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Title Page
June in August
By
Samantha Sommersby
eBooks are not transferable. They cannot be sold, shared or given away as it is an infringement of the copyright of this work.
JUNE IN AUGUST
Copyright © 2005 SAMANTHA SOMMERSBY
All Romance eBooks, LLC
Clearwater, Florida 33761
www.allromanceebooks.com
This is a work of fiction and any resemblance to persons, living or dead, or business establishments, events, or locales is coincidental.
All Rights Are Reserved. No part of this may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.
First All Romance eBooks publication: April 2013
Previously published by Linden Bay Romance: January 2007
I’ll never forget the day Wylie Patton first told me that he loved me. It was the kind of day that my Daddy always called a scorcher. The entire week had been unbearably hot, in fact. For the fourth day in a row the temperature had reached over a hundred. It was terribly muggy and the air felt thick and heavy. It was downright oppressive. But I wasn’t minding the weather at all. Not one bit. I was on a mission. I was going to prove to Wylie Patton that I was all grown up. A woman. I was going to get him to notice me.
I climbed out of my Daddy’s old truck and walked up to the door of the Patton garage. It was almost one o’clock and the door was still locked. “Back soon,” the sign hanging in the window said. I smoothed down the skirt of the crisp, white, linen dress that I was wearing and frowned at the wrinkles that had appeared during the short ride over. A wisp of hair escaped what had been a neat French twist and I immediately regretted not using more hairspray. Momma was always going on about the importance of using hairspray. Not for the first time it occurred to me that perhaps I should have listened to Momma.
If I were to be perfectly honest, I’d have to admit that I’d always found listening to my parents difficult. I tried my best to understand them, honestly I did. But then I kind of started to give up. Last night may have cinched it for me. My parents, I think, might be a lost cause.
My brother Sam’s number was called in the lottery yesterday morning. Momma, Daddy and I had just returned from two weeks at the shore. Sam hadn’t been able to go with us this year. He waited until dinner to tell us the news. When he announced that he was planning to leave for Canada the following morning Momma became hysterical. She actually fainted. Daddy put his fist through the dining room wall and told Sam that he was ashamed of him. He called Sam a coward.
That night I was woken from a sound sleep by a loud crash. At first I thought I’d been dreaming. But then I heard it, over the hum of the fan in my bedroom, sobs coming from the bathroom next door. Sam told me to go away when I called out to him, but somehow I knew he didn’t mean it. He had left the door unlocked so I half-closed my eyes and peeked in. He had a rope around his neck and he’d broken the shower-curtain rod. He begged me not to tell Daddy. We cried for an hour together on the bathroom floor. Then I called Doc Lyons. I woke Doc up at 2:00 a.m., I did. Don’t know where I found the courage. I explained the situation, laid it out plain as day. He promised to arrange for an evaluation in Houston with a man he trusted, someone he’d gone to school with. He told me that everything would be all right and I believed him. Doc was a good man.
At eight o’clock, in the middle of breakfast, the telephone rang. My parents were asked to bring Sam to Houston for a complete physical evaluation. The appointment was set for the following day. Predictably, they telephoned my Aunt Laura to let her know they’d be coming. She’s younger than Momma and lives in Houston with her lawyer husband and no children. Momma, apparently, thinks that’s a crime. Within a couple hours the three of them, Momma, Daddy, and Sam, were packed and on their way. Daddy left me with some money and instructions to bring the truck to the garage for an oil change. He waited until they were driving away to spring the news on me. While we were away at the shore, Wylie had come home.
So, there I was, waiting outside the garage for Wylie Patton. I hadn’t seen him in three long years and my stomach was all a flutter. I kept on having to remind myself to breathe. After all, the last time I’d seen him I’d been fifteen. It was the night of his big send off. Wylie had enlisted. It was one week after his eighteenth birthday.
“Junebug! Is that you? What are you doing out here all by yourself in the dark?”
