Clover Creek (Sweet Southern Nights Book 1)

by Heather Michelle

  I shook the thought away. It didn’t matter why he was here. I knew it had nothing to do with me. I swallowed hard and squared my shoulders. “Well, this day just keeps getting better…”

  I heard his quick intake of breath. “Claire…” His voice cut straight through the walls I’d hurried to put up. Not too hard to do when my walls were paper and his voice as strong as steel.

  “I’m assuming you aren’t here for me, so…” I pulled the door all the way open. “My parents are inside.” I kept my voice steady, but my heart raced. Breathe, Claire.

  Jayce cleared his throat and stepped further into view. The front porch light illuminated features that were hidden in the shadows. His strong jaw. His honey-golden eyes. Full lips.

  “No… I just… you just… It’s good to see you.” Something flickered in his eyes. “You look—”

  I placed a single finger over his mouth, cutting him off right there. The move was instinctual. Like it hadn’t been thirteen years since I’d touched him. His lips were so soft, so familiar... so forbidden. “Let me stop you right there. Save those next words for someone who wants to hear them.”

  He smiled underneath my fingertip and I quickly pulled it away. My skin tingled where it had touched him. The kind of tingle that went straight from my lady bits down to my pinky toes. My mother walked up before Jayce could respond. At least I’d shut him up before he said something he’d regret. I didn’t want to know how he thought I looked. They were just empty words anyway. Why was he here?

  “Jayce,” my mother said when she spotted him in the doorway. “How can we help you?”

  The look on her face wasn’t a pleasant one. Maybe they didn’t know he was coming.

  His smile dropped. My mother always seemed to have it out for Jayce. I never could figure out why. “Mrs. Cunningham, it’s nice to see you.” My mother forced a smile. It was stiff and cold and completely fake. Jayce had to see that. I certainly did. “I don’t mean to bother you—” he started to explain. I felt sorry for him. Then again, I always felt sorry for anyone that had to deal with my mother.

  “And yet, here you are…” Abigail pulled her brows together and studied Jayce.

  Well, that was awkward. I took that as my cue to slip past Jayce and call it a night. Say goodbye to the both of them and all the memories they brought back.

  “I wouldn’t be here if it wasn’t important. My father needs your help.”

  His words stopped me from taking another step. “Your dad? Is he okay?” Instant worry shadowed my face.

  “Yes… and no.” Jayce replied.

  “I know why you’re here, and I can’t help you. It will have to wait until Monday,” my mother quipped. Her tone was clipped and cold. Did she have a heart in there at all? Surely, she knew Jared Sterling was sick.

  “Mom—"

  “Claire, this has nothing to do with you,” my mother warned.

  “He’s sick. Surely you know he’s sick…”

  Jayce turned to look at me. His eyes were full of curiosity. “How did you know… Never mind.” He shook his head and turned back to my mother. “Mrs. Cunningham, it’s not what you think.”

  “We don’t arrest innocent people here, Jayce.”

  Arrested? Jared was arrested? And Jayce needed my mother’s help getting him out of jail. Of course. That’s why he was here.

  “He wasn’t drinking,” Jayce explained.

  Drinking? Jared didn’t drink. Why would my mother think Jared was drinking? The whole conversation was giving me whiplash.

  “I’m aware. I’m also aware that driving under the influence isn’t exclusive to alcohol. Are you?” my mother countered.

  She had that look in her eyes, the one she brought to the courtroom, the one she gave me whenever we argued. The one that said Abigail Cunningham’s word is the law. And unfortunately for Jayce, this time that was true.

  “He was in pain, so he took a pill. He can’t miss work. He could lose his job, Abigail.”

  He just called my mother by her first name. Only my father and her friends did that. Jayce Sterling meant business. It was kind of hot. I felt like an outsider looking in on an intimate conversation. I should go. This wasn’t my business. But at the same time, a sick man sat alone in a jail cell. A man I’d cared about regardless of my feelings for his son. And my mother had the power to help him.

  “Mom, could you just suck it up and hear him out? For once. Please,” I pleaded, not for Jayce, but for his father.

