by Lia Riley
“Not really,” he answered.
She couldn’t get a look at his eyes in those damn Ray-Ban sunglasses. Her own face reflected back, and as she unbuckled the helmet he’d provided for her, it became obvious she had a serious case of bed head. Less polite folk might even be tempted to refer to the look as freshly fucked.
“I have got to go. I’m running late, and Karen is going to have to reschedule the call if I don’t—”
“Of course, go! Please. You don’t owe me an explanation,” she said. But what did he owe her…and what did she owe him?
He nodded toward the trio currently gaping as if Santa Claus and the Easter Bunny had appeared, but he held her gaze. “Good luck handling that.”
She didn’t really have a choice. “Thanks,” she said. The word left a strange taste.
“I’ll call you,” he said distractedly, and then he was gone.
That’s when she realized the flavor; it was bitterness.
Of course Beau had somewhere he had to be, but he’d also spent the night with her, and sometimes, given the situation, plans could be adjusted. And not only had he dropped her off like a special-order delivery, but he’d done it in plain view of the three biggest gossips in town.
And had he stayed to smooth things over?
No. No, he hadn’t.
Her sister rounded the corner, although as she held the leashes for three dogs, it was hard to tell who was walking who. Rhett came up behind with another.
Phaedra, Lucille, and Miss Ida May huddled together. She couldn’t hear what they were saying, but all outbursts of “law law” and “I declare” suggested high emotions were involved.
All she had to do was paste on a smile, flounce her skirt, and be her brightest, shiniest, most princessy self. She could concoct a silly story about how she was locked out of her car and Beau offered to take her home, but then he’d simply had to show her something or other at Belle Mont and one thing led to another and she fell asleep on his couch.
No one would want to believe it, so by feeding them a story, she gave them an out.
Let them play pretend.
Except, you know what? She didn’t want to. She didn’t have it in her.
She had had the best night of her life and somehow had woken up from the dream to find herself in, not a nightmare, not quite, but in one of those dreams where you walk and walk and never end up anywhere.
Beau had slept and scrammed. And she felt scammed. And right now all she wanted to do was get out of this dress, get in the shower, and have a good long cry.
So she didn’t pretend to smile. She didn’t wave at the neighbors. She didn’t even wait for her sister.
She turned around, walked into the empty house, and locked the door, but it didn’t make a difference. The vase of fresh cut daisies on her coffee table mocked her. No point destroying a perfectly pretty flower when she already knew the answer.
He loved her not.
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Ma Hogg rocked in her porch swing perusing the paper. The Hogg Jaw Herald’s headline took up half the page: TEN THINGS TO KNOW ABOUT THE NOROVIRUS. A cloud of dust kicked up the road, slowing near her mailbox. What fool would interrupt her when Southern Woman’s Gospel Hour was on Everland Radio?
Everland Radio.
“Ha!” She snorted before taking a slow sip of sweet tea. Once she was finished it would be Hogg Jaw Radio. Soon, so soon, her town would get its due and those Everland snobs would be stuck crying into their peach pie.
She raised her bifocals from the silver chain around her neck. Humph Miller’s Cadillac bounced down her driveway. He drove too fast, kicking stones into her flower beds. “There’s a man I’d unplug from life support to charge my phone,” she muttered to her hens while reaching for the .22 perched against the railing. The warning shot struck off the front bumper.
A grinding filled the air, the sound of brakes locking. “Son of a biscuit.” Humph Miller jumped out of the driver’s side door. “Are you crazy? You just shot me.”
“Heavens to Betsy, this is shooting at you.” She fired again, this time taking out his front wheel. “That’s for blasphemy, and for being a numbnut.”
“You know what? You’re crazy as a pet coon under a red wagon.” His nose matched the shade of a fresh-boiled beet. “Yeah. I finally said it. Someone needs to lock you away from the decent people.”
She set her sights and took aim again. “Tell me, is that what you are, Humphrey Miller? A decent person?” The bullet took off his passenger-side mirror.
