Love, Tussles, and Takedowns

by Violet Duke

  And since it’d been a good six months since he’d felt like that, he didn’t want to rush through it.

  “You said you needed to stop by your shop first for a bit, right?” He looked across the street and saw a small shop bearing Lia’s name and an emblem of pre-Civil War rifles. “Why don’t you go take care of what you need to do first? We can meet up for breakfast after you’re done.”

  “Are you sure? I’m actually only open by appointment on weekend mornings since I’m usually doing on-site appraisals or auctions for clients.”

  “Take your time. I was actually going to check out that toy shop across the way. One of my friends works with the community outreach programs out where our troops are deployed in the Middle East, and I know they rarely get things for the kids so I was thinking of sending her some cool toys that she could ship over for them to hand out.”

  She smiled. “Okay. How about I meet you in the town center in about a half hour?”

  “Sounds like a plan.”

  A plan in theory, perhaps.

  But in reality, the second Lia stepped foot into her shop, two people immediately stopped him in the street to essentially ask him ‘what his intentions were’ with their Lia. The kindly old woman in the hand knit sweater who stopped him first was perhaps just as fierce in her warnings as the gruff biker dude that growled out a brief, “Don’t you dare hurt that sweet woman.”

  He’d managed to get two-thirds of the way down the main street when he saw that half his time was already up and if he wasn’t mistaken, Lia was already at the town center, getting chased around the grassy area by a screeching swarm of kids.

  “I take it you’re Lia’s mystery guy. The one everyone’s buzzing about this morning,” said a cheerfully amused voice from the next bench over.

  Hudson had always been good with faces, but not names. “You were at Luke’s wedding a few weeks back, right? You’re the brother of one of the other groomsmen.”

  The man’s eyebrows hopped up in recognition. “You were in the wedding party too—Luke’s friend from high school. Sorry, I didn’t recognize you there for a second. And yeah, I’m Brian Sullivan. Good memory. Connor’s my brother.”

  Hudson looked over at the kids, wholly astonished to see them now quiet, and marching in a military-grade single file behind Lia holding what looked like… He squinted. “Are those play-fort sized Lincoln Logs?”

  Brian chuckled. “This town has some very unique amenities.”

  Clearly.

  Seeing the children now gathered around Lia, silently hanging on her every word, Hudson marveled, “She’s really great with them isn’t she?”

  “Yep. You wouldn’t guess it from how quiet she is, but Lia definitely has a way with kids, in a way that’s uniquely her own. MaGyver-ing games out of random things around town like she’s doing now is just one of the reasons why they love her. I know my kids and my niece”—he nodded over at a cute little girl with Connor’s blue eyes—“are definitely huge fans. To them, Lia’s one of the town amenities they’re always wanting to visit Cactus Creek to come see.”

  Hudson could see why. Lia had a very…unassuming charm the kids seemed drawn to. There wasn’t a single trace of rah-rah kid’s show host in her actions, nor did she carry herself like a singing dinosaur. She was more like a modern day Pied Piper, quietly inspiring fun, effortlessly cultivating life. In fact, just watching her lead the kids over to a tire swing tree at the center of the park, he half expected smiling daisies to slowly bloom to life out of the ground in her wake.

  While it had been crazy sexy to see her passion about antique rifles, mind-blowingly erotic to see her this morning in her thin white tank top and cute boyshort panties…this…seeing her directing the now dozen or so kids that had gathered around her as if she were the Pied Piper—it tugged on a part of his heart he hadn’t really thought was accessible anymore.

  * * * * *

  “OKAY, GANG ARE we ready?” called out Lia. “Are all the logs in place? We’re going for a strike so we need to make sure it’s in a nice, clean triangle.” She walked back over to check on Skylar Sullivan, the designated “bowling ball” in today’s game. It was an honor bestowed on the lanky teen by the town children primarily because she was the only one of the bunch taller than three feet, but also because they all just flat-out adored her. Lia didn’t blame ‘em. Skylar was one very cool soon-to-be-sixteen-year-old. Lia didn’t know many high schoolers who would choose to hang out with her toddler sister and wobbler cousins on the weekends, not to mention a bunch of random grade school kids currently lining up to push her on the tire swing toward their makeshift “bowling pins.”

