Drawn to Him: A Romance Collection

by Willow Winters

  “So, will you let me know if you see her?”

  “Huh?”

  “Molly,” she answers.

  Molly. Her pup.

  Right.

  “Of course,” I tell her. “I’m sure she’ll be home real soon, Mrs. Duke. Nothing to worry about. She’s probably just raising hell over at the Gentry farm again.”

  “Probably,” she agrees.

  I fire up the cruiser and tighten my knuckles around the steering wheel as I drive back through town, my eyes scanning the streets for Molly. But it isn’t Molly that’s on my mind. It’s the red head I can’t seem to stop thinking about. The one that’s set me on edge and got me in a daze since she sent my world spinning this morning. She’s disrupted the status quo. Come home and wrecked me all over again.

  It’s like not a day had passed when I was standing there in her presence. It didn’t matter that I’d done something with myself over the last decade. None of that mattered when it came to Ginger. One look at her, and I was transported back to our past.

  I was nineteen all over again. Scum on the bottom of her shoe. She was too good for me, and she made that abundantly clear while her friends watched on and laughed. As long as I live, I’ll never forget that look on her face when they caught her with me. Like she was doused in cold water.

  “Don’t tell me you’re slumming it with burger boy now, Ginge?” they taunted.

  She wrinkled her nose and looked disgusted by the idea. Then she told them that I was stalking her. Following her around like a lovesick puppy dog who wouldn’t leave her alone. She felt sorry for me, so she threw me a bone now and then.

  They all got a real good kick out of it, and Ginger never looked at me again. Her posse came into the burger joint a few times after that, and she just sat there like a statue while they threw their trash on the floor and told me to clean it up.

  I enlisted the very next week. Blew out of this town and thought I’d never look back.

  Things are different now. I’m not a boy anymore. And I’m damn sure not the fool that’s going to fall for her twice. The girl’s come back with her tail between her legs, probably expecting me to feel sorry for whatever happened with that rich boyfriend I heard she had up in Birmingham.

  She better think again.

  I want her gone. Need her gone.

  Back to whatever pit of hell she crawled out of.

  CHAPTER 4

  Ginger

  I’ve spent three straight days going on little sleep and a whole load of caffeine to get the salon fixed up. I’m down to my last dime and bone tired, but I feel a sense of accomplishment when I wake up this morning and shower. It might not be a whole lot, but it’s mine.

  Goldilocks Salon, I’ve decided to call it. My slogan is that I’ll get it just right.

  The salon is really cute now, with shades of yellow and blue paint. It’s a happy place. At any rate, it’s a lot nicer than this ghetto ass camper I’m living in just outside the town limits.

  I didn’t want anyone to know how bad off I was. I didn’t want them to know that things had gone so far downhill that I was nearly six feet deep in mud. After all, I’d been painting a nice picture for all my old high school pals over the last few years. They said my life with Chris looked like it was straight out of a magazine. I agreed and smiled because that’s what you do when you’re a stubborn ass who can’t admit defeat.

  My life with Chris had been a bitter cake with no icing. But I guess on the outside it looked sweet. I was so determined to keep up with that dreamy idea for so long that by the time I left, I was more than just flat broke. I was broken spirited too.

  Chris had money alright. But that money was his. I was a college dropout who took to beauty school when I couldn’t figure out what else it was I should be doing. And Chris said that no girlfriend of his would be cutting hair for five dollars a pop at the local cheap clips salon. So he made me quit with promises of a future together.

  He painted a nice picture, but that wasn’t how it turned out.

  I shake off the memories like a bad chill and hop into my old Chevy to drive to the salon. The sun is out this morning, and it looks like it’s going to be a beautiful day. Plus, Miranda Lambert is on the radio singing about showing boys what little girls are made of with her shotgun. It seems fitting, so I turn it up loud, and I even have a smile on my face as the wind whips through my hair. I feel happy.

  But then I pull up to the salon and see the graffiti on the door.

  My stomach lurches and a chill creeps over me as I look around. The lot is empty. Unlike the last few days when all the ladies would gather around to stare and whisper, the place is now a ghost town.

  I don’t want them here gossiping about me right in front of my face, but at least when they’re here, I feel somewhat safe. My fingers curl on the steering wheel until they turn white. I tell myself not to be afraid. It’s just the locals giving me another bout of trouble. They were the first to coin the nickname, after all.

  Ginger Duke- Daisy’s slutty cousin.

  That’s what’s painted on the door in bright red.

  But the thing is that not many of my high school pals even still live in this area. And they always said it as a joke, but this time it doesn’t feel like one.

  I think of the time that I told Chris about that. Back when I felt like I could tell him things. Back before I was smart enough to know he would use them against me later. I glance around the lot again, and fear freezes me to the seat of the truck.

  I’ve always been headstrong. The old Ginger would have gone in there without fear and probably socked whoever it was right in the gut. But that Ginger isn’t around anymore. It’s evident now that I’m sitting here with nobody to call.

  Then I think of Justice. Justice who was always there when I needed him that summer under the stars. He was the only decent man I ever really loved, and I threw him away like last week's news.

