Picture Me and You: A Devil's Kettle Romance, #1

by Sey, Susan

  Anxiety stirred inside her as she walked toward the great room, toward that kick-in-the-teeth view. She waited for her breath to catch, for the relief of sanctuary to wash over her.

  Nothing.

  Panic fluttered restless wings in her chest and she quickly pictured the shabby old comforter she’d left spread over her bed upstairs. Brought to mind the smell of lake wind and white pines, made herself hear the low rumble of water that had underscored every moment of her life here at the summit of Devil’s Kettle. Still nothing. She felt only that same grinding unhappiness that had filled her since the moment Jax had pinned her against a wall, kissed her halfway to madness, then announced that he was done with her. That he’d enjoyed frenching her whenever the mood struck and privacy allowed, but he wasn’t going to keep doing it. He was over it. Bored.

  He hadn’t said it in exactly those words, of course, but Addy wasn’t new at this game. She knew what we have to talk meant, especially when it was delivered in that particular shade of grim. Her novelty had worn off. She hadn’t managed to keep his attention very long, she noted dully. Even Diego had lasted longer. He’d at least slept with her before losing interest.

  She gripped the back of the huge white sofa and stared blindly at the sunset. She’d tried for a week to figure out the mess of her life and was no closer than she’d been the night Matty blew the roof off the carriage house and the lid off her secret. The night Bianca had kicked her out and Jax had kissed her madly. Now suddenly Bianca wanted her back, but Jax didn’t want her at all, and everything she understood was shattering around her. She had no idea what was going on anymore, let alone how to fix any of it.

  People were going to do what they were going to do, she decided, and no amount of preparation was going to protect her heart from this night. So when Jax asked for a private conversation — and he would, probably tonight — she’d give it to him. And she’d survive it. Of course she would. She’d abandoned chunks of her heart all over the stupid country. If heartbreak was saying goodbye, Addy was a pro.

  She pulled in a deep breath, hoping for calm and courage, but got instead a lungful of that singular mix of smoke and soap that belonged only to Jax. She turned to find him in the arch between the foyer and the great room, his eyes dark and steady on her. Sunset streamed through the massive windows at her back, touched that unruly chestnut hair and pulled out streaks of amber and copper. She took in the determined line of his mouth, the deliberate quality of his stillness.

  This was it, she thought, even as she pushed her lips into a friendly smile. He was letting her go. Right now. And all the goodbyes she’d said over the years weren’t going to help her at all. Because this wasn’t goodbye. This was neither of them going anywhere. This was her seeing him across the family table at least twice a week. Saying hello in the gallery, crossing paths at the Wooden Spoon. This was her smiling at him over paintings, over pie. Over Matty’s head until the day the boy didn’t need them anymore. This was her heart breaking a dozen times a day for the next forever.

  How on earth was she supposed to live through that?

  Oh sweet mercy. Realization crashed through her like a rogue wave, tried to drag her to her knees. She hadn’t been kissing Jax all week. She’d been falling in love.

  Well, maybe not love precisely. Maybe it hadn’t gone quite so far as that. She took a careful inventory of her heart and soul. Not yet. The knowledge was a bitter relief. Not quite yet. She was teetering on a very dangerous ledge, but she hadn’t fallen. She’d held back, and he had, too. Both of them waiting for…something. For what, she had no idea. She knew only that Jax, evidently, hadn’t found it, not in her. She’d been found lacking. Again.

  She cleared the agony from her throat and said, “Hey, Jax.”

  “Hey, Addy.” He kept those fingers tucked into his pockets and rocked back on his heels. Watched her with careful eyes. “You’ve been avoiding me.”

  “Yep. All afternoon.”

  “Try all week.”

  “You caught me once or twice.”

  “We didn’t talk much.”

  “Nope.”

  “We need to.”

  She smiled a little. “Looks like my luck’s run out, then.”

  He studied her for a long moment, face cool and closed. “Care to explain?”

  “Not really.” Pain-laced exhaustion lapped at her.

  “We really do need to talk, Addison.” He moved toward her, a subtle, sideways circling that made her feel like prey. “I know this isn’t a conversation you want to have and I’m sorry for that. But you need to hear what I have to say. You owe me that much.”