Humphrey made a strangled sound. “I love this car like it’s one of my own kids.”
“And I loved my daddy. He’s the one who taught me how to shoot cans off the fence post when I was knee-high to a grasshopper. You know what else? He taught me that a man should respect a woman. Did you get the mayor to sign off on condemning the park last night?”
“What? No.” He frowned in confusion.
She raised the gun again. “That’s ‘ma’am’ to you, boy.”
“No, ma’am,” he ground out. “He left before we had a chance to corner him.”
“Who’d he leave with?”
“Sounds like you already know.” He grimaced, forcing out the word. “Ma’am.”
“I want to hear you say it.” Her tone was deadlier than her aim.
“With that Happily Ever After Land princess. The pretty blond Joe Wilcox asked to work as a lobbyist. Mayor Marino chased after her on his motorcycle.”
“And before he ran off to be…lobbied…who else was he engaged in conversation with?”
Humph looked flummoxed by her game of Twenty Questions. “No one of importance comes to mind.”
“That’s because while Beau Marino and the head of the Georgia Tourism Commission were locked in a deep and meaningful conversation, you played ‘Sink the Sausage’ in the coatroom with your intern.”
His eyes bugged. “How did you—”
“You ever wonder why I gave you a shot at the big leagues?”
He opened his mouth.
“This was a rhetorical question, Monkey Breath. Look up the word when you get home.” She sat back, savoring the moment. “Oh, on second thought, you don’t have a home. Not anymore.”
“What did you do?” His underbite became more pronounced.
“You got a shot at locking up the Discount-Mart deal because your long-suffering saint of a wife’s granny hailed from these parts. LaWanda Foster sang in the Halfway Baptist Choir for fifty years, the star of the soprano section. Now”—she frowned, momentarily losing her trail of thought—“where was I?”
He opened his mouth again.
“I said, don’t speak. The whole point of a rhetorical question is to make a statement, not elicit information.” She lowered the gun. “The Fosters have been in Hogg Jaw nearly as long as the Hoggs. LaWanda, God rest her soul, requested I try to help you before she passed last month. I wasn’t sure, and warned you not to make a mess of things. And what did you go and do?”
A pause.
“Go on, then. This time I’m not being rhetorical.”
“I tried to do—”
“Aw, forget it.” Ma Hogg waved her hand in derision. “Quit your yapping.”
“I did my best.” He twisted his hands. “I’m telling you, I did my best.”
“Yes. Bless your heart.” She clicked her tongue. “And more’s the pity, because it wasn’t nearly good enough, sugar. Not twenty minutes ago I called your long-suffering wife.”
He went so white he could blind an angel. “You did what?”
“Have I developed a stutter? Merris now knows all about how you’ve played your tiny blue-veined piccolo all over town. Now get out of my sight.” She picked up the shotgun and leveled it again. “Last I heard, your better half was about to have one hell of a bonfire with your golf clubs.”
“Please.” Humph swayed, forehead sheened in sweat. “Where am I supposed to go?”
“You think that’s something I have time to co
ncern myself with? I’m busy; you’re ugly. Have a nice life.”
After Humph rolled off in his ruined car, Ma Hogg rose, slung the gun over one shoulder, and eyed the old apple tree near her house. It had been planted not long after her wedding day. Her mother-in-law, the old bat, had sworn back and forth and every way sideways that apple trees couldn’t grow in this climate, not in the coastal humidity. That she’d proven the ornery woman wrong brought no end to her satisfaction. The tree was gnarled and stunted, but grow it did, even bearing fruit. Bitter, puny apples only good for baking, but…
“Wait a cotton-pickin’ second.” She hoisted the .22 and shuffled closer. “Only good for baking, eh?”
Good thing no neighbors lived for nearabouts half a mile, so no one could hear her cackle.
One didn’t become the largest crime boss in the county by letting half-wits do their dirty deeds. No, if she wanted Hogg Jaw to beat out Everland as a Coastal Jewel, she’d have to roll up her sleeves and double down on playing dirty.