  He acted like it was no big deal. Like he doesn’t even remember. And he is the Sheriff, after all.

  My trembling fingers are dialing the number before I can talk myself out of it. Not even five minutes later, he’s standing on the sidewalk beside me. When he sees what’s written on the door, he smiles. And it rankles me.

  “Folks still using that old nickname?” he laughs.

  “It’s not funny,” I tell him. “I just got the place fixed up.”

  He waves it off like it’s nothing. “It’s probably just one of the locals having a bit of a laugh. I’ll help you paint it over if you want.”

  “What I want is for you to do your damn job,” I snap. “You are the Sheriff now, aren’t you?”

  The humor slips away from his eyes, and for a minute, they flash with anger. It’s so brief I can’t be certain if my eyes are playing tricks on me.

  “No need to get your tail feathers in a spin,” he says. “I’ll take care of it. Don’t you worry about that.”

  Silence falls between us when our eyes meet, and my breath goes still. The man might be a prick now, but he sure looks good. He’s no protein guzzling gym junkie like the guys down in Birmingham. His body is earned from hard labor. He’s a mechanic, a carpenter, a lumberjack when he needs to be, and everything in between.

  I’ve seen him around since I’ve been back. Fixing up cars the way that he used to. He was always good at fixing stuff. For a while there, he might have even fixed me.

  Now he struts around town like he’s the only cock in the henhouse, and all the ladies go bananas every time he walks into a room. Hell, not even just the young ones. He’s got the older crowd riled up too. The other day I heard Mabel telling her friends how she keeps breaking the slats on the old back porch, so he’ll come around to fix them. She fanned herself when she talked about him taking off his shirt and wearing his tool belt.

  The woman is eighty years old.

  And I’m also pretty certain she was probably in the same circle that used to whisper about him back in the day. The nobody kid of the town busybody that
his mama was. They used to talk about how she was like the village bicycle, and everybody had taken a ride. Then they used to say that the apple didn’t fall too far from the tree with Justice, but what could you expect when his daddy was in prison, and he had a mama like that.

  Before I ever gave him the time of day, I just took everyone else’s word for it. They said he grew up poor and had anger issues. But the truth was that Justice just marched to the beat of his own drum. He did what he wanted, and nobody told him otherwise. I liked that rebellious side of him. The bad boy. Because deep down, I wanted to be a bad girl too. One who went to school in the pretty clothes my mother picked out only to change into cutoff shorts and cowboy boots.

  I was a wild child and Justice was the shiny forbidden apple I was never meant to have. All I ever wanted to do was hold his hand and go on crazy adventures with him. But it was a dream that wouldn’t come to fruition.

  It’s a bitter pill to swallow when I see him now. His life only ever got better, and mine only ever got worse.

  “I’ll have a look around inside,” he says.

  The silence must have been uncomfortable for him too, but I don’t protest because I feel safer for having him here. He goes inside and takes a look around and then comes back to report that whoever it was never went inside.

  Then he retrieves a paintbrush and some paint and starts painting over the door for me.

  I just stand there like an idiot, watching him the way Mabel probably does. Only he’s not shirtless here with me, he’s in his nice uniform that I can’t help wondering what he’s packing underneath.

  “You sure have grown up since I last saw you,” I tell him.

  He looks back at me and his eyes move up the full length of my body before he smiles. “You did too, Ginge. You were all elbows and knees back then. At least that’s the way I remember you.”

  He makes it sound like everything is so blurry, and it only serves to irritate me further. Because it wasn’t nothing. Not to me. And I’m fairly certain it wasn’t to him either, even if he is the town hero with his pick of peacocks now.

  I grab a paintbrush and move beside him. And even after all these years, he still smells the same. Like mint, truck oil, and mischief.

  “Do you remember the first time you met me?” I ask.

  He looks at me, and he’s quiet. His jaw is tense again, and I know there’s something going on up in that head of his. Whatever it is though, he doesn’t let on to it.

  “Can’t say that I do, actually,” he answers.

  It’s a lie, and I know it’s a lie because I’ll never forget it. So how could he? How could one event be so important to one person and mean nothing to another?

  “It was in that old warehouse you used to sneak into. Remember? You had the whole place set up like it was your bachelor pad.”

  Thinking back on it now, I guess he had to, the number of different guys his mama would bring home. But I don’t mention that.

  Justice shrugs, half-hearted. “I completely forgot about that place to tell you the truth.”

  “You were always there,” I say. “And I knew you were always there. But I lied and said I didn’t when I snuck in there one night. Because my mama and daddy were going at each other’s throats that night, and I suppose I wanted someone to pick a fight with myself, and I decided that someone was gonna be you.”

  He stops painting for a minute and just looks at me, but I can’t look at him. I keep focusing on the paint job, his eyes burning into the side of my face. I don’t know why I decided to be so honest with him. I don’t know why I let that slip out. But maybe a bit of honesty is what it’s going to take to make him come out and admit that he remembers too.

  I never did tell him how bad things really were at home, though I know he suspected some of it. My life was just one big show on the outside. Sugar coated acid. I was afraid if I told him the truth he’d go right on over and clock my daddy in the face. It would have been well deserved, but I didn’t want Justice getting in trouble over me. Especially not with my daddy, because he could get real nasty when he wanted to.

