I kept that smile on my face and talked back to her in a raised voice, purposely setting her off. “We can talk about the loan later, Mother. Let’s celebrate first.”
Her cheeks went red under the layers of expensive makeup. Her eyes clinched in at the corners in a way that had haunted me as a boy. Surprising, considering the amount of botulism toxin her face contained. She turned and moved away, flitting from guest to guest, all with that phony smile plastered on her face. She was seething inside. I knew my mother well enough to know that she was trying to figure out the best way to jab me in retaliation. Too bad she didn’t hold any power over me anymore.
Although the Millingham finances were managed by excellent lawyers and accountants who did their best to protect and invest the family assets, their hands were tied. Not one of the Millinghams’ seemed to know how to do anything but spend. Fortunately, my share had been protected by a trust that I’d come into full control of at age twenty-four. Unlike the others in the extended family, I’d turned my millions into billions. Hence, I became the moneybag to this, my family of leeches. No, Georgina Millingham no longer held any power over me.
Or, so I thought. Her gaze bore into me from across the room commanding my attention. She accepted a glass of champagne from a server’s tray and raised it to her lips. Then, turning to my sister, who was always ready to unleash daggers of petty viciousness on an unsuspecting victim, looked almost giddy. “Did I tell you, Sandra,” my mother’s voice was louder than normal, “Who I saw in town last month? You’ll never guess.”
My stomach tightened. Something was up. Mother had that gleam in her eye that said she was locked onto her target.
“Who, Mother? Do tell.”
Mother met my eyes. “Muddy Hilton.”
And there it was. The kill shot.
“Of all the people to come crawling back.” My mother continued dramatically waiving her champagne flute in the air in a flourish of righteous indignation.
Sandra looked over at me and then smiled wickedly back at my mother. “Ooh. I don’t know how she could show her face around here after everything.”
“She was crossing the street in front of the post office wearing this god-awful cheap excuse for a dress.” My mother shuddered. “Nothing any decent person would wear in public.”
“Well. It’s Muddy. What should one expect? Sow’s ear, silk purse, and all that.” They linked arms, grinning, before striding together towards the dining hall.
My sister paused, glanced over her shoulder straight into my eyes, and called out louder than necessary, “Was Deacon Allred with her?”
My mother didn’t answer. Instead, they both looked at each other as though sharing an inside joke, and continued towards the dining hall emitting laughs that sounded more like cackles.
I stood rooted to the hand cut Italian marble tiles, shaking. Turns out, my mother could still wield power over me after all. I felt suddenly like I’d been beaten over with a tire iron.
Muddy had been here, in Chattington, just a few weeks earlier? Why? Was she still here? Was she okay? Was anything wrong? Deacon better be treating her right. If he’d done anything to hurt her, anything at all, I’d fucking kill him.
Part of me already knew she wasn’t still in town. If Muddy was anywhere nearby, I would’ve felt it. But, I had to know for sure.
I excused myself to the study and yanked out my phone, quickly calling Brice, my go-to guy for information gathering. Always discrete, I tasked Brice with doing something I’d talked myself out of doing every day for the last ten years. Finding Muddy
Funny how oblivious Mother was to what she’d just done. She’d just let the cat out of the bag. No pun intended.
3
Muddy
I was dead. Six AM had come early as hell and I was either still asleep, still drunk, or so hungover that I couldn’t tell the difference. I went downstairs and found Jay looking just as rough as me.
He glanced over his shoulder in acknowledgement as he fried eggs, probably for himself. “You look like hell.”
“Funny, coming from you.” I nodded for him to fry up one for me. “And watch your mouth. There are fifteen elderly ladies upstairs.”
“Fucking hell! I’ve got a headache that could awaken the undead. I need coffee, stat!”
I blew out a breath and met Jay’s eyes. “That’s Laverne. I suggest you meet her demands or be prepared for her wrath.”
He actually shivered. “She’s one of our guests?”
I nodded. “And the reason I look like this.”
