by K. Langston
“Son,” I blinked when the sound of his father’s voice met my ears. It carried the same deep tone as his son’s and from studying his strong jaw and rugged features, it was clear to see where Cannon got his rough edge from.
“Dad.” The two men embraced, giving each other a few slaps on the back like men do when they hug.
When they released one another, Cannon reached for my hand once more. “Dad, this is Cora.”
“We’ve heard a lot about you. Pleasure to have you here, young lady.”
I swung my eyes to Cannon, who looked almost embarrassed. “Thank you, Mr. Jacobs.”
“Please, call me Titus.” He said wrapping an arm around his wife’s shoulders, tucking her to his side. “And you can call me Ruby.”
The screen door slamming had me spinning in place to find a younger version of Cannon heading our way. “Holy shit, how’d you ever snag a chick this fine?” He was a little bit shorter than him and not near as broad, but you could tell they were brothers. They were almost identical in the face.
“Language in front of the ladies, son,” Titus scolded.
He gave his father a nod before he set his eyes on me. “Well hello there, beautiful, I’m Battle. Cannon’s single and better lookin’ brother,” the handsome boy stated before extending his hand.
“Annoying and conceited baby brother,” Cannon corrected, pulling him in for a hug. “And the girl is mine, asshole. Find your own.”
“Boys,” his father warned once more.
Battle tossed me a wink as he hugged his older brother. “You know me better than that. The ladies love me too much for me to keep just one. But you better treat her right man. Someone might steal her away.”
Cannon reached for my hand, interlocking our fingers. “Not a chance in hell.”
For a nineteen year old, Battle was definitely a charmer. Cannon had smiled fondly when he told me his brother was a sophomore in college, still living at home and mooching off his folks. He seemed a bit more carefree and relaxed than Cannon, harboring an easy smile and a carefree spirit. Then again he hadn’t seen the things Cannon had. Regardless, I liked him right away. After all Cannon had told me, I had a feeling I was going to fall in love with all of them.
We all made our way into their welcoming home. The hardwood floors were polished and covered with tasteful decorative rugs. There were family photos everywhere. I was dying to take a closer look. His past was something he didn’t share a lot of and I longed for those pieces of him.
“Why don’t you take Cora up and get settled, then when you come back down, I’ll make you two a snack,” Mrs. Jacobs said, stepping forward to embrace her son. Cannon released my hand to wrap his arms around her. “I’m so happy you’re home, baby.” When she pulled away, she cupped his face as tears shined in her loving eyes. Then her eyes shifted to mine.
Before I could blink, I was in his mother’s arms. “I’m so happy you’re here too, sweetie.” I hugged her back and watched with rapt attention as Cannon’s father clamped a hand to his shoulder, a silent yet intense conversation happening between them.
After the sweet moment in the foyer, Cannon led me upstairs while I tried in vain to dislodge my heart from my throat.
“This is your room,” he informed me as we entered the bright, open space. It had a large four post bed, covered in a gorgeous dove grey duvet and a good amount of pastel throw pillows. The curtains were sheer, allowing natural light to flood the room. A blue chair was tucked in the corner near the window with a small side table. Cannon released my hand flipping on the to reveal a Jack and Jill bathroom with a huge garden tub, fluffy towels rolled in a wicker basket on the floor and even a bar of lavender soap resting on a hand towel on the sink. “She goes all out when we have company.”
I smiled, wrapping my arms around his neck. I kissed his lips, sweetly at first, but it didn’t take long for the heat to build.
“Where’s your room?” I asked as he gathered his bag from the floor where he’d dropped it when we entered.
“Right next door. We have adjoining rooms,” he said with a sexy grin.
“You better lock your door at night.” I warned, collecting a step closer.
He opened his free arm and wrapped me in it. “You better lock yours.”
Cannon stole another kiss along with another piece of my heart.
After we were both respectively settled in our separate rooms, we returned downstairs together.
