by Lori Wilde
That was the thing. The guy was a comic book superhero, and no one could live up to Beau’s expectations. How the hell had Lois Lane managed it?
Was that the reason she’d put him off every time he’d asked her to marry him? Of course, she had other reasons. External reasons. Good reasons. Or was her real reason something else entirely? Or perhaps she should say someone else entirely.
And then—boom—there he was nibbling at the back of her conscience as he’d done off and on for the past ten years.
Jesse.
The wild side that she’d never gotten to explore. Her one serious regret. Just the thought of him took her breath in a way Beau never had. Immediately she felt disloyal and bit down on her bottom lip.
“Flynnie, look at me.”
She forced herself to meet Beau’s chocolate brown eyes underneath straight, black brows. Good ol’ reliable Beau. Everyone in town loved him. He was a war hero, having earned a Bronze Star in Iraq. He was a pillar of the community. A man that people looked up to and admired.
Goody, Goody Two-shoes.
God, what was wrong with her? She was secretly pining for a convicted criminal incarcerated in Huntsville prison while this decent and law-abiding man, who’d never been anything but kind to Flynn and her family, was sitting here asking her to marry him. She was lower than river sludge. Why couldn’t she just pull the trigger and say yes?
“Before you turn me down again there’s something very important I have to say,” Beau said.
“I—”
“Ah, ah.” Beau pressed his index finger to her lips. “Shh, shh.”
She pantomimed zipping her lip, and his smile crinkled up the corners of his eyes. She really did love the big lug. Just not in the way she should. Not the way her mother had loved her father. Not the way the members of her knitting club all loved their high school sweethearts.
Her heart twisted. Honestly, what in the hell was wrong with her? Why couldn’t she give him her all?
The thing of it was, she had always expected to marry Beau eventually. Her mother had certainly wanted it for her. As she lay in the final throes of dying, Lynn Dupress MacGregor had made her eldest daughter promise two things.
One, that Flynn would open a yarn store so the knitters of Twilight didn’t have to make the forty-mile trek into Fort Worth whenever they felt a yen for something more sophisticated than the basic Wal-Mart skein. And two, that Flynn would one day accept Beau’s proposal of marriage.
Flynn had pointed out that with the proliferation of the Internet it was now feasible for the citizens of Twilight to meet their knitting needs online, but her mother insisted it wasn’t the same. All her life Lynn had dreamed of owning a yarn store where she could host knitting circles and give lessons to pass on her love of the craft. Flynn had agreed to both promises, fully expecting to keep them.
One day.
First on her list, find the right property—and the financing—to start Lynn’s Yarn Barn.
But now here was Beau, pushing for the second item.
“You remember the first time I asked?” Beau crooned, giving her hand a gentle squeeze.
“It was your high school graduation,” Flynn said.
The day after the night Jesse had made out with her for the first and last time. Made out with her on the old Twilight Bridge, gave Flynn her first orgasm right through the fabric of her panties and rocked her teenage world.
It was also the same day Beau’s father had arrested Jesse on cocaine trafficking charges and possession of an illegal firearm. He was supposed to have graduated that day as well.
“You looked so gorgeous. You were wearing a pink sundress.” His voice softened.
Little did Beau know she’d worn that dress because Jesse had told her she looked pretty in pink. Flynn’s cheeks warmed at the memory. She’d thought…
You were sixteen. You had no clue about who Jesse really was. You barely knew him. Let it go. She wished it was that easy. She felt guilty somehow—like she’d betrayed Jesse—and she didn’t know why. If anything, she’d betrayed Beau.
Okay, here came the full-on guilt.
“It was thoughtless of me to ask you then,” Beau was saying. “I understood that you were too young. I just wanted you to know how I felt. I wanted to know that you were mine before I headed off to college.”
Flynn forced a smile. Beau’s hand was warm and moist around hers, his grip just a tiny bit too tight. Panic fluttered against her chest wall the way it always did when he asked her for a solid commitment.
