Chapter Twenty-Four
How do you know when it’s forever?
MADDIE WALKED into the hospital shortly after the sun came up Sunday morning. She’d slept better than she thought she would, but her courage had deserted her sometime in the middle of the night.
What if she called Trent and told him she loved him, and he told her where to shove it?
What if he was tired of giving her chances?
What if he’d been in a terrible accident and died and nobody had found him yet?
She blew out a slow breath and stepped into the elevator. The problem, she decided, was that she didn’t know how to show him that she loved him. She could tell him, but he deserved more. He deserved paint and VW vans and cornflowers. He deserved to know she’d rather spend her entire life with him than to have children with any other man on earth, but cutting out her uterus seemed extreme. After all the harping she’d done, she doubted whether he’d buy that she changed her mind overnight.
She had, but the peace that had come with the decision was all she needed to know she was finally doing what was right. Adoption, fostering, not having kids at all were all preferable to losing Trent.
The elevator dinged softly as the doors slid open on the fourth floor. Visiting hours didn’t technically start for another hour, but she wanted to see her dad. If he was sleeping, she wouldn’t disturb him.
Two doors down from his room, she heard voices. Her heart jumped up and let out a squeal of joy, but her feet stopped moving and refused to start up again.
Trent was there.
“She did great,” he was saying. “Kid’s got lungs. She yelled louder than the rest of the squad put together.”
Maddie’s breath caught in her throat. He’d gone to Tiffy’s game last night.
How many other things had he done for her family, for her, while she was too stupid to realize what she had?
“Gets that from her mother’s side,” her dad said.
Both men chuckled, and once again, Maddie’s personal waterworks threatened to start. Her dad sounded weak but happy. She leaned against the wall, ignoring the curious looks from the nurses, and listened.
“Appreciate what you did yesterday,” her dad said after a minute.
“Been through worse than an hour with Scilla before,” Trent replied.
Maddie cringed. He’d suffered enough, and she hadn’t helped that.
“Meant before that,” her dad said dryly.
Maddie had to crane to hear Trent’s answer. “Guess God puts us where He wants us.”
“Think He’s still got some work for you to do around here.”
“I know it’s Sunday, Reverend, but you’re supposed to be getting better instead of preaching today.”
A chair squeaked in the room. Combined with the whir of medical equipment and the sounds of the nurses at their station, Maddie’s clock started pounding out a new rhythm. She felt a smile growing in direct proportion to the warmth in her heart. It truly would be a bright, beautiful day.
But the chair in her dad’s room squeaked again, and then there was the unmistakable sound of shoes on hospital tile. Trent was leaving so her dad could get some rest.
She wanted to see him, to tell him everything she’d figured out, but he deserved something better than a weepy Maddie in a hospital hallway. He deserved something big. Something special.
Something that would show him she knew him as well as he knew her, something that would prove he meant more to her than anything else in the world. Something like prom.
The answer was so obvious, she almost laughed. She turned and retraced her steps to the elevator, soaking in the fading voices of two of her favorite men while she almost pranced along to the beat of the song in her heart. She’d come back to visit her dad later, but for now, she had work to do.
BEING A hero sucked.
Trent had thought it was bad enough that half of the town lauded him during the whole running for mayor joke. But now that everyone knew he was the one who’d stumbled onto Reverend Mason’s having a heart attack, he was pretty sure he would have to move back to Atlanta. If one more person walked through Ruby’s door this afternoon and ordered a Swish Saves! milkshake, he was out of here.
Because apparently Swish couldn’t save himself.
He’d never known he was the type to always want one more thing, but now that Linda had opened the door to let him back in, now that he’d restored his reputation in town, now that he knew he deserved a woman who’d accept him for who he was with no conditions, he was miserable.
Because he still wanted Maddie.
“How long will it take?” Linda asked beside him.
Trent blinked down at the sketches on the table. Ruby had given him free reign to do whatever Linda wanted in the dining room, and it turned out she was pretty good with drafting paper. “Depends on how long it takes to find the vans.” He took a sip of his coffee, the only thing not named after him on the menu, then shook his head. “But the menu’s gone tonight if she doesn’t fix it first.”
“You ain’t touchin’ my menu.” Ruby emerged from the kitchen with a tray full of brownies. “Folks just got used to it.”
