by Ciana Stone
“She got married and had two kids.”
“Wonder if she still looks as good as she did back then?”
“Don’t know.”
“Well, what made you ask if I remember her?”
“Just ran into her mother and it got me to thinking about old times.”
“About the one who got away?”
Beau, having reached his car, unlocked it and climbed in. “Yeah, I guess so.”
“Ever wonder what if?” John Luke asked.
“From time to time. But not much point in it.”
“I guess not. Okay, I’ll see you soon.”
Beau started his car and pulled out of the parking lot. As he drove, he thought about those days long ago and wondered if he would ever see Grace again.
And if he did, would those feelings still be present, or would he realized that those feelings he’d had as a young man were now just a thing of the past?
Chapter Three
Grace looked around the bedroom one last time. She was adult enough to admit that trashing a bedroom was juvenile, but she still didn’t feel guilty. This was the room she’d shared with Tad, the one she’s spent months decorating, scouring stores for just the right bedding and lamps and decorations.
Now it was just the room of a man who’d betrayed her. That seems to be a pattern for you, girl. As much as she hated that inner voice, it had a point. Grace had loved two men in her life, and both of them had betrayed her.
Her phone rang, and she snatched it from her back pocket. “Hey, Mama,” she answered.
“Are you still planning on leaving today?”
“I am. We’re just about to get in the car. We should be there by dark.”
“Well, be careful, honey.”
“I will, Mama.”
“Okay… Gracie, honey, are you sure this is the right thing to do?”
“He cheated on me, mama. With my best friend.”
“And you can’t get past that?”
“Would you want me to? Would daddy?”
“No, your daddy would tell you the same thing I did, sugar. Pack your stuff and come home. Oh, did I tell you that Beau moved back to town?”
“No, you didn’t mention that.”
“Yes. The family moved the entire company to Legacy. John Luke quit or retired from the FBI—not sure which, and he’s now living at the ranch, running it. Logan James got married—again. I think this is number four or five, but anyway, he moved up to Colorado where his uncle on his daddy’s side lives. Beau is pretty much in charge of the family fortune and from what I hear, he’s one sharp businessman, but also a fair one. You can’t find anyone who works for Legacy and is unhappy.”
“Well, I know his mama and daddy are proud of him.”
“His daddy divorced his mama. Beau was telling me about that last night at dinner.”
“Dinner? You had dinner with Beau? Why?”
“Well, because he asked and because unlike you, I forgave him a long time ago. He’s a nice man, Grace. And good Lord, is he a looker! Whew! If I was thirty years younger, I tell you what.”
“Mama!”
“What? Just ‘cause there’s snow on the roof doesn’t mean there’s not still fire in the furnace.”
Grace couldn’t help but laugh. Ida Storm Summerfield was not a woman to hold back. If she had something to say, she said it. She was what she was. There wasn’t a fake bone in her body.
It dawned on Grace that once upon a time, she was that way. Why had she allowed herself to change and become so shallow?
“Well, isn’t Beau married?” she asked to change the subject.
“No. He said he just never fell in love again after the two of you split up. Grace, I tell you, my Spidey senses were tingling like crazy when he talked about old times. I asked him if he wanted a second chance with you and he said he didn’t expect he’d ever get the opportunity for that so there wasn’t much point in wasting time talking or wishing for something you can’t have.”
Grace sat down on the bed, stunned by what she’d heard. Beau Legacy still carried a torch for her? How was that possible? He was the one who had screwed things up when he cheated on her.
“Well, I guess that’s flattering, and goodness knows my ego could use some stroking right about now, but that’s water under the bridge. I have to go, mama so we can get on the road. See you tonight. I love you.”
“Call me along the way.”
“I will. ‘Bye.”
Grace took one more look around and left the bedroom. “Y’all ready to hit the road?” She shouted as she walked downstairs.
