Home Again with You

by Liza Kendall

  Chapter 25

  Rhett felt like he’d been driving around Silverlake forever. Grady wasn’t at the firehouse. Rafi said he’d swapped shifts with him. This didn’t give Rhett pause until Rafi narrowed his eyes and added something in Spanish that Rhett couldn’t understand. The tone was enough to make him take advantage of Scarlett’s acceleration on his way up to the Holt Stables.

  It was a relief when Rhett’d taken maybe six steps toward the barn and Grady appeared out of nowhere. Rhett relaxed a little when he saw that his best friend looked calm, though it was odd that he was still in his uniform even though he’d swapped shifts with Rafi.

  Rhett gave him a wave. “Hey, man, I’ve been looking for you.” Okay, this was going to be hard, but at least—

  “And I’ve been looking for you,” Grady said.

  The blow came out of nowhere. It slammed like a wrecking ball into Rhett’s jaw and felled him to the dirt. Rhett had always appreciated the deep blue of a Texas Hill Country sky, but he couldn’t recall ever seeing it from behind stars—or from a supine position on his back in the dirt with the thunderous expression of his best friend looming over him.

  “Give me one reason I shouldn’t kill you right now,” Grady growled.

  Grady had somehow found out about the one-night stand in Dallas.

  “One reason!” roared Grady.

  Rhett rubbed at his jaw. He couldn’t think of one. What he’d done had broken the guy code. It had broken his own moral code. He truly hadn’t meant to go there.

  Jules. Sweet, hot, bourbon-laced handfuls of Jules . . . What had he been thinking?

  He hadn’t been. It had all been primal instinct: Want. Mine. Now.

  “Get up!” Grady ordered. “Back on your feet. I am going to friggin’ take you apart.”

  Rhett struggled up onto his elbows. “I’m sorry, man. It wasn’t—”

  “You’re sorry?!” Grady erupted into a blue streak of cussing. “Get up!”

  Rhett stood up, wincing. He didn’t even brush the dust off his clothes. He just braced himself for the next blow.

  All six foot six inches of Grady was shaking with rage. “You knock up my sister, and you kick her to the curb? No, man—” He drew his enormous fist back again.

  Knock up? Rhett stared at him blankly. “What did you say?”

  And then another wrecking ball hit his left eye and he went flying backward yet again, ass over teakettle.

  The deep blue country sky turned black.

  * * *

  Grady had fists like granite. Rhett opened his eyes. Well, one of them. And from it he saw Jules hovering over him with bloody gauze in her hand, rhythmically dabbing around the eye that wouldn’t open. To his surprise, Beast was seated next to him, whining and occasionally shoving her nose into his neck, which involved a lot of slobber.

  Behind Jules stood her brother, looking like a massive, mean old hound himself, his arms crossed over his chest, his lip curled.

  Beast turned and growled at Grady, then subsided under his glare.

  Rhett couldn’t quite put the pieces together but Jules’s eyes looked red, as if she’d been crying. And that fist Grady was flexing . . . those were bloody knuckles.

  “Jules,” Rhett said weakly.

  “You got about fifteen minutes before Declan gets here to pick up his trash,” Grady’s voice said.

  Oh no. Not Declan. “Call Jake . . .” Rhett croaked.

  “Jake’s on duty. Looks like you’re getting only tough love today, because I’m not bugging Lila with this BS.” Grady stepped out of view and a door slammed.

  Jules cupped Rhett’s face tenderly. “I’m so sorry,” she whispered. “I tried to stop him.”

  She looked like an angel. An angel with rooster feathers sprouting from her head.

  Rhett closed his eye again because when she moved, the sun hit it full force. He put a hand to his jaw and winced. It was very possibly broken.

  Jules carefully settled a bag of ice onto his busted-up jaw, and he hissed with the pain.

  “Thank you.” He opened his eye again, and got a heavenly scoop of cleavage as her T-shirt gaped open. Thanks for that, too.

  “Poor Rhett,” she said, leaning forward even more.

  Lucky Rhett. He tried to grin again.