“Won’t go with the new theme,” Trent said.
“Fine. When you get Maddie in here to paint me a new one, you call my sandwiches whatever you want.”
Trent’s shoulders hunched.
“You heard about that Mediterranean landscape she did in her living room? Connor was in the other day, said he could smell the saltwater.”
It was gorgeous. It was Maddie. But he’d also heard she hadn’t left her house this week for anything other than visiting her dad at the hospital and picking up paint from Billy.
He had a feeling if he ever saw the inside of her house again, the landscape would be gone. He hoped she wasn’t turning the walls dark again.
“Leave him alone, Ruby,” Linda said.
“What? The girl’s good with a paintbrush.”
Ruby set about moving the brownies to her glass dish atop the counter. Trent forced himself to concentrate on something other than what he’d lost. He turned back to Linda. “I need to get down to Atlanta to pick up my stuff and settle my business sometime soon. Got some leads on some vans between here and there. Might speed up the renovations.”
“Good,” Linda said. She nudged her omelet with her fork. “Then maybe you can fix the kitchen.”
Ruby made a strangled sound, and a smile tugged at his mouth. Felt good to smile again, especially at Linda.
The bells on the door jingled, and Maddie walked in.
His heart skittered in a painful rhythm. Behind the counter, a glass dish hit the ground and shattered with a horrific crash. Trent was on his feet halfway across the shop before he even realized he’d moved. “You okay, Ruby?” he called, but he wasn’t looking at her. Because Maddie looked as if she were possessed by that damn cat she’d given away.
Layers of dark circles dipped beneath her wide, glossy eyes. Her lips were dry and cracked, and pale yellow paint smudges on her cheek and neck only made her pale skin sicklier. She wore jeans and a stylish pullover that highlighted her curves instead of hiding them, and her hair lay against her head in soft brown waves, the purple completely gone.
“Trent Sawyer, you fix that,” Ruby said. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw her point at Maddie. “You fix that right now.”
He didn’t give a damn what their problems were, Maddie needed him whether she’d admit it or not.
God help him, he needed her too.
Maddie twisted the fabric of her pullover between her fingers, darting cautious glances between Trent and something behind him. She licked her lips, and her chest rose as she settled her attention on him. “Hi.”
He stopped in front of her and brushed his hand over her hair. “Maddie,” he murmured, “what have you done?”
She trembled beneath his fingers. “I need to show you something.”
“You need sleep.”
Her gaze focused on something behind him again. She blinked, and it seemed to take some effort for her to open her eyes all the way. “Please. It won’t take long.”
He slid his arm around her shoulders and steered her toward the door. “I’m taking you home.”
“Okay,” she whispered.
His truck was parked on the curb. He boosted her up into the passenger seat. She smiled at him, a soft, sleepy smile, and it took everything he had not to bury his head in her neck and offer to have babies with her. “You need to get rid of your boyfriend,” he grumbled instead.
He slammed the truck door and crossed around to the driver’s seat. He climbed in, buckled up, and cranked the engine.
“Already did,” Maddie said.
He glanced over at her, unsure if her request to show him something had anything to do with dumping her boyfriend.
He was afraid to hope.
Her head was tilted back against the headrest, her eyelids drooping. “I didn’t mean to take you from Linda.”
“She’ll understand.”
He put the truck in gear and pulled away from the curb. Hints of something sweet tickled his nose. Her shampoo, he guessed. He wanted to pull the truck over and lose himself in it.
He wanted to make her love him.
But he couldn’t. He’d spent too many years pretending it was okay for his girlfriend to love him for who she wanted him to be rather than everything he was. He might’ve taken a step back in choosing to move home, but he wouldn’t settle for being loved for anything more or less than what he was, no strings, no conditions. Even if it meant he was alone the rest of his life.
By the time they pulled up in front of Maddie’s house, it wasn’t just her shampoo driving him nuts. It was the little sighs she made as she relaxed into the seat, the way the fabric of her pants rubbed against the leather, the sight of her paint-speckled hands uncurling in her lap.
He still had it bad.
He turned the corner onto her street and slowed the truck, but his foot hit the brake too hard when he noticed the front of the house.
The door was brown.
So were the shutters.
