Texas Blaze

by Jean Brashear

  “Oh, honey.” Ruby made her way over and embraced her. “You are my dream. You, here and happy together with Ian. Building your future, keeping your heritage alive. The courthouse is only a building, though I’m so grateful for everything you’ve done. But you cannot let that man’s strong, wonderful heart go wanting. You need him, and he needs you. Neither of you will ever be truly happy without the other.”

  Pen had to look away. She would never have that, and her heart ached for the loss.

  “I don’t know if he’ll have me now.” Scarlett’s shoulders hunched, and she clung to Ruby for a moment.

  “Oh, sweetheart…I’m so sorry.”

  Then Scarlett straightened. Her eyes blazed. “But I’m going to change his mind. He’s not done with me yet.” She looked at her grandmother. “I should probably apologize about the wedding surprise, but you owe me an apology, too.”

  “Not on your life, sweetie.”

  Scarlett laughed. “Ditto. So what are we going to do?”

  “I’m going to get ready to ask a man to marry me,” Ruby said. “But first, I’m going to use all of you to make me so gorgeous his eyes will fall right out of his head.”

  Scarlett laughed. “And I want to see this amazing wedding dress I just heard about.”

  When Jeanette brought it out, Scarlett’s eyes filled. “Oh, I have to stop crying.”

  Click-clack. “That’s what they make eye drops for.” Hayley stood there. “Thank goodness you finally came to your senses. I’d marry that man in a New York minute.”

  “You don’t like New York, remember?” Scarlett shot back.

  “All right,” Rissa leaned toward Pen and chuckled, rubbing her hands together. “Girl fight. I’ll go get the guys.”

  Scarlett tore her gaze from Hayley. “No, you won’t. You’ll find Mackey for me. I’m assigning him to guard my groom, so he doesn’t escape.” She looked at Maddie, one brow arched. “You ready, Machiavelli? Let’s do this.”

  Maddie rose, eyes sparkling. “We’re on it.”

  Chapter Four

  The assembled group was feverishly working on setting up for the weddings no one was sure would occur when Pen heard a ripple of noise behind her. She turned toward the entrance and saw Scarlett and Ruby both standing in the doorway in their wedding gowns.

  The room went completely silent.

  “Wow,” said Boone.

  She watched Ian turn. Blink.

  “Old man, where are you?” Ruby called out.

  No response.

  “Arnold Howard, show yourself.” She was an amazing sight in her long red dress.

  “What do you wa—” Arnie halted nearby, eyes bugging. “Ruby?”

  “Who else would I be? You got anyone else asking you to marry her?”

  “Marry you?” he echoed.

  “Didn’t you say that, in bed last night—that I’d have to ask you the next time?”

  Some in the group tittered. Her glance shifted. “Oh, grow up. A person is never too old for good lovin’.”

  “I don’t know if I want to now.”

  “Oh, don’t you play coy with me, mister.”

  Arnie’s smile spread. “Why not? It’s my turn.”

  Astonishingly, Ruby blushed. Didn’t speak for a minute. She folded her arms over her middle, a bouquet of reds and golds gripped in one hand. “All right. Go ahead. Chortle your heart out.” She tapped her toe.

  Pen joined the others in helpless amusement.

  Ruby glared at them all. “All right, time’s up. Go get your suit on.”

  “I don’t have a suit with me.”

  “Of course you do. Ian, too.” She pointed to the side.

  Mackey and Ian’s dad stood there. Mackey was holding two garment bags.

  “I should make you wait,” Arnie grumbled.

  “Fine by me. I’m in a mood to marry. I’ll just grab one of these good-looking young bucks. Makes me no difference.”

  Arnie rolled his eyes. “You love me, Ruby Gallagher. Only me. You know that, and so do I.” He winked. “And it’s enough for me to know who won.” He turned away as the group began to applaud, leaving Ruby spluttering.

  But she was smiling, too.

  Then silence fell once more, and Scarlett stepped forward. “Ian…” She took a deep breath. “I owe you an apology.” She sounded really nervous.

  “No, you don’t.” Ian covered the space between them quickly. “I want to see you better.”

