by Jamie Begley
Before she could snatch him closer to her, he took her arm and spun her to face the door. “If it were any better, I’d miss the diner’s lunch special,” he said, deliberately misunderstanding her come-on.
He hustled her outside, ignoring her irritation as she locked the door behind them. Then he took her hand until they reached the door that went outside. Opening it, he didn’t take her hand again, keeping a good inch between them.
He wanted to groan out loud when he saw Asher, Holt, and Bubba sitting at one of the booths. Seeing an empty table for two, he and Shelly made their way there.
Politely holding the chair out for her to sit down, he made sure it was the one that had Shelly’s back turned toward the Hayes.
After ordering the special, Dustin chose a topic that would have her talking nonstop until it was time to leave.
“You been busy today?”
Shelly went off on a rant about her boss underappreciating her and her anger that he hadn’t come through on a promised raise. As she criticized him, Dustin was treated to the sight of all three men giving him glances that promised retribution. Asher even went so far as to mimic slitting his throat.
Dustin was getting so fed up with how the three were acting that he was about to ask the waitress for a knife so that Asher could use a real one instead of an imaginary one.
When their food arrived, Dustin ate as fast as he could, nodding his head occasionally at something Shelly said. He was determined to enjoy his meal, despite the show Asher was putting on.
When Bubba started to get out of the booth, Dustin knew he was planning to interrupt his and Shelly’s lunch. Therefore, he sent the only man with half a brain seated at the booth a warning glance.
Holt glanced back with a glare, but he did say something to Bubba that had him sitting back down.
“Lordy, I’m going to be late,” Shelly said, putting her napkin on the table.
“Go ahead. I’ll take care of the ticket.”
“Thanks, lover. I better be getting a text soon. I need my Dustin fix.”
She would be seeing him sooner than she expected.
“What time does your boss leave? You want to get a drink after he leaves?”
“I look forward to it.”
He took a bite of his meatloaf instead of responding to Shelly’s promising smile that was nothing like the one the Hayeses were giving him.
He didn’t even have time to swallow the bite, and Shelly wasn’t out the door before the men came barreling toward his table.
Holt’s palms landed on his table, shaking it and sending his refilled soda over the side. “You’re dead meat.”
Dustin placed his fork down on the plate. “Holt, sit down. Bubba, pull up a chair, and I’ll explain. Asher, you can go fuck yourself.”
22
Asher rudely took an empty chair from another table, pulling it closer to Dustin’s. Bubba found one at the next table as Holt took the chair that Shelly had been sitting on.
Holt waited until all the men were seated before addressing the killing glares that had been directed at Dustin’s table when Shelly was there. “I must not have been clear with my warning this morning. I usually don’t have that problem.”
Dustin faced down meaner men than Holt ever thought about being. If it were any other person, he would have told him to meet him in the parking lot or bashed in his thick skull with a chair. But, as much as he disliked these men, they were Jessie’s kin, and he didn’t want her hurt by their misguided attempts to step in. She had been hurt enough.
“I’m not going to explain myself to you knuckleheads every time you see me in town with a woman. I know you don’t like me any more than I like you, but we’re going to get along whether we like it or not.”
“I for sure don’t,” Asher grumbled. “And you’re right about another thing, too. I don’t like you.”
“The feeling is mutual.” Dustin scooted his chair closer to the table, folding his hands together to keep himself from strangling the fucker.
Pinning his eyes to Holt’s, he addressed the only one who would make the other two listen. “You know I wouldn’t do anything to hurt Jessie.”
“I don’t know that,” he started, then stopped when Dustin stared meaningfully into his eyes.
“If it weren’t for your pa, Jessie and I would have been married and had a couple of kids by now.”
Holt went pale as Asher and Bubba looked at him, clearly surprised that Holt knew something they didn’t.
Dustin didn’t have any sympathy for him. “I ain’t blaming you. You were in the same position as me and my brothers with our pa. I blame our fathers. We can make the same mistakes they did, or we can settle it here and now and put the past behind us.”
Dustin would never forget the dark and dreary day after he had thrown the bracelet down at Jessie’s feet. Realizing he was just a hothead, he had wanted to apologize, hoping she would be at their meeting place. Jessie hadn’t been there, so he had sneaked toward her house.
Her pa had caught him, jerking him by the collar and shaking him like a rag doll until Holt had come out of the house to stop him. When Holt forced his pa to release him, he was thrown to the ground where the furious man spat at him.
“She ain’t here, you little bastard. I sent her to the store with her ma. I knew you would come here, sniffing after her when you got out of school.”
Dustin used his elbows to crawl backward, her pa following him every inch of the way.
“Boy, if I see you on my property again, or if I even hear you within breathing distance of my girl, I’m going to shoot you the way I did your dog. I’d rather see my girl dead and buried than ever see her with a Porter.”
His blood went cold at the implicit threat that he would hurt Jessie.
“Isn’t that right, Holt?”
Dustin would never forget how scared for Jessie he was when Holt answered, “Yes, Pa. Let him go, Pa. You’ve warned him. Let him go.”