  “I’m so sorry,” Jules said again. “I tried to stop him. But he guessed. And he reacted.”

  “Ha. Can’t blame him. I’da done the same. I kinda deserve it.”

  “No. You don’t. I mean, you did . . . but you don’t, now. If that makes any sense.”

  “Not really.” Rhett sighed. Put up his hand again to wipe away a trickle of blood that ran from his mouth down onto his neck.

  “I just mean—” Jules began again.

  Rhett groaned. “I should have told him. I should have found a way.” And then it all came roaring back into his mind. You knock up my sister . . . Rhett pulled his hand away from Jules’s hair. “Jules?”

  She moistened her lips but didn’t say anything.

  “You’re pregnant? You should have told me.” He cleared his throat but it was still gravel when he said, “You didn’t see fit to tell me about my own baby?”

  “I . . . I haven’t known that long. Maybe. I’ve been in denial.”

  “When would you have told me?”

  Jules swallowed and then shrugged.

  She didn’t want him for more than she’d already gotten. She didn’t care if he even stayed in Silverlake. Story of his life.

  “Right,” Rhett said, doing his best to keep the bitterness inside, along with the shock. “I don’t really understand what sort of man you think I am, Julianna Holt.”

  She swallowed but didn’t say a word. Did she notice she’d pressed her hand to her belly? Rhett watched her splayed fingers, shook up by the intense joy rocking through him. Jules’s face, though, didn’t look joyous.

  He ducked his head so she wouldn’t see how hurt he was. Not the cuts and bruises that Grady had left behind. His heart.

  Silverlake was nothing but pain for him. He’d fooled himself into thinking he could belong again, be part of what was special about this place and the people. And once again, what he had to offer wasn’t what anybody wanted, beyond what his wallet could provide.

  Rhett sighed. If Jules was pregnant with his child, she could have his wallet and anything else that would help her in this situation. He would do the right thing, here. Right now, in fact.

  “You don’t need to worry about how things are going to be,” Rhett said, forcing his voice to steady. “I’m offering you my name and my hand. I’ll do right by you and this baby. You’ll want for nothing. Send you as much money as you need. I can go back to Dallas, come out on the weekends. It’s more than I got from my dad for the last part of my life. And no reason to wait on getting married. I don’t like to think of you fielding all those looks and rumors you’re gonna get . . .”

  Jules was looking at him as if he’d sprouted three horns in the middle of his forehead. But he kept on talking. “Julianna Holt, will you marry me?”

  After a moment of shocked silence, she said, “That’s . . . that’s very . . . um, appreciated. But you’re not yourself right now, Rhett. You’ve taken some big blows to the head.”

  She doesn’t get it. I’ve got to make her understand.

  Declan chose that moment to drive up in his Silverado and Grady came out of the barn to meet him, his body language tense and towering.

  Great timing, bro. “I’m serious, Jules.” Rhett struggled to sit up and finally succeeded in propping himself up against the garbage can that stood outside the barn.

  “Rhett—” She shook her head. “Don’t.”

  “But, Jules—” Rhett said desperately.

  Grady and Declan headed toward them. “Jules, get lost,” Grady called out. “Declan’s got this.” />
  “Jules, Will you marry me?” Rhett asked again.

  “Shut up,” she said, just as desperately. “Please.”

  His brother picked up the pace and suddenly he was beside Rhett, taking quick inventory of the mess of his face. “Aw, hell,” Deck muttered.

  “Jules!” Grady barked, catching up and placing one proprietary hand on his sister’s shoulder. “Let’s go inside.”

  Rhett reached out for her. She had one hand pressed against her temple, the other on her stomach. She looked completely stunned. “Jules,” he whispered.

  “No, Rhett!”

  Rhett slumped back as Grady led a dazed Jules away. Ironically, he wished again for the sweet oblivion of Grady’s fist.

  Chapter 26

  Jules desperately needed to be alone. She pulled away from Grady and ran around the barn, the heels of her rubber boots thudding dully against the earth, more sharply on the flagstones that formed the path back to the trailer that was no longer hers now. She hurtled through the door anyway and threw herself on the single bed without bothering to take off the boots. Beast, who’d followed her, lay down beside the bed and whined.