Cannon and Battle had been summoned to help their father man the grill, leaving Mrs. Ruby and I to the sides.
I was in the middle of peeling potatoes for the twice baked potato casserole when Cannon’s sister and her fiancé arrived. As with the rest of the family, Cannon had given me the low down.
Once crowned Miss Alabama, Noble Jacobs went on to win Miss America before she finally hung up her crown to peruse a career in politics. That’s when she met Tom Peterson. She’d helped manage his campaign for state senate three years ago and shortly after he’d won, by a landslide no doubt, he’d proposed. They were supposed to get married two years ago, but a close friend of the family passed away unexpectedly, so they decided to postpone it.
Mrs. Ruby moved past the topic pretty quickly before I could ask questions or even offer condolences, but I didn’t miss the tears in her eyes when she told me this, noting that it had been two years since Cannon had been here.
Tom was dressed in dark slacks and a white button down shirt. Noble was outfitted in a pair of white denim capris, a navy blue top and a pair of gold sandals. She was very stylish. Her light brown hair was pulled back in a messy ponytail at the base of her neck and she smiled warmly at me as she set her designer bag down on the other end of the table. “You must be Cora?” She said with a wide smile.
I stood from my seat and extended my hand, but she passed it up and wrapped me in her arms for a hug instead. I was beginning to learn that the Jacobs family was a very affectionate. “You’re real,” she whispered, squeezing me tight before letting go. Her smile was contagious. “This is my fiancé, Tom.” The man extended his hand, giving me a polite smile.
“Nice to meet you both,” I said, nervously.
Tom nodded then turned his attention to a beaming Noble. “Think I’ll go supervise, make sure they don’t burn anything.”
Noble kissed her fiancé on the cheek. “You do that, babe.”
She leaned in once he was out of earshot. “The man can’t cook a lick. The only think he’ll be supervising is the bottle of beer daddy hands him.”
I liked her already.
Noble took a seat in front of me. “So…I want to know all about the girl who managed to steal my brother’s heart.” Heat flushed my cheeks as I took my own seat and retrieved the potato I’d been peeling prior to her arrival.
“Don’t crowd her, Noble,” Mrs. Ruby said as she continued to work on her chocolate pie. “Go outside and say hello to your brother first.”
Noble stood, but she didn’t have to go far. Cannon walked through the back door, heading straight for his sister. She rushed him, wrapping her arms around him. “Cannon.”
Was she crying?
Why would he stay away for so long when he had a family who loved him so dearly? So much, I was almost green with envy.
They held each other for a long embrace before they finally let go. Then she slapped his chest before wiping tears from her eyes. “Don’t you ever stay away that long again, dammit.”
He smiled and wrapped his arm around her shoulders. “You meet my girl?”
Noble nodded. “Yep.”
“Well, what cha think?”
“Considering she’s the reason your ass is here…I say you better not ever let her go.”
Cannon’s eyes shot to mine. “Not a chance in hell.”
Dinner was a noisy, but entertaining affair. Although Cannon had not been home in some time, and this had a substantial emotional effect on the rest of the family, they didn’t let that show. While Battle and Cannon ribbed each other
, their parents took turns reprimanding them, even though I could see that this behavior was completely acceptable. It meant their family was together, gathered at this table filled with scraps of our leftover meal and enough love to go around. I took it all in. The smile on Nobles’ face as she gazed adoringly upon her two brothers, even throwing in a few jabs of her own when the opportunity presented itself.
Mrs. Ruby stood to gather plates, prompting me to do the same. “I got it honey,” she said, but I ignored her and followed her into the kitchen. “Dinner was delicious, Mrs. Ruby. I can’t thank you enough for welcoming me into your home.”
I turned to find Mrs. Ruby standing next to me, tears shimmering in her blue eyes. “That out there…you did that. You’re the reason he’s here. It’s me that should be thanking you, sweetie.”