Jessie’s father stomped his foot down next to his head. “Get!”
Dustin had run, too afraid to look back, too afraid his heart would stop beating because he was so scared.
Once he was safely at home, he never breathed a word to his family about the threats that Jessie’s father had made. No one knew that he and Jessie had been threatened, except for him and Holt.
“I would have killed him before I let him hurt Jessie.” Holt’s roughhewn features grew pained at the memory Dustin had brought up.
“I didn’t know that, did I? I was just a kid, and I let him scare me away.”
“What’s he saying?” Bubba asked.
“I’ll tell you later.” Holt shoved the dirty dishes away from him. Then he lowered his voice so no one other than the ones sitting at the table could hear. “Pa’s been dead for three years. If you were so hot-fire in love with her, you could have—”
“What could I have done, Holt? Taken on all the Hayes’ clan? To tell you the truth, anyone who was mean enough to threaten their own daughter or sister wasn’t one I was sure I wanted to subject my son to in case it didn’t work out between me and Jessie. Every time I thought about asking Jessie out, one of you would do something that would have me doubting my sanity as to why I would want to.”
All four men stared at each other, remembering the numerous fights between Asher and Greer, and Holt and Tate. Dustin didn’t even bother bringing up the incident with Logan and Asher not going to the police. He didn’t have to; he could see it on their expressions.
“If you hate us so much, then why are you hellfire determined to wiggle back into Jessie’s life again?”
Dustin answered Asher’s question the only way he could—with the truth, or as much as he was willing to share with the three men.
“Because I’m finally in a place where I don’t give a fuck about what you want. If you want to kill me because I’m in a relationship with Jessie, you’re more than willing to try. I’m not a nine-year-old boy anymore. You, Asher, or any of your clan tries to come after me,
come on. I’ll take on every fucking one of you. My biggest fear isn’t for myself—it never was—it’s for Jessie. And the one thing I did find out when she was kidnapped is, every single one of you fuckers would die before you’d hurt that girl.”
The men didn’t say anything. Finally, it was Holt who broke the silence by catching the waitress as she was about to go by. “Bring us some coffee.”
The waitress took the dirty dishes as she walked away to get the coffee. The lunch rush was over, and they were the only ones still sitting at a table.
“Why were you eating lunch with Shelly?”
Holt’s question wasn’t snide. It only held curiosity and a deep weariness within his soul about a past that couldn’t be changed.
“Shelly works for Day’s Financial.” Dustin talked lower. The restaurant was empty, but Carly was behind the counter, and he didn’t want her to gossip about what they were about to discuss.
“What’d he say?” Bubba asked Asher loudly.
“Switch chairs with me, Asher.”
“Why?” Asher gave him a quizzical look.
“So Bubba can hear what I’m saying.” Being mindful that Bubba’s hearing problem was a closely guarded secret, Dustin wanted to ram his head into the tabletop when Bubba scooted his chair closer to his.
“What’d he say?”
Asher switched chairs with him.
“I was saying—” Dustin broke off as Bubba switched trajectories, scooting his chair closer to him again. “I was saying that Shelly works for Day’s Financial Services.”
The men stared at him, not comprehending.
“Jackson and Miranda Scott are Day’s clients.”
“Ah ….” Bubba finally got the gist.
Asher waited until the waitress left after bringing their coffees before resuming the conversation. “Why does that matter?”
“Because I’m a damn good accountant, that’s why. You know the best part about having access to people’s finances?”
“So you’ll know how much money you can steal from them?” Asher wisecracked.
Dustin’s lips tightened into a thin line. “No, not to steal. Why go to jail when they’ll pay me to keep their asses out of trouble with the IRS? Do you want to know the most interesting thing about doing people’s taxes?”
“No. What?” Asher’s interest was finally caught.
“You find out a shit-ton of things about them. The businesses that hire me, I can tell you how many times a month they buy toilet paper and how much. Or if someone’s cheating on their wives or husbands by buying things coming across their joint accounts. Dumbasses even try to write it off as a business expense. If I have access to a couple’s financials, I can tell if they’re in over their heads in debt, or if they have enough money to go to dinner a couple times a month.”
“I’m glad I don’t pay taxes.” Bubba snorted in disgust.
Dustin’s mouth hung open at the revelation. “I thought you work at the bread store?”
“I do. So what?”
“Eugene pays you, doesn’t he?”
“Yeah.”
“Then you pay taxes, don’t you?”
“No.”
“Then he pays you in cash?”
“No, he gives me a paycheck every Friday.”
“Then you pay taxes.”
“No.”
Trying to talk to a Hayes was like someone pulling a hair out of his head one at a time.
“Bubba ….” Dustin took a deep breath to control his temper.
“Yeah?”
“There’s no way you could have worked for Eugene as long as I know you have and not have gotten in trouble with the IRS for not paying taxes.”
“Not if I haven’t cashed the checks.” Bubba tapped his temple like he was smart, which Dustin knew for damn sure he wasn’t.
“You’ve never cashed any of your paychecks?”
“Nope, not a single one.”
Dumbfounded, Dustin opened and closed his mouth several times before asking, “Why not?”
