Anyway, I decided I was cursed by the spirit of J.R.R. Tolkien for my ironic sexy Gandalf blasphemy. That’s why I couldn’t stop thinking about Duane Winston’s body parts and his perplexing suggestion we were suited.
Five days had passed since Halloween and my busy, bizarre night. Of course I’d avoided him since. What would I say? What could I say?
Hi, Duane. I don’t know whether I like you or not, and you confuse the hell out of me, but I’d like to buy you a piece of pie so we can argue about the color of the sky. Let’s schedule that.
Or how about,
Hello, Duane. I obviously lack self-respect and common sense because—even though you kissed my cousin, your sexy stripper ex-girlfriend right in front of me—I don’t find that weird or creepy or disrespectful. Let’s go out for ice cream cones so I can watch you lick yours.
Making matters more muddled, Tina had cornered me Sunday afternoon at Daisy’s Nut House. My daddy and I had gone out for breakfast after Sunday service. She’d been super friendly. She wanted to get together, hang out, do cousin stuff.
We hadn’t really spoken to each other since we were thirteen. I hadn’t been cool enough to be her friend when we were in high school. When I went to college and she started working as an exotic dancer, we’d rarely interacted, and then only during family get-togethers.
But now she wanted to re-establish a relationship.
And I was having oddly whimsical and amorous thoughts about her ex-boyfriend.
“So, are you ready to tell me what happened when you disappeared with one of the Winston twins?”
I didn’t look up at Claire’s question even though she startled me a little. I could tell by the direction of her voice that she was standing in the doorway of my classroom.
“How long have you been standing there?”
“Long enough to watch you stare into space for several minutes before plunking your head into your hands and making those lovely moaning sounds. I can’t decide what the sounds mean, but they sure are interesting.”
I shook my head and peered at her through my fingers. “A circumcised penis.”
I was gratified when she choked on air, “Ah…what?”
“A circumcised penis. That’s what happened. And some hot looks, hotter kisses, truth or dare, then maybe we’re suited—I don’t know—skinny-dipping and rubbing for warmth and—”
“Stop, stop right there.” She held her hands up. “We can’t have this kind of conversation at work.”
“Why not? Is it against policy?”
“Not precisely, but drinking while at work is a big no-no.”
“I’m not drinking.”
“But I’d like to be a little tipsy if we’re going to talk about the Winston brothers and whether or not they’re circumcised.”
I let my hands drop and gave her a little smile. “You went to school with Billy and Cletus, sandwiched between the two, right? Billy a grade above, Cletus a grade behind?”
She nodded and said quietly, “Yes, but I know Jethro best. He and Ben were best friends.”
I could feel my smile turn sad before I could stop it, and regretted the unintentional pity that must’ve shown in my eyes. Claire looked away and cleared her throat, looking equal parts resigned and impatient.
“Ben used to joke he didn’t have the patience to learn the Winston boys’ names, so he called all of Jethro’s brothers Jethro Jr.” Claire addressed this to her feet and paired it with a small laugh.
I smirked at Ben’s pragmatism as I studied my friend, how her face had fallen even though she tried to smile.
Claire had no family to speak of…actually, by that I mean her daddy was the club president of the local motorcycle gang, the Iron Wraiths. As well, her momma was his old lady. But together or separate, those two were the definition of dysfunctional. As far as I knew, Claire had no contact with her parents.
I assumed she was still living in Green Valley because she wanted to stay near her husband’s family. She accompanied them to church every Sunday, and her house was within a block of theirs.
She’d been a local beauty growing up—she even had those awesome high cheekbones that magazines talk about, with the little hollow above the jaw—but she had sad eyes. Add to her stunning good looks the most laid-back, kind, generous, and all-around talented person I’d ever met. For example, she had the most beautiful singing voice and should have been in Nashville singing, or in New York or Milan living the life of a muse or a model or a concert pianist.
Meanwhile, I couldn’t carry a tune in a bucket.
