CLOVER Creek
Sweet Southern Nights: Book One
By Heather Michelle
Copyright 2018 ©Author Heather Michelle
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
No part of this book may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form by any means, or stored in a database or retrieval system, except in the event of brief quotations included in articles and reviews, without the prior consent of the author.
Cover design by: Poole Publishing Services LLC
Formatting by: Poole Publishing Services LLC
Content editing by: Erin Toland of Edits by Erin
Proofreading by: Kim Holm and Patricia Lail
Dedication
In loving memory of my grandma. Thank you for being that grandma.
If things go right, I’ll see you in heaven one day. And we’ll pick berries and have cobbler.
GRAB A FREE SHORT STORY BY HEATHER MICHELLE
Sign up for Heather’s newsletter and grab your free copy of Black Tie Bachelor.
Get my Free book!
There’s a thin line between love and hate… and Josephine Riley is standing on it.
Chapter One
Claire
By the age of thirty-one years old, I should have known what I wanted to be when I grew up. Instead, I was a licensed massage therapist, turned medical receptionist, turned phlebotomist. And most recently, a certified elementary school teacher in Hickory Falls, Georgia. But now, I stood in front of at least a dozen little rectangular boxes on a white metal shelf, hoping the one thing I wouldn’t be, was pregnant. I had nothing against kids. Or the people who want them. Parenting just isn’t for me. People typically learn one of two things from their childhood: how to be a parent or how not to be one. All my childhood showed me was that parenting a child is like planting a garden. Feed it, nourish it, let it breathe, and it will blossom into something beautiful. Neglect it or smother it and the whole thing ends up full of rotten plants. I felt rotten. No one or nothing could convince me that motherhood was anything other than terrifying.
So, I stood there panicked and wondering at what point my birth control had failed me. I stared at white and purple boxes, and pink and white boxes, and blue and purple boxes until my heart felt like it was about to jump right out of my chest. My throat grabbed the air I breathed, taking it hostage and leaving me suffocated. I hadn’t felt panic like this since Jayce Sterling left a letter on the dashboard of my Honda Civic that would change my life. And not for the better. I still had that letter, tucked in a wooden box with a handful of dried white clover flowers and pictures of a time I’d rather forget.
My knees locked. I could just hear it. “Clean up on aisle six. A lady passed out and peed herself at the thought of actually purchasing one of these things.”
I closed my eyes and reached forward to grab the first box I touched. That wasn’t so bad, was it? I told myself that like I’d conquered the hardest part. Right. I carried the box as if it was a grenade across the white tile of the department store. Then, I hurried through the self-checkout. Anything to avoid the stare of the little old lady on register six who watched me buy two bottles of wine the day before. They were gifts, of course, but the register lady didn’t know that.
I downed a bottle of water on the way home to make sure I’d really have to pee. No need in dragging this out any longer than I had to, right? I popped a squat and tried to rip open the package. Holy cow. Talk about childproof. (The irony of that wasn’t lost on me). This thing was sealed up tighter than my grandma’s— Okay, I wasn’t going there. I waddled across the bathroom with my black lacy panties around my ankles and grabbed a pair of scissors from my make-up drawer. It was time to get the show on the road. That bottle of water wasn’t gonna hang around in my bladder much longer.
After all that work, I pulled the plastic stick from the package and looked around the room for hidden cameras. It had to be a joke. I was supposed to pee on this thing? It was like… an inch long. The chances of not splattering urine on my own hand were slim to none. Great. As if the experience wasn’t traumatic enough.
I grabbed the end of the stick with two fingers, tried not to fall off the toilet, and let the living waters flow. Oh man, I really had to pee. Please don’t let the stick fall in the toilet. Pleeeeeease don’t let the stick fall in the toilet. I hoped I’d held it tight enough. I peeked to make sure I actually hit my target because I definitely did not want to do this again.
Then I waited.
For what seemed like the longest two minutes of my life. It stared at me, the little purple and white stick on the bathroom counter. If it had a tongue, it would’ve stuck it out at me every time I walked from the bedroom to the bathroom to check it. Then it was back to the edge of the bed where I tapped my feet nervously on the floor and glanced around the room and out the window like I was going to find a great prophetic awakening out there. Then, I paced back to the bathroom. I repeated this erratic process at least nine times in the two-minute eternity until finally the timer on my phone chimed and all bets were off.
I stood in the doorway of my master bath, staring at the countertop, my feet frozen to the floor. Everything else that surrounded me was a blur. The only thing that existed was me and that stick. A million thoughts raced through my head at once. Would I be a cute pregnant woman, or would I need to wrap myself in a tent to hide my cankles? If it was a boy, how would I know how to potty train him? If I breast-fed, would my boobs stay big and plump forever? Did women really poop while giving birth? ‘Cause that could get ugly. Most of all, how was I going to tell my (almost officially) ex-husband that I was having his baby? So much for closure.
One line. One beautiful little pink line. Not two. Just. One.