Bubba tapped his temple again. “I don’t want them tracking me down.”
“Who? The IRS?”
“The government, the IRS—it’s all the same. They want to find me to find out what I know,” he said self-importantly.
“Why would the government be trying to track you, other than you’re not paying taxes?” Dustin’s voice rose.
“Shh! I hear you. You’re sitting by my good ear.”
Dustin dropped his head onto the table. “Holt?” he mumbled.
“Yes?”
“Does this have to do with the little green men?”
“Could be. Why don’t you ask him?”
Dustin raised his head. “Never mind. I don’t want to know.”
He tried to remember where he left off. His mind was still on the green men. There was no way he was going to let Logan invite friends over. The thought of Jessie being able to convince them about the green men wasn’t something he was going to take a chance on. Dustin considered himself a smarter than average nine-year-old back then, yet she had convinced him to paint himself green.
“What’d you find out about Jackson’s and Miranda’s?”
Holt’s question put Dustin back on track.
“That if Jackson killed her, he didn’t do it because they were having money problems.”
“That don’t mean shit.” Asher shrugged. “He could have just knocked her around and got carried away.”
“If that’s the case, why attack Jessie?” Dustin shook his head. “Jackson’s DNA didn’t match the one found on Jessie.”
“I know. I’ll be the first person told when a match is found. I got robbed on justice when Kyle was killed. It’s not going to happen to the Hayeses again.”
Dustin felt bad for a minute that he was going to steal that justice away from Holt again. Then the memory of what Jessie had looked like when he found her squashed it down. That was why he had no intention of telling the Hayes about Charles.
His conscience did get the better of him, though. Dustin wanted the Hayeses to know they weren’t going to get what they wanted.
“You can have whatever’s left when I’m done with him.”
The thick veins in Holt’s thick neck protruded out. “She’s my sister … and a Hayes.”
Dustin lowered his voice to a deadly level. “No one hurts what belongs to me.”
“What’d he say?”
“Shut up, Bubba,” Asher told him, then growled just as lowly back to Dustin, “Jessie isn’t yours.”
“Yes, she is.”
“Since fucking when?”
Holt remained silent, letting Asher do the arguing, but Dustin could see the acceptance in his eyes. It was going to take the rest of the Hayeses more time to come to the same conclusion, but the one he was most concerned with wasn’t denying his claim.
Thinking over Asher’s question, Dustin went back to the moment he knew he loved Jessie. Instead of going into an explanation or spouting words the rednecks would make fun of, he kept it brief and simple.
“The little green men.” Dustin had known then that he loved Jessie. Only a woman he was destined to love could talk him into something so ridiculous and get him an ass whipping, as well being the brunt of his family’s jokes.
“What’d he say?”
Asher rubbed his forehead tiredly. “He said we’re fucked.”
23
“Jess?”
Jessie raised her closed lashes. “Is it morning already?”
“Almost. I need to leave early.”
Jessie stretched out under the covers as Dustin rose to put on his boots.
“Is you’re weed done drying yet?”
“Yes. Greer and I are going to package it this morning, so Logan can come home tonight for the barn raising.”
The bed shook as Dustin stood up, then placed a hand on each side of her head. “Are you coming to the party tonight?”
“No.”
“Jess, I want you to
come.”
“I’ll think about it.”
“Then think hard, because I really want you to.” Pressing a sweet kiss to her lips, he was gone before she could touch him.
Sighing, Jessie tugged the blankets over her head, wanting to stay there until Dustin came back tonight. What if he didn’t want to come if she didn’t go to the party? The thought put even more pressure on her to attend.
Knowing who the woman was who had been killed increased her fear that the person who kidnapped her was someone she was familiar with. Miranda and Jackson attended her church. Jackson was one of the deacons. She had gone to fellowship meetings with them. She had even attended their son’s baptism.
Dustin told her that Holly had invited her friends and several people from town. What if he was there? Was she ready to take that chance?
Unable to come up with the answer, she got out of bed and dressed in a pair of jeans and a long-sleeved red top. Going to the kitchen, she then made a big breakfast of fried potatoes and sliced ham.
She was putting the biscuits in the oven when Holt wandered into the kitchen.
“I’m going to have to go on a diet if you don’t go back to work,” he complained, sitting down at the counter.
“Then you’re going to be relieved to know that I’m going back to work next week.” Jessie slid a large plate across the counter to him. Going to the fridge, she took out the ketchup bottle and slid that to him, too.
“When did you decide on that?”
“I guess just now.”
“You think you’re going to be able to handle it?”
“I’ll find out when I go back. If not, then I’ll sell the business to Bliss. But I’m going to try to make it work. I’m getting bored staying here with nothing to do.”
Jessie saw him frown as he squirted a big glob of ketchup onto his plate next to the potatoes.
“Does that mean you’re wanting to move back into your apartment?”
“No, it doesn’t mean that. I’ve come to another decision about that.” Jessie took the biscuits out of the oven before making a plate for herself. “If you and Asher don’t mind, I want to let my apartment lease go and move back in here permanently.”