Just then, the kitchen door swung open and Laverne leaned in, poking her head around the door jamb, Meredith right behind her. “Did you hear me in there? I was requesting coffee, young lady.”
Meredith looked worse than I did. How the woman was still alive was beyond me. She opened her mouth to say something and her dentures fell out on top of Laverne’s head. Laverne reached up and grabbed them, her eyes narrowing before she tossed them into the big metal trashcan beside the door.
“Serves you right. If you’d just use the adhesive I sent you, your damned chompers wouldn’t be falling out of your pie hole all over the place.”
I snatched a napkin and hurried over to the can. I tried not to gag as I reached in, retrieved them and held them out to Meredith.
“Can you be a dear and juth rinth thoth off for me, honey?”
I looked back at Jay. He was facing the grill, doing his best to be invisible. Fucker. I indulged in a quick mental picture of throwing the teeth at the back of his head. Then, I decided I ought to aid an old lady and I rinsed the teeth and gave them back to her.
“Thank you, dear. Now, grab that coffee, please. If Laverne doesn’t get coffee first thing in the morning, she turns into a roaring cuntwagon.”
Jay snorted and I had to bite my tongue to keep from laughing, myself. I just nodded to Meredith and made a show of picking up the carafe of coffee. “I’m on my way.”
As soon as the door shut, Jay looked back at me and shook his head. “We’re never going to survive this week.”
“They kept me drinking with them until one this morning.”
He laughed a deep, throw your head back laugh, and I kind of wanted to punch him in his exposed throat. Instead, I loaded a tray with coffee cups and the carafe and went out to prevent Laverne from becoming a roaring cuntwagon.
Breakfast was a wild frenzy of house coats, bedroom slippers, curlers, and extra bread plates for a couple of the ladies to set their teeth on. By the time it was over and the Flamingo Grannies had gone back upstairs to get dressed and ready for the day, I was dead on my feet. I still had to get through breakfast clean up, straighten all the rooms, and serve lunch before I could take a nap.
One foot in front of the other; a soft warm bed is closer than you think.
It was in the middle of making the bed in room number three when I had a fleeting image of Georgina Millingham. I shuddered. It was the perfume in the damned room. The same putrid floral bend that Georgina wore that probably cost a grand an ounce.
My memory of the visit back to my hometown flashed into my head. She’d been stopped at the red light in front of the Chattington Post Office. Behind the wheel of her BMW, she’d looked shocked to see me. Shocked, and then angry enough to potentially run me over. I’d been too afraid to cross in front of her, because knowing her, she’d do it. I’d waited until the light changed and she sped off before I ran across the street.
Seeing her had rocked me. To be fair, it wasn’t Georgina, herself, that shook me up. I could give a crap about her. It was the memories, thoughts and the questions that followed. One big memory in particular. Lang.
Even as I cleaned and ran up and down the back stairs, doing laundry, thoughts of him pinged around in my head. They had been plaguing me for weeks, niggling, harassing, and outright bludgeoning.
Every single memory of him still felt like a blow to the chest. I dropped the laundry off in the laundry room, loaded the washer, and then stepped ou
t the back door to breathe in some fresh air. I pressed my back against the side of the house and stared off to the left into the woods that crept a little closer each year. I wanted to shift and go for a run. The painful feelings that came over me every time I thought of Lang Millingham were dark and oppressive. It had taken me years to get myself off the ground and functional after Lang. I was in a good place. Or, I had been until about a month ago.
I looked down at my watch and weighed my options. I could have Anna finish cleaning and I’d take over her chores and clean up after the lunch service. I’d have to give up my nap, but it’d be worth it. Maybe I could sneak a nap in while shifted. There was a special place in the woods that opened up with a large boulder in the middle of it. It caught the sun perfectly and I loved to lounge across it.
I went inside to find that Anna had already taken over my cleaning chores. She looked up at me and her cheeks flushed. What was that about? I raised my eyebrows and stood next to her. “Hey. I was just coming to find you. I was going to ask if you’ll finish the morning cleaning for me. I’ll take over this afternoon.”
