by C J Marie
Squeals erupted, will you marry me posters flew about the room, as Rafe stood and scooped her into his arms, pressing a fervent kiss to her lips. Olive didn’t care if a few students groaned, or that the entire first grade team was in her classroom swooning. She let Rafe Whitfield kiss her as long as Rafe Whitfield wanted to kiss her. He clasped her face in his hands, smiling through a glimmer of emotion in his eyes.
“You should know I did string those shells by hand. Mama helped; her therapist even called it therapy for her fingers.”
Olive laughed and kissed him again before resting her head on his chest as his safe, sure arms wrapped around her shoulders. “No one knows me like you, Rafe. And we already know this will make a great story someday.” She tilted her face toward him. “I love you. Forever, I will always want you exactly as you are.”
His sweet kisses tantalized her senses almost more than the passion they shared in private. Rafe leaned his forehead against hers and grinned. “You’ve had me since the beginning, Ollie. It’s always been you, and it always will be.”
Epilogue
Zac
Zac Dawson was born and raised in Honeyville. The place was in his blood, a part of his rugged attitude and appearance. So, he’d expected a certain level of teasing when he showed up to the wedding with clean fingernails, his dark beard trimmed close, and his hair cut and gelled.
Zac shoved Rafe’s shoulder as they lined up near the massive oak tree decorated in flowering vines, and white lights. He would have shoved August for snort-laughing too if he wasn’t holding his wiggling daughter while Millie got settled in her chair at the front.
“This,” Zac hissed at Rafe while pointing to his face, “is for Ollie, so don’t be teasing, and be grateful I have a high opinion of your girl.”
Rafe chuckled. “I think Ollie would have let it slide, but Jace, Dot, and Mama might have had something to say.”
Zac agreed, eyeing his friend. Rafe’s hands were ringing together as his nerves seemed to mount with every minute passing. Zac grinned and clapped him on the back when a smooth harp started playing as the signal the main event was about to get started. “This is a good day, man.”
Rafe nodded, adjusted his tuxedo coat, and smiled when his sister-in-law was the first to come down the aisle. “It is. A very good day.”
The Cutler’s backyard was donned in glittering lights that added a magical glow to the sprawling garden. Zac understood why Rafe and Olive spent so much time by the creek and in the yard. The smells alone from the magnolias were enough to make one stay. Mr. and Mrs. Cutler had spared no expense on their only child’s wedding. The banquet tables were stacked with different cuts of meat from nearly any animal he could think of. Olive had insisted on ribs—that was the table he’d be hitting as soon as the ceremony was over. Weddings were often tiresome and cliché, but today was different. It was a wedding a long time in the making.
Zac was boiling in his suit, standing there with Rafe and August. To keep his mind off the muggy humidity, he took a bit of pleasure watching the bridesmaids saunter down the aisle. Jace and Dot were both dressed in blue skirts with a touch of silver, and both had the ability to cause inappropriate thoughts if Zac stared too long. Inappropriate thoughts, but Zac knew the two ladies were his friends and friends only. Jace apparently had a boyfriend, and Dot had sworn off men for the foreseeable future. Zac didn’t mind having female friends, and it was even thanks to Dot and Lily he was as groomed as he was today.
Lily Whitfield was stunning too, though he’d never say that to August who was rather protective of his two girls. Zac had gotten closer to everyone in the wedding party through the last year. Where he’d once viewed Dot as a prude and a snob, Zac found her funny, with a witty tongue he liked having around. Jace was the same. By default, Zac had detested the Whitney family for abandoning August, Rafe, and Millie, but Jace, her parents, and her brother, Will, were different. Zac glanced into the crowd catching sight of the only Whitney representatives seated close to Millie and baby Brin. They’d hit it off with the Whitfields and now it seemed as if Jace and Will had always been part of the crew. He wondered if Rafe’s dead-beat daddy even knew his son was getting married. From the sounds of the relationship between his Uncle James and Jed Whitney, Zac doubted he’d been told.
