by Zoe Dawson
“But not about the baby?”
“No. Not that.”
“Oh, dear. Well, you know best. I just wanted to offer you a partnership.”
“But, Minnie, I haven’t even shown my collection yet.”
“It’s going to be a hit. I have no doubt, Verity. I want you to work with me. You could go to school if you chose to, or we can just keep putting out great stuff. That’s up to you.”
“I’ve always wanted to go to school.”
My line of vision slammed into Boone. He was talking to Brax, Booker, Aubree, and that blond kid, Deke. The three Outlaws, even dressed appropriately for church, looked just as tough and disreputable as they had in high school. My heart literally twisted with the feelings I had for Boone.
I looked away, wondering why I had thought coming back here was a good idea. Minnie could see my distress and she slipped her arm around me.
“What am I going to do?” I said softly, still looking at Boone.
“Are you involved with one of those very attractive men?”
“Yes. The one dressed in that blue button-down. His name is Boone.”
“And the blond bloke? What is his name?” Her eyes roamed over him.
“Deacon West.”
“He could easily be a male model. He has that very unique look. Exactly how old is he?”
“Minnie!?”
“Well, how old?”
“He’s eighteen.”
“Oh, dear. Four years’ difference.”
“He’s going to Columbia in the fall, studying engineering. He’s going to be in New York City as a freshman.”
“Oh, dear,” she said, “He’s smart, too? Oh, my.” Just then Deke looked over and took in Minnie’s riotous red curly hair and her tall, willowy body. Those ocean eyes of his held interest and his mouth curved up in a very male half smile.
“Oh, dear. Oh, dear.” Minnie said again. “Why don’t you show me your spare room before that boy gets me into trouble?”
I groaned and headed for the house.
#
Boone
As I got out of my truck outside of Outlaws to bartend the Monday after we sang in service, I was disgruntled. I’d only caught a glimpse of Verity today, and she’d told me she couldn’t make it to see me tonight because her friend was in town and she obviously couldn’t leave her alone. I’d gotten used to having her in my arms when I slept, and I didn’t like the idea of going home to an empty house.
I also got a bad feeling from her, like something had shifted. Like she was distant and pulling away from me. Maybe she thought it would be easier this way. But it only drove me fucking crazy. I was trying not to read anything into her actions. But after spending so much time with her, I was lonesome.
I’d only taken three steps when something hit me hard in the head from behind. I went down, but was so used to scrambling in high school, it was second nature for me to roll. Normally when a guy attacks, he’s going for the kick after the first blow. My head was reeling, but I made myself move.
As I came up to face whoever hit me, I got slugged in the jaw and knocked into the dumpster, hard. Through my ringing head and my blurry vision I realized there was more than one attacker.
Several blows hit me, to the face and to my ribs, and this time I went to my knees. Someone grabbed my hair and pulled my head back. “He has a dominion known as the dominion of darkness.” The guy said, then I heard a shout and he let go of my hair and they disappeared into the night.
I collapsed to my hands, spitting blood.
“Geezus,” Brax said. “Fucking bastards. Are you all right?”
“I don’t know.” Trying to clear my head, I staggered as he slipped his arm under me and helped me up. He walked me straight to his car and helped me into the passenger side.
I leaned my head back. “What the hell was that about?” Brax said.
“I have no idea.”
“Who the hell did you piss off?”
“Just Billy Joe Freeman, but it could have been friends of Marcy’s, I guess.”
“Right. Marcy. I bet she wasn’t happy about getting fired.”
“No, I’m sure she wasn’t. But she deserved it. She’s lucky Verity didn’t press charges against her for assault.”
“Fuck, Boone.”
“Where are you taking me?”
“To the hospital.”
“No, no hospital. I’m just a little banged up.”
“Boone.”
“Fucking take me home.”
We argued, but he finally turned the car around and drove me home. When I got there Booker was waiting for me, and I told him I wasn’t a fucking baby and to go home. Aubree just looked upset, and I softly told her I was okay.