  “I know.” Her voice was small in the vast room, her words disappearing in the echoing space. She cleared her throat and steadied herself. “I know. Just...” Tears rushed up her throat and she stopped. Swept up the shreds of her composure. “Just not right this minute, okay? Not here. Not now.”

  “Then when?” It was a tight demand. “Tell me when, Addison, because I’m not going to chase you all over town again, begging for an appointment.”

  “After dinner.” She backed toward the dining room, toward the arch at the side of the great room that led to a long table set for a full house. “Let’s just get through dinner, okay? We’ll celebrate Georgie, then talk when we get back—”

  Home. Home? Oh good heavens, no wonder she hadn’t gotten the usual home-and-hearth buzz off Hill Top House. Not only had she been stupid enough to fall halfway in love with him, she’d fallen completely in love with that tiny bucket of charm and built-ins he called a house! She cursed her stupid, needy heart. Now she’d be doubly orphaned when he dumped her, and wasn’t that just what she deserved for being an idiot? She closed her mouth, swallowed, and tried again.

  “We’ll talk when we get back to your place, okay?”

  He studied her, and something shifted in those green-brown eyes. “Tonight?”

  “Yeah, tonight.” No time like the present. “You want to say something, I’m ready to hear it.” Just like she was ready for the end times. She gave him what she hoped looked like a smile. “Promise.”

  He stepped forward yet again, close enough to touch her if he wanted to. And God help her, she swayed toward him, yearning for him to reach for her. “I’ll hold you to that, Addison,” he murmured.

  So anxious to be done with it, Addy thought on a stab of anger. To be done with her. She latched onto that flash of temper and thought, well, fine. Have it your way, you jerk. She’d rebuilt her life before. She would again. If there was one thing she knew how to do, it was start over.

  “Fine.” She lifted her chin, shook back her hair, and turned toward the dining room. Away from him. Jax could follow or not. Or he could just go to hell. His choice. She didn’t look behind her to find out which he’d picked.

  Chapter 22

  JAX HAD NO idea how he survived the following hour and a half. Peter Zinc arrived — his brother-in-law-to-be — with a bottle of champagne that made Bianca coo like he’d presented her with a human child. An endless round of champagne toasts followed, of course, then dinner came and went in a series of pretty dishes scattered like confetti across the table cloth. As usual when his mother cooked, however, the food was more decorative than edible.

  The cold carrot-yogurt soup hadn’t been half-bad, though kind of a strange choice while eternal winter was upon them. He’d tried with the salad, he really had, but gave up when he ran across an actual twig. He had to admit, though, the couscous-fig thing with the tiny skewer of lamb sticking straight out of it had been tasty. All two and a half bites of it. Lucky for him, he was too busy trying to get a handle on Addy’s mood to pay much attention.

  She sat at his left elbow, pale and unhappy, pushing a few twigs around her plate. Was it really that awful, he wondered wistfully? The prospect of hearing him out? Of hearing that he loved her and wanted to build a life together? Or was he pushing her too hard, too fast? His palms felt a bit clammy and he pushed them surreptitiously down his khakis under t
he table. Maybe he was. Maybe he should—

  “Peter, have a little more whipped parsnip,” his mother urged from the matriarch’s chair at the head of the table. She waved her wine glass at a glazed pottery dish full of white mash sculpted into a perfect curve, as if it had been dispensed from a soft-serve machine.

  Peter smiled up the table at her from his place at Jax’s right. He was handsome bastard, no question, that bald-by-choice look a winner when a guy had cheekbones as pretty as his fiancée’s. Throw the looks in with the money and he figured Peter would make Georgie as happy as anybody possibly could.

  “Oh, I couldn’t,” Peter said, patting his lean stomach with a rueful appreciation. Given that the parsnips had functioned more like cement than a side dish, Jax knew this to be the stone-cold truth. He had to admire the way the guy had made it sound like a compliment, though.

  “More roasted sprouts?”