“Maddie?”
She unbuckled and slid out of the truck. “Inside.”
Foreboding settled over him as he walked past the veil of new grass in her front yard. He caught a whiff of fresh paint, and his stomach sank to his toes.
He followed her inside and found himself facing four generic tan walls. Plain blue curtains hung on the windows. No Mediterranean landscape, no redneck goth museum, nothing unique.
Nothing Maddie.
She spun toward him and crooked her finger, excitement dancing behind the gloss in her eyes. “For you,” she said. “Come see the kitchen.”
He trailed along, enjoying this tour of the house even less than he’d enjoyed the last one.
The drunken leprechaun party in the kitchen had ended, the cows moved on to a new pasture. White cabinets stood out against light blue walls. Lacy curtains hung over the sink. His fingers twitched. This felt familiar, but he was too worried about the grass in her bedroom to think too hard about it. He started toward the bedroom, but Maddie’s fading excitement stopped him. She’d started gnawing on her lip again. “You don’t like it? I know the colors aren’t exactly what they were when Linda lived here, but I got as close as I could.”
He ran a hand over his head. She’d repainted the house for him? Why? “Mad, I don’t understand.”
She fidgeted with the hem of her pullover. “I want you to have the house.”
She what?
He gaped at her. Tried to shut his mouth, tried to stop his eyes from bulging, but he couldn’t.
Her lips wobbled in an uncertain smile, and tears glistened in her eyes. “I know how much the house means to you, and I want you to have it.”
He swallowed a couple of times before he found his voice. “Maddie—”
“I love you,” she blurted. “I love you more than I will ever love anyone else, and if I can’t have your babies, then I don’t want them at all, because the only thing worse than not having them would be bringing them into this world with someone I don’t love the way I love you. So I want you to have my house, I want you to have my heart, and I want you to please, please tell me it’s not too late. Because I’m tired of screwing up and I’m tired of hurting you and I’m tired of fighting what’s been right in front of me all along. I love you.”
His own eyes went misty. “Even without kids?”
“You’re perfect just the way you are.” She swiped her nose and gave a little laugh. “Which should balance me out nicely.”
He stepped toward her. “You’re crazy, but you’re perfect in your own way too.”
“You hate the house.”
“Mad, you took you out of it. This”—he said, gesturing around the room, then at her— “this isn’t you. This isn’t the you I fell in love with. I want that Maddie back.”
“That Maddie screws everything up.”
Finally, he had his arms around her, tucking her against him where she belonged. He kissed the top of her head, let his fingers wander up under her pullover to the soft skin beneath. “Nah. She makes life interesting.”
Her breathing hitched. “So you don’t want me to have somebody come out and sand the bedroom floor?”
He tipped her head back and kissed her. Then he kissed her some more, tangling his fingers in her soft hair, tasting her hot mouth, until his entire body was on fire. He broke the kiss and tugged her hand, his chest heaving. “I’ve got other plans for that bedroom floor.”
She smiled up at him, and the next thing he knew, her pullover sailed over his head. “Bet my plans are better.”
He smoothed his hands over her bare back, then unclasped her bra. “I love you, Maddie.”
She slid her fingers beneath the waistband of his jeans. “Show me.”
He took her to the bedroom, lay her down on the grass, and did just that. Exactly like he planned to every day for the rest of his life.
THE WORLD was still dark when Maddie woke up the next morning, quiet and calm, but she smiled at the song whispering through her mind. Yes, she would always love this man whose arm was tucked around her. The impressive early morning erection poking her leg didn’t hurt. She wiggled closer to him. He tightened his grasp, and she smiled.
He was perfect. They were perfect.
She didn’t even mind letting go of her dream of kids. She and Trent would make their mark on the world somehow. They’d do it together, and it would be perfect too.
“Sshh,” he murmured, his breath tickling her ear. “It’s too early to be thinking so loud.” He shifted, and the feel of his hard length sliding up her thigh sent a jolt of lust through her.
She twisted around and hooked a leg over his hips. “So help me get back to sleep.”
He surged up, and she gasped at the feel of him sliding into her as he pushed her onto her back. “Like this?”
She arched up, taking him in deeper. “Oh, yes.”
He pulled out slowly, then thrust back in. “And this?”
