by Jordan Marie
“Whoa! Hold the hell up here. I thought what we’ve been sharing has been pretty damn good. How in the hell did we go from having fun and enjoying each other to being toxic?”
“We run in different circles!”
“Whatever, Cooper. You’re going to have to come up with one better than that.”
“How about the fact that you keep dragging me around people who hate me? People I hate? People who did their best to destroy me years ago? I don’t want to be in that circle again for any reason, Gray!” I yell, close to breaking down and telling him exactly what he’s asking of me. “Not even for you.” I whisper that last part, the part that hurts the most. I’m weak and I know it, but I can’t handle being around the Rivertons or anyone in their circle. My sense of self-preservation tells me I can’t… even for Gray.
“I see.”
“I like you, Gray, I really do. But…”
“But?”
“We’re just too different.”
“I don’t think we are at all. I think if you took the time to go meet my family, you’d see that, CC. I think that if you cared even a little bit about me, you’d at least fucking try,” he growls, and this time it’s he who turns away. Funny how that seems to be the last thing I want after this conversation.
“I do care about you,” I argue and mean it. I think part of me is already in love with him. Or at least I think that’s what it is. I’ve never really seen or had that in my life enough to recognize it.
“Then prove it.”
“I can’t.”
“Can’t or won’t?” he challenges.
That’s when I see it: the hurt in his eyes, the hurt I put there. The weight of that crushes down on me and I almost feel like I’m suffocating.
“It’s the same thing!” I lash out in regret, needing to get away because suddenly I can’t breathe.
“I never figured you for a woman without a backbone, Claudia Cooper. It’s good I found it out now, I guess. Maybe I’ll see you around,” Gray says, and those words combined with the tone of his voice make me jerk my head up to look at him.
“Gray, it doesn’t have to be this way. We can keep having fun. We can—”
“What? Keep fucking? Oddly enough, Cooper, I don’t want that from you. For the first time in my life, I can honestly say that’s not even close to what I want,” he says disgustedly.
He looks like a stranger. He barely spares me a glance before he turns around and walks out the door. I’m left standing there wondering how we got here. In the last two days, he’s joked about me meeting his family, and yeah he told me that he had made all the reservations to leave today, but I never realized he was completely serious about taking me with him. Other than mentioning it to Cammie and her father, he’s never once asked me. And now… we’ve gone from laughing and playing, making love every night to… this.
I head out the door and go to my car. I start it up and, on autopilot, I head to the garage. I don’t want to think about it anymore because this feels like I just broke up with Gray Lucas. I’m not ready to face that just yet. I may never be.
Three Days Later
“Grayson Lucas, you’ve been moping around here since you got back. What the hell is going on with you?”
My mother’s tone is one I’ve learned I shouldn’t ignore. It means she’s getting desperate, and when Ida Sue “Love” Lucas gets desperate, chaos ensues. Still, I can’t seem to drum up enough energy to care. Everything just seems… flat, lifeless, and colorless since I left CC’s home three days ago. God, I miss her. Me, missing a woman? It would be the world’s biggest joke except there’s nothing funny about how I’m feeling. There’s nothing to find humor in when I picture the rest of my life without CC in it. The woman has ruined me.
“Answer your mother when she speaks to you,” Cyan says, slapping me up the side of my head.
“Thank you, baby.”
“Anytime, Mama,” Cyan answers, dodging my halfhearted attempt to swat him back.
“Asshole,” I mutter, partly because he’s annoying me, but mostly because he’s the biggest mama’s boy on the face of the planet.
“Grayson Lucas, you stop that or I’ll wash your mouth out with soap.”
I roll my eyes, though I do it where I’m sure Mom can’t see me. The truth is, she says worse than us boys ever thought of—and that’s saying a lot. She however, can’t stand it for her kids to say the same words in front of her.