“My timing has always been off when it comes to us. What with your family problems, my stint in Iraq, then my extensive rehab after being wounded, my father’s stroke. We’ve been through a lot and yet we’re still together. You’ve always given me hope that one day you’d be ready to wear my ring.”
“Beau, you’re a wonderful person.” This time she squeezed his hand.
“I love you, Flynnie. I’ve loved you for years. You’re my oldest and dearest friend. I think it’s important to be friends with the person you marry.”
They were good friends and they knew each other so well.
“But as much as I love you, as much as I want you to be my wife, I can’t keep waiting.” Beau cleared his throat. “I know you have a problem with commitment and I get why. You had to assume the role as head of the household when your mother got sick and your dad went off the deep end. You were only thirteen years old and you were cooking dinner and changing diapers and making sure the bills got paid and taking care of your mother…” He shook his head. “I admire you so much, Flynnie MacGregor. You’re my hero.”
Aw shit, she was gonna cry. She ducked her head, stared down at her sneakers stained with grease from Froggy’s. “Beau…”
“Shh, listen, listen to me good.” He hooked two fingers underneath her chin, raised her face up to meet his gaze. “I’ll be thirty next year and Hondo Crouch is running against me in the upcoming sheriff’s race. I need a wife by my side to help me win. Not to mention that I’m ready to start a family.”
“I know.”
“No, this is different.” He paused. “I realize you haven’t had a chance to sow your wild oats. That you’ve been so busy taking care of everyone that you’ve never taken care of Flynn, and I’ve tried to be considerate of that. I didn’t take offense when you turned me down the last four times.”
No, no he hadn’t.
“I understood and I waited.”
Yes, yes he had.
“So I have to have an answer. One way or the other. Will you marry me?”
The squad car suddenly seemed to close in around her. She tried to draw in a deep breath but her lungs wouldn’t expand properly. “I…I need time to think.”
“You’ve had ten years to think, Flynn; if you don’t know the answer by now—” He broke off, shook his head.
“Are you—” She stopped, gulped. “Giving me an ultimatum?”
“I am. Either agree to wear my engagement ring or I’ll find someone who will.” He couldn’t have shocked her more if he’d reached out and slapped her across the face. “You’ve taken me for granted and I’ve allowed it to happen because I’ve wanted this so much. But you aren’t the only woman in Twilight. I’ve had lots of offers.”
A sour taste spilled into her mouth. It tasted like guilt. She had taken him for granted. Assumed Beau would always be there. Waiting for her. She saw now how unfairly she’d treated him, keeping him dangling on a string. He was right. She should say yes or let him go.
“All your excuses are gone,” he continued. “Cassie grew out of her wild phase and turned her life around. Froggy’s is finally in the black. Your twin brothers graduate from high school next May. Your father is on the wagon. There’s nothing you have to do for anyone else, Flynnie. You deserve to pursue your own happiness.”
And of course he thought pursuing her happiness meant marrying him, becoming the sheriff’s wife. In all honesty, Flynn had no idea what constituted her own happiness. She
’d never had an opportunity to give it much thought.
He took the ring from the box and held it out to her. “This is it, Flynn MacGregor, your last chance. I won’t ask again. I’ve got to have a definitive answer once and for all. Will you marry me or not?”
Flynn opened her mouth to speak but no words came out.
“Yes or no?” Beau demanded.
“I…I…”
“Yes or no, Flynn, it’s a simple question.”
Emotions crowded in on her. Anger with him for springing this on her, irritation with herself for dragging her feet, desperation at his challenge, fear that she was never going to figure out who she really was outside of being everyone’s go-to girl.
And beneath it all lay a bone-deep sadness. If you say yes, you forever close the door on Jesse.
Jesse, that vulnerable boy who’d come to live with his Aunt Patsy his junior year. He’d swaggered into Twilight High all tough bravado and oozing tortured-loner cool. Leather jacket, skull tattoo on his upper arm, pierced tongue, chip on his shoulder twice the size of Texas, laser-sharp stare that sent chills of excitement chasing up a girl’s spine.