“I ready, Mama.” Five-year-old Theo appeared at the foot of the stairs. He wore his Batman backpack and had his Transformers lunchbox in one hand. His pillow with the Avengers pillowcase was crammed under his arm, and he had his iPad in the other hand. Paws, the family Maine Coon cat, stood beside him.
“Well, let’s get you in the car, punkin.” She smiled and kissed the top of his head. “Where’s your sister?”
“She say she not going.” Theo pushed his glasses up his nose. “She be so mean.”
Grace bit back irritation. She was trying very hard to be understanding. Sherri was eight and had a dozen best friends she didn’t want to leave. She also was “daddy’s girl” and was not taking the impending split well at all.
“Okay, into the car.” Grace herded Theo and Paws outside and got them situated into the SUV. “Now do not move,” she said and headed back into the house. “Sherri! Sherri? Where are you?”
She found her daughter sitting in the breakfast nook, staring out at the backyard.
“Does grandma have a pool?” Sherri asked.
“No, honey, but there’s a lake real close by.”
“Ugh. There are icky things in lakes.”
“Not necessarily bad things. I swam there the whole time I was growing up, and nothing ever hurt me. You don’t know. You might like it.”
“I won’t ever like it.” Sherri stood and faced her mother. “I don’t wanna go, Mama. I wanna stay here with Daddy. Please, just let me stay.”
Grace knelt down in front of Sherri. “I’m sorry baby, but you can’t. You know Daddy is at work most of the time. He wouldn’t be here to take care of you, and you’re too little to be by yourself. Besides, I’d miss you so much I wouldn’t be able to do anything but cry if you weren’t with me.”
“I don’t want you to cry, Mama.” Sherri threw her arms around Grace’s neck and started sobbing. “Why do we have to move, mommy? Do you not love Daddy no more?”
“It’s not that, sweetie. It’s just…” Grace didn’t know how to explain. She didn’t want to toss Tad under the bus and make him into a villain to his children, but neither did she want to lie and make him out to be some great caring dad, because that was a lie as well.
He cared, but his love was superficial. He loved his kids to be cute and smart, talented and quiet. He liked to show them off like he did his car or his boat and then put them away. Spending time with them was, to him, family dinner on Sunday or the occasional movie he’d watch with them.
She marveled at how much the kids adored him and wondered if it was because he was so out of reach. Getting to spend time with their dad was rare, and so it meant more.
“Mommy and daddy just need to time apart, sweetie. And besides, Grandma needs us to come stay with her for a while. You know she’s been so lonely since my daddy died. We can keep her company and make her smile again.”
“I want Gran to smile.” Sherri pulled back and wiped at one eye. “I don’t want her to be sad.”
“Then let’s go make her happy, okay?” Grace smiled and hugged Sherri.
“Okay, Mommy.”
That hurdle overcome, they gathered up the things Sherri was taking in the car with her, called Brick, the family dog and headed outside. Five minutes later, Grace pulled Tad’s Lincoln Navigator out of the driveway, laden down with every item of clothing she and the kids owned, a Maine Coon cat that weighed forty-f
ive pounds and a Rottweiler who tipped the scales at over one hundred pounds.
She looked in the rearview mirror as she drove away. It was the end of a big chapter in her life. She wondered what came next.
Chapter Four
“No.” Beau crossed his arms over his chest.
“Well, why not?” John Luke demanded. “You did it fine when we were in that scrape and—“
“That was different.” Beau cut him off. John Luke and damn near his entire family had been trying to talk him into perfecting his shifting techniques. They didn’t seem to understand that he didn’t really enjoy the experience.
He was perfectly happy being a human. He also didn’t tell them that while most of his siblings’ DNA tests revealed that they had inherited a lot from their father, his and his younger brother Jericho’s tests showed that they had also inherited some interesting genetic characteristics from their mother.
The same mother who had been dosing them since birth to prevent them from shifting, and the same mother who had allowed Logan’s wife Sabine to be tortured. Beau could barely stand to think about it. How could a mother do that to her kids?