  “Alright, who’s up first?”

  Two little preschoolers bounced forward like eager bunnies while Skylar made a theatric show of securing her grip on the rope like a trapeze artist.

  “When I say go, you two give her a nice big push now.” All the parents of the gaggle of kids had gathered around as well to watch, indulgent smiles alit. “Okay, 1 – 2 – 3 – GO!” All the kids squealed as the two “bowlers” gave Skylar a mighty shove on the rope and watched as she swung toward the big plastic logs they’d arranged as the “pins.”

  There was a collective, “Oooh,” and a raucous symphony of cheering as Skylar put an extra fancy flare on her return swing back and picked up the 7-10 split via the very tip of an outstretched hand, along with the last-second Hail Mary launch of her flip flops.

  Judges’ ruling?

  Totally allowed.

  Arms up in triumph along with the kids, she gave them all hi-fives just as she saw Hudson standing at the edge of the crowd, shaking his head and smiling at her.

  “Okay kids, I gotta get going. My friend is here.” At the musical collection of, “Awwws,” she chuckled and waved over a few parents to take over her little ringmaster role before heading over to Hudson.

  “You could’ve bowled a few more rounds with the kids,” he told her, smiling ear to ear.

  “Nah, that’s okay. I usually just get them all riled up and then send them back to their parents.” She beamed as she watched the kids and parents cheer through a strike. “This was one of my more successful games.” Turning back to check out his empty hands, she frowned. “They didn’t have any cool toys you could get?”

  “I actually didn’t make it to the toy store,” he replied with an amused chuckle.

  “What happened?”

  “The entire town decided to stop me for an interrogation the minute you stepped into the shop.”

  What? Hands on hips, she scanned the streets to see if she could find any usual suspects. She stopped counting at ten. “Hudson, I’m so sorry. They’re a little…nosy.”

  “They worry about you. It’s cute. And it’s no big deal. I can swing by the toy shop on my way back home after breakfast.”

  At the reminder that he’d be gone in a few hours, Lia fell silent, surprised at her level of disappointment over a man she’d just met leaving town.

  When she felt Hudson’s hand grip her elbow gently, she looked down and blinked.

  They were about to step off a curb. How’d she miss that? He ensured she’d make that harrowing journey off the four-inch landing with a warm palm that sensitized her back, and she barely concealed the ripple of awareness in her breathing.

  Okay, so maybe she wasn’t so surprised over her level of disappointment. He affected her like no other man ever had. Not even her husband.

  Automatically, her fingers went up to her throat to spin the rings on her necklace.

  Hudson’s eyes followed the movement, but instead of commenting, he asked instead, “Hey, so what’s the deal with all these people walking around town eating bowls of cereal?”

  WHEN THAT SMILE he was starting to get addicted to lit up Lia’s face once again, Hudson felt another tug in his chest. Legitimate question aside, he’d hated seeing her eyes dim as she’d toyed with the wedding bands dangling from the thin gold chain she wore around her neck.

  From her m
arriage.

  For once, his trademark patience was practically nonexistent. He wanted to learn all there was to know about her.

  Well, as much as he could before he left.

  Because he was leaving, he reminded himself for the third time this morning.

  “Want to get that breakfast now?” he asked.

  She lit up again and re-navigated them to a Cajun and Creole food booth.

  Reminder number four ran through his brain then. With noticeably less conviction.

  As they sat down on one of the many colored picnic blankets that were arranged under trees around the grassy courtyard—because picnic tables were so last century—Hudson asked again, “Okay, really. Why are there so many folks walking around town eating cereal from disposable bowls?”