I disappeared into the bedroom, just plain angry about getting my ass kicked. Really, would anything ever change? Verity’s distance since Sunday was weighing on me. My mouth hurt like a sunuvabitch and my ribs were starting to throb.
I dragged myself into the bathroom and yanked open the medicine cabinet a little too hard, so everything came spilling out. I heard someone behind me and wasn’t in the mood for any more of my brothers’ coddling.
I spun around. “Booker, dammit. I’m fine! I can take care of this.”
Verity was standing there. Her eyes were tortured, and tears welled and slipped down her cheeks when she looked at my face.
“Oh, God, Boone. Oh, sugar. Aubree called me.”
We met halfway and her arms went around me and I closed my eyes. “Don’t cry, darlin’. I can handle anything but that. Your tears turn me inside out.”
She clutched me to her. “Who did this to you?”
“I don’t know. The guy said something right before Brax chased them off.”
“What did he say?”
“He has a dominion known as the dominion of darkness.”
She stiffened and then pulled away from me. “That’s from scripture. It’s a-a reference to the devil.” She backed up. “Oh, my God. Billy Joe did this to you. He’s so not the man my daddy thinks he is. You have to go to the sheriff.”
“I can’t. I have no proof and it’s Freeman’s word against mine. I wouldn’t stand a chance.”
“This is my fault. This is all my fault.”
She backed up.
She ran out of the bathroom.
“Verity!”
I went after her and caught her before she got to the door. “Don’t let him do this to us. Don’t let him come between us.”
She stood there rigid and wiping at her tears. Then she turned to me and wrapped her arms around my neck. She took my hand and led me back to the bathroom. She cleaned me up and we laid down together on the bed. I tried to stay awake, but with the feel of her stroking my hair and kissing me softly wherever it didn’t hurt, I fell asleep.
When I woke up, she was gone.
I had a terrible, ugly feeling she wasn’t coming back.
Chapter Sixteen
Boone
Verity wouldn’t answer my calls. She wouldn’t come to the door when I knocked at her house. She refused to talk to me or see me. By the second day, I was getting frantic. She was going to leave.
In spite of all that, while Deke and I finished up the rectory gazebo and hauled in the picnic tables and installed the barbeque, I worked methodically. Deke knew there was something wrong, but he didn’t ask.
When I started to install the plants, I felt exhausted. I wasn’t sleeping well. I heard her voice just outside the rectory. She didn’t see me, so she probably wasn’t aware that I was here.
I stood and walked around the corner, and when she saw me, her eyes went soft and painful.
“Boone,” she said, her voice raw with emotion.
I drew an uneven breath at the sound of it. In my name she said everything I wanted to hear. I didn’t think. I didn’t form any thoughts. I just walked up to her and pulled her against me and kissed her. She made a soft sound in her throat and after a moment, she pulled me to her tightly.
Her mouth connected with mine in a kiss that was filled with a passion that drove every conscious thought out of my head. Rising on tiptoe, she molded herself against me as I shifted my hold, bringing her against me from shoulder to thigh. Nothing was held back in that kiss—nothing. And I felt the fire in her, the wonderful, hot, all-consuming fire that seemed to come from her very soul. Fuck, it was the most overpowering feeling I’d ever felt. And that’s when I knew.
I knew how I felt about Verity.
I knew what I had to tell her.
She looked up at me, her eyes smoky. I didn’t give her any time to talk. I picked her up in my arms and walked to my truck. She held onto me. I set her in and shut the door and walked around to the other side and got in. We didn’t say anything, but she reached out and curled her hand over mine. I held onto her like a lifeline. I called Deke and told him to call Savannah and have her finish the installations and for him to help her. I wasn’t going to be available.
Once I got to my house, I went around and pulled her out and carried her inside.
I stopped inside the door and set her down, then crowded her against the wall. Pressed my body and my mouth to hers. My heart was bursting and pounding so hard I didn’t think I could catch my breath.