“Yes, Mama,” I answer, looking out over the yard in front of the large farmhouse I was raised in. It’s a large three-story home which has been completely updated, much to Mother’s dismay. The boys and I got together while Mom was on vacation and completely renovated the place, giving her all the latest appliances and conveniences. Most mothers would have loved it; ours complained we ruined the charm of the place, though I notice she doesn’t complain that the washroom is now downstairs with her bedroom and large master bath.
There’s a large wraparound porch that completely encircles the home—a fact my nephews, when they’re around love and make complete use of. It’s white with red trim and has a bright red tin roof. The yard is encased with matching red trim and it’s quite beautiful when you pull up and see it, but that’s not why I love this place and always will; it’s the memories. Even when we didn’t have two nickels to rub together, this place was the most magical place on Earth. No matter what has happened in my life, being home always had a way of healing me and making things better.
That is, until CC.
“Is Grayson still being moony-eyed over that woman?” Blackie asks.
“Seems so. I don’t get it. I haven’t seen a flitter worth that,” Maggie says.
“Magnolia Marie! You did not just say that!” Mama yells.
“Sorry, Mama. Terry has taken to using the word and it just slipped out.”
“You ruined that boy, naming him Terry. You should have kept the family tradition.”
“You mean naming him after where he was created? No, thank you. I don’t need a son named Subaru.”
“Yeah, cause we all know the story of how Maggie whoopty-do’ed in her Subaru and Nine months later…”
Maggie elbows Cyan with a huff. “That wasn’t funny the first five-thousand times and it’s even less funny now that Terry is three years old, dumbass.”
“Ouch! Stop, that hurts! Mama, Maggie called me a name.”
“That’s because you are being a dumbass. I don’t need no grandchild named Subaru. Though you could have named him Cross, dear.”
I smile. It’s an old argument. Maggie was caught in the back of an old Subaru with Bryant Matthews out on Old Cross Road.
“You really need to make an honest man of that boy,” Mama chides her.
“Like you have Janson?” Maggie comes back.
Janson is the foreman of the ranch and the unofficial boyfriend of my mother. Mom had her oldest child when she was barely seventeen, which means she will be turning fifty-four in just a week. All of us like Janson and would love to welcome him completely in the family, but he won’t even move into the house with Mom. For some reason, neither one of them want a traditional relationship of living under one roof. Weird, considering they’ve been together and exclusive for the last eight years.
“Pffft…” Mom waves her off. “At our age,” she says, like they’re eighty, “we’re just celebrating the miracle that we’re both still even interested.”
“There sure is a lot of celebrating going on around here, specifically in the kitchen,” Cyan says, and from the look on his face, I don’t even want to know what he saw.
“Praise Jesus,” Mom says.
I take a drink of my beer to keep from laughing out loud. I manage to hide my smile around the rim of the can; Mom doesn’t need any encouragement.
“Lovey, that damn cow got out again,” Janson growls, sliding onto the edge of the porch, sitting down, and letting his legs hang over the side. He spits out his tobacco and Cyan hands him a beer.
“He
just wants his freedom, Jan,” Mom defends.
“If he don’t stop breaking my fence, I’ll give him his freedom. I’ll make sure he gets his ticket to the green pastures in the sky,” Jan grumbles. Mom ignores him, probably because she knows it’s the same empty threat he always gives. Instead, she focuses on the one thing about Janson that she absolutely does not like.
“I thought I told you that if you didn’t give up chewing, Janson Reed, there would be no more celebrating between us?” she grumbles, hitting his back with a fly swatter.
“You did, but I had a talk with the good Lord about it,” Janson says, looking over his shoulder at her. “He said He’d allow the vice, if I celebrated and praised Him harder. So we’re working it out.”
“I call bullshit,” she says, but she’s smiling.
“I’ll show you later,” he promises with a wink.
“I don’t know what’s sadder,” Cyan says.
“What’s that?” Janson asks.
“The fact that my mom gets more action than I do, or the fact that hearing about it is the highlight of my week.”
“Probably both, son,” Janson says.