But Flynn had immediately seen past the façade. The minute she looked into his intelligent gray-blue eyes, she’d known they were the same. Pretending to be something they weren’t in order to keep their chaotic worlds in balance. He was faking being a bad boy; she had donned the role of responsible good girl. He’d touched her heart in a way no one ever had and she’d fallen in love with him.
And then to her ultimate dismay she discovered she’d been wrong about Jesse. That he truly was a bad boy involved with drugs and guns. But still, some small part of her refused to believe it. Some part of her still yearned.
What in the hell was she thinking? The door had closed on Jesse years ago. That was just a foolish girlhood longing. She’d grown up. She’d stopped believing in soul mates and kismet and sexual chemistry so urgent it scared the hell out of her. Marrying the steady, reliable man who’d stood by you through thick and thin was good enough. It wasn’t settling. It was sensible. Right?
“Flynn,” Beau prompted.
She looked down at the diamond sparkler and everything it represented—home, hearth, husband, family. She should want this, but the truth was she was up to her ears in home, hearth, and family. The only new addition would be husband.
His gaze burned her cheeks. She forced herself to meet his eyes. Caring and concern for her shone there, and for the briefest moment, she spied a flicker of panic. He rubbed his thumb over her ring finger. “Flynnie?”
“Why today, Beau?”
“What do you mean?”
“Why not yesterday? Why not tomorrow?”
He shrugged. “I guess I just made up my mind that I can’t keep hanging in limbo. I gotta know once and for all, will you be my wife?”
“Could you give me twenty-four hours?”
His lips pressed together to form a hard line. “You’ve had ten years. Will twenty-four hours make that much difference?”
No, of course not, but she needed time alone from him to think this through. “I wasn’t expecting an ultimatum and the knitting club will be arriving any minute and my father is AWOL and—”
Beau heaved a long-suffering sigh. “It’s always about your family.” Flynn bristled, but then he lightly touched the tip of her nose with his index finger. “Good thing your devotion to those you love is one of the things I adore most about you. Yes, okay, twenty-four hours. But that doesn’t mean I’m not serious about this. My ultimatum still stands.”
“Okay. You’re right. You deserve an answer.” She moved to get out of the car.
“Flynnie?”
“Yes?” She turned back to look at him, and that’s when Beau gathered her up in his arms for a kiss.
As kisses went it was one of his best. Firm, warm, moist but not wet—full of passion, yet properly controlled. He tasted of mouthwash and toothpaste. She realized he’d recently brushed his teeth. Rehearsed this.
She found that fact both endearing and bothersome, and she couldn’t really say why. She knew Beau was a man who did nothing without forethought and preparation. Eagle Scout all the way.
He pulled his lips from hers. “Keep that in mind as you do your thinking.”
She nodded mutely, got out of his patrol car, stumbled in the ditch on her way back to her Ranger. As she climbed onto the running board, Beau poked his head out of the window. “And don’t forget to buckle up,” he hollered.
Flynn waved a hand, but had the strangest impulse to raise a finger. God, he was such a stickler for rules.
And what’s wrong with that, river sludge? He only wants to make sure you’re safe.
She got in and buckled her seat belt, looked back, and saw Beau making a U-turn, then spied a car on the overhead bridge that she recognized. Patsy Cross’s ruby red Crown Victoria packed with carpooling members of the knitting club.
Crap!
At best she had only a two-minute head start. Flynn gunned the engine and zoomed to the end of the road. She slammed the Ranger into park, tumbled out, sprinted up the back steps, and banged in through the screen door.
CHAPTER TWO
Beau Trainer voted boy most likely to be brought home for Thanksgiving dinner
—Twilight High, 1999
For as long as he could remember, Beau Trainer had struggled to overcome the image of his larger-than-life father. Clinton Trainer was a throwback to the lawless days of the Wild West when men were men—drinking, whoring, gambling, smoking, fighting, shooting off guns for sport—and the women put up with it because they were scared not to. His father called every boy Bubba and every girl Sissy-babe. He had a picture of a hula dancer with oversized bosoms tattooed on his forearm, and until his stroke he’d always kept a whiskey flask tucked into the top of his cowboy boot.