  “I do remember that night,” Justice says. “Now that you mention it. You asked me if I was stalking you, and I told you to get over yourself.”

  I laugh, and he smiles.

  “That sounds about right. You never treated me like the other guys did. You didn’t put me on a pedestal. I liked that about you.”

  “Someone had to put you in your place,” he says.

  “Oh please. I couldn’t have been all bad since you used to spend night and day with me. Man, we sure did wreak a lot of havoc together. I think I lost count of how many moon pies you stole for me and how many times we broke into places and didn’t get caught.”

  I start to laugh again when I think about us skinny dipping in the Johnson’s pond. But Justice isn’t smiling anymore, and he isn’t painting either. Apparently, this trip down memory lane hasn’t been as nice for him as it has for me.

  “I better jet,” he tells me. “Your mama’s pup got out again, and I promised I’d keep an eye out for it.”

  “Okay.”

  My voice is thin and weak.

  I want to tell him right now. I want to explain what happened that hot summer night when my world fell apart. But one look at his face and I know it doesn’t matter anymore.

  From the looks of it, Justice Grayson wrote me off a long time ago.

  CHAPTER 5

  Justice

  The woman is like the damned plague.

  If she’s not on my mind, she’s in front of my face. Like right now, at my favorite bar. Dusting up her heels out on the dance floor in her white V-neck shirt and cutoff jean shorts that aren’t fair. Her hair is messy- spilling out from beneath a ball cap- and she still beats out every other girl in this joint.

  All eyes are on her, including my own. Old Mr. Johnson whistles and shakes his head.

  “Nobody grows them like Alabama can.”

  I take a sip of my beer and watch as song after song, a new partner comes up to ask her if they can cut in. Young or old, it doesn’t matter. She dances with all of them and laughs until there are tears leaking out of her eyes. It’s the most I’ve seen her smile since she’s been back in town. And if you were to ask me, it looks like there’s something haunting her in those soft gold eyes.

  I try not to think about it because then I get to feeling sorry for her. And I have no business feeling sorry for her. The best thing I can do is ignore the whole charade. And that works out really well for me for about five whole minutes. Until Jimmy the quarterback from high school decides he’s going to try to get back into her good graces. He’s twice divorced and now the resident man-whore of Oak Grove, and his cock has just taken aim at Ginger Duke.

  He cuts in smoothly and spins her around the dance floor, putting on a big show for everybody. His mama made him take ballroom dancing classes with her for as long as I can remember, and apparently, the skill is like riding a bicycle.

  Ginger seems oblivious to the fact he only has one thing on his mind and I don’t know why I care so much. But I know she’s already had a few drinks, and she’s vulnerable right now, and I don’t like to think of her vulnerable. Ginger has always been able to take care of herself, but since she’s come back to town, there’s something different about her.

  There was real fear in her eyes today when she thought about going into that salon alone. The old Ginger I knew would have just blasted right on in there and handled her business. But I guess everyone changes and Ginger has too.

  Still, whatever is going on with her is none of my business, and I’d like to keep it that way. I turn my attention back to my drink until Mr. Johnson starts narrating beside me.

  “That Jimmy sure is a handsy little fella,” he observes.

  When I turn around this time, Jimmy’s hand has migrated south to the swell of Ginger’s ass. An ass he has no right to be grabbing. And there’s only about two inches of breathing room between the two of them now. Ginger
isn’t smiling so much anymore, and when she does, it’s fake as hell.

  She’s still the same sugar-coated liar that she was in high school, but this time she’s lying to herself. Her eyes are tormented and confused. She doesn’t know what she wants. But those golden irises drift over his shoulder and straight to me.

  I don’t know why.

  I don’t care either.

  She has no right to be looking at me like I’m her life preserver. If she wants a white knight, she best be taking her act elsewhere because I think she’s forgotten where she came from.

  “You best go on and help her out, Sheriff,” nosy Mr. Johnson says.

  I finish up my coke and set the empty glass on the marred wood of the bar.

  “There’s plenty of other men in here that can help her out,” I say.

  And yet, my feet have something else in mind as they lead me in her direction. I tap Jimmy on the shoulder, and he turns around and glares at me.

  “Time to move along, Jimster. Thanks for keeping my date company.”

  “Your date?” he scoffs. “Since when, burger boy?”

  It’s been a long time since anyone dared to call me that. My hands curl into fists at my sides, but now that I’m Sheriff, I have to check my temper. I can’t just clock him here in the middle of the crowded bar, even if it is what he rightfully deserves.

  “How long we been dating, Ginge?” I ask her.

  She blinks and doesn’t answer. Go figure. I turn back to Jimmy and give him an easy smile.

  “If I had to venture a guess, it must have been shortly after I quit messing around with your ex-wife too.”

  Jimmy’s an act first, think later sort of idiot, so it doesn’t surprise me when he takes a swing at me this time. He’s slow and drunk, and even if he wasn’t, he never did know how to throw a punch. I dodge him easily enough and then lay him out, slapping some handcuffs on his sorry ass while I dig my knee into the middle of his back.