Perfect. The feel of his hot, slick skin rubbing inside her, driving her closer, was divine.
Wait.
Skin?
She pushed at him. “Trent. Stop.”
He nuzzled her neck. “Tease.”
“Condom.”
Finally, he stopped. He hovered over her, his profile barely visible in the predawn light that had begun to filter in. “I thought you wanted my babies.”
A warm ache settled in her chest. Her hands dropped away from his chest. “That’s not funny.”
The sheets rustled around them as he shifted to stroke her cheek, but he still didn’t pull out of her. “Mad, while you were painting, I was thinking.”
“About babies?” she whispered.
He dropped a kiss on her nose. “About babies. And family. And you and me. And here’s the thing. Having kids is scary as hell. But I keep hearing it’s worth it, and if there’s anybody with genes that can kick mine into submission, it’s you.”
Tears trickled down into her ears. “You’d do that for me?”
“I’d do that because of you. My whole life, I’ve never been good enough for anybody. I know how much you want kids. If you’re willing to give them up for me, then I don’t think I deserve you if I’m not willing to try for you.”
She shook her head. “You don’t have to deserve me. I love you anyway.”
She could almost make out his smile. He gave his hips a thrust, and Maddie whimpered, half out of sheer pleasure, half out of the overpowering strength of his love. “You keep this up, you’re gonna have to marry me,” she said.
“How’s tomorrow look?”
She laughed, and he sucked in an audible breath. “Easy,” he murmured.
“Oh, no.” She pulled him down and kissed him thoroughly as she wiggled her hips. “You’re not getting easy. You’re getting me.”
Forget good enough. They were perfect.
- THE END -
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The Misfit Brides Series
Blissed (CJ & Natalie)
Matched (Will & Lindsey)
Smittened (Mikey & Dahlia)
Sugared (Kimmie & Josh, release date to be announced)
The Officers’ Ex-Wives Club Series
Southern Fried Blues (Jackson & Anna Grace)
Moonshine & Magnolias (Zack & Shelby)
~ ~ ~
Like Southern gentlemen and military heroes? Meet Jackson Davis, hero of SOUTHERN FRIED BLUES (Officers’ Ex-Wives Club #1)…
An extra burst of heat spilled out of Anna’s car when she swung the door open. This weather was defying the laws of thermodynamics. At least, what she remembered of it. Thank goodness she didn’t have to smell pretty to be smart. But it was June. Nowhere should’ve been this hot in June.
She tossed the label maker in the back seat. She braced herself, scooted into the car, and cranked the engine. Steam flowed out of the air vents. She tilted them away while the AC system caught up. After buckling in, she gave her rearview mirrors a quick check. The gearshift seared her palm, but she gritted her teeth and put the car in reverse anyway.
Something tickled her finger. She absently scratched it and gave the car a little gas. Something else tickled the back of her hand.
She frowned.
Sweat didn’t usually tickle. Not like that.
She moved to shift the car into drive and something dark scurried over her windshield. “What the—”
A line of fire ants marched across her steering wheel.
Anna shrieked. She threw the car into park and tumbled out of it. “Get off! Get off!” She raked her hands over her arms and hopped on her clogs to shake the little buggers off. The prickles moved to her back, up her neck, into her hair. She knew the ants couldn’t be up there, there’d only been one or two, but she scrubbed at her scalp anyway.
“Ma’am? You okay?” A guy leaned out the side of a red car behind her. She was blocking one of the exits.
“Oh, yeah, sure, you betcha.” She wiggled her itching toes. “Sorry. It’ll just take me a minute to get out of your way.”
Her car’s engine whined. Heat radiated off the hood and wrinkled the air. The backs of her knees tingled as if a hundred ants had gathered there for an impromptu Riverdance.
A car door shut behind her. “Need a hand?” he drawled in a local-boy kind of way.
“Everything’s fine. Thanks.” Because she carried insect-killer in her car all the time in case her car came down with a case of the ants.
It took some effort to not reach for her phone. This was the kind of thing Neil would’ve taken care of for her. And it pissed her off that she wanted to let the man approaching solve her problem.