“I could ask you the same question, Wylie Patton. It’s your party after all. Shouldn’t you be inside?”
Wylie lifted his hand to his head and raked it over his short-cropped hair, then sat down next to me on the top step. He smiled. “Well, I guess if I were to be honest I’d say I was hiding. What would you say?”
I laughed. “The same, I guess.”
“What are you hiding from?” he asked.
I shrugged. “Everyone’s acting so happy. Like this is a good thing.” I swallowed, hard. “But it’s serious. You might not come back and…” I couldn’t quite finish. I looked away and all that I could think about was the sick feeling in my stomach and the huge gaping hole in my heart.
Wiley cupped my chin in his hand and turned my face back towards his. He looked steadily into my eyes. “I’m gonna come back, Junebug, you can count on that.”
“But—”
Wiley placed a finger over my lips, silencing me.
“You don’t want to jinx things now, do you?”
I shook my head, closed my eyes, and tried not to cry.
“I’m gonna come back,” he repeated with conviction.
“Not all the boys come back, Wylie,” I whispered as the tears escaped and began to roll down my cheeks. “Ray Johnson, his family hasn’t heard from him—”
“I’m gonna come back,” he said again, wiping away my tears. “Daddy, Grand-daddy, they were both Marines. They fought for freedom. Now it’s my turn. It’s my turn to give something back. If you don’t stop crying I might just get the impression that you’re going to miss me.”
I reached up, stilled his hands, and looked into his eyes.
“I am going to miss you Wylie. I’m going to miss you something awful. I know that you see me as that pesky little girl next door. But I’m growing up. I have thoughts and feelings and…”
“You have thoughts, Junebug?”
I couldn’t help myself. I started to laugh.
Wylie leaned back, his long legs stretching out in front of him. He appeared to be studying me carefully, with a seriousness that I didn’t remember seeing in him before.
“I’d like to know your thoughts, June,” he said quietly. “Will you write to me?”
“I will.”
“Promise?”
“Every day.”
And I had. Every day for the three years that he was away. But I never got one letter back. Not one.
The sound of an approaching motorcycle startled me from my thoughts. I walked back towards the gas pumps, shielded my eyes from the sun, and gazed down the road. It was a motorcycle all right. The rider was wearing big black boots, a black leather jacket, faded jeans, and dark glasses. His sandy hair was long, down to his shoulders, and it flew out behind him. I wasn’t surprised when he pulled into the station. I quickly moved back towards the building and sat down in one of the chairs outside the garage door. I was careful not to look at the stranger and instead busied myself with pulling my compact out of my purse and adding a light dusting of powder to my face.
“Junebug? Is that you?”
I dropped the compact, shattering the mirror. We both reached for it at the exact same time. His hand covered mine
. He looked up at me and suddenly I was flooded with embarrassment and panic. Embarrassed about every word that I had ever written to him. Every thought I had shared. Every secret I divulged. Every feeling I…. Oh, God!
“It’ll be all right,” he said, smiling reassuringly and handing the compact back to me.
He unzipped his jacket and took it off. Wiley was wearing a white t-shirt underneath. It was drenched in sweat and clung to his chest. He was lean and hard, thinner than I remembered and his eyes were a bit duller. He pulled a pack of cigarettes out of his back pocket, shook one out, lit it up, and inhaled deeply.
“Hoped I would see you today,” he said, blowing out a stream of smoke. “When I came in this morning I saw that your Daddy had scheduled an oil change. Thought you might come with him.”
“Momma and Daddy are in Houston with Sam. His number came up yesterday. He’s getting his physical today.”
Wylie tossed his cigarette onto the ground. “Damn,” he murmured. “Sorry to hear that, Junebug.” Wylie fished the keys to the garage out of his front pocket and unlocked the door.
“No one calls me Junebug anymore,” I told him, stepping over the threshold.
