up a trellis would have been a piece of cake for him.
Hunter looked at her as if she'd lost her mind. “And run the risk of your daddy taking a shot at me? Not likely,” he said with an exaggerated shiver. “The thought of your daddy catching me at your bedroom window...it still freaks me out. I only wanted to deliver the flowers and skedaddle, but I don’t think it would have mattered to him. He would have been twice as mad as when I stole his ham.”
“Were you scared of him?” she asked, surprised by the revelation. She'd always viewed Hunter as fearless—afraid of nothing and no one. Not even her all-powerful Daddy.
“Who wasn't scared of your daddy? Jack Renault was the King of Savannah. He was the man. The boss. He had swagger before there was a name for it.”
Olivia frowned. “Is that why our relationship was always a secret?”
“Not entirely, but it did play a part. I didn't think he would ever approve of us being together. My family wasn't well-off like yours. I was a little older, more rough around the edges. Even though I was a good student and a jock, I imagined most people in Savannah believed you were dating beneath you.”
His comment sparked immediate outrage within her. “Hunter! That's a terrible thing to say! And it’s not true!”
/>
“That's how I felt at the time. It was my truth. Looking back on it, I was probably wrong to think that way, but I was young and not as sure of myself as I pretended to be. And we Rawlings got a lot of grief about our situation. Now they call it bullying, but back then it was tolerated.” He stared into her eyes, studying her for a moment, all of his playfulness gone as he searched for answers. “How do you think you would've felt if the roles were reversed? What if I'd been the only son of the richest man in town and you'd been the one with nothing? Would you have been so confident about our relationship? Would you have wanted to flaunt our relationship all over town?”
She paused for a moment to consider Hunter's question. Never in a million years had she ever imagined he'd ever felt so vulnerable and unworthy. In her eyes, he'd had everything—a big family, popularity, good looks, athleticism and amazing grades. Matter of fact, she'd often wondered if he'd been ashamed of her and their relationship. And now, he was basically admitting that he'd never felt good enough to be her love interest. As a result, raw emotion coursed through her and she felt on the verge of tears.
Blinking away the moisture in her eyes, Olivia coughed to clear the sobs from her throat. “Any girl would've been proud to date you, to be your girlfriend. I know I was,” she said boldly. This is what Hunter did to her. He made her bolder and more open than she'd felt in her entire life. Free to take chances. Free to speak her mind. Free to live and love.
“I didn't want just any girl, Liv. I wanted you. It was always you.”
“I felt the same way, Hunter. Then…and now.”
Hunter's eyes went wide, and in their depths she saw it all—surprise, excitement, joy.
“Where have you been all of my life, Olivia Renault?” Hunter asked, his voice sounding ragged with emotion.
Olivia laughed, the sound of it echoing in the stillness of the room. “I’ve been right here in Savannah. Right where you left me.”
Hunter placed his lips on her mouth, effectively shushing her from mentioning the fact that he had once ridden away from her on his motorcycle. Although his kiss may have been a means of shutting her up, it was so tender and delicious that it made her heart soar. She swayed a little before she felt his strong arms behind her back, propping her up and giving her legs. With every kiss it felt as if he was being scorched with the heat of a thousand suns.
A Moment in the Moonlight (Secrets of Savannah Book 2) Page 13