She was not at all the woman he thought, and it scared him to think she was part of him. Or more precisely, Dark Fae blood was inside him. How could it be that only he and Jericho had genetic characteristics from her and none of the others did?
Thus far, he hadn’t noticed any special skills or abilities, so he assumed that whatever traits he’d inherited from his mother were not of the paranormal variety. And that suited him just fine.
“Beau, what gives?” John Luke asked.
“Nothing gives. I just don’t like it. What’s so damn hard to understand about that?”
“Well, nothing, I guess, but I just thought—“
“That I’d be like you and Logan. I know, but I’m not. Now before you argue, would you just think about it? When we were kids, I was the bookworm. If it hadn’t been for dad insisting that I do something active, I’d have been happy to keep my nose stuck in a book.”
“Or playing with that science kit you got for Christmas one year.” John Luke laughed and lifted one foot to prop it on the fence rail. “Remember when you tried to create some—something or other and ended up setting fire to the shed? I thought Dad was gonna stomp your ass good for that.”
Beau laughed at the memory. “So did I. But he did make me work weekends at the feed store until I made enough to have the shed repaired.”
“And he made you try out for basketball and football and take rodeo classes.”
“Yeah, he did that, too.”
“And you liked it.” John Luke turned toward him. “So before you start arguing, let me say this. I get that you think you don’t measure up to Logan James. Shit on a stick, brother, none of us do. He’s always been bigger, stronger, faster, smarter, and has a way with the ladies. But look, what all that got him? How many wives did he have to go through to finally realize that the gal he wanted was that little tagalong who followed him like a puppy until our mother sent her away.”
“I don’t feel less—“
“Yes, you do. You always have, and so did I. But that’s the way things are when you have a big brother. Only you took it to mean that you are less and that just isn’t the case. Hell, you were a star on the football field, the basketball court, and won how many ribbons for roping?”
“I get what you’re trying to do and I thank you, sincerely,” Beau said. “But that has nothing to do with this shifting thing. I just don’t enjoy being in another form. Just like I don’t like mucking out stalls, working with the horses, rounding up cattle, and much of anything else there is to be done on a ranch.
“I like what I do, and I'm good at it. I don’t need anyone to tell me that, I already know. So you and Logan can be the alphas of the pack or whatever, run with the wolves, howl at the moon. I’m just not interested, and I really wish both of you would just leave it be.”
He turned away from the view of the land stretching out for miles, land that was in his blood but was no longer his home. “I’m happy for you and Logan, and big enough to admit I’m a little jealous. All I ever really wanted was to be part of the family business and have a wife and some kids. I’m starting to think that just isn’t in the cards for me.”
“Not like you don’t have your share of interested women, bro. I mean, you might not be Cowboy Country come to town or some shit like Logan, but I know for a fact women are always making plays for you. So, what’s the problem?”
Beau considered his words before he spoke. He’d thought about it a lot of late and knew what held him back from having a lasting relationship. “The problem is, I don’t think I ever got over Grace.”
“That was college, Beau.”
“Yeah, it was. But she was—something special. I know she wasn’t head cheerleader, prom queen, or stuff like that, but she was something. And she saw me. Me. Not a Legacy or an athlete or what people wanted me to be, but for me. And she loved me for it.
“I fucked up and lost her, and if I could go back and do it again, I’d made sure I didn’t lose her because I think she just might have been my one true love.”
He barked a self-depreciating laugh. “Listen to me; I sound like one of those sappy romance movies.”
“Or not.” John Logan put his hand on Beau’s shoulder. “It took me awhile to find it, but now that Ily’s in my life I finally get what true love is and honest to God, brother, if that gal was it for you, I wish you could go back and make it right, too, because there’s nothing that even comes close to being a fulfilling as that.”