Zac beamed when the music changed tempo and Olive Cutler appeared beneath a wisteria archway, her arm linked with her father. Rafe’s reaction was worth Zac trimming his beard and donning a suit. Out of the twins, Rafe had been the brisk one, the defensive one, but today he seemed ready to break down and cry as he kept attempting to look at Olive in her flowing, lacy dress. It was something Zac wondered about—being so in love you couldn’t keep your emotions steady. He’d seen it with August and Lily, now again with Rafe and Olive. Zac loved to love women, made clear by his track record. Don’t get the wrong idea, he was a gentleman, like his mother demanded, and he sincerely tried to get to know the women he took out. But the connection, that feeling of blood pumping, or tears brimming—he’d never had the pleasure.
Rafe told him he was picky—Olive told Rafe to lighten up. He appreciated the support, but Zac was starting to think he might be looking for something that didn’t exist. He couldn’t help it—after so long with the same person, he got bored. No one challenged him. Most women were satisfied with dinner, some passion-fused evenings, and having him hold their hand during movies. He wanted someone who sparked that ridiculous fire Rafe and August talked about. Even if Zac made fun of them for their sappy talk about the women in their lives, inside Zac wouldn’t mind it for himself.
Zac shoved away the thoughts and gave his full attention as his best-friend vowed to honor and love the girl of his dreams forever. Olive was a catch; she was real and crazy about Rafe. Zac was sincerely thrilled watching them finally tie the knot. Heaven knew most everyone in the crowd had anticipated this day for two decades. He clapped with the rest of the spectators when Rafe pulled Olive against his lips for their first kiss as husband and wife. It was a good day.
Sitting around one of the linen-covered tables, Zac lost himself in the laughter between him and his friends. “I’d get married just for the honeymoon,” Zac grumbled. “Why did you pick The Keys, Ollie? Do you know how bad Rafe’s been rubbing it in since you booked the trip?”
Olive beamed, her veil foregone, and her shoulders relaxed as she wrapped her arms around Rafe’s neck. Zac rolled his eyes, along with Dot, when the newlyweds gazed at each other for at least five, embarrassing, seconds before she kissed him sweet and quick. “You can’t be asking me how I could spend ten days lounging in paradise with this guy, Zac,” Olive chimed. “You’re only whining because you’re going to be short-handed while we’re drinking out of coconuts.”
Zac scoffed and August nodded his agreement with Olive, as he broke up bits of his roll for little Brin to munch.
“I won’t even notice he’s gone,” Zac murmured. No one believed a word. Rafe was his friend, but also his best employee and had been since they were both eighteen. If Zac’s uncle hadn’t owned the shop, he wouldn’t have been surprised if Rafe was the boss, not him. Though, he’d be leaving in a few years after he graduated from school. Zac would just pretend that wasn’t in the cards right now.
Olive kissed Rafe’s cheek, adding to the permanent grin the groom had carried all night. “Good,” she insisted. “Maybe we’ll stay a few extra days. I have three weeks off at school.”
“Don’t you dare,” Zac grumbled, sipping a glass of silky beer. He didn’t know where Lon Cutler got his drinks, but Zac planned to drink his fill for the taste alone.
As far as weddings go Zac couldn’t imagine one filled with more laughing, dancing, loving, than the Cutler-Whitfield wedding. Well, he couldn’t say Beau Cutler enjoyed himself much—mostly Olive’s cousin sulked on the edge of the lawn. He’d need to accept a pauper had married into the Cutler empire, or spend a lot of years throwing a hissy fit.
Sending Rafe and Olive off through a tunnel of spar
kling sticks and rose petals drew the night to a close. Zac relented to August driving him home, since he’d made good on his promise to drink—drink he certainly did.
“You good?” August asked, once he pulled up to Zac’s house, conveniently tucked next door to the shop. His commute was about a hundred steps—what more could a guy want?
Scrubbing his face, Zac nodded. “Yeah, thanks for driving. I plan to sleep until two in the afternoon.”
“Do it,” August insisted. “I’ll be up at six since Brin thinks that’s a sensible time to wake up.”
Zac scoffed and plopped out of his truck, taking the keys from August as Lily pulled their car up his driveway. Lily waved out of the window, and even in his haze, Zac could see Brin’s head flopping to one side as she slept peacefully in the backseat. “You make it easy to want to stay single when you talk like that,” Zac said, shoving August’s shoulder.