“Enough about this topic, please? It’s almost dinner time and I need my appetite. Besides, I want to hear about Gray and his new woman.”
“Nothing to tell, Mags,” I grunt, cutting her off.
“Life is short, son. Don’t waste it pissing in the wind. One day, you’ll wake up all alone and stinking to high heaven with nothing but a basket of laundry.”
“That’s deep, Mom,” Cyan says with a laugh.
“Thank you, sweetie.”
“Well, if she’s anything like Grayson’s usual women, she’s an airhead,” Maggie says.
“Yeah, we’ll probably see more of her than we want in the tabloids soon enough,” Cyan agrees.
“She’s not like anyone else,” I growl.
“Do tell, brother.” This comes from White as he comes outside. The screen door squeaks in protest. He leans up against the porch post and looks at me. Shit.
“Mind your own business,” I growl.
White is my oldest brother and he’s a self-declared permanent bachelor, which is a shame because his best friend is a woman named Kayla—a damn good woman, at that. Plus, everyone knows she’s completely in love with White. Well, everyone but him. He doesn’t give a fuck about anything other than the next bull he’s going to ride. He’s on track to be the world’s champion.
Mom jokes she has a child in every profession and she’s not far from the truth. Bull riding, golf, baseball, fireman, cop, and rancher. Then there’s Cyan. Cyan tells everyone he’s still finding himself, but the truth is that he finds himself at the tables gambling most of the time. That’s just my brothers. My sisters are just as diverse, from a novelist to Maggie, who’s the principal at a local elementary school.
“Come on, Gray, give it up,” Maggie says.
I take a deep breath. “Fine. Cooper is smart, funny, beautiful… caring. She’s—”
“What kind of name is Cooper?”
“Cooper?” Cyan interrupts.
“Her name is Claudia Cooper. Everyone calls her CC.”
“Dude, that’s a rough ass name for a girl,” Cyan says.
“Oh please, like any of us could talk,” Maggie says. “Hello? Magnolia tree, front and center here.”
“It was a hell of a Magnolia tree,” Mom says. Maggie holds her head down.
We all laugh, even me, and I don’t really feel like it, especially since talking about CC reminds me of everything I’ve lost.
“If she’s so wonderful, what the fuck are you doing here without her?”
“White Hall Lucas, watch your mouth!”
“Yes, Mom,” he sighs.
“I still want to see the woman who has one of my brothers all twisted up,” Maggie says. I flip her off without letting mom see me.
“We may not have to wait long, dear,” Mom says.
“Why’s that?” Cyan asks, and I just listen to them chatter while I open my second beer. I wonder how long it would take me to get drunk on drinking nothing but beer.
“Because, unless I miss my guess, the woman in question is getting out of that taxi at the end of our drive,” Mom says.
My heart speeds up at her words and joy spreads through me. CC must have changed her mind! I’ll make sure I reward her later tonight.
“Fuck!” I growl.
“What? What’s wrong?” Mom asks, and she must know something is way off from my tone, because for once she doesn’t bitch at me for my cursing.
“That’s not CC. That’s David Riverton and his daughter Cammie,” I growl.
“Oh, shit,” Maggie whispers while everyone else goes quiet. I hold my head down, wondering how the fuck life got so complicated.
“Okay, so hit me,” Mer says, staring at me from across the table. If she only knew how inviting that was right now, she wouldn’t tempt me. It’s been five days since Gray left to visit his family in Texas. Five days and I haven’t seen nor heard from him. I mean, I guess we broke up, so I understand it, but somewhere in the back of my mind, I thought he might try to contact me. I thought I’d get the chance to… maybe rethink things? Get a do-over? Hell, I don’t know. Truthfully, I didn’t think much past hearing from Gray again. “Earth to C. You get about five minutes to start talking,” Mer adds.
“And you’ll what?”
“I’ll throw such a fit they will kick us out of here.”