I’d been in the thespians my sophomore through senior year of high school and was therefore labeled as one of those drama kids—for my school, that basically meant weird and funny. Plus, I was universally acknowledged as the county math whiz, having led our school’s team to math bowl victory three times.
I didn’t marry my childhood sweetheart because I didn’t have one, though I kissed lots of boys because I liked kissing boys. Kissing boys also had the delightful byproduct of aggravating my father and overprotective brother. Essentially, I’d left home for college an antsy, angsty, but well-mannered good girl. So, a typical teenager.
But upon my return to Green Valley High School (just a short four years later), same school with the same social order and subsets, I’d now become a new stereotype.
I was the hot math teacher.
I’d never thought of myself as the hot anything. Don’t get me wrong, I had a perfectly fine self-image. But I guess in comparison to Mr. Tranten—the previous and now recently retired math teacher—the fact I had boobs and was under eighty-five meant I might as well have been Charlize Theron.
“Well, come on,” Claire finally said. “Come home with me and you can tell me all about it, I just need wine first.”
“I can’t.” I glanced at the wall clock at the front of the room. “I have to wait for my brother to pick me up. My beast of a truck is still parked at the community center with ‘catastrophic engine failure.’ He’s driving me home.”
Claire’s eyes darted back to mine; she studied my face with a question in her expression. “Uh… No, it’s not.”
“What?”
“The beast, your truck. It’s not at the community center. It was towed.”
Panic seized my chest and my hands balled into fists. “No, it couldn’t. Could it?” I’d talked to Mr. McClure about keeping the truck at the center until I could afford the towing and repair costs; he’d assured me it was no trouble.
“Calm down.” She lifted her hands and walked farther into the classroom.
“I can’t afford impound costs. Why would they tow it? Your father-in-law said it was fine.”
“It’s not at the impound, Jess. I saw it this morning in the parking lot of the Winston Brothers Auto Shop. It’s not at the impound. Calm yourself.”
I flinched at this news, blinked furiously. “What…why would they do that?”
Claire chuckled, and I didn’t miss the amusement or the wicked glint in her eye when she responded, “Probably has something to do with that circumcised penis.”
* * *
I was going to get tipsy. I needed at least two glasses of wine. But first, I was going to find out what in the name of tarnation was going on.
I called my brother and left a message telling him I would be out with Claire. I did not tell him Claire was driving me over to the Winston Brothers Auto Shop. Jackson and the Winston boys did not get along, mostly because everyone knew Jethro Winston—the oldest—used to steal cars and neither my daddy nor my brother had ever been able to make the charges stick.
It also had something to do with their sister Ashley Winston, and Jackson acting like a fool about her in high school.
I remembered Ashley growing up, mostly because she was so darn pretty and sweet. Just the nicest girl in the history of forever. I think most people expected her to be catty because she was so pretty, but she was the opposite.
I pulled at my bottom lip with my thumb
and index finger, my narrowed eyes seeing nothing of the colorful foliage umbrellas framing the mountain road. Fall color was out in full force and would be for the next few weeks, assuming we didn’t get any unseasonal snow.
I’d be lying if I said the Smoky Mountain landscape wasn’t a big draw and factor in my decision to return home after college. The other two main contributing factors were my family and the student loan deferment plan for STEM (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics) teachers who taught in underserved areas. Living at home helped me save money and pay off my student loans. And I was the only high school calculus teacher outside Knoxville for fifty miles in every direction.
My predecessor, Mr. Tranten, had taught math as high as Algebra II. This was the first year high achieving math students in our area and the surrounding valleys weren’t bussed off to Knoxville for trigonometry and calculus.
But ever since I was a little girl I’d dreamt of seeing the world, experiencing it, and not as a tourist. I wanted to be a world traveler. I’d craved freedom and adventure. Being home now felt like preparing for launch. I’d been savoring the time with my family, storing memories, because—if all my painstaking planning came to fruition—I wouldn’t be seeing them much in the coming years.