  “You’re not supposed to see the bride before the wedding.”

  “That horse is already out of the barn,” Josh shouted. Everyone laughed.

  Ian lifted the veil, anyway. Then he just stood there, eating her up with his eyes.

  Pen wanted to sigh. To weep.

  “I am so sorry,” he said. “I shouldn’t have lost my temper.”

  “You should have,” Scarlett responded. “It pushed me over the edge. Made me stop shying at the gate.”

  “Horse metaphors,” Rissa interjected. “I love that. You too, Quinn?”

  “Think I’ll stay out of this,” Quinn responded.

  “Ignore them,” Ian said softly, wiping the tear with his thumb. “Want to discuss this in private?”

  “No.” She laid a hand on his chest and shook her head. “I’m ready to admit in front of God and everybody that I’ve been an idiot. This courthouse is important, Nana’s dream is important, and so is Sweetgrass.” She glanced around at the assembled. “I love you all—even you, Cousin Crankypants. You too, Harley Sykes.” Laughter rolled. She returned her gaze to Ian. “But I love this man more. More than life or breath or any hope of heaven.”

  “Oh dear lord, she’s gone poet on us,” Rissa groaned.

  “I’m gonna have to go take my woman in hand,” Mackey said. “Please excuse me.” He jammed Ian’s garment bag into Case’s hands and crossed the floor. He swept up Rissa and began carrying her out to the sound of much laughter—until she jammed an elbow in his side and managed to wriggle down. “I am not missing this, you brute.”

  Ian smiled at Scarlett.

  Scarlett smiled back. “Will you let me marry you tonight, Ian McLaren?”

  He cradled her cheek. “I thought you’d never ask.”

  And then he kissed her, while everyone cheered and clapped.

  Click-clack. Click-clack. “No time for that, you two. Ian and Arnie, go shower. Somebody get these brides out of our hair,” Hayley ordered. “Now listen up, people. We have to make it snappy before someone gets cold feet.”

  “I don’t want to leave you,” Ian said.

  “I’ll marry you just as you are.”

  “Oh, no, you won’t,” Maddie said, and took Scarlett’s elbow, drawing her away. “Go on, Ian. I promise she’ll be here when you get back.”

  Scarlett broke away from Maddie and rushed back to him, standing on tiptoe to whisper in his ear.

  Whatever it was, Ian smiled. Hugely. Then laid a big, wet kiss on her and let her go. He strode to his father and left, Arnie in tow.

  “Okay, people,” Hayley said. “We have work to do.”

  Pen picked up a large pot of flowers.

  “Here—that’s too heavy. Let me.” Bridger plucked the pot from her arms. “Where to?” He followed her to the spot she’d been instructed. He set it down and grinned. “This is the craziest damn town.” He shook his head. “I love it.”

  You didn’t grow up here, she started to argue—but she thought back. Until her mother had died and their lives had been blasted to bits, Sweetgrass had been a good place to grow up. She could see that now, free of the fierce determination she’d always had to leave this place, to find the big city, the bright lights.

  “You don’t agree?” he asked.

  “Actually…it was. I didn’t appreciate it then. I was too busy making plans to see it in my rearview mirror the first possible second.”

  “Must have been nice.” A shadow crossed his features. “I wouldn’t know about anything like that.”

  “Whe
re did you grow up?”

  “Everywhere.” He shrugged. “Nowhere.”

  “Do you have siblings?”

  A moment of grief, too quick to be sure she’d seen it. “I’m sorry. I’m prying.”

  His look was distant. “Long story.”

  She touched his forearm, heavy with muscle. “I don’t have any pressing appointments.”

  His face closed in even more. The laughing, easygoing Bridger was nowhere in sight. “I think Barbie has a different notion.”

  Hayley stood in the room, clapping her hands for attention. “Okay, people. Here’s what’s left.” She rattled off directions.

  Bridger gave Pen a polite nod. “Guess I’ll go help with the heavy lifting.”

  It was a brush-off, if a gentle one. Usually, she was the one putting distance between herself and eager members of the opposite sex. She was a master at the icy dismissal.