  Rhett had asked her to marry him. Unbelievable.

  He’d looked horrific. Eye swollen shut and turning a dark plum color. Blood in his mouth, between his teeth, as if he’d just ripped into some kind of prey.

  My fantasy zombie proposal.

  She closed her eyes and tried to swallow a rising hysteria. How many times, as a preteen girl, had she imagined Rhett proposing to her? On a mountaintop, or with a banner flying out behind a private plane? In front of millions of people at a Super Bowl game?

  And instead of a ring on her finger at that moment, she’d had a Ziploc bag of ice held to his jaw. God, you certainly do work in mysterious ways . . .

  How many times as a teenager had she imagined marrying Rhett Braddock? And here he was, proposing to her for real.

  Except in those fantasy proposals, at those fantasy weddings, he’d always dropped to one knee and told her how much he loved her. He hadn’t suggested a business deal in response to an accidental pregnancy.

  Jules placed her hand on her belly only half consciously. Would this baby have Rhett’s blue eyes and dark hair? His stubborn chin? His genius brain?

  Would the baby be a boy? Or an adorable little girl that she could dress in frilly pink things that she wouldn’t touch with a barge pole for herself? She couldn’t help but smile at that.

  She saw Rhett’s grin again as he’d asked her, showing his gruesome, bloody teeth again, not understanding that his usual megawatt smile wasn’t doing him any favors.

  The hysteria at the sheer awfulness of the situation, the wrongness of it, the irony of it—the hysteria could no longer be denied. Horrible giggles burst from her throat as tears streamed down her cheeks.

  She stared at the wall opposite her, in disbelief that she found herself in this situation. The very same situation that Sue had been in, all those years ago. Feeling that she had to marry someone who didn’t love her. Because of an accidental pregnancy.

  And it had ended in total disaster.

  Jules stared more closely at the wall. This was the very same space her aunt had occupied when she’d made the decision to protect herself and her child. The wall, obviously, had been rebuilt after the tragedy.

  A lot of people probably wouldn’t have wanted to live here. But Jules hadn’t thought much about it. Or about how she’d always gone to Aunt Sue’s, and Sue had never come here over the years. Not once.

  Sue, too, had rebuilt herself. But at what cost? She didn’t really talk about it, aside from vague references. She’d never gotten married again. Why not?

  Jules rolled off the bed, grabbed her keys and backpack, and headed out to ask her. It was time she and her aunt had a real talk.

  * * *

  She found Aunt Sue on her knees in the vegetable patch behind her little house. Her white hair hung in a braid down her back, and a cowboy hat sat on her head. She wore a denim skirt with a long-sleeved, pale blue T-shirt and a western suede vest over that. Nothing on her feet. As usual, Aunt Sue was barefoot when at home.

  “Hi, hon.” She shot Jules an appraising glance. “You seem . . . rattled.”

  “Go figure. Grady just punched out Rhett, who regained consciousness and proposed to me.”

  Sue put down her trowel and set her dirty hands on her knees. “Tell me you said no.”

  “I said no.” Jules met her gaze miserably. “Of course I said no.”

  “Good girl. The last thing you need on top of everything else is an unhappy marriage.” She got ponderously to her feet and brushed the dirt off her hands, then wiped them on an old hand towel lying on a wooden bench. “It makes things worse, not better.”

  “Do you ever wish you’d said no, back then?” Jules ventured.

  Sue’s head snapped back. “Of course I do. I wish I’d told everyone to go to hell. Wish I’d run for the hills.” She took off the hat and turned it in her hands.

  “But you didn’t.”

  “I was a coward. If I had said one simple, two-letter word, none of what followed would have happened.” Sue stepped into the kitchen and set the hat down on the table. “None of it.”

  Jules followed her.

  “He wouldn’t have felt trapped and desperate. He wouldn’t have been drinking so much to drown his emotions. Wouldn’t have felt the urge to take his fear and rage out on me. It all could have been averted—if I’d just said no.”