August chuckled and shook his head. With a clap on Zac’s back, August and Lily left him to the solitude of his bachelor pad. His house wasn’t huge, but two bedrooms was plenty. It was updated inside with nice tile and wood flooring. He even had real-wood cabinets, and the counters were granite. He didn’t need the upgrades, but his Mama got a little carried away when she came to help him plan a few home improvements. The shop was doing well, so he didn’t see the problem with splurging here and there.
Zac popped two aspirin before heading to bed. Getting a head start on the hangover was key. He was halfway down the narrow hallway when the haze in his brain ripped into focus by the sound of shredding metal, and screeching tires outside
Zac darted toward his front window which overlooked the lot of his shop and cursed enough to make his dead grandmother blush. His shirt was half-buttoned, his shoes long gone, so socks and a half-exposed chest was as good as it was going to get.
“Lady,” he shouted, stomping across his lawn and onto the gravel parking lot. “What are you doing?”
A woman leaning out of the driver side door of a shiny, black SUV whipped her head over her shoulder. By the light of the overhead lamppost Zac got a clear look at her unique eyes—almost like an amethyst with a soft green in the mix. Her face was slender, her auburn hair long and wavy over her shoulders—in a nutshell—she was gorgeous.
None of that mattered though—she’d slammed the edge of her car right into the pole of a vintage gas pump. The pole was leaning precariously close to blocking the drive to the garage. Another nudge and the heavy metal would crumble, tearing through part of the entrance to his business, and blocking the way for cars on Monday. And she had the audacity to snarl at him.
“What does it look like I’m doing? I was trying to get gas, but I swerved because there was a bear or something in the road.”
To be fair, the shop was built out of an old abandoned gas station from the 1950s. Zac and his Uncle Kent kept the old pumps for the look. Zac had them polished up, lights installed, and repainted to improve the curb appeal, but there was a giant yellow sign over the building that read Zac’s Auto Repair—he thought that would be a giveaway it wasn’t a working station—and the fact the pumps were antiques. She could have taken that clue.
“A bear?”
She nodded and glanced cautiously toward the street. “Yes, something huge with fur was in the road, so I swerved.”
Zac followed her gaze as a car drove by casting its headlights over the dark road as a ringed tail shuffled into the trees. He scoffed and shook his head. “That’s a raccoon. I’m surprised you escaped with your life.”
She glared and folded her arms. “Look, I’m sorry, but it seemed bigger than that.”
“And then naturally, you always smash into gas pumps,” he said as he folded his arms over his chest.
She glared deeper and peeled out of her car. “The lighting here is a nightmare.” She glanced at the scrunched headlight and scratched side of the car and groaned. “Great. Now, I have to pay damages.” With a furious glance toward Zac, as if it were his fault, she grumbled under breath and plopped back into the seat. “If you’ll excuse me, I’m going to be on my way.”
Zac tilted his head. “Uh, you’re just going to drive away after causing damage to a piece of property?”
She scoffed. “I’ll send a check for the repairs.”
She scanned him once, her eyes falling to his sock-covered feet, and disheveled hair. Zac wasn’t so tipsy he couldn’t see her disgust. Miss High and Mighty thought she was something special, so it gave him a tiny bit of pleasure when she tried to start the ignition and the car only sputtered and hummed.
“You’ve got to be kidding me. I don’t have time for this,” she shrieked at the steering wheel.
Zac inched around to the front of the car, trying to hide his grin. “It’s not starting?”
“Very observant.”
He narrowed his gaze and took a deep breath. One thing his uncle and mother had drilled in his head, was you never leave a woman stranded, in the dark, alone. His uncle would say, “Be a man, and you help out. It’s what you know to do and so you do it.”
Of course, the first time he could play knight in shining armor, the woman was feisty and rude. Ignoring her sneer, Zac popped the hood and inspected the stalled vehicle for a moment.
“I can guess the problem,” he said after checking all the basics were intact.
“Impressive,” she hissed. “A hick that has a brain.”
Zac’s blood raged in his veins when he slammed the hood shut.