But first she had a newspaper to read.
Chapter Twenty-Nine
It had been a long morning. Beau’s Tourism Commission phone presentation went well, but Everland wasn’t out of the woods. They were competing for the last of two small-towns slots to secure the coveted Coastal Jewel designation. The problem was that the other town was Hogg Jaw.
The conversation had kept circling back to the Roxy Theater. Donna Summer and Angie Robert in particular wanted more detailed plans, ones that he fudged, but fudging made him uneasy. He preferred to deal in cold, hard facts, to provide concise information unobscured by flowery language.
As he hung up, Karen, who’d sat opposite his desk taking notes, flashed a disbelieving look.
“Think I blew it?” He removed his headset.
“Not the call.” Her tone was aghast.
“What’s up?”
“You abandoned the poor girl on the street?”
“Who?” He glanced at the window. There was nothing in sight but green lawn and trees exploding in autumn red-gold. A coolness spread through him, his old invisible armor. The one that protected him through all kinds of shit.
Karen shook her head, her eyes slits. “For being a so-called prince, you’re a real dunce.”
He swiveled back, her words finding a chink, and their meaning stung. “Can you stop speaking in riddles?”
“The Back Fence,” she all but shouted. “I checked your e-mail during the call wrap-up and saw an alert. The article just came out.”
“Article? What article?”
She rose, clutching her pen and paper. “Go on the blog yourself. You can’t miss it.”
He grabbed his mouse, and the movement woke his desktop. A quick search for the blog got the site. He gaped at the headline: KICKED TO THE CURB: PRINCESS DITCHED AFTER LANDING A ONE-NIGHT STAND WITH EVERLAND’S PRINCE.
There was an out-of-focus image. Tuesday stood beside his bike in her ball gown, their faces close, not actually kissing, but about to or just had.
He cursed under his breath.
Karen mashed her lips, opening her mouth twice to speak before finally seeming to find the words she sought. “Tell me you didn’t sleep with that poor girl and then drop her off like so much trash.”
“I had the meeting,” he said flatly.
“A meeting?” Karen spread on the sarcasm. “Oh, phooey. You think that couldn’t have been rescheduled?”
“It was important.”
“And last night wasn’t?” She frowned, crossing and recrossing her legs. “I don’t mean to tell tales out of school, Mr. Mayor, but I have seen that young woman in this office and it’s clear that she wasn’t just a pretty face.”
“It happened fast. Too fast,” he murmured. Kissing Tuesday had been bad enough. Sex? He might as well kiss common sense good-bye. Forever.
“When has love ever followed an assigned speed limit?”
“Whoa, whoa, whoa. Who said anything about love?”
“I did, you big bully. And kindly don’t raise your voice at me. I went to school with your mama and can remember when you wet the bed.”
“I didn’t mean to cause her trouble.” He’d felt uncomfortable this morning, but that wasn’t fair. All through the conference call about the Roxy Theater he’d regretted his rushed exit. He’d wanted to get a little breathing space, but instead he’d ended up unmoored, drifting aimless within himself.
“Don’t dodge the bullet. Part of being a real man is owning your mistakes, and this one is a doozy.”
He hadn’t meant to sell Tuesday out. But the road to hell was paved with good intentions.
“I have to go.”
“You do. And remember, women love flowers.”
He didn’t stop for any of that, too focused on getting to Love Street. When he pulled up in front of her cottage, he heaved a sigh. A light shone from her bedroom.
But no one answered the door.
He knocked again, hearing her dog scratching the wood.
“Tuesday?” he murmured.
“Go away,” she called.
Karen had been right. “I’m not going anywhere.”
“Ha.” She opened the door, the security chain latched. “Big words. Until you have another meeting.”
“Guess I deserved that.” He’d give up a lot in life never to see pain in Tuesday’s gaze. Worse, it was a hurt he was responsible for putting there. He’d fucked up, broken her trust. But the question remained, had he broken everything between them as well?