  Jules put a hand on her arm. “He could have said no, too, Aunt Sue.”

  Sue laughed bitterly and shook her head. “He was on the wrong end of a shotgun. That’s how it all started. And ended. Same gun.”

  Jules sucked in a breath.

  “So it really did come down to me,” Sue repeated. “If I’d just said no . . .”

  “You’re not being fair to yourself. You were a teenager being ganged up on by your family and a pastor, and it was a different time.”

  Her aunt was silent. Headed for the coffeemaker. Turned her back on Jules.

  “You also weren’t responsible for his actions; you weren’t responsible for his temper or his violence. His abuse.”

  “I know. Coffee, hon?”

  “No, thanks.”

  “Yeah, I think I’ll go straight for the Baileys myself.” Her hands shook as she retrieved the bottle, poured some into a glass over ice, then added a touch of milk.

  “What happened to all of that guilt-is-a-useless-emotion stuff?” Jules asked.

  “This isn’t guilt. It’s pragmatism.”

  “Sure sounds a lot like guilt to me.” Jules struggled with her next question. She shouldn’t ask it. “Would you do it again?”

  Sue took a gulp of her Baileys and went quiet. “With that shotgun in my hands,” she said, “I felt powerful for the first time. Able to control the situation. I was . . . exultant. Loving the power. I felt strong.” She took another gulp of the Baileys. “I told him to stay away from me. To get back. To leave.”

  “Good for you.”

  “But I also took the opportunity to tell him exactly what I thought of him. That he was a lowlife, a coward, a drunk. I made him even angrier. Called him a fool, too.” Sue upended the Baileys and poured another.

  “So . . .”

  “So.” Sue’s mouth worked. “I was stupid. And I was right. Only a fool grabs the wrong end of a shotgun. Happened so fast. And then . . .” Tears filled her eyes. “Then he was . . . in pieces. The wall shattered. Blood . . . everywhere.” The ice in her glass rattled as her hands shook.

  “Oh, Aunt Sue.” Jules wrapped her arms around her, squeezed her, rubbed her back.

  “Would I do it again, you ask?” Sue choked on a dry sob. “The answer to that question is that I should have said no to the marriage. And I have to take resp
onsibility for that.”

  “Okay, but you were a pregnant teenager from a conservative, religious family. And he’d knocked you around, he’d kicked you in the stomach while you were pregnant! He’d tried to hurt the baby.”

  Sue nodded. “Yes. But what I did—it didn’t save her. If I had just said no to the marriage, if I’d just gone off somewhere on my own . . . then she’d be alive today.” She broke down. “So promise me, Julianna, promise me. You will not get married under these circumstances. I know you have feelings for Rhett. But marriage is a big decision, a complicated one. It’s not a Band-Aid, and nobody should pressure you into it.”

  Chapter 27

  He still couldn’t quite believe it. Nobody said no to him, not anymore.

  Rhett stared into space as now Declan instead of Jules held the bag of ice to his face.

  She was really turning down everything he offered. Rhett told himself he was too numb to care, anyway. A lie. But lies were better than the truth right now. That she didn’t want him, didn’t need him, didn’t love him. Did anybody?

  “Ready to go yet?” Deck asked gruffly. “I’m feeling motivated to get off Holt land at the moment.”

  Rhett nodded. He struggled to his feet, Declan suddenly at his side, propping him up.

  “I messed up but good,” Rhett whispered.

  “Grady doesn’t have a scratch on him—did you miss?” Declan asked.

  Rhett shook his head. “I let him do it. Didn’t take a swing at him.”

  Deck stared at him as if he’d sprouted antennae. “You what?”

  “I deserved it. I’d let him do it again.”

  “Well, hell, Rhett,” Declan said, leading him out to his Silverado. “There is clearly some story here that you may want to share with me.”

  “Not hardly.”

  Declan got him settled in the passenger seat; Rhett let his head loll back against the headrest. Grady’s left hook was legendary for a reason, and Rhett’s head ached even more than his jaw or the cuts on his face.