  “Ah, no. Thanks.” Peter glanced at Georgie beside him, appreciation glowing in his dark eyes. “I can’t think of another thing I want right now. This pretty much fills me up.” He smiled at Bianca again. “I mean, a table like this, the family around it?” He moved those big shoulders. “It’s not something I grew up with. That’s no secret.” Bianca inclined her head regally, acknowledging if not dismissing Peter’s less-than-impressive pedigree. “It’s certainly nothing I ever anticipated having myself. But Georgie’s brought all kinds of surprises my way.” He put a tender hand on hers and she stopped fiddling with her twig salad long enough to smile up at him.

  “Good ones, I hope?” she said.

  “The best.” He smiled back, a couple of ultra-manly slashes appearing in his lean cheeks. Jax shot a quick look at Addy. Women loved that Clark Gable shit but she was still frowning at her twigs. She must’ve felt his eyes on her, though, because she lifted her head and met his gaze. And Jax all but reared back from the accusation and anger burning in her face. What the hell? “I don’t have anything to offer in return that even comes close,” Peter was saying. Jax hastily tuned back in. “But I do want to give you something.”

  Georgie perked up. “Presents?”

  He laughed. “Think of it more like a dowry.”

  Addy spoke for the first time in minutes. “Doesn’t the bride traditionally give the dowry to the groom?” she asked Peter, her own dimples winking out.

  “Depends on the culture,” Jax said. Addy kept her eyes — and her dimples, damn it — on Peter.

  “That’s true,” his mom said from the head of the table. “In some parts of the world a good wife can run a man several hundred heads of cattle.”

  Georgie lifted a lock of hair from her shoulder, inspected it idly then flicked it behind her. Her eyes laughed into Peter’s. “I’ll be worth every moo, I promise.”

  “Of course you will,” Bianca said serenely. “There’s no such thing as free milk, not in this life.” She sent Peter a wicked smirk. “Boys do like their milk.”

  “I think we’re mixing metaphors now,” Addy said, smiling. But there was something off about that smile. Something tight and forced and inherently un-Addy-like. She glanced his way and the smile died.

  On Addy’s left, Matty froze, a massive forkful of parsnips half-way to his mouth. He said, “I think I lost my appetite.”

  “Over sexual innuendo at the dinner table?” Jax looked down the table at Bianca, his own tone deliberately light. Because lord knew letting his family get even a whiff of the discord between him and Addy wouldn’t speed things up, and his patience with this dinner was thinning dangerously. “What kind of thirteen-year-old are you raising here, anyway?”

  “The kind who tries not to think about that kind of thing when I’m eating.” Matty set aside his fork. “With my family.”

  “Sex among family members is how you got here though,” Jax pointed out. “Or did you have a different theory?”

  “Adoption?” he said hopefully

  Bianca laughed. “With that face? You look exactly like Diego at thirteen.”

  “Oh, gosh, right. I forgot.” Matty’s mouth twisted into a tight, ugly smile that Jax liked about as much as the one Addy had given him. “I’m just the off-brand Diego replacement. Thanks for reminding me, Mom.”

  “We have company, Matisse,” Bianca said, her voice suddenly icy and sharp. “Either mind your manners or excuse yourself.”

  Matty shoved himself away from the table and stalked out of the room without another word. His boot heels pounded up the stairs and Addy’s eyes followed the stomping all the way to the upper floor where a door slammed. She half-rose to go after him but a look from Bianca had her subsiding with an inaudible sigh.

  “Forgive him,” Bianca said to Peter. “Something’s gotten into that child.”

  “Nothing to forgive,” he murmured. “Thirteen’s a difficult age.”

  “Diego was exactly the same, you know. Just a wild flame trapped inside a boy’s body. But he came around, and Matty will, too.” She released a long, slow breath. “I’m afraid we’ve spoiled him, though. It was hard not to, given the age gap.” She sent Peter a half-smile. “He was a bit of a surprise, you know. I was touring Italy with Georgie when he was born.”

  “I’d heard,” Peter said. No surprises there. Everybody in town knew the story of Matty’s birth. It was the stuff of legend.