  Though to be fair, he hadn’t been icy. Beneath that stoic calm lay the burn of heartache, maybe guilt, she wasn’t sure. There were depths to this man she would not have expected to find.

  Not her concern. Pen shook off fanciful thinking and got to work.

  Pen would have liked to change into something more suitable for a wedding, but everyone here was in work clothes except the two grooms standing at the altar that had magically appeared, flanked by hundreds of blooms from Veronica Patton Butler’s flower farm.

  Pen still couldn’t get over the fact that Veronica had married Jackson’s buddy David after Jackson disappeared.

  She was the only person, as far as she knew, who realized that Jackson and Veronica had been crazy in love. Oh, not because either one ever acknowledged it, but mostly because of the twin bond. She and Jackson simply knew things about each other they didn’t even have to say out loud.

  They’d shared a womb, a crib. Shared so many milestones, so many birthdays.

  Tears burned her eyes.

  You left me. How could you leave me?

  And worse, how could you stay gone?

  He was alive, she believed that to her marrow. She would know otherwise, she was certain. The part of her that had always belonged to him was dormant after so many years of pain…but it wasn’t dead, the way it would have been if he were gone from this earth.

  But why? She understood why he’d wanted to get away from their father—the same man who treated her like his princess was brutally hard on her twin, especially after their mother died. Jackson was the only boy, and he had no interest in taking over the ranch. He was brilliant—seriously brilliant—at mathematics, and he’d always set his sights on something techie and exotic. He’d written computer games when he was ten years old that had kept them all enthralled, the Four Horsemen and her, as well. She wasn’t much on video games, but Jackson was her twin. He’d listen to her carry on about fashion, and she would test his video games. They were a team.

  Until they weren’t. That horrific wreck in which Beth Butler had been killed had been something their dad refused to consider an accident. He’d heaped all the blame on Jackson’s head, and one day Jackson was just…gone. Their father had refused to even speak his name again.

  The doors opened, and there stood Ruby and Scarlett.

  Ian lit up like a Christmas tree, and Arnie was one big grin as grandmother and granddaughter escorted each other down the makeshift aisle, while Henry and—heaven have mercy—Walker Roundtree played guitars and sang, apparently as a favor to Josh. He’d pitched in on the work earlier, too.

  Who would believe this, out in the wider world? Josh Marshall, Sexiest Man Alive and top draw at the box office, there wearing jeans and boots while the big time country artist Walker Roundtree played and sang in the tiny town’s abandoned courthouse, rigged up with homemade partitions covered with quilts and fronted by buckets of marigolds and celosia, all hot pinks, reds and oranges.

  A whole community stood to watch and give its blessing upon two couples who were at the heart of Sweetgrass and the center of its hopes. Ruby had kept Sweetgrass alive, along with Ian, until Scarlett arrived and made them both whole.

  And damn it, she was going to cry. She sniffed, and Melba Sykes shoved a tissue into her hands.

  Pen heard the door open again, she thought, but she was focused on the ceremony taking place in front of her. Aunt Ruby was a tiny goddess, and Scarlett looked deceptively princess-like, delicate and ethereal, black curls falling down the back of the stunning white gown Jeanette had concocted. Judge Porter was beaming as he officiated. If there was a dry eye in the crowd, Pen couldn’t see it.

  Then it was over, and everyone was clapping and grinning—no one wider than Ian McLaren, who once more stared toward the back.

  Pen turned to follow the arc of his gaze.

  But her heart had already started thudding.

  Even before she saw him, she knew.

  “Jackson!” She took off running and threw herself into her twin’s arms.

  Bridger was grinning over the sheer joy rocketing around the room when he heard a voice ring out, “Jackson!” and saw Legs race past, headed for the back of the room.

  And the roar began.

  “Jackson?”

  “He’s here?”

  “He’s back?”

  Pandemonium ensued, and he took advantage of his height to look over the heads of the crowd to spot a man probably as tall as himself but with the unmistakable black hair and brilliant blue eyes of the woman currently wrapped around him like a vine.