A wave of relief washed over my body, and my vision cleared again. I could finally breathe. My feet were no longer nailed to the floor, and the overbearing throbbing of my pulse in my ears came to a halt when I looked once more at the negative pregnancy test.
I fell to the ground and clutched my knees to my chest. Negative. I placed a hand on my abdomen. “Not today, ladies,” I whispered to my ovaries. Thank God, not today.
Chapter Two
Jayce
“Good morning, Mr. Sterling,” Big Al, the security guard, greeted me when I walked through the revolving doors of the tall, glass building.
Traffic on 59 was murder, and the barista got my coffee order wrong. Caramel doesn’t belong in coffee. Ever. Not a great start for a Friday morning. But none of that is Al’s fault, so I raised my coffee cup and smiled in response.
“Morning, Al. How’s your week been?”
“Beautiful, sir. Just beautiful,” he replied. His bright grin beamed across the lobby. That was his reply every Friday morning. I wondered if the man ever had a bad week. If he did, he never let it show.
I placed my cell phone, watch, and wallet into a clear, plastic tray and watched as it slid through the scanner on the conveyor belt. Then, I passed through the metal detector and let Al run an electronic wand over my body. A pain in the neck, yes, but at one of the top fine jewelry suppliers in the world, it was a necessary evil. No purses. No backpacks. And no jewelry other than a wedding ring and a watch. No one got in or out without passing through security. And no one was exempt from the process. Not even me.
I took the elevator to my corner office on the eleventh floor, smiling at a woman I didn’t recognize. I made it a point to try to memorize every face, even if I didn’t
always remember every name. Occasionally, a new face would appear, a new employee, fresh and vibrant and eager to work. I took great pride in making the newbies feel right at home. My signature might be on the bottom right corner of every paycheck, but I wasn’t any more important than any of the three-hundred and seventy-one people I employed at Sterling’s Silver.
I stepped off the elevator and without thinking, took another sip of my coffee. I choked it back in order not to spit it out. Then, I tossed the cup in the stainless-steel trash can in the hall. Could I still call myself a man if I’d just had liquid cotton candy for breakfast?
Sydney waved at me from behind her large mahogany desk. The black lacquered top was already littered with the day’s work. Despite the chaos scattered across her work area, she was the most efficient personal assistant to ever work for me. Underneath thick locks of platinum blonde hair, her brain was a sponge for information. She never forgot a name, a date, or an appointment.
“Good morning, Mr. Sterling,” she almost sang as she handed me a manila folder.
I flipped it open and scanned the contents of the first page while I walked to my office. “Good morning, Sydney. I thought this was next week?” I asked, noting the change in the day’s schedule.
Sydney shrugged. “Garrett sent an email first thing this morning. He wants to meet this afternoon instead.”
Garrett Frost: anal-retentive, micro-managing jewelry distributor who ran his company like a drill sergeant running a boot camp. Sterling’s Silver had been doing business with Garrett since day one. Out of all of my clients, Garrett was the one thorn in my side. This was a job for real coffee.
“Of course, he does,” I called out over my shoulder then closed my office door before she could throw any more surprises my way.
First things first. I walked over to the stainless-steel coffee pot, inserted a pod, and pressed start. Coffee first. Then Garrett.
Twenty-five unread emails since I checked them from my phone before I left my penthouse. The subject line of the one on top caught my eye. “Cracked the Case…” From Bennett.
Inside the email in large vibrant color was a snapshot of a man in a hospital gown. From behind. It wasn’t pretty. It was the opposite of pretty. It was white. And hairy. Was he bending over? I was scared to look any closer. Above the photo Bennett had typed, “NSFW.”
Usually the “Not Safe for Work” warning belongs on the outside. You know, in case I’m actually at work.
“The warning goes on the outside of the email, genius,” I said when Bennett answered his phone.
The line filled with laughter. “You should know by now not to open my emails at work.”
He was right. I should’ve known. The water gurgled and spit, filling the air above the pot with steam as the coffee finished brewing.
“You didn’t open it in front of that hot blonde piece, did you?” Bennett asked.
That was Bennett. Successful financial advisor for a huge firm in Houston, but mentally still living in a frat house at U of H. He was the same obnoxious flirt he’d been since eighth grade. His sister recently gave him the hairbrained idea to write a novel, so that kept him occupied when he wasn’t working his day job. Every time he came across these little gems during his research, he’d always send them my way. It kind of made me wonder what kind of book he was writing.
“She’s my assistant, not a piece of property. And no. I’m in my office,” I said.
“Good. I’m trying to make a good impression on that one.”
I’d had my fair share of dates. I didn’t do commitments. That wasn’t a secret. The women I went out with knew exactly what to expect… and what not to. A nice dinner, a fancy party, a night at the ballet— that was all I could give. No one ever made it past a couple of dates. Because no one was her. But I wasn’t a pig, not like Bennett. One day he was going to meet a woman who would change all that. I hoped.
I walked away from my computer and across the soft gray carpet. “Try not to scare this one off. She’s actually good at her job.”