“That’s not much of a threat, woman,” I grumble. We’re at the new bar that just opened downtown called Drink. It’s a small hole in the wall filled with, from what I can tell, college-aged kids and rich snobs who never had a hard time in their life, unless you include chipping a nail or their daddy freezing their trust fund for a few days.
“I thought we both could use a change of pace,” she defends, but she doesn’t look exactly happy to be here either. “But you’re right, it blows. Which is why you have to tell me about Gray!”
“I told you, there’s not much to tell,” I all but growl, shifting in my seat.
“Oh, please. Last week you couldn’t stop talking about him. All I heard was Gray this and Gray that. Today it’s over, end of discussion. I’m getting whiplash from the change.”
“He went back to Texas to visit his family.” I shrug, staring at my drink and wishing I could just go home, curl up on the couch like I have for the last five days, and sleep until I have to get up in the morning.
“So? That does not constitute a breakup. I swear, C, if you kicked him to the curb just because his vine wasn’t going to be around to swing through the jungle on, I may kill you myself.”
I roll my eyes at her. I decide to talk with her, knowing that if I don’t, this is just going to go on all night, and I really need to talk about something else if I’m going to survive tonight.
“Our last date, he took me to a dance.”
“So? You love dancing!”
“A society formal at the Riverton’s Country Club.”
“Oh, shit.”
“He was very sweet. Even picked out my dress.”
“Okay. So far, I’m seeing no reason to cut the man loose. I mean…”
“It was this beautiful silk and lace, deep red,” I interrupt her, “that probably cost a fortune.”
“Again, C, not making a connection.”
“It was a black and white formal.”
“Oh hell.”
“Yeah, that’s not his fault. I have a very good hunch that it was all Cammie’s fault he picked out a red dress.”
“What? I mean, why would he…”
“He went to the one shop in Addington to buy formal gear. You know, the one where Cammie’s best friend Eliza works.”
“Holy fuck-nuggets Batman.”
“Pretty much.”
“Someone needs to bitch slap that cunt-a-saurus for freaking days.”
I think about the sprinklers and start to tell Mer, but I just don’t want to get
into it right now. As much as I hate Cammie, she’s not my problem. I have this sneaking suspicion that it’s me that is the problem right now. I let my doubts push Gray away, and the truth is… I miss him.
“I miss him,” I whisper out loud.
“Oh, honey,” Mer says.
“I got scared, Mer. I like him. I really like him.”
“C…”
“Like, really, really liked him,” I stress.
“So tell him that.”
“He’s gone.”
“He’s in Texas. Not some third world country. Text him.”
“But we broke up,” I sigh. “Jesus, I feel like I’m back in high school worrying over Clinton Sparks.”
“He was an asshole.”
“Maybe Gray is,” I argue.
“I never thought I’d see the day that Claudia Cooper was afraid to live her life.”
“You take that back!”
“Nope. Not going to happen.”
“You’re such a bitch.”
“You say that like it’s a bad thing. Now find your lady balls and text your man.”
I sigh, looking at my phone. “I could just text him to see what he’s doing,” I reason, nerves filling my system.
“My freaking Lord, C, you are jinxed.”
“What?” I ask, jerking up.
“Cammie and her Witches of Crossville crew just came in. You’re jinxed.”
“Or maybe my best friend just picked a particularly horrible place to meet,” I grumble, because really, this place is just the kind of people Cammie would hang around.
“Point made. Jesus, they’re going to sit right behind us. Try not to move. If I have to talk to her, I may projectile vomit,” Mer says, and I agree with her. So for the next five minutes, other than making weird faces at each other, we say nothing. Mer makes silly faces imitating Cammie, and I might giggle a time or two, but we remain mostly silent.
Until the topic of conversation changes. “Cammie, where have you been? I was going to tell you about the new shipment of dresses we got in from Paris last week. They are to die for!”
“Father and I just got back from Texas,” she says, her voice hitting on every nerve ending I have. Mer mouths the word “Texas” and I stare at her, my fists clenching. It really pisses me off that Gray does business with these people, even if I don’t have a say so in it.