  Right behind her was Rissa, who smacked Jackson on the arm. “I hate you! We—you—” She socked him again. “You could have been dead. I needed you. Damn you, Jackson, I—”

  Mackey approached. “What the hell, Wiz?”

  Jackson looked supremely uncomfortable as Mackey led a sobbing Rissa away.

  “Welcome home,” Ruby said, but her eyes were both welcoming and sad.

  Then an older man with a striking resemblance to Jackson, if not as tall, broke in. “Figures you’d wreck a good day. What the hell are you doing here, boy?”

  Penelope’s head rose from Jackson’s shoulder. “Jackson’s come home, Dad. After all these years of wandering, your son is back, thank goodness.”

  Her father’s eyes were filled with loathing. “I have no son.” He shoved past them and out the door.

  The mood took a dive.

  Pain and anger rolled over Jackson’s face.

  The muttering competed with the delight. Apparently there was quite a story here, not all favorable to the prodigal son who’d just arrived.

  Then there was a disturbance across the aisle as the pretty blonde flower farmer named…Veronica, that was it, took off like a scalded cat out the side door.

  Looking hunted, Jackson tore himself from his twin. “I have to go back to Austin. Business.”

  Ruby caught up to him and spoke intently, then all but towed him out the door.

  Penelope was left standing there, looking stunned and bereft.

  He moved to her. “Hey. You okay?”

  She looked up as if he was a complete stranger, those beautiful blue eyes filled with tears.

  Then recognition stirred and she tried to go icy on him. “Of course.”

  “I don’t think so.” Her face was white, and she swayed on her feet. He wrapped his arm around her waist, felt the trembling in her too-thin frame and lent her the shelter of his body as he escorted her out the other side.

  Once outside in the shadows, she simply stood, staring into the distance.

  “Penelope?”

  Her gaze focused. “Why do you call me that?”

  “It means faithful, you know that, right? The wife of Odysseus, who waited for him to come back for so very long?”

  “Faithful,” she repeated dully. “I don’t know about that.”

  “Where has he been? That’s got to be your twin—no one could mistake the resemblance.”

  In a dazed voice she answered. “I don’t know.” Her lips pressed together. “I knew he wasn’t dead…I wou
ld feel it,” she tapped her chest. “In here. But…he left me. Left all of us, but…how could he leave me and never…?” Life flickered in those staggered eyes. “I am so angry with him,” she whispered. “I understand why he had to go, but—” Her voice broke.

  “Why did he have to go?” He thought he could tell, though. “Something with your dad? Not that uncommon for fathers and sons to be at loggerheads.” And didn’t he know that song only too well?

  “After our mother died, everything went wrong. Daddy was barely present. We were all so lost without her.” She glanced up at him. “Are you close to your mother?”

  He so did not want to talk about all that. “She’s been gone a long time.”

  “But did you love her?”

  “Yeah.” Even if she’d been weak and let their dad beat the hell out of all of them.

  “I was a daddy’s girl, but I loved Mama, too. He spoiled me, but she…she taught me everything I know about being strong. Only she was strong and gentle, too. I’m…not.” She brushed at her eyes.

  He turned her head toward him. Used his thumb to brush away tears. “You lost her before you were grown? And your twin soon after?”

  She nodded, those beautiful blue eyes studying him.

  “You had to be tough to make it through.”

  She glanced away. “I deserted Rissa. I left the second I could after graduation. She was only twelve, and she was stuck here. I didn’t understand that until today.”

  “She doesn’t seem resentful.”

  Her mouth twisted. “I don’t know why. She should be.”

  Impulsively he gathered her in, and though there was resistance, she let him. “Families are complicated.”

  “Yours, too, huh? We have time now, I guess. Want to tell me a long story?”

  “Nope.” He rocked her a little and stroked her back. “I’ll take a raincheck. Hush now and breathe deep.”

  Her head tilted back, blue eyes curious. “You do this for every strange woman you meet?”

  He huffed a laugh. “You’re not that strange.”

  The faintest smile crossed her lips.

  He eased her head back onto his shoulder, aware that her height made her a good fit, even as she was still stiff and guarded.