She wrapped me in her arms, squeezing me tight enough to garner my own tears. “I love him very much,” I told her, my emotions thick in my throat.
“I can see that. I see his love for you too. You don’t know what it means to us to finally see him smiling again.”
It felt good to know I was the reason for his happiness. She hugged me again before returning to the dishes.
Once I finished helping Mrs. Ruby, Cannon took me out for a ride. I wanted to see where he grew up, where he came from. It was clear he came from a good family with a lot of love. But I also hoped to find some clue as to why he left it all behind. Because if I had a family like his, there’s no way I’d ever leave. We drove past his old high school, where he told me of his glory days as running back for the football team. He was even offered a few scholarships, but ultimately he’d chosen the Navy over college, set on following his father’s footsteps from a very young age.
The revelation made me smile. It was plain to see Cannon loved and admired his father. They were alike in many ways and seemed to share something stronger than just a father-son relationship.
Thirty minutes later, we were parked at the end of a beaten path that opened up to a secluded slice of heaven. Cannon’s family didn’t live far from Orange Beach, so Cannon had driven to a private section of the beach. When I asked about the No Trespassing signs, he told me the land belonged to an old friend and he had permanent permission to be here.
Cannon backed up to where the grass met the sand and killed the engine, leaving the key turned so we could keep the radio on. With the doors of the truck open, he laid down the tailgate and lifted me up by my waist to sit on the edge. He hopped up next to me.
The moon reflected off the surface of the water in front of us, flooding the night with a glowing light. Waves softly beat the shore in the distance as the faint sound of the radio faded away.
“Still looks the same.” He observed quietly, a slight smile tugging his full lips. “I came here a lot growing up. My friends and I, we’d have bonfires out here, camp. I stole my first real kiss behind that boulder over there.”
“Lucky girl. What was her name?”
“Mary-Ann. I had a crush on her for an entire year before she finally let me kiss her. That led to other things of course.”
“Was she your first?”
Cannon nodded.
“We were together almost two years before she broke up with me for another guy.”
“Ah, one of those.”
He nodded again.
“What happened after you broke up?”
He smiled thoughtfully. “I focused all my attention on school and football.”
“And girls?”
“Girls became a close third.”
“So you were a player?”
“Not necessarily.”
“But you didn’t have a girlfriend?”
“No,” he shifted uncomfortably. “But there was one girl.” His words were an afterthought, like it was the last thing he wanted to say but the moment forced him to acknowledge it. Because it was important to him. “I thought I loved her but…she fell in love with my best friend, so I knew it wasn’t meant to be.”
My mouth slipped, falling open at his revelation. I sucked back a deep breath, picking through the ways I could get him to continue. But I didn’t have to. With little more than a shaky breath, I finally found out who Landon was.
“We met Nikki coming home from football practice one day. She was on the side of the road with a flat. She was bent over, damn near in traffic, trying to get the lug nuts off the tire. So we stopped to lend her a hand, concerned for her safety, of course.”
“Of course,” I smiled, imagining just how pretty this girl must have been.
“Before we even got out of the truck, I called dibs. The second I saw those long legs in them cutoff jeans I knew I had to have her.”
“You got a thing for cutoffs, huh?”
“I like ‘em country, baby. Ain’t nothin’ wrong with that.”
I smiled. “Nope…nothin’ wrong with that,”
“Anyway, I don’t know why I even bothered. I thought I had her when she caught my eyes and smiled her sweet smile handing me the tire iron, but that was before she got a load of Mr. fucking personality.” he said, jokingly.
I giggled.
Cannon continued. “Nikki flirted with us both the entire time, but it was me who asked for her number even though I knew she wished it was Landon who’d asked instead. I didn’t feel bad though. Landon always had girls falling all over him. Nikki was mine.”
Those three words stabbed at my heart, but only a little. I ignored the pain.