  “Georgie — my baby — was fourteen. Can you imagine? We had agreed we were done with babies but—” She shrugged, and her eyes went shiny. “I was just barely pregnant when we lost Joe. I had no idea. Then the grief took me over, and I didn’t feel anything — heart, body or soul — for months. So Matty was a shock, yes, but a blessing, too. He brought me back to life.” She blinked away the tears and smiled. “He was such a happy baby.”

  “That’s true,” Jax said. “Kid was bullet-proof.” He made himself grin at Georgie. “Remember how you used to cart him around like a doll?”

  “I remember you taking him to student council meetings in a camouflage sling,” Georgie returned.

  “My soldier phase.”

  Addy turned to him, evidently surprised into addressing him directly. “You had a soldier phase?”

  “Sure. Until I realized that soldiering included, you know, shooting people.” He leaned back and sent her a smoky smile. “I’m a lover, not a fighter.”

  “Ah,” Addy said, that inexplicable rage flickering back into her eyes. And that snapped it. Jax was done here. Because a woman didn’t look at a man like that, not when she’d kissed him halfway to embarrassing himself a few hours earlier. Something had happened between the kissing and the glaring, and Jax was going to find out what it was. He just needed a suitable exit line. For God’s sake, when would this dinner end?

  “Sure you are.” Georgie rolled her eyes then turned to Peter. “Can we get back to the part where I get presents, please?”

  Peter smiled at her. “Anxious for your cattle, are you?”

  One silvery brow lifted and Peter laughed. “How would you feel about a little real estate?”

  Avarice lit up her eyes. “Real estate?”

  “It is the family business.” He leaned in. “Are you up to managing a little project of your own?” He grinned at the surprise in her angular face. “I was thinking about the Hideaway. That abandoned resort I picked up last summer, north of town? It sort of fell off my radar when I got busy with the dealership, and now it’s just sitting there, waiting for some love. How about I deed it over to you?”

  “You want to give me a resort?”

  “It’s just a dilapidated lodge right now. But if you rehab it properly, it could be a very nice little investment for you.”

  She gazed at him, a small frown ghosting over that perfect face of hers. “You think I have what it takes to rehab it properly?”

  “I know you do, Georgie,” he said quietly. “You can do anything you set that brain of yours toward.”

  She launched herself into his lap and Peter rocked back in his chair. Silverware clattered and his surprised oomph ended
on a surprised chuckle.

  “I love you,” she said fiercely. “I’m going to be the best wife you can imagine.”

  He stroked a palm down all that shiny hair. “Of course you are, honey.”

  Georgie linked her hands behind his neck and leaned back, excitement lighting up her face. “Does it have to be the Hideaway?” she asked. “Or can I pick something else?”

  “Whatever you like.” He tapped the end of her nose with a crooked smile. “I think the Hideaway’s a nice entry point for you, but you can pick anything you like. I’ll put together a list of—”

  “I already know what I want.”

  His brows shot up. So did Jax’s. “You do?”

  “Yep.” She glanced across the table at Addy and said, “I want to buy into the Davis Place make over.”

  “Davis Place?” Peter asked his face blank. “You mean Nan’s old house, up on the bluffs?”

  “That’s the one.” Georgie bounced on his lap with excitement. “Addy’s turning it into a bed and breakfast for aspiring artists.”

  “Nobody’s set foot in that place for years,” Peter said faintly.

  “No kidding.” Georgie wrinkled her nose. “Addy took us on a walk through last week, and it’s a disaster. It’s going to take the world and a fortune to bring it up to speed but oh, Peter, the views! People are going to come from all over the country to paint those views, and I want to help.”

  “You do?” Across the table, Addy shot her a wary look.

  “You do?” Peter echoed.

  “I do.” Georgie’s mouth went flat and stubborn. “Don’t you think I can do it? You just said I could do anything I set my mind to.”

  “And I meant it,” Peter said helplessly, and Jax almost smiled. Underestimating Georgia Davis was a rookie mistake. Peter ought to know better by now but some guys only learned the expensive way. And Georgie was nothing if not expensive. “It’s just…I mean, it’s a big project.” He hesitated. “It sounds like it’s Addy’s project, actually. Are you sure she wants a partner?”