She was an independent woman, dammit. She’d fix this herself. She squared her shoulders, marched to the edge of her door, and hit her trunk release. She scooted around the car to survey the potential ant weapons in her trunk. She had to have something useful. Maybe she could club them one by one with her jumper cables. Shoot her emergency flares at them. Drop the box of Neil’s junk on them. Label them to death with the label maker.
It’d worked on her marriage.
And there was that stingy feeling behind her eyeballs again.
Long runner’s legs ending in flip-flop–clad feet entered her blurred vision. “You got some friends there.”
If Neil had to leave her, he should’ve done it somewhere else. Somewhere without fire ants, somewhere more hospitable to her Norwegian coloring, somewhere with halfway intelligent locals. She shot her audience a look she should’ve tried on the ants. “Where I come from, they’re called a nuisance.”
Instead of shriveling up and dying, he flashed her a goofy grin. His dark-lashed eyes creased in the corners.
Those lashes and the mass of just-long-enough-to-be-curly hair on his head were proof positive a man could have brains or looks, but not both.
And that tingly sensation along her breastbone was proof positive she had no business being single. First she agreed to a date with Rodney, now she was getting hot over a redneck.
She was supposed to be worrying about the ants. Class. Her life.
He scratched his curly hair and surveyed her neatly organized trunk.
As if he could wield her jumper cables better than she could against an army of fire ants.
Instead, he swung her Windex out of the trunk like a gunslinger preparing for a showdown, then tucked her paper towels under his arm.
“My car is very—” she started, but then it hit her.
He wasn’t going to clean it.
Carbon-based ants, meet ammonia.
Forgetting simple chemistry principles was not a good omen for her degree.
Wanting to watch her unexpected helper go to battle against the ants wasn’t a good omen for her sanity.
Her skin flushed as if she were standing inside Hell’s boiler room. She reached for the Windex, but something stopped her before she could get close enough to grab it.
Something that tasted suspiciously like fear.
Not of him.
Of herself.
“I’ll do it,” she bit out. She flicked her fingers up, gesturing for him to hand over the Windex.
“Ain’t no trouble.” His gaze wandered down her body, and she felt a whomp in her chest beneath the tingles spreading to her rib cage.
“Be a shame to mess up them pretty clothes,” he said.
“I can handle this,” she said firmly. She gestured to his car. “There’s another exit two rows down. I’ve taken enough of your time.”
His eyes were big and blue as her wounded heart, but when he squinted at her like that, they went a shade darker to cobalt. “Now I’m sure it don’t matter none to you, but my momma’d have my hide if she heard I abandoned a lady with critters in her car.”
Anna stifled a whimper of frustration. She swiped at her forehead. She’d probably drown in her own sweat before she managed to wrestle the Windex out of his hands.
If she could get brave enough to get within touching distance of him. “I don’t know your momma, so you don’t have anything to worry about.”
He scratched his hair again, and she felt an intense desire to claw out that part of her that wanted to know how it would feel between her fingers.
Rebound, her brain yelled.
Something more primitive was still clamoring about his hair.
“Reckon you might be right on that one,” he finally said. “But she’d still know. Scares me more’n that mound you parked over, that’s for sure.”
“I didn’t—” She stopped herself. Red ants swarmed around a huge ant mound beneath where her front bumper had been. “That wasn’t there this morning.”
“Be doing me a real big favor if you let me take care of this for you.” The solemnity of his expression was refreshingly innocent compared with what she expected out of Rodney Friday night. “Besides, killing bugs ain’t no work for a lady. Even a Yankee lady.”
An unexpected snort of amusement lodged in her nostrils. This one was either Southern chivalry at its finest or a few tomatoes short of a ketchup bottle. “This Yankee lady takes care of herself, thank you.”
But she still couldn’t propel herself close enough to grab the bottle.
He propped himself into the drivers seat and squirted a trail of ants. A whole row of the little buggers curled up in the fetal position. He took a leisurely swipe at them with a paper towel, then sprayed again. He shot Anna a sly look out of the corner of his eye.
Like he was looking to see if she were watching him.
She quickly dropped her gaze and made a show of checking the time. Her heart thumped again, but this time it was pure panic. If she left now and ran once she got to campus, she’d only be seven minutes late. Plus heatstroke recovery time after the dash to the classroom. She tapped a foot. “We could be done in two minutes if you’d let me help.”