“We went out on several dates, kissed a lot, lots of making out. Became damn close in a short amount of time. But the spark just wasn’t there. Not on my part, but definitely on hers. She was…so perfect. Easy to talk to, sweet, caring, funny as hell. Everything I knew I wanted in a girl.” He gave me a look of complete adoration before he went on. “When I finally told her how I felt about her, she cried. Then she told me she had feelings for Landon.”
A few days later, after I’d cooled off, I encouraged Landon to ask Nikki out. He refused, hell bent on being the loyal friend he was. I had to trick him into going.”
“Trick him?” I laughed.
Cannon smiled. “Told him I’d gathered a bunch of guys for a bonfire here, instead,”
“Nikki was here.”
He nodded.
Gosh, this was so romantic.
“Why are you smilin’ at me like that?”
“Because I never would have guessed you to be a match maker.”
He shrugged. “I do crazy shit for the people I love.”
“So what happened next?”
“What do you think happened? They fell in love.”
“Then what happened?”
“Life.”
Courage is found in unlikely places.
J.R.R. Tolkien
It had been so long since I allowed myself to think about any of this, much less relive it. The pain wasn’t as bad as I thought it would be though, coming here, facing my past, my memories. My parents hadn’t pushed me, neither had Cora. Everyone was letting me go at my own pace. It was me who wanted to push.
I’d buried his memory long enough.
With the strongest breath I could find, I continued. “He had his pick of any school he wanted. Nikki had settled on Auburn and Landon was set to do the same until I enlisted in Navy SEAL program. Once Landon heard about it, he signed up the very next day.
“What? Why?”
“Said he didn’t think college would be for him, but I think deep down he worried if it would be a big enough challenge. He was an overachiever. Had a 4.0 GPA and enough skill to play pro football. He was meant for something far bigger. Being a football star would have made him great, but being a SEAL made him a hero.”
“You cared about him a lot.”
“He was my best friend, my brother. We served three tours together. I was the best man at his wedding. Godfather to his son. Yeah, I fuckin’ loved him.”
She remained silent.
I did too.
Then after a while, she finally
asked. “What happened to him?”
I swallowed past the lump in my throat but it only grew tighter. “He jumped on a live grenade to save five of his men, including me.”
Cora gasped, tears filling her eyes.
My emotions threatened to choke me. I gritted my teeth before clearing my throat. “We were on a mission to rescue an American reporter that had been missing for thirty-seven days. Once we were finally able to pinpoint the location of where they were hiding him, we went in. Made a clean sweep. All routine. We were working to secure the hostage when a kid crawled out from under a small crate in the corner. He couldn’t have been more than six or seven years old. It all happened so fast, but the second Landon spotted the grenade in the kid’s hand, I knew what he was going to do. When the grenade fell from the kid’s hand, Landon jumped on top of it.”
“Every goddamn day I wish it would have been me instead. Landon had a wife, a son. I hesitated. Like a fucking coward. He had far more to live for.”
She climbed over to straddle me, invading my space in the comforting way she always did. Her hands soft on my neck soothed my aching heart and her breath on my lips worked to calm my fear. “You are so brave.”
“No, I’m not.”
Tears rolled down my face. I wiped a fist across my burning cheeks, trying to fight the heaviness in my chest, but it was no use. They fell anyway. Dad told me once, it took a real man to cry. To express true emotion and be unashamed is a testament of the soul. The very place that harbors your secrets, your lies and all the shit you hide inside. Only when you set it all free will you find peace.
I never understood what he meant until this moment.
Until I let it all go.
Until there was nothing left to hide.
Until there was only…
Peace.
I’d finally found it here, in her.
In our love.
Cora held my soaked face in her hands, wiping away my tears with a strength I’d never known. The shadows around us were dark, but not dark enough to dim the light reflecting back at me. Her lips brushed mine, soft, sweet, and trembling with her undying love and affection. Heat erupted in my chest as my need for her grew substantially in that moment.