Bennett laughed it off in response, as if his attention was a gift rather than a curse. “You all packed for this weekend?”
Packed? This weekend? As in… now? It was already Friday. And we didn’t have plans. I poured my coffee. The dark liquid swirled around the bottom of the oversized mug. No sugar. No cream. No caramel. The way coffee was supposed to be. I stopped a moment to peer out of the floor-to-ceiling window in front of me.
When I would visit the city as a kid, the buildings that lined the streets of downtown Houston seemed like giant beanstalks that reached the sky. I always wondered what it would be like to walk inside one of the monsters made of glass and steel. Now I owned one. They didn’t have buildings like that where I grew up. The only giant in Clover Creek was the secret I was forced to keep, the secret I wished I’d never known.
“Packed?”
“Yes. That thing you do when you throw a bunch of clothes into a suitcase.”
I went back to my desk and scrolled through the rest of my emails. “Where am I going?” I asked, putting Bennett on speakerphone.
“Costa Rica. We talked about this last month. Deep sea fishing?” Bennett said, as though he’d repeated the fact a hundred times.
I stopped scanning numbers long enough to think. Nothing rang a bell. “I have plans with Monica.”
“Dude. You just met her a week ago. And it’s dinner. It’s not like you’re going to date her or anything. You have plans with us.”
I was organized to a fault. I planned my life down to what tie I would wear next Thursday. I’d never forget a planned fishing trip to Costa Rica.
Poker night.
That was the only explanation. They talked me into it when I was drinking... and I wasn’t a drinker. Three beers in and anything goes.
I took another sip, letting the hot liquid sit on my tongue for a second before swallowing. “When are we supposed to leave?”
“Saturday morning. 8 a.m.”
“Fine,” I agreed, knowing I didn’t really have much of a choice anyway. A trip to Costa Rica was better than having three grown men camp out in my living room drinking beer and ordering take-out all weekend. I swear I was the only grown-up in the whole group.
“How are we getting there?” As if I even needed to ask.
Awkward silence.
“Right,” I said, finally. “My plane.”
“See? I knew you’d remember,” Bennett chimed in, and I could almost see his camera perfect smile through the phone.
“I’ll have Sydney get all the paperwork ready. We leave at 8 a.m. You boneheads better be there at 7:45.”
“Aye, aye, Captain,” he said with a ridiculously phony accent that would make any pirate cringe.
“It’s a plane, not a ship.” I shook my head then ended the call with a laugh.
How bad could it be? A weekend in Costa Rica sure beat a weekend crunching numbers and pretending I didn’t hate being alone.
Chapter Three
Claire
The blaring ring of the final school bell of the year blasted through the hallways and classrooms. Children shouted and scrambled to load their backpacks with papers and workbooks. One more hour of car duty, then I was free to pass Go and collect my two-hundred dollars.
“Carson, don’t forget your pencil pouch,” I called out after the ten-year-old as he hurried to beat the line out the door.
I rolled my eyes and let out a sigh when he completely ignored my reminder. Nine weeks of relaxation and solitude. Books and wine… and quiet. That was my mantra the entire walk down the hallway to the double doors on the side of the building. Exercise was not on my to-do list for today, but here I was— speed walking like I was training for a marathon— the kind where they offer chocolate and wine at the finish line. I made it just in time to catch Carson and his father at the front of the line.
“You almost forgot this,” I said, handing the bag through the open car window.
Carson’s father
smiled and nudged his son on the arm. “What do you say?”
The little boy looked up at me then buckled his seat belt and sighed. “Thank you.”
It was exaggerated and drawn out, but I appreciated the effort. “You’re welcome,” I replied with a grin of my own. “Have a great summer, you two.” I started to back away from the oversized pick-up truck when Carson’s father stopped me.
“I know this is probably a little awkward—” Colby started.
“Dad,” Carson interrupted, burying his face in his hands.
I laughed with Colby and waited for him to continue.
“Now that school’s over… and technically you aren’t Carson’s teacher—”
“Dad,” Carson shouted, a little louder that time before throwing his head back against the leather seat. Adorable. Both of them.
“Yes?” I knew full well where this was going. The man attended every open house, book fair, and parent-teacher conference all year long with no sign of a wife. The second my wedding ring had come off my finger, the corny jokes and flirty comments had begun.
“Maybe we could have dinner sometime?”
I glanced over my shoulder at the growing line of cars behind them. It was time to go ahead and put him out of his misery.
“I’m flattered, Colby. I really am. But—”
He held his hand up before I completely butchered his manhood. “It’s okay. It’s probably too soon.” He looked away for a second then back at me. “Yeah. Too soon. Maybe another time… When you’re ready.”
“Maybe,” I said with a smile. Then I stepped away from his truck and waved the next car forward.
When you’re ready. I’d had my heart broken twice in one lifetime. I didn’t think I’d survive it the first time. I was still cleaning up the wreckage from the second. Ready? I didn’t know if I would ever be ready again.
Clover Creek (Sweet Southern Nights Book 1) Page 1