Squirt. Squirt. Squirt. “Getting the ones you can see don’t mean you’re getting the ones you can’t.”
Anna shivered. “Still, you’ve done enough. Would it help if I wrote your momma a thank you note?”
Oh, God, and he had dimples. Of course he had dimples. This fiasco wouldn’t be complete if he didn’t have dimples.
“It sure would make her day,” he said.
“Then if you’ll hand me my purse, we can both be on our way.”
“Reckon I could do that, but then I'd have to find some other excuse to stay here and coax that pretty smile.”
Oh.
It was one thing for her body to go renegade on her. It was something completely different for her mind to contemplate skipping class so she could listen to Momma’s Boy drawl out Southern platitudes.
Neil never talked to her like that.
Of course, Neil had left. Packed up while she was at work. Sent his attorney to pick up her wedding ring. Avoided her like she was some kind of freak with a communicable label maker disease.
“Now, see, that's supposed to make you smile more,” he said.
Anna blinked, but her eyes still burned. “Sorry. Bad timing.”
He squirted a few more ants. “Shoulda got him with the Windex.”
Anna inadvertently pictured herself chasing Neil out of their house with her label maker and a bottle of Windex, and she was surprised to find she still had a laugh in her. “Now what would your momma say to that?”
“That I should buy you dinner for making you sad.” He took another swipe at her steering column. “I’m Jackson.”
All she had to do was tell him her name. She didn’t have to go to dinner, didn’t have to ever see him again. Tell him her name, and she’d move back into the ranks of the mostly-single-and-attractive-to-somebody ranks, questionable though his mental state might be. But she’d still be late for class.
She sucked in a breath. She could do this. Just say her name. “I’m—I’m late. For class. And I don’t do late, and I don’t want to start off on the wrong foot. And I need this class, I really do, because—well, I just do, so I need to take the ant-mobile and go. But thank you. It was nice of you to help.”
“Darlin’, you ain’t gonna get outta this parking lot without getting all bit up. They’re still crawling out your vents.”
She wouldn’t cry again. She wouldn’t. “Then will you please let me help?” Nine minutes late. Did professors lock the classroom doors when class started? She couldn’t remember.
He gave the dash a couple of quick squirts, then handed her the paper towels. “Keep on going. I’ll go on and get ’em from the other side.”
Anna heaved a sigh of relief and sank into the car. She attacked the melting ants with an efficiency that apparently hadn’t made it this far south yet. Between the semi-cool air blowing on her, the faint scent of Old Spice lingering in her seat, and the feeling of being useful once again, things looked less dire.
Jackson climbed into her passenger seat and kept squirting. “You taking classes out on base?”
She suppressed a shudder and tore off another paper towel. These ants were going down faster than her marriage. “James Robert.” A beautiful, private campus without any military presence.
“Ol’ Jim-Bob, eh? What kinda class you taking?”
“Heat Transfer in Hell.” She lunged for an errant ant.
“Thermo?”
She stopped wiping to stare at him. “You’ve heard of thermodynamics?”
He blinked, almost like he was offended, then nodded solemnly. “Yes, ma’am. I grew up Baptist. I know all about them temperatures in hell.”
Another shadow of a laugh eased a bit more pressure in her airways. “Guess your momma raised you right then.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
Together, it took five more minutes to wipe out the worst of the ants. If she sped on the roads and ran from the parking lot, she’d be only thirteen and a half minutes late, assuming a quick heatstroke recovery time. She tucked her Windex and depleted paper towel roll back into her trunk organizer, and she found a genuine smile for her unexpected helper. “Thank you.”
“My pleasure.” He took her hand into his, his grip warm and smooth and flutter-inducing, and pressed something against her palm. “In case you need help with any more critters.” He stepped back, amusement evident in the quirk of his lips. “Hope you know more about hell than you look like you do.”
He’d written his name and number on a paper towel.
It was almost sweet enough to make being fourteen minutes late for her first class worth it. Even if he was a big ol’ redneck, he thought she was cute.
Ants and all.
Or maybe he owned an exterminator company.
She sighed. Given her track record of being lovable, she was betting on the latter.
…Excerpt from SOUTHERN FRIED BLUES by Jamie Farrell ©2013