Beau nodded. “I’m happy for you. You and Logan and I hope it’s always that way for you. Who knows, maybe one day I’ll find another Grace. Or not. If not, then I’ll just learn to be happy with what I have. Life could always be worse.”
“Tell me about it. Glad I’m not King Michael’s daughter. Thanks to Ily and Severin, she claimed possession of property he owned in Florida. But she’ll need a lot of luck to find what is necessary to unlock the portal between dimensions.”
“What do you mean, ‘lot of luck’? If Ily and Severin know how, why don’t they just tell her?”
“Apparently it’s not that simple,” John Luke said. “It’s something she has to do. Ily said they left her as many clues as they could, and the rest is up to her. She’s just excited that Elena, or Ellie as she goes by, has claimed ownership of the place.”
“So what happens if she opens the portal? Is that a good thing or a bad?”
“I wish I knew.” John Luke put a hand on his belly, turned and headed in the direction of the house. “My stomach’s threatening to gnaw on my backbone. Let’s get started on rustling up some food.”
“Sounds good.” Beau fell in step with his brother.
“Oh, one other thing,” John Luke said. “Mysti told me this. Apparently, some writer no one ever heard of wrote this vampire book that rocketed to the top of the bestseller charts.”
“So?”
“So according to Mysti, the vampire in the book is a cowboy and his description sounds a lot like Augustus.”
“But it’s not, right? Him, I mean.”
“Beats me. I doubt it. Anyway, Ravyn and Mysti read it and went nuts and gave Ily a copy.
“Ily said Ravyn told her that the writer was going on a book tour and would be coming to Texas. Ravyn and Mysti want to go and invited Ily to join.”
“Ily doesn’t impress me as the fangirl type.”
“She’s not. She said the book was stupid. But then, from what I hear the human woman is kidnapped by the vampire. You can imagine someone trying to kidnap Ily.”
They both laughed at that. “Yeah, that would be a sight. Poor sap would realize real quick he bit off way more than he can chew.”
“Ya think?” John Luke laughed again. “Oh, did I tell you that Dad’s dating?”
“No way.”
“Scout’s honor.” John Luke remarked and then added, “and she’s pre
tty hot. Mid-forties and a Fae.”
“You think he’s making a mistake?”
“Maybe, but it’s his to make. And I guess it just goes to show that no matter how old you are, you’re never too old to go over fool’s hill.”
“Oh God, I remember Uncle Eli saying that when we were teenagers.”
“Yep, and I guess it’s true.”
“Well, I think I’ll stick with just keeping my eyes open and hoping I meet a nice woman I enjoy spending more than an hour with,” Beau said and resumed walking toward the house. “Kidnapping isn’t much my style.”
“Well, you could rope one. If you still remember how.”
Beau's shoulder bumped into his brother. “Yeah, that’d do the trick.”
“You never know, bro. You just never know.”
Chapter Five
Grace slowed when she reached the city limits of Legacy. She hadn’t been home for nearly ten years, and she was a bit ashamed of that. Tad didn’t care much for Grace’s parents, or Texas for that matter, so he always found an excuse why they and the kids couldn’t go for a visit.
The only times Grace’s father and mother had seen their grandchildren was when they came to Grace’s home, or when Grace would meet them halfway in between for a weekend so they could see the kids.
Looking back, she hated herself for allowing Tad to control her the way he had, and rob her parents and her children of the precious time they could never get back. Now, Grace’s father was gone, and her children would never know what a wonderful man he was.
But it appeared they would get the chance to know Grace’s mother, Ida. Grace noticed how pretty the town was. The streetlights were new and looked like old-fashioned carriage lamps. The roads looked freshly paved, and there didn’t appear to be an empty storefront on the main street.
Grace slowed even more as she neared the Apothecary Shop, Summerfield’s Herbs. Tears welled in her eyes as she looked at the front window with its pretty gold writing the door her mother had saved so long for with Tiffany-style border on the clear inset panes and the dark walnut frame that was polished to a shine.