Hell, what had happened now?
He wasn’t in any mood to soothe some family squabbles or hear any more about the blasted party that Nicky was planning. Especially since it appeared his mother had taken over that planning and was now trying to involve him.
“I’m not here about the party,” his mother said the moment she stepped in the doorway.
“Good.” Well, maybe that was good. Garrett waited for the other shoe to drop because with his mother, there was always another shoe. “But you should know that Roman just got here.”
“Yes, I called him.”
“And he came?” Garrett sounded as surprised as he truly was. These were perhaps the end times because Garrett seriously doubted Roman and his mother had buried the hatchet.
“Yes, but if it’s to say no, please try to talk him out of it.”
Garrett just lifted his hands to let her know he didn’t have a clue what she was talking about. Roman obviously did, though.
“No,” his brother said the moment he made it to the office. “I am not giving permission for a Widowers’ House to be set up here. It doesn’t matter that I don’t live here, but I don’t want the place to become a boarding house to strangers.”
Garrett had considered several ways this chat might play out, but that wasn’t one of them. “A Widowers’ House?”
“It makes perfect sense,” his mother insisted. “We’ve got widows in Z.T.’s house, and who better to understand what they’re going through than men who’ve lost their spouses?”
“Counselors and other widows can better understand that,” Roman snarled and then turned to Garrett.
Garrett couldn’t agree more, and there was no chance he was going to try to convince Roman to change his mind. Besides, he suspected the real reason his mother wanted this was so she’d have a new pool of matchmaking candidates. The last thing Garrett wanted was to add a new set of strangers to the mix. He was just getting used to the old set of strangers.
“Look, I’m tired of being in the middle of this,” Roman went on. “Tired of hearing about your being in a bad mood. Hell, I’m tired of Nicky’s friend calling me about Meredith. I just want to be out of the FYI and ‘could you please do this?’ loops. For that to happen, I can either kill all of you or remind you one last time to quit bothering me. I’ve got a business to run and a son to raise, so quit pestering me with this kind of crap that I can’t do anything about anyway.”
“A son you’ve chosen to raise on your own,” his mother said. She punctuated that with a know-it-all nod.
Damn. This was about to get ugly. His mom was about to launch into her usual nagging session about Roman not marrying Tate’s mother. This despite the fact that neither Tate’s mother nor Roman had wanted to get married.
But there was something else in what Roman said. Something that got Garrett’s attention.
“Why would Nicky’s friend call you about Meredith?” he asked his brother.
Roman gave him a flat look. “I just said a lot of things, and that’s what you got out of it?”
“Yeah,” Garrett admitted.
Roman continued to look at him, maybe because he thought Garrett would rethink that. He wouldn’t. But he did do something to help with the Roman-Mom dispute.
“I don’t want a Widowers’ House,” Garrett told her. “Sophie probably doesn’t, either. After all, she’ll be planning her wedding soon, and she’ll likely want to get married here. No way would she want a bunch of people around when she’s trying to do that.”
It was as if a light went on over his mother’s head. Of course, she knew Sophie was engaged and would soon marry. But maybe it was just occurring to her that wedding plans were a better way to spend her time than widow-widower matchmaking.
“Besides,” Garrett added, and he went straight for the pay dirt, “think of all the gossip there’d be about you if you had a bunch of single men living under our roof. The Garden Guild would have a field day with it.”
Some of the color blanched from his mother’s face. Since Belle was the queen of gossip, she knew just how vicious something like that could get.
“Fine,” she said as if it were a great concession and she was giving up on her dream. “And you need a haircut,” she added to Roman before she walked away. It wasn’t a new insult. She seemed to bring it up every other visit.
Garrett didn’t waste any time getting some clarification from his brother. “Now, tell me about Nicky’s friend who called you.”
“Gina,” Roman quickly provided. However, he still had his attention on their mother who was making her way down the hall. “You don’t think any of the widows put the crazy notion of a Widowers’ House into her head?”
“Maybe Lady.” But he doubted it. From what he was hearing, Lady had found an adequate pool of lovers right here in Wrangler’s Creek. “Why did Gina call you?”
“Maybe because she saw me with Nicky. It was the day Nicky had been crying.”
Probably when Garrett had seen the scar.
“Were you responsible for those tears Nicky was shedding?” Roman asked.
“No. Well, maybe.” He scrubbed his hand over his face. “It’s complicated.”
“I gathered that. Hope it doesn’t happen again. Nicky’s got a lot going on in her life. Her kid is cute, but kids are work. So are ex-boyfriends who make her cry. I’m sure she loves her daughter, but the ex-boyfriend making her cry she can do without.”
Garrett nearly mentioned the scar. Nearly. But it wasn’t his story to tell. Plus, he didn’t know what the hell the story was even about.
“You read a book to Kaylee that same day,” Garrett said a moment later. “Is that when Gina called you, too?”
“No, it was later. And how did you know I read her a book?”