The Trainers hailed from a long line of lawmen, dating back to some of the first Texas Rangers. And when Clinton married Kathryn Loving and her family’s cattle money and used her wealth and his boldness to get elected sheriff of Hood County, his place in Twilight history was cinched. No one dared cross Clinton Trainer except Kathryn, and that was only because she held the purse strings.
When Beau was eight years old his father took him behind the woodshed, pulled a cigar from his pocket, bit off the end, and spit it into the field. “Let’s see how tough you are, little man,” Clinton had grunted. “Smoke this.”
He remembered being simultaneously repulsed and seduced. He’d brought the cigar to his lips. Clinton fired a match with his hoary thumbnail. “Now suck,” he commanded.
Beau sucked. Acrid smoke filled his lungs. It tasted like wet, moldy leaves set on fire. He’d coughed and tried to hand the cigar back to Clinton. “I don’t like it.”
“Keep smoking,” Clinton growled with that don’t-give-me-no-shit look on his face.
Knees trembling, tears burning at the backs of his eyes, Beau took another hit. The second time was worse than the first. “I can’t do it,” he’d whimpered.
“Again.”
“Daddy, don’t make me.”
“You want me to take off this belt?” Clinton settled his thumbs on his belt buckle. “’Cause I will.”
He couldn’t hold the tears back any longer as he took another horrible drag off the vile cigar and promptly vomited in the sand.
“Pussy.” Clinton curled his nose in disgust and walked away.
When he was ten, Clinton took him deer hunting. When it came down to pulling the trigger and annihilating the defenseless animal, Beau had shot wide, missing on purpose.
“Pussy.” Clinton reached out and slapped him across the face.
When he was twelve, Clinton took him to the Horny Toad Tavern and told Earl Pringle to serve Beau a whiskey.
“I can’t do that, Sheriff,” Earl had said, looking nervously at Clinton’s badge, no doubt wondering if it was a test.
“Then give me a whiskey.”
Earl served him and Clin
ton pushed the glass to Beau. “Knock it back in one swallow, kid.”
Beau tried, he really did. Honestly, all he wanted was to please his father, but it turned out like the cigar. Vomit on the floor.
“Pussy.” Clinton grunted and finished off the whiskey Beau hadn’t been able to down.
Then when he was fourteen…Beau closed his eyes against the memory of the whorehouse and the naked woman who’d touched him. All he heard ringing in his ears were his father’s parting words as he slammed the door behind him. “Pussy for a pussy.”
It was at that moment Beau realized that no matter what he did he could never impress or please his father. He also realized something else. His father was morally bankrupt and he wasn’t a man worth emulating. And Beau recognized that from then on, he was going to have to father himself. Find his own blueprint for the way a man was supposed to be. He was going to make his own guidelines, develop his own moral code, police himself so there’d be no need for anyone else to police him. He’d adhere to the letter of the law and he’d live up to his image of what a real man should be. From that moment on, Beau made it his life mission to be better than Clinton in every way. He’d be everything his father was not—ethical, fair, honest, and self-disciplined.
And then at sixteen he’d fallen in love for the first time. Madly, deeply, blindly in love, the way that only a teenager could fall. Jodi was beautiful, impulsive, and exciting. Beau was drawn to her, moth to a flame. She strung him along, then broke his heart by leaving town with a thug so much like Clinton it crushed his soul. When he heard a few weeks later that she’d been killed in an accident on the back of the guy’s motorcycle, he took it personally. If she’d just stayed with him, she would still be alive and safe. After that, he’d drawn up his image of the perfect woman. She would be a good person, hardworking, responsible, generous, and practical. She wouldn’t let her head be turned by some swaggering bad boy.
And then he met Flynn. She fit his mental blueprint perfectly, and he set about falling in love with her in a calm, rational manner.
They were getting along good, she was his perfect mate. Even though they were still in high school, he was already picturing their children. Then Patsy Cross brought her nephew to Twilight and ruined everything.