“We’re here.”
Claire’s pronouncement pulled me from my thoughts. I stared out the windshield as she placed her car into park and turned off the ignition, glaring at the open garage of the auto shop. I saw a pair of boots sticking out from underneath the car and my heart kept asking my head, What if that’s Duane? My head kept putting my heart off, saying, We’ll cross that circumcised penis when we get to it…
“Are you going to get out of the car?”
I shook my head. “I haven’t decided yet.”
Claire sighed. “The sooner you get this sorted, the sooner we can go back to my place and drink wine.”
“Well, that settles it,” I said distractedly, still not moving.
She paused, likely waiting for me to do something; I could feel her eyes on me. “Jess, what are you stalling for? What are you afraid of?”
Just as the words left her mouth, two redheaded and bearded male specimens of mighty fineness sauntered out of the garage. The boots under the car were a decoy, likely Cletus. My breath caught and I held it, my eyes widening behind my sunglasses.
The twins were both dressed in sky-blue coveralls and black work boots, with a white undershirt peeking out at the collar. Claire had been wrong last Friday; their hair was approximately the same length and so were their beards. Even the grease stains on their hands and clothes seemed identical. I forgave myself a little for my mix-up on Halloween.
They looked exactly the same and I hadn’t seen either of them for going on three years.
Regardless, now I knew immediately which of the two was Duane. If I’d given myself a moment at the community center, I would have been able to figure it out. Duane carried himself differently than Beau, he always had; how he stood, where he looked, and the line of his mouth was in stark contrast to his sociable brother.
Beau swaggered even as he stood still, glanced around at his surroundings, his brow untroubled, and his smile was easy.
Duane held himself straight and aloof, his eyes never leaving his brother’s, as though Duane only ever focused on one thing at a time. His slight squint made him appear deep in thought as Beau chatted cheerfully. Duane’s smile was almost reluctant. I’d noticed the reluctant smile on Friday, too. His smiles were reserved, secretive, like he rationed them.
I glanced between the two brothers and didn’t have to wait long to figure out whether the mystical Beau voodoo spell had truly been broken.
It had.
I looked at Beau now and felt a placid warm fondness. He really was such a nice guy.
Another sign of Beau’s diminished power: I looked at Duane and felt powerfully and irrationally irritated, flustered, and insecure. These weren’t unusual reactions to his proximity; however, each swelled inside me with a sudden surprising fierceness, and were paired with something new—abrupt and intense longing.
Duane hadn’t made any attempt at contact over the last five days. Of course neither had I. After his admission at the lake, we’d walked back to the bonfire in strained silence, my hand in his. Releasing me as we approached, he’d disappeared after depositing me with Cletus, telling his brother to take me home. He’d walked out of the ring of light provided by the fire and that was the last time I’d seen him…if you didn’t count all the odd dreams I’d been having about him since.
“Which one, Jess?”
I started, Claire’s question interrupting my aggrieved reflections, and responded without pulling my gaze from the twins. “I’m going to sound like a looneybird when I admit this, but…Duane.”
“Well, I’ll be…” I knew she was fighting a smile.
“I know, right? I’m a crazy person. Obviously I can’t trust myself, what with my flighty impulses. Next week I’ll probably be bat-shit crazy for Cletus.”
“Well, Cletus is adorable. You could do a lot worse.”
“Yes, I could. Maybe I’ll just decide to be infatuated with Cletus.”
I tried to make light of my feelings, but I knew it wasn’t that easy. My emotions for Duane were wrapped in years of knowing him—animosity, begrudging respect, and five days of agitated pining. Our history was complicated enough, multifarious enough, for me to be wary that the feelings could be genuine and lasting.
Claire chuckled, placed her hand over one of mine, and squeezed. “Must be rough, liking the look of him so much when you obviously dislike him so.”