This chat was moving like a sidewinder, and Garrett didn’t want to sound petty, but he felt a little petty at the moment. “She told me. She calls you Roaming.”
Roman smiled a little. Not his usual reaction. But then Kaylee could have that effect on even a badass. “Like I said, she’s a cute kid.”
True. A kid who kept finding her way into his lap. And his heart. Garrett wasn’t sure he was ready for either, but Kaylee didn’t seem to notice that.
“Now, back to Gina,” Garrett prompted his brother. “Why did she call you?”
“She wanted to know if Meredith was capable of doing something sneaky and mean. I told her yes. Especially if she thought sneaky and mean would get you back.”
Garrett felt his forehead bunch up. “What did Meredith do?”
“To heck if I know. Gina’s call was a fishing expedition, but she was short on details. She just said something had happened at the Widows’ House, and she wanted to make sure Meredith wasn’t involved. I pressed her for more, and she finally said it was something involving flowers.”
Yes, that. “Nicky got upset when some flowers were delivered for her. But she didn’t say anything about them being from Meredith.”
“They weren’t from her,” someone said.
Nicky.
Garrett hadn’t seen or heard her come in, but she stepped into the doorway next to Roman. She volleyed glances between them as if she expected them to continue, but Garrett wanted her to do some talking. That said, he also didn’t want her to run again.
“Meredith didn’t send the flowers,” she repeated. “They were from someone else. Why did Gina think Meredith had sent them?”
Apparently, Nicky had heard a great deal of the conversation. Roman only shrugged, though. “You’d have to ask her. Or Meredith.”
“Meredith left.”
Well, that was one problem solved. Garrett wouldn’t have to risk running into his ex or having Meredith meddle in whatever was going on in Nicky’s life.
“I’ll talk to Gina,” Nicky
assured him. “I came to see your mother about the dinner.”
She said the word dinner as if it were about as pleasant for her as it was for him. Once, it probably had been a fun idea, but it no longer was now that his mother and some of the other widows were involved.
“But I also wanted to talk to you,” Nicky added, looking at Garrett.
Roman had some bad habits, but getting lost at the appropriate moment wasn’t one of them. He mumbled a goodbye to Garrett, kissed Nicky on the cheek and headed out. Later, Garrett would ask him when he’d gotten so chummy with Nicky that he could give her a peck like that.
Later, he would figure out why he felt jealous of the peck.
Nicky didn’t actually come into the office. She just stood there and bracketed her hands on the jamb. “I got a text and then a call from a woman who might know something about the wedding ring. The one that John Doe was wearing. She wants me to meet her at a café in Houston where she lives so we can show it to her. Then she can see if it belonged to her uncle, Felix.”
“Clay knows about this?” he immediately asked.
Nicky nodded. “I called him right after I got off the phone with the woman. Candy Halverson is her name. She saw the post I put on Facebook.”
This was perhaps the lead they’d been looking for. “She couldn’t try to ID the ring from a picture?”
“No. She said she needed to see it because she remembered the ring fitting perfectly on her middle finger. She’d apparently tried it on a couple of times.”
Finger size could easily change over the years, but maybe this woman would be able to tell them if it belonged to her uncle or not.
“Anyway,” Nicky continued, “Clay can go on Friday, three days from now, and he asked if we wanted to go with him to the café where Ms. Halverson arranged for us to meet. I’d like to go. How about you?”
That would eat up an entire day. And it wouldn’t really accomplish anything that Clay couldn’t do on his own. But he would get to spend some time with Nicky. Especially if they drove up separately from Clay so they could have some time to talk.
Of course, talking hadn’t worked great for them so far.
“I can join you if everything goes well on this cattle buying trip I have to make,” he explained. “I’m leaving first thing in the morning and will be gone for two days.”
“Oh,” Nicky said.
“Disappointed that I won’t be around?” He smiled, tried to make it sound like a joke.
“Yes.”
Well, he certainly hadn’t expected that response. Heck. Was something wrong? And why was that his go-to reaction whenever Nicky was around? Of course, his other go-to response was to want to kiss her again. That, despite the mess the last kiss had caused.
“I also wanted to say I was sorry,” Nicky added a moment later. “For everything.”
“That covers a lot of territory.” He hoped that would sound a lot lighter than it had. “You want to talk about what happened in my truck? Or what happened on the porch with the flowers?”
“Not really.” Then she gave a heavy sigh. “I know the scar has become the elephant in the room. But it won’t make you feel better to hear about it.”
“Will it make you feel better?”
“No.” She sighed again. “It’s not something many people know about. Gina and Patrick are the only ones. Patrick looked disgusted when he saw it. I figure disgust was your reaction, too, but you did a great job of hiding it.”
“Not disgust,” he assured her, and Garrett walked closer to her.
“Pity then. That was Gina’s reaction. She cried.”
He shook his head. “I wanted to punch the person who’d put it there,” he corrected.