He opened up the cooler that contained the Coca Colas, pulled out two, popped the caps off using the side of the countertop and handed me one. “What do they call you?”
“Just June.”
“Well, ‘Just June’, suit up. You can help me with the oil change,” he said, tossing a pair of greasy overalls at me.
I dodged them.
“Wiley! I’m wearing white linen for heaven’s sake!”
“Wouldn’t be my choice for changing oil,” he said, shaking his head. “But then, you’ve always been peculiar.”
“I am not peculiar and I’m certainly not changing the oil!”
“Forgot how?”
“No!” I said feeling exasperated. “Are you blind? Look at me. I’m—”
“All grown up, with thoughts…and feelings. I remember,” he said, taking a step towards me.
I felt myself start to blush.
“I don’t mean to embarrass you. Your letters were wonderful, June. They were all that kept me going sometimes. The war, it…it wasn’t what I thought it would be. ”
I was certain that I was going to faint. My heart was pounding so fast and so loud I half expected it to break my chest.
“You never wrote back,” I managed to say, my voice barely a whisper.
He glanced down at his boots then looked up at me and smiled. His long sandy blonde hair half hiding his eyes. “I wrote. I wrote all the time. I just didn’t mail any of them.”
“Why not?”
“I’m not the boy you knew anymore June. I’m not the boy you wrote those letters to. I haven’t been for a long time. I’ve seen things. I’ve done things. Everyone expects me to be the same ol’ Wiley…”
“But you’re not. We all change, Wiley.”
“You lightened your hair and your tits got bigger. I killed people. Lots of people.”
“Wiley!” I gasped, my arms folding, protectively over my chest. “They’re called breasts and you shouldn’t be commenting on them!”
He brushed the hair out of his eyes. “Sorry, my manners are a bit rusty.”
“Do you still have the letters?”
“Some.”
“I’d like to read them.”
“No. They’re…dark.”
“I want to read them.”
“I’ll think about it.” He held his hand out.
I looked up at him.
“Keys,” he said. “So I can pull the truck into the garage?”
“Of course.” I dropped the keys into the palm of his outstretched hand and yawned.
“Am I boring you?” he yelled over his shoulder as he stepped outside and sauntered towards the truck. He had the same smooth, confident stride that he’d always had. Graceful yet determined.
“No. I was up late last night with Sam. He tried to hang himself.”
Wylie had been climbing into the cab of the truck, but he stopped. He stood there, stock-still for a minute. Then he turned back to face me. His hand, the one that held my keys was shaking.
“Doc Lyons said he’d fix it. Sam’s not gonna have to go fight. It’ll be all right. Doc promised. Momma and Daddy don’t know. They wouldn’t understand.”
Wylie nodded, then stepped into the truck, started the engine, and drove it into the garage.
“Who’s Doc Lyons?” he asked as he stepped out the truck.
“He came right after you left. He’s a good man. Sarah Jane, she got in the family way a while back. He referred her to…someone.”
Wylie looked pointedly at my hand. “I see you haven’t got a ring on your finger. Does that mean you said no to the proposal you were expecting from Peter Johnson?”
“Told you I would in the letters.”
Wiley smiled. “Bet your momma had a fit.”
“She wouldn’t speak to me for a week. She couldn’t understand why I’d say no.”
“Why did you, June?”
I shrugged. “I guess because I’m not in love with him.”
“Course not, who in their right mind could love a man named Peter Johnson? He’d probably want to name your first child Richard and call him Dick.”
I blushed again. I could feel the burn down to the tips of my toes. I lifted the Coke bottle and pressed the cool glass to my cheek. I closed my eyes for a moment and licked my lips. Suddenly I didn’t know what to say or where to look. When I opened them Wylie was standing right in front of me.
“Do that again,” he said, reaching up and placing his hand on the back of my neck. His thumb began to trace a path from behind my ear to the crook of my shoulder. Instinctively I leaned into his touch.