  “He could’ve hurt people,” my mother sighed. “You don’t know the whole story.”

  I didn’t need the whole story. A sick man was in pain, so he took a pill. Now he could lose his job. “Mom…”

  “Fine.” My mom stepped aside to allow Jayce room to go inside. “Come in. Let’s talk.”

  A sense of pride rushed through me. All the years I’d tried to reason with my mother and never got through meant nothing compared to how I felt right then. She would help Mr. Sterling, and that was all that mattered.

  “Well, I’ll let you two kids have at it, then,” I said with a grin. I unknowingly placed my hand on Jayce’s arm. The tingle came back in full force. I couldn’t jerk my hand back the way I wanted to. That would be rude… and way too obvious. No. I had to pretend that being so close to him didn’t make my ovaries feel like they were about to explode. “Good luck in there.”

  His eyes held me in place for a moment longer. “Thanks.”

  I nodded and waved over my shoulder as I moved past. “Bye Mom. I’ll call you later.” I hurried my steps, letting my voice trail off in the distance.

  When I reached the end of the walkway, I stopped and caught my breath. What in the world just happened?

  Chapter Ten

  Jayce

  The last thing I expected to see when I walked up the familiar brick walkway to the Cunningham’s front door was Claire. Her skin was sun-kissed —not in an artificial way— but like she’d spent a lot of time outside. Her hair was longer than I remembered. And her touch… It had only been seconds since she’d touched me, and I already wanted to feel it again. If I took every memory I had of Claire Cunningham and multiplied it by a thousand, it wouldn’t compare to how it felt to stand in front of her again with our bodies just inches apart. I watched Claire’s silhouette move to the edge of the circle driveway. My Range Rover was parked by the mailbox right next to... Where was her car?

  “Jayce?” Abigail’s voice cut through my thoughts, forcing me to turn and face her.

  Her mouth formed a firm grim line as she watched me watch her daughter. There were a million things I wanted to say. Things I’d rehearsed in my mind at least a hundred times. I wanted to run down the driveway and grab Claire by the hand and make her listen to them. But one look at her mother’s face and I was reminded why I couldn’t. I’d rather let Claire resent me for leaving than have her hate me for telling her why.

  I stepped all the way inside, flinching when the door closed with a heavy click behind me. “I promise not to take up too much of your time,” I told Abigail as I followed her into the living room.

  Not a single thing had changed since the last time I was here. Pictures of landscapes hung where most people kept family portraits. Law encyclopedias lined built-in shelves that were usually reserved for classic literature. The cozy sectional didn’t look a day more worn than it did thirteen years ago. It’s hard to wear out a sofa that no one ever sits on. Carter Cunningham sat in a leather chair in front of the fireplace. His smile welcomed me.

  “Hi, Jayce. How’s your father doing?”

  It was small talk. Carter was the only doctor in Clover Creek. He knew how my father was doing, but the question was thoughtful.

  “He has good days and bad days. I’d say today falls under the bad.” I turned my attention to Abigail. “He’ll be better once I can get him home.”

  Claire’s mother folded her arms across her chest. Her long, slender frame leaned against the side of one bookcase. “I’ll grant him bail and post
pone his hearing on three conditions.”

  Three? She wasn’t going to let this go easily. I knew it. The woman was a master at holding grudges. I hoped that wasn’t genetic.

  Claire’s father took a sip of his drink then nodded toward the sectional in front of him. “Have a seat.”

  I shook my head. I was ready to get out of here the moment the door closed behind me. Partly because being around Abigail Cunningham was more uncomfortable than presenting to my board of directors. But mostly because Claire was right outside the front door. What if she left and I never got to see her again? What if after all this time that two minutes was all we got? I needed to go. I needed to stop her before she was gone.

  “Thank you, but I really should get going soon,” I said, hoping Abigail’s conditions didn’t require typing up a contract.

  Carter took another sip of his drink, finishing it off. Then he set the glass on the table next to his chair and leaned back. “Of course. I’m sure this won’t take long.”