“I don’t dislike him.” I shook my head, searching for the right words to explain what I felt for Duane. “I mean, I did—I did kind of dislike him when we were growing up. He was never nice to me like Beau was. But he talked to me more than Beau did, a lot more. He seemed to go out of his way to argue with me all the time.”
“And now?”
“Now…” I shrugged. “Now I don’t know him anymore, not really. I mean, assuming nothing’s changed since I left for college, I know his favorite ice-cream flavor is rocky road, I know he’s got a scar on his right arm from climbing over Mr. Tanner’s junkyard fence when he was thirteen and that it required a tetanus shot and stitches. I know he drives way too fast and, last I knew, had never lost a race at The Canyon. I know he whistles Darth Vader’s theme song from Star Wars when he washes his car or fixes his car or does anything in rote. I know he takes his coffee black and doesn’t like the taste of carbonated beverages—that kind of stuff.”
“Seems like you know a lot.”
I shrugged again. “Just stupid stuff you pick up when you grow up with someone.”
“How does Beau take his coffee?”
My eyes slid to Claire’s and I frowned at her. “I don’t know, why?”
“Does Beau whistle when he fixes cars?”
I shook my head, lifting my eyebrows in the universal sign of ignorance. “How should I know?”
I could tell she was hiding a grin when she responded, “Are you sure you had a crush on Beau? Or did you maybe like Duane all along, but felt Beau was a safer choice?”
My mouth fell open—not a whole lot, just enough to be gaping—and my eyes narrowed as a small sound of disbelief tumbled from my lips. “What? No…no.” I shook my head again, with more vehemence this time. “No, no, no.”
“Jess, Duane still races cars down at The Canyon and he’s still undefeated—mostly because he takes crazy chances and fear doesn’t seem to register. Over the summer he killed a rattlesnake at the community center.”
“So?”
“So, he walked right over to it, stepped on its head, then reached for it with his bare hands.”
“Then he’s stupid.”
“No. Lord knows he’s no fool. He knew what he was doing, he just doesn’t seem to have a healthy fear of deadly snakes, or of getting killed at the drag races either. Beau is the safer choice. I can und
erstand how you might’ve been drawn to Duane all along, but—”
“No. No. Just no.”
“They’re identical.”
“Looking. They’re identical looking. They’re not identical people.”
“Yeah, but by your own admission, you actually knew Duane growing up. You knew about him, you spent time with him. Yet your crush was on Beau?”
“He was the nice one,” I grumbled.
Claire laughed, rolling her eyes. “Maybe. Or maybe he was the safe one.”
I turned away from her and back to the brothers in question. They were leaning into the hood of a vintage car, their red heads obscured; however, I had an excellent view of their backsides.
I huffed with indignation, not liking Claire’s re-writing of my history (mostly because it made sense). “Listen, Dr. Phil, I don’t know why we’re even talking about this yet. Neither of us have had enough wine for this conversation. Although I could sit in this car and ogle Duane Winston’s fine ass all day from afar, I need to find out why my truck is here and what’s to be done about it.”
“I agree.”
“Good.” I nodded, reaching for the door handle, finally having enough incentive-impetus to eject myself from my seat.
“I, too, could sit here all day and ogle Duane Winston’s fine ass from afar.” Claire said this just as my feet hit the ground. Before I could administer my reproachful glare, she was out of the car with her door shut, striding purposefully toward the twins.
“Hey, boys!” she called immediately, drawing their attention and giving me no time to prepare my game face.
My steps faltered as they looked over their shoulders, Duane’s glare catching on Claire first then flickering to me. His expression didn’t change, not precisely. Rather, I had all of his focus. Once his eyes latched on to me they didn’t waver.
Apprehension warred with anticipation, and both caused a lump to form in my throat. Try as I might, I was unable to hold Duane’s gaze and I looked away, preferring instead Beau’s lazy, easy smile as he grinned at both Claire and me with straightforward, undemanding affability.
Fall in Love Book Bundle: Small Town Romance Box Set Page 8