I cupped her face. “Talk to me, Verity. Please, just talk to me.”
“Oh, Boone. Everything is so awful. I feel so awful.”
“This isn’t your fault. You didn’t hire three guys to work me over, as if that’s going to change my mind about you. It was Freeman, and I won’t be intimidated by him or anyone. Don’t pull back from me.”
“You sweet fool. I can’t bear it that you got hurt because of me.”
“Verity, I just got my ass kicked. I’ll heal, but I don’t think my heart will heal if you leave.”
“Boone, don’t. This is painful enough.”
“I can’t help it, Verity. I’m in love with you. I know it hasn’t been long, but sometimes shit like that happens. I need you. Please, don’t go.”
“What did you just say?”
“Don’t go.”
“No, not that part.”
“That I love you. An out-of-control, can’t-live-without-you, consuming, joyous, think-about-you-all-the-time love.”
She breathed out a small, soft sob. “Oh, I love you, too, Boone. More than I thought I could ever love anyone. I love being with you, love everything about you. Your sweetness. Your kindness, your body, your smile and the way you make me laugh. The way you make love to me.”
I felt shattered and put back together again—just like that—and everything I had ever thought about myself, all my bullshit just dissolved into nothing.
I closed my eyes, and finally it seemed like for the first time in two days I could breathe. “You’re not leaving. Tell me you’re not leaving.”
“I’m not. I couldn’t leave you now. I just couldn’t.”
The instant my mouth touched hers, I fought against the wild surge of emotion that made me shiver. With a low moan, she turned blindly into my arms, sliding her hands up my back in a desperate hold. Emitting a ragged groan, I took her mouth with a kiss that she returned, devastating my senses. My hand supported the back of her head and I locked my other arm around her hips, hauling her up against me. My mouth opened hungrily against hers, feeding a need that raged in me, and Verity sagged in my arms, the frenzy in my chest making it impossible to see, hear, feel, taste, or smell anything else.
I wrapped her hair around my hand, gently pulling her head back, asking for more, desperate for more, and she yielded, giving me access, drawing me as I probed the moist recesses of her delectable mouth, because I was famished for the taste of her. Another guttural sound was torn from me as she moved against me, and I widened my stance, pulling her hard against my groin, thrusting against her with a thick, heavy need. She cried out, and I drank in the sound of her response, the feel of my dick against her making my heart pound and clamor as a rush of hot, pulsating desire slammed through me. Caught in her own delirium of need, she brushed and slid against me, and the passion in me exploded, my hunger turning desperate, my need raging out of control.
She took care of my jeans, and I took care of hers, hauled her up against me and shoved inside. I pumped into her as she wrapped her arms around my neck and held onto me. There was no finesse, no gentleness, just a raw, greedy need that tore at my gut. She met my thrusts with her slim hips driving me higher, her mouth open on my neck, then we fused together, mouth to mouth, skin to skin, hip to hip. I thrust deep and my release was close, and when I came, she cried out with me, against my mouth.
I took her cry inside me, and, when I could move, I walked to my bedroom with Verity holding onto me like she was never going to let me go. We shucked the rest of our clothes and I folded down into bed with her and held her against me, both of us thoroughly exhausted from our thoughts and emotions over the last few days.
Even though it was early afternoon, we fell asleep.
I jerked awake, but then rested back as I felt Verity still wrapped around me. I knew what it was to have it bad, to be strung out. I knew how Booker felt and what he must have gone through with Aubree. I was determined that Verity and I were going to work this out. I would do what it took to keep her. Now that I knew she loved me, there were, as far as I was concerned, no more obstacles that really mattered.
She stirred in my arms. When her eyes opened she smiled at me. “Boone.”
“Hey, darlin’” I pushed up on my elbow and brushed back her hair. “You look fucking beautiful when you wake up.”
“I’ve heard that.”
“We can work this out.”