  The town was so weird.

  He was starting to like it.

  “We have a mix-your-own-cereal shop at the center of town. It’s kind of like an ice cream sundae bar, but with practically every variety of cereal out there. They have certain combinations they mix together with add-ins to make specific flavors like chocolate strawberry pie.”

  “Out of cereal?”

  “Yep. It’s a huge hit. And the parents love it because it’s cheap and a healthier alternative to ice cream and things like that for the kids.”

  Lia handed him his plate and utensils while opening the take-out container of creamy creole-spiced grits with smoked Andouille and fried green tomatoes she’d ordered along with a heaping pile of Cajun pain perdu, which essentially looked like the thickest, fanciest stack of French toast he’d ever laid eyes on.

  He settled his back against the tree and realized he’d never been on a picnic before. For that matter, he couldn’t even remember the last time he’d sat under a tree just to sit under a tree either.

  To try and get some much needed shade in the Afghan heat? All the time, yes.

  As a base from which he’d taken point with a sniper rifle? Yep.

  But never just for a meal with a pretty girl.

  Less than twenty-four hours with Lia and he was getting hit with firsts from all sides.

  This was starting to become a thing.

  Lia made quick work dividing the food up in equal halves. “I have three brothers who have bottomless pits for stomachs,” she narrated as she scooped up half of her half into her paper plate. “I’ve found I can usually get a nice little bidding war of favors done for my extra food. Just laying that out there…just in case you find yourself still hungry later.”

  At that, he chortled out loud. She was constantly surprising him. “Here I thought you were so quiet.” He took all of his half of food and dug right in. Good lord, that was good. Already, he found himself thinking up favors he could bid with to claim the rest of Lia’s half.

  The idea of just buying more food from the booth on his way home, not even a blip on his radar.

  “So are you going to tell me about you being a twenty-seven year old virgin widow now or should we start with some lighter breakfast conversation?”

  “And leave you with all those gaping holes from the town debriefing of my marriage?” she teased after finishing her last forkful of pain perdu drenched in syrup. “It’s actually not all that interesting of a story. Leo was my first real friend at my new school. Since it had been so soon after my parents died, I didn’t talk much. But then came my sophomore year when Leo was determined to talk to me, determined to get me to talk to him. And I did. I liked him. We dated through junior and senior year, and then when he decided to join the Army, we kept up our relationship long distance.”

  More fiddling with the rings.

  “It wasn’t long after his One Station Unit Training out in Fort Benning that Leo got his deployment orders to relieve a unit in Afghanistan, just weeks after he got stationed at his first brigade.”

  An infantry man. Hudson respected the hell out of that.

  “But before he shipped out, he flew back here and asked me to marry him.” She smiled softly. “He said he just couldn’t go off to the war without being able to have and hold me as his wife—the one thing he knew for sure would bring his butt back home, and remind him exactly what it was he was fighting for out there if ever he began to doubt…life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness with me.”

  That was one heck of a proposal.

  “So at the ripe old age of nineteen, we both hopped on a plane to Vegas and got married that day. We spent exactly two days as a married couple before he had to leave.”

  She met Hudson’s gaze and as if she could read his mind, she answered, “Leo didn’t want to rush our first time together, or link it to his leaving somehow in my mind. And he really didn’t want me to think that he’d married me just so he could ‘close the deal’ with me before he went off to fight for our country. So we didn’t. We spent our first and only two nights as husband and wife just sitting and dreaming up plans for our future together.” A faint wash of tears appeared before she blinked it away. “We were naïve, idealistic. We planned to have our perfect first time together the night he got home from the war, the night we could really start our future together.”

  Pain abraded her voice as she finished, “He and four other men were the only ones unaccounted for when their chopper went down a few months later.”

  “How long was he MIA before they found him?” asked Hudson gently, knowing far too well over the years what kinds of thoughts tortured the imagination when it came to reports of MIA soldiers.