“Do what?” I asked, sounding breathless.
Wylie bit his lower lip and in a voice rough with passion said, “Wet your lips.”
Suddenly I felt every bit as young and inexperienced as I was. I’d been kissed before, of course. But I’d never gone further. Never felt the need to. Never wanted to.
“Allow me,” said Wylie as he leaned down, ever so slowly.
He brushed his lips across mine. They barely touched. Then his tongue darted out and swept across my lower lip. He pulled back slightly and sighed leaning his forehead against mine. I could feel the warmth of his breath on the side of my cheek as he exhaled out through his nose. He reached behind my head and pulled out the comb that held my hair in place. The loosened curls tumbled down my back and he ran his hands through them. Wiley pulled me in closer, wrapping one strong arm around my waist.
“You should stop me,” he said as he turned me around and pressed my back against the side of the car.
I reached out and wrapped my hands around his biceps. “And why would I want to do that?”
“Because you deserve better than me. I don’t seem to be able to sleep at night anymore. When I do sleep, I have nightmares. That’s why I didn’t move back into the house. I didn’t want to keep everyone up, didn’t want to worry them.”
We were so close. I could feel the buckle of his jeans pressing into my stomach. He was aroused, I could feel that too, and the excitement it brought made me shudder despite the sweltering heat.
“You can’t possibly be cold,” he whispered into the shell of my ear.
“Cold?” I gasped. “Lord, no! I don’t think I’ve ever been so… God, Wiley! I feel…”
He took my face in the palms of his calloused hands and crushed his lips to mine. The second he did, I realized that I had never before in my life been kissed, not really. He sucked my bottom lip into his mouth causing me to moan. I felt him smile as he tugged on it gently with his teeth. It caused a pressure to begin building in my belly. I wanted to reach for something more, but I wasn’t sure what that was, so I just held on, my fingers digging into his arms.
Wiley released my lip and then smoothly slid his tongue inside my waiting mouth. He tasted slightly of tobacco.
At first I just let him kiss me. His exploration turned tender, his movements slow and deliberate. It was almost as if he were committing the territory to memory. Perhaps, like me, he just wanted to savor the moment.
His hands slid around my waist and down my back. He shifted his hips a bit so that his leg was positioned between mine. He squeezed my bottom and tugged me closer still. I could feel the skirt of my dress begin to ride up, but I didn’t care. All I could think about was the delicious sensations that were coursing through me. The rough fabric of his blue jeans between my thighs caused a tingle, the kind that I’d read about in romance novels. The kind that made you want more, the kind that promised so much. It felt wonderful and wicked and then suddenly…it was gone.
Wiley pulled away from me and rushed outside. I was left flushed and panting. My legs felt weak. I leaned against the truck and only vaguely paid attention to the conversation that he was having with the stranger at the pump. I hadn’t even heard the man pull up. I smoothed down my skirt and picked the comb up off of the floor. I was certain that my lipstick was smudged and that my hair was a sight. I leaned down and peered into the side mirror of the truck to assess the damage.
I was wiping what was left of my lipstick off when he returned. His approach was so quiet that I hadn’t realized he was behind me until his hands were on my waist.
“I’m suffering from a moral dilemma, June,” he said as he leaned over. Molding his body to mine. His hips against by bottom, his chest curved over my back. “If I don’t apologize I’m afraid that you’ll think I’m horrible. If I do, then I’d be lying for sure. Should I apologize?”
His breathing was deep and measured, just like his voice. I let is wash over me. I reached back and curved my hand around his neck. I didn’t answer him right away. I breathed in his scent and soaked up the feel of him, comparing it all to the conjured dreams that had kept me wanting and ready while he’d been away.
“No. Please don’t say you’re sorry, Wiley.”
His arms tightened around my waist and he said my name. It was almost as if he was assuring himself that I was there.
“June.”
“Yes, Wiley?”
June in August Page 1