  Abigail uncrossed her arms and walked toward her husband. She grabbed the glass from the table and started walking across the open space into the kitchen. She ran the glass under the faucet to rinse it out then set it on the counter. She took her time. On purpose.

  I stuffed my hands into my pockets and watched her with my mouth shut. My mind raced with a few choice thoughts, but I wasn’t about to say something we’d both regret. An unwelcomed tension drew the walls in around us. It was almost too tight to breathe.

  Finally, Abigail spoke. “I’m suspending your father’s license. Indefinitely.”

  Of course, she was. She probably expected her first condition to stimulate some sort of shock value or an argument on my part. Without a license, there was no way for my father to get to work. I’d just finished telling Abigail the man couldn’t afford to miss a day of work, and now she’d made it nearly impossible for him to get there at all.

  I pushed my hands deeper into my pockets. “Fair enough,” I said smoothly, with no expression on my face.

  It wasn’t fair. It was spiteful. But I wasn’t about to argue that point. I was resourceful. I’d figure something out.

  Abigail refilled Carter’s glass from a nearby pitcher and walked it over to him. She moved to sit in the chair next to him but paused to look back at me. “And of course, the fence will need to be repaired.”

  I knew my father had run off the road and into a fence. It didn’t come as a surprise that the fence would need to be replaced. “I’ll call someone first thing Monday morning.”

  Abigail shook her head. “I’ll need it done sooner. My mother-in-law refuses to leave her house because of the damage your father did. The fence needs to be fixed this weekend. I won’t have her feeling like a prisoner in her own home.”

  Her mother-in-law? As in Claire’s Gram? My father ran into Justine Cunningham’s fence. No wonder Abigail was on the warpath.

  “I understand. I’ll get it done in the morning.”

  I did understand. Maybe a little too well. I didn’t want Claire’s Gram feeling like she couldn’t leave her house because of something my father had done. During one of my stays at the B&B, Mrs. Abraham mentioned that Justine Cunningham was sick. Dementia, she had told me. For as long as I could remember, that might as well have been a four-letter-word in the Cunningham house. Now they were dealing with it on a first-hand basis. If that wasn’t irony, I didn’t know what was.

  Abigail walked to the edge of the sofa not far from where I stood. Her perfectly arched eyebrows formed a tight line as her eyes narrowed. I pulled my hands from my pockets and straightened my shoulders. We looked like two opponents ready for Round One.

  Abigail was an attractive woman. Her face was delicate and feminine. On the outside, she looked almost regal. On the inside, she was bitter and hard. “Last, but certainly not least,” she said with a twisted smirk on one corner of her mouth. “I need you to stay away from my daughter.”

  “Stay away from my daughter.”

  Abigail’s words were both a warning and a promise. She didn’t want me anywhere near Claire. Why would she? I was the man who broke her daughter’s heart, and Abigail knew exactly why I did it. But why would she warn me to stay away? Unless she knew Claire wasn’t leaving...

  Claire wasn’t leaving.

  I’d fix the fence. And I’d figure out a way to get my father to work. But I wasn’t staying away from Claire. As much as I knew I shouldn’t, as hard as my brain pushed me to keep my distance, my heart took one look at her and I knew I couldn’t stay away. I would see her again. The only question was… when?

  Chapter Eleven

  Claire

  I touched him. Twice. What in the world was I thinking? My hand felt like it was on fire. Touching someone like Jayce as an eighteen-year-old girl was a very different experience from touching him as a thirty-one-year-old woman.

  Touching in general was different. As a teenager, touching was more about things like curiosity and wishful thinking. Puppy love. As adults, touching was much more intimate. Every stroke of the cheek or accidental shoulder brush was filled with emotion and experience. And I touched Jayce. Twice. I was intimate with him. Twice.

  The worst part about it was that I didn’t hate it. I didn’t hate him. Seeing his face, hearing his voice, brought back so many memories. Every detail of the time we’d spent together left an imprint on my heart that burned at the sight of him. Like a scar when the weather changes.

  I had to leave. Jayce wasn’t going to stay inside talking to my mother any longer than he had to. Not only that, but my Gram had been in an accident, and I had no idea how bad it was. Four blocks. My Gram lived four blocks away. Just a few streets over. The walk would do me some good. Clear my mind. I hoped.