“Guess so.” She regarded him for a minute, wounded humiliation stamped on her face. It made his insides churn.
“You know, I didn’t expect you to spend the day with me.”
“But I should’ve gotten off the damn bike and walked you to the house.”
The admission earned a small smile. “It ain’t rocket science, just good manners.”
“Would you like to come with me?” he said. “I have somewhere I want to take you.”
She studied him a moment. “First, I want an apology.”
He cleared his throat. “I’m sorry that I ran out of here and left you alone with the Back Fence biddies and your sister. I did have a full schedule, but to tell you the truth, I panicked.”
“Makes sense.” She glanced down at her faded THEATER KIDS DO IT BETTER T-shirt. “I am pretty frightening.”
He looked around. A curtain twitched in Miss Ida May’s house. “I haven’t been with a woman since my wife died,” he murmured. “And before she passed we’d been estranged.”
Her hand went to the latch, undoing it with a turn. “I’ve heard a little of this.”
“Not from me,” he said firmly. “And while I don’t like to make a habit out of speaking ill of the dead, you need to know a few things.”
She studied him. “You’ve intrigued me. Let’s go.”
A few minutes later he parked in front of the Roxy Theater.
“You didn’t bring me here to hit you again, did you?”
He snorted. “No, although I’m also not saying that I don’t deserve it.”
The side door was opened courtesy of the fire marshal. He’d put in a call and despite misgivings had been granted access with a caveat that the floor might be unstable.
He didn’t let on that he’d been in the premises recently.
They walked in, and Tuesday gasped. The hall was shadowy. Shafts of light seeped around the borders of the boarded-up windows and through cracks in the walls. “It’s even prettier in the daylight. Look!” She ran up the stage stairs and took in the ceiling fresco, painted a midnight blue pinpricked by gold foil stars.
“Do you miss it?”
“Miss what?” She hummed a tune under her breath, her gaze turned to the empty seats, wistful and unfocused.
“Being onstage.”
That got her attention. “Only about every five minutes or so.”
“Everland is as different from New York City as it’s possible to be. There’re no bright lights or sta
r-studded marquees. But how would you feel about helping to restore this old place?”
Twin lines appeared between her brows. “How?”
“What if you founded a community theater?”
“Me? Found a community theater?” She repeated it blankly.
“As a key part of the strategy that could get us over the line with the Coastal Jewel program.”
“You. Over the line.” Any enthusiasm had drained from her. She wasn’t being overly dramatic or stamping her feet, but there was a seismic shift. Her shoulders slumped as if something vital leached from her.
He didn’t know how to stop the leak.
“You don’t have to.” Frowning, he flipped back through their conversation, unable to pinpoint where he’d gone wrong. Somewhere he’d fucked up. “I figured you’d appreciate the career upgrade.”
“Upgrade.” Her eyes darkened to the color of a sea squall.
How many times had he planned dates or gifts for Jacqueline only to be met with scorn? He must have an invisible sucker tattoo on his forehead. “Will you stop parroting me and say something?”
She lost the glazed look to her eyes. “I’m happy plodding along in my life at the park. Happy enough anyway. Responsibility has a way of biting me in the butt. So I guess I’m saying thank you, but no thanks.”
He’d thought she’d jump at the theater with both feet. This was supposed to make her happy. He was offering her a chance to do what she loved, and her face looked like he’d drop-kicked a puppy.
She took a deep breath. “Anyway. What did you want to tell me about your wife?”
Coldness flooded him. He’d wanted a true connection, to share his history, but how could she expect him to be open when she wouldn’t do the same?
So he pretended to get a text. “It’s Karen,” he said, fishing out his phone to stare at the blank screen. “There’s an emergency back at the office.”
She didn’t move. Or lift her head. “Thank you,” she whispered. “Your offer was nice.”
Nice? She might have well have said “meh.” He gave a nod and walked toward the exit, frustration crushing his windpipe. He’d gotten so close to closing the gap with another person. Last night he’d felt a connection more than the obvious. But his confidence was shrinking by the moment.