Nicky flinched just slightly. But it was more than enough for him to fill in the blanks.
Shit.
She’d done that to herself.
He knew nothing about cutters. Didn’t know if it was a good idea to press her to talk about it or not. So, Garrett just stood there and waited.
“It happened a long time ago,” she finally said. “And yes, I got help for it. Obviously, I wasn’t thinking straight when I did that.”
Obviously. Something else then occurred to him. “Does it have something to do with me, with what happened between us?”
He figured she’d rather eat glass than admit it, and that was why he was surprised when she nodded. Surprised, and he felt as if she’d slugged him.
“After you broke up with me, my father heard the gossip that we’d been together.” Nicky spoke slowly, as if she’d rehearsed this but still wasn’t certain she should be saying it. “That’s the word he called me. I got upset. Really upset,” she clarified. “And I took a razor blade and...well, you can figure out the rest.”
He could indeed, and it made him sick to his stomach.
“Don’t say you’re sorry,” she went on just as he’d been about to say it. “Because it wasn’t your fault. Truth is, I don’t think it had much to do with you.”
“I was the straw that broke the camel’s back,” he mumbled.
She shrugged. “Anyway, believe it or not, it helped.”
“How the hell could that have helped?” Garrett hadn’t meant to blurt that out, but he just didn’t get it. She’d cut herself. Deep enough to leave a scar. It must have bled. And it must have hurt.
“It got my mind off other things. Not just you,” she quickly added. “That was around the time of that police report about my father.”
Definitely more straws.
“Again, don’t say you’re sorry,” she repeated. “It happened a long time ago, and the only thing left of it is the scar.”
That was plenty, and she no doubt got a reminder of that hellish time whenever she looked at it.
“Do the flowers have anything to do with the scar?” he asked.
The long, weary breath she took let him know that he’d just overstepped the limits of what she intended to tell him. “You know, I’m tired of all this gloom-and-doom talk.”
Hell. He figured she was about to turn and run again. And he couldn’t blame her. That’s why it stunned him when she came closer, leaned in and brushed her mouth over his.
“Actually, I came to tell you that we should have sex.” She kissed him again. “Think about it and get back to me.”
* * *
GARRETT HAD NO idea if that was a real invitation or if it was just a ploy to get his mind off the dark and gloomy stuff she’d just mentioned.
If it was the latter, it’d worked.
His mind was off that and onto the two kisses Nicky had just stunned him with. Those kisses would have been her version of a farewell since she started to walk away, but Garrett put a stop to that. He moved in front of her to block her path.
And then he kissed her right back.
It wasn’t one of those pecks, either, like Roman had given her. Nor was it short and sweet like the ones she’d given him. He kissed her, catching on to her waist to pull her closer so that not only their mouths were touching.
“I told you to think about it,” Nicky reminded him with her mouth still against his.
“I did. Trust me, that wasn’t a subject I needed to give a lot of thought.”
Though it should have been. She was offering him sex, which could make things more complicated than they already were. It could make things worse for her. Those were both valid arguments that he didn’t stand a chance of making after she pulled him back to her to resume the kiss.
Garrett wanted to ask her why she’d had this change of heart. Or ask her if she’d lost her mind. But he would have had to stop kissing her to do that, and it suddenly seemed like those questions could wait. Everything could wait.
Including but not limited to his need for oxygen.
Man, she t
asted good. Not something he could put a label on, but whatever it was, it went straight to his dick. Of course, just about everything Nicky said or did had that effect on him these days. He’d had the hots for her in high school, and the years hadn’t cooled that heat one little bit.
Without breaking the kiss, Garrett pulled her away from the door and closed it. No way did he want Roman or his mother returning to witness this. Not that he cared if they knew, but he figured Nicky wouldn’t want anyone to see them. Especially since things seemed to be escalating—fast.
The kissing quickly turned to groping, as good kissing usually did, and he backed her against the door to hold her in place so he could free up his hands. He’d learned his lesson about going after her top so he just caught her hips and aligned them with his.
Garrett liked that, but his erection was especially pleased with it. Nicky appeared to be, too, because she made one of those throaty sounds of pleasure that he’d heard her make in the truck. He wanted this to have a whole lot better outcome, though.
But what outcome exactly?
That question flashed through his head like a neon sign. Certain parts of him knew where they wanted to take this. Maybe pull her to the floor or up on the desk. Maybe just take her right against the door. However, the question came with a reminder.
He didn’t have any condoms in his office.
As a general rule, he’d just never thought of mixing sex with business reports. That rule, however, was about to be broken. But perhaps not broken the way one specific part of him wanted it to be.
There were some condoms in his bedroom on the other side of the house. Old ones. And it would mean making a trek there to get them. There were potential pitfalls along the way: his mother, the housekeeper, Alice, Sophie and any number of women from town who’d shown up to cure his loneliness. Garrett would have risked it if he’d thought he could walk that far, but he wasn’t going to get more than a few steps with this raging hard-on.
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