  The Nicholson’s dog barked from behind their white picket fence. A porch light flicked on, and I waved at Mrs. Nicholson as I walked past. It was dark out, and the tree-lined sidewalks made it difficult for the street lamps to do their job. But Mrs. Nicholson waved back anyway before she stuck her head back inside and closed the door.

  I saw the headlights reflecting off the mailbox in front of me before I heard the engine. A vehicle pulled close to the curb and slowed to a near stop right behind me. It was Jayce. I knew it. I felt it.

  “You shouldn’t be walking around in the dark,” he called from his open window.

  I looked straight ahead while his SUV inched alongside me. “This isn’t the big city. Pretty sure I’m safe.”

  “I didn’t say you weren’t safe. Just that you shouldn’t be walking.”

  I couldn’t see him, but I knew he was smiling. It echoed in his voice. Smug as ever. I stopped walking and his vehicle stopped moving. I exhaled and steeled myself then marched over the small patch of grass to the curb where Jayce was now parked.

  I peered my head through the open passenger side window. “I happen to like walking.”

  His lips curved into a smile. It was heart-stopping, proud, and… pure male. His light eyes reflected the glimmers of the street lights. “I remember.”

  My eyes clouded with visions of the past, of the two of us walking this same path to my Gram’s after school. From there we would walk to Freddie’s Diner. I would swear I didn’t want fries then eat half of his. We argued over which milkshake was better, strawberry or chocolate. It was one of my favorite memories as a teenager. But that’s all it was, a memory. We weren’t those people anymore.

  I blinked my thoughts away. “I need to go. My Gram, she’s—”

  “I know.”

  “There was an accident.”

  “I know.” How did he know when I didn’t even know until ten minutes ago? I heard the lock on the door of the SUV click. “I’ll take you. I need to get my dad and it’s on the way.”

  His dad. How selfish could I be? I was worried about fanning the fire of old flames and Jayce’s father was stuck in jail… because of my mother.

  “It’s fine. Really. I don’t mind walking. Go get your dad.”

&nb
sp; Jayce leaned across the center console and pulled on the door handle. The door cracked open enough to nudge me backwards. “You always were stubborn. You might as well get in because I’m not moving until you do.”

  Stubborn? He was one to talk. When we were in ninth grade, Jayce found a note Michael Willoughby left in my locker for Avery and got the wrong idea. The football locker room had never heard as much colorful language as it did when Jayce got a hold of Michael. I was so embarrassed about the whole thing that I’d walked home alone and refused to take Jayce’s calls. So, he spent the entire night on my front porch swing. It had to have been ninety degrees out that night. Not to mention the mosquitoes.

  I pulled the door open and slid inside. I buckled my seatbelt then tossed my hands into my lap and huffed like a spoiled toddler.

  Leather seats. Wood grain dash and a touch screen stereo. And that smell— clean, crisp, and so very Jayce. If anyone looked in my car, they’d probably find a stack of losing lottery tickets and a handful of Skittles buried under a pile of forgotten t-shirts.

  Jayce shifted the Range Rover into gear and pulled away from the curb. I stared down at my fingers in order to keep from stealing glances at him. I expected the silence to be awkward, but it wasn’t. Why couldn’t I just hate him?

  “I’m sorry about your dad,” I finally said.

  Jayce turned right at the stop sign. “I’m sorry about your Gram,” he said, avoiding the subject.

  I forced myself to look away from him. The pain in his voice was hard enough. I didn’t want to see it in his eyes too. Especially if it was anything like what I was feeling. So many emotions fought for control inside my heart. I was worried about my Gram. I was sad for Jayce’s dad. I wanted everything to go back to the way it was, when it was me and Jayce taking on the world. And I wanted to forget I ever knew the man sitting next to me. It was like an emotional tug-of-war pulling me in all directions.

  The sound of a phone ringing echoed through the car’s sound system and pulled me back to reality. The name Monica glowed like a big neon sign on the touch screen display in front of us.