  “Leo’s remains were never recovered.”

  He frowned. “But they found evidence—” There wasn’t really a kind way to say it…

  “That he was presumed dead? No. None.” Lia closed her eyes and said softly, “His mother had him legally declared dead last year not long after the seven-year common law mark. And she did it behind my back.”

  Hudson hissed in a breath—appalled for her, angered for her husband.

  “Leo’s brother Drew and I found out after she got the death certificate. And while Drew actually had quite a bit of information that could have been used to overturn the ruling—existence of evidence to indicate the possibility of survival, Drew didn’t exactly obtain the information…legally.” She glanced around as if the trees might have ears. “Drew’s a hacker. And while he was willing to suffer the consequences the confession would have brought, I wasn’t willing to let him throw his future away.”

  “I don’t get it,” Hudson pressed further. “Even without the evidence, couldn’t you get it overturned somehow as his wife?” Instantly, he wished he could call the question back when he saw frustration and anguish mar Lia’s expression.

  “Sorry, I didn’t mean to pry—”

  “No, it’s okay. Leo’s mother’s lawyer informed me that if I fought the death certificate, they would fight back. Basically, they were prepared to drag in the fact that my marriage was never consummated, and since we’d never cohabitated or shown any other signs of a married couple to any witnesses, they were going to introduce the speculation that perhaps Leo had been persuaded under duress by me to make this rash decision just a few days pre-deployment. I’d only had a few months being married to him and they were prepared to tarnish every day of that short period completely. When Drew found out, he told the lawyers to stop. He vowed then and there he’d find another way. Then he told his mother to never speak to him again.”

  Hudson was at a complete loss for words. His parents had never been in the running for any parental awards as far as he was concerned but Leo’s mom made them look like lifetime achievement winners in comparison. “Honey, that’s horrible. I’m so sorry you had to go through that. I can’t even imagine why a mother would want to do something like that.”

  “That’s the thing. She said she was doing it for Drew. Because he’d been so obsessed all these years with finding his brother that she couldn’t watch him continue to do this to himself. Horrifically misguided as her actions were, I had honestly believed her intentions were honorable, that she was trying
to be a mother to him for once. Getting back at me, though probably satisfying, probably wasn’t a factor.”

  “What do you mean?”

  Lia sighed. “She blames me. For having Drew get taken away from her in the first place. Leo and Drew’s mother was—is—an alcoholic; she had been their entire lives. Leo basically raised Drew. For a while there, he was actually considering not enlisting for another four or five years, until after Drew was at least halfway through high school. But their mom had seemingly turned a new leaf Leo’s senior year. She’d been sober for over ten months, going to her meetings, holding down a job, making them meals every night—the whole nine yards. She knew how important this was to Leo so she told him not to worry about them. So Leo enlisted.”

  “According to Drew, the day we found out Leo’s chopper went down was the day their mom started drinking again. It got pretty bad. And since Drew was only twelve at the time, I asked Caine to step in and within a month, Drew was officially the Spencer’s newest foster child, living in my old room all the way until last year, when he graduated from high school with honors.” She smiled. “He received his pick of cyber security undergraduate programs, and ended up in Texas on a full ride scholarship.”

  Hudson marveled again at the power of a good family like the Spencers. Drew’s mom could’ve easily ruined Drew’s life with her downward spiral. “You said you ‘had’ believed her intentions were honorable. You don’t believe it anymore?”

  “We—and by we, I mean Drew—found out later that she’d apparently had some sort of check-the-box-now-and-figure-it-out-later company life insurance benefit on Leo back when Leo had been an only child and she’d been sober with a good-paying desk job. Even after she’d left the job, this financial advisor guy she’d been dating at the time apparently helped her roll it over somehow. According to her emails—don’t ask—she thought she’d been paying for just her own life insurance this whole time. When she’d tried to cancel it to save some money, evidently, that’s when she found out she could get paid out if she declared Leo dead.”