She bit her bottom lip. “Sorry…can you fix it?”
She deserved to have her mouth cleaned out with soap. Remember knight in shining armor? Yeah, he wasn’t too fond of the damsel in distress, so he put in for early retirement.
Forcing a wide smile Zac leaned against the door so their faces were closer. If she wasn’t so downright nasty, Zac wouldn’t mind leaning in close enough to breathe in her silky perfume a little more. He saw in the passenger seat she had a bag, and several folders of what looked to be medical files slipping out. Stop—he didn’t have time to wonder about this stranger—no matter how pretty she was.
Clearing his throat, he widened his eyes, and pitched his voice to conceal the sarcasm. “You know what, Miss? You just so happened to land right here in a car shop. And golly, wouldn’t you know, I own the place. You just hold tight, now—I reckon I could have you fixed on up in no time and sent on your way. We might talk slow here, but ohhhweee, we sure work fast with our hands.”
She eyed him with mounting suspicion. “You’ll fix the car?”
“Sure will, sugar,” he drawled, laying it on thicker with every word.
“Oh,” she muttered, her voice softer like a normal human being for once. “Great. I will pay for the damage—and the labor.”
“Bless your heart,” he insisted, trudging toward the front door. “A purty thing like you—well, we’ll just call it even since you plopped into my shop.”
Again, she was suspicious. Zac chuckled as he used the hide-a-key and unlocked the front door, closing it tight behind him. Rolling his eyes and losing the false grin he picked up the landline. It rang only three times before the husky voice broke through the line.
“North Honeyville Police.”
“Hi, this is Zachariah Dawson, I’m calling to report a hit and run. Yeah,” he muttered into the line. “No, no one was hit, but my business was. Uh, huh. Yeah, the runner is still here. Trying to leave. Yeah, thanks.”
After giving the address he clicked the phone until silence encompassed the front lobby. Smiling, and quite pleased with himself, he returned outside. She was hugging her middle and waiting with the bag slung over her shoulder now. Zac swallowed hard, taking in her athletic, lean body with curves in all the right places. He avoided her gaze and pretended to work on the car. It was a simple inertia switch reset and the car would be on its way, but he wasn’t going to admit that to her.
“Thanks, for doing this,” she muttered. Zac just grunted.
Several minutes passed without
a word and the tension added to the already humid night. Zac lowered to his haunches, doing nothing really, but trying to avoid her eyes when he caught sight of the patrol car peeling into his lot.
“What…” she gaped, her voice picking up in pitch. “Did you… did you call the police?”
The officer stalked toward them as Zac rose from his place by the tire. “Ma’am, we got a call you were trying to flee the scene of an accident.”
She raged her fury toward Zac. “No, officer, I offered to pay—”
Zac chuckled. “Sorry, but us hicks know when there’s a runner, and we don’t take well to dishonest people.”
She practically castrated him with her eyes. “Dishonest? You lied to me.”
“You destroyed my property.”
“Ma’am, can I get your license and the registration for this vehicle?” The office asked, glancing at the bumper.
“Fine,” she huffed digging through the bag and handing him her ID before stalking toward the glove compartment. “It belongs to my boyfriend, Doctor Emmitt Baron.”
“Doctor, sounds mighty fancy,” Zac added for good measure.
She shot him a scathing gaze, and he decided it was best to put the dramatic southern drawl on hold. The officer scanned the paperwork and sighed again. “Ms. Graham?”
“Yes, Josephine Graham. I’m a Physician Assistant who is needed back home.”
The officer wasn’t impressed, but Zac was intrigued. Josephine Graham—a firecracker he wasn’t sure if he hated or wanted to know better.
“Ma’am, do you know this vehicle is four months beyond the registration date?” asked the officer.
“What!” She glanced at the papers. “I didn’t know, it’s not my car.”
The officer seemed weary when he spoke again. “Alright since there seems to be a few troubling things tonight, why don’t we go to the station and we’ll get this straightened out?”
“No,” she shrieked, ripping her arm back from the police officer. “I’m not going anywhere. I’m getting in this car and going home to Boston and getting as far away from this stupid, bumpkin place as possible.”