She closed her eyes and I sat up. “Verity, I want to play something for you.” I reached out and grabbed my guitar. I had it close to the bed because it gave me comfort to play it, and unless Verity was here, I played it every night before I went to sleep.
She sat up and I pulled her between my legs and set the guitar in her lap.
#
Verity
I was a complete and utter mess. When Boone said he wanted to play something for me and slipped the guitar over me, I pressed against his back. One of his arms went over me and the other grabbed the neck of the guitar.
He strummed the strings and the music vibrated through me.
“The first part of this song is a cappella. I love singing without music. It makes the message of the song so much more potent. I make my voice my instrument. This song is called ‘Storm.’”
His voice was so powerful. I was always so impressed with how he sang without music. The song was about getting lost and drowning into someone and how the singer knew that he would be saved.
As he sang, tears gathered in my eyes and each note was like a needle to my heart. Listening to him sing that song to me was one of the hardest things I’d ever had to do. The guilt and the lies twisted inside me, scoring my insides.
When he started playing the guitar after the first two verses, I was pressed between him and the instrument, his voice resonating against my back and the guitar vibrating against my chest. Trapped between the music, trapped in the truth.
I loved Boone. I was sure of that. But, how could I begin our relationship with this terrible secret between us? We started with a lie, and I was determined I would not end with one.
As the last note came to a close, I pushed at the guitar and slipped out of bed. I needed to be away from him.
“Verity?”
I pulled on my shirt and underwear and jeans. Boone got out of bed and donned his underwear and jeans. “What?”
“Sit down,” I said. “Please, Boone. Sit.”
He sat back on the bed.
I bit my lip. “There is something that I have to tell you. Something that I left out about the night we were together at the graduation party.” I started to cry again, and he moved to come to me, but I knew I had to get this out, so I backed up towards the bedroom door, holding out my hand. “No, Boone. Wait, let me get it out.”
“Verity, what is it?”
“I got pregnant, Boone.”
His eyes widened and he lunged off the bed. Suddenly, I felt a presence behind me. I was confused until I felt a cold pain in my back. I gasped at the sharp sensation. Then I was suddenly weak and, with a soft sigh, I slipped to the floor.
Boone shouted my name, but I was trying to understand what happened. Then I heard another voice.
“I’m going to cleanse her, devil. This is only the beginning. I’m going to cut out your heart and then I’m going to send her to her maker.”
“You fucking crazy bastard. Over my dead body.”
I was dimly aware that Billy Joe stepped over me casually, like I was a rug in his way. When he came into my line of sight, I saw he was holding a common, everyday kitchen knife. Boone picked up his guitar, it was the only weapon he had. Billy Joe laughed and lunged at Boone, who swung the guitar. He was trying to fend him off, keep him away from me, and the wood cracked, audible above the sounds of heavy breathing as Boone tried to hold Billy Joe off.
He shoved Billy Joe back, but Billy Joe swung the knife and slashed Boone along his rib cage. Blood splattered and Boone grunted and jerked back, but Billy Joe was pushing his advantage and he lunged. The light from the window glinted off the blade as it arched toward Boone’s face. Everything seemed to have slowed down for me. I felt my vision dimming and the slick wetness against my back. I wanted to move, to help Boone, but I couldn’t. My breathing was rapid, and shallow, like I couldn’t catch my breath.
The blade bit into his cheek, laying open the skin, sending more blood flying.
Boone cried out and as Billy Joe arched the knife back for another strike, Boone caught his wrist and twisted it.
I heard bone crack and Billy Joe screamed and dropped the knife. Boone kicked it and it slid under the bed and out of sight. All of Boone’s muscles seemed to swell as he swung at Billy Joe’s face with a powerful blow that snapped his head back. Boone punched him again and again. Blood blossomed at Billy Joe’s nose and mouth and he started to fall. Boone let him go and he fell on top of him, punching him again and again until Billy Joe lay still. Breathing hard, groaning with pain, blood all over him, Boone jerked the laces out of his boots, rolled Billy Joe over, and tied his hands behind him.