She nodded quickly. “Yeah, sure. Of course. You don’t have to take over this afternoon, either. I can do both.”
I frowned. “Everything okay?”
She nodded so vigorously her ponytail flapped up and down. “Of course. Go on. I’ll see you for lunch.”
I wanted to stay and talk to her more—okay, pry—but that sunny boulder was calling me. I gave her a fast hug and confirmed that I was fully planning on taking over in the afternoon, then headed back outside. Stripping naked and shifting was like a full-body stretch after a long plane ride.
My lioness prowled deep into the forest, and I felt immediate relief. My lion form always made things better. What’d happened with Lang when we were young had been the most intense and excruciating pain of my life, but instead of pulling away and rebelling, she’d moved in and been sure to take care of me through the years by bonding ever closer. We were tight, she and I. Letting her free to run was like spending time with a best friend.
She leapt from the ground to a tree branch and tumbled off that, onto a thick layer of leaves below. Purring wildly, she rolled over on her back and twitched her tail as she rubbed herself in the leaves. She was feeling good, despite the stress we’d both been under since the visit back to Virginia. Before long, we made it to the big boulder in the clearing. The sun was bright and high in the sky, and though it was a cold day, stretching out on the warm rock felt luxurious. Her purring grew louder, she curled her tail up between her legs, and we both settled in for a nice nap.
I awoke to the sounds of footsteps trailing through the woods nearby. My lion hissed and we fled into the trees. If it was someone trying to mess with us, she preferred to be the pouncer rather than the pouncee. She was paranoid that way. Instead of finding an enemy, though, we watched in jaw-dropping horror as my mom and Duncan Patterson, Alec’s Dad, tumbled into the clearing. Their arms were tangled around one another, clothing being shed, faces mushed together, going at each other hot and heavy.
Yuck. Even my lioness was creeped out. Alec was my friend Carter’s mate, and his dad, Duncan, had come to live in Helen’s Corner shortly after Alec and Carter mated. He was a good guy. A great guy, but this was a scene I had no interest in watching. Turning away, I led my lioness back to the B&B, knowing it was almost time for the lunch service.
Even if it wasn’t, we would’ve high-tailed it out of there. I had no desire to be anywhere near any part of the woods my mom was using for hook ups. It was just too gross to think about.
Yet another thing to bury at the back of my brain in the “things I’d like to un-see, un-hear, and un-do” file. I had a feeling that by the time the Flamingo Grannies left, I’d have so much buried back there, it’d look like a landfill.
4
Lang
Brice called back in less than an hour. I excused myself from a second cousin I hadn’t seen in eight years and our one-sided conversation in which he reminisced about all the fun times we’d had that one weekend eight years ago when he’d been in town. He was obviously winding up to ask me for money. Fortunately, I was saved by my phone. I stepped away from everyone, out onto a balcony that overlooked the manicured gardens in the rear of the estate.
“Millingham.”
“Sir, Muddy Hilton has returned her place of residence. A town called Helen’s Corner. It’s in New Mexico.”
I felt the ache of hearing her name all the way through my bones. “Helen’s Corner?”
“Yes, sir. Population is less than one thousand. She’s a registered business owner. She owns and operates a bed and breakfast in the center of town, on the corner of Main Street and Maple, aptly named Muddy’s Corner Bed and Breakfast.”
A hundred random questions popped into my head. What was she like now? Was she still beautiful? Did she still purr when she was aroused?
“Sir?”
I cleared my throat and turned my back to the doors leading to the party. “Thanks, Brice.”
“Anything else? Would you care for me to dig deeper?”
I thought about it. The last thing I wanted to do was disrupt Muddy’s life. But, I could just have Brice do a tad more digging, just to make sure she was well. That was all. I wouldn’t bother her.
Then again, maybe that wasn’t such a good idea. It would be uncomfortable to hear about her life with another man. Probably married with kids. Which was why I had strictly forbidden myself from looking her up before.
Uncomfortable, hell, who was I kidding? Hearing that Muddy was a soccer mom driving her minivan with a car seat, 2.5 kids and a golden retriever in the back would rip my heart out. Even though that’s what I wanted for her.
But, what if she wasn’t happy? Or worse, what if was having problems and needed something? Or someone? What if she was alone and had no one help her?
I took a deep breath while Brice waited. Was it wrong to have her investigated? Probably. Was it self-sabotaging to hear all about her and her life? Definitely. Could I stop myself this time? Not a chance in hell.
“Yes. Get back to me as soon as possible. And, Brice, I want to know everything. Everything.”
I hung up and looked back at the party guests. I’d shown up. I’d spent enough time mingling to be considered polite. I’d promised various family members handouts worth a total of almost forty grand. My duty was fulfilled. Besides, if one more person subtly, or not so subtly, came at me with their hand out and a sob story, I was going to chew my own ears off. I hadn’t had the “financial discussion” with my parents, yet, but that could wait. Better yet, maybe I could avoid it and just have my assistant, Andrea, write them a check.
Standing on the balcony, I glanced over my shoulder one more time to make sure no one was watching before hopping the railing and hurtling towards the earth. I landed in one of my mother’s prized rose bushes and cursed. It didn’t really matter that the thorns tore at my cashmere suit, but I did grimace as I imagined her gardener, Manuel, finding the damn thing squashed all to hell and back. Manuel was good people.
I stood up and freed myself from the bush before straightening my suit jacket. Jumping off balconies wasn’t my typical manner of exit—not for me or my wolf—but if it meant not facing Mother, or more of the family freeloaders on the way out, it was an easy choice.
I jogged back to my truck and left the estate with a heavy feeling in my chest. Muddy Hilton. Damn. There wasn’t a morning, noon, or night, that I could remember her not being on my mind, but I hadn’t heard her name spoken aloud in almost a decade.
I’d made a huge sacrifice giving her up. A sacrifice only someone born and raised in a blueblood, purebred wolf shifter family could understand.
I stopped in front of the post office and rolled down my windows, hoping to catch a hint of her scent on the breeze. But, nothing. I hoped she was happy with Deacon Allred. I wished I could have been the one to give her that happiness. But I, Langdon Millingham, had inherited the dut
y of providing for my family and upholding the Millingham name, lineage, and breeding. By the time I realized how inane and ridiculous all that was, Muddy was gone. She’d run off with Deacon. Not that I blamed her. She deserved every bit of joy the world had to offer, and I hope she’d found it.
I drove to the hotel where I was staying and let myself into the penthouse suite. Spreading out on the bed, I stared up at the ceiling and allowed myself to indulge in the only thing that brought me pleasure, despite their equal dose of pain, thoughts of Muddy. I wondered what she looked like now, ten years later.
Her hair would still be fire red and wild. There was no taming it. It’d still curl in every direction and frizz out at the slightest hint of moisture. I knew women who spent hundreds of dollars on treatments to prevent that type of frizz, but none ever looked half as stunning as Muddy at her frizziest. Her eyes would still be so green that once they pulled you in, it was hard to look away. Sprite bottle green. Pure green with a gold streak around the middle. They’d still shine golden when she was upset or angry or, my favorite, in the throes of passion. Her mouth would still be pouty, the corners of her lips upturned in a way that made it seem like she was keeping a juicy secret to herself.
That’s where what I knew stopped, though. Her body would have changed over the years. Her choices in clothing, shoes, jewelry. Those things would all be different than I remembered.
I could clearly remember every detail of the way she’d looked the day she turned eighteen. It was my most cherished memory. One I held close and didn’t share. I didn’t want to tarnish it. Corny as it was, I just wanted to hold the memory safely, a remembrance of a treasure I’d once had and lost forever.
My fault. I couldn’t really wallow in the pity party I seemed to be working up to. Everything had been my fault. Fuck, I’d been a grade A moron. I’d been naïve and idealistic and had thought I’d been doing the right thing.
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