Hogan knew what Jenna was thinking. That this was all his fault. If he hadn’t donated that Harley, none of this would have happened. He’d gone and messed up everything—before he’d even had a chance to take Jenna for a walk. Or a ride on his Harley.
Bull returned, discarded the chair he was carrying, and pushed past everyone to whisk April off the stage.
“Okay,” the MC said. “If you’ll make your way to your tables, we’ll eat and then post the results for the silent auction.”
The hostess from the front took the microphone. “And if anyone would like to make a final bid, now’s the time.”
Jenna was looking around the formidable room searching for someone or something. Probably an exit. “I’ve got to find April.” Determination was plastered all over her face.
“She’s in great hands with Bull, and I’m sure he’s already left with her.” He held up a finger and said, “I’ll call to make sure.” He couldn’t stop himself from shifting from one foot to another. Or from staring at the strong-willed woman before him. She continued to scan the room, looking like she was poised to jump off the deep end of the pool to save her friend.
He scrolled through his contacts and hit Bull’s. “Hey, man, is April all right?” He rubbed the back of his neck.
“Yeah. Just really shook up, though. I’m taking her home now.”
“Call me if you need anything. Jenna is pretty worried.” He wanted to smooth out that little furrow in her brow with a light kiss. But that would probably get him slapped.
“I’ll give you a call when I get April home and calmed down. Get the motorcycle to the shop. I’ll handle things from there,” Bull said.
“Will do, my friend. Call me later when you get April settled.” Hogan ended the call.
Jenna didn’t need to say anything. Her eyes questioned him.
“They’re gone. Bull will take care of her. He’s a real stand-up guy.” And kind of protective, like he could tell Jenna was.
He shifted his weight. Again. Man, his fancy shoes were uncomfortable. He had to think fast. He was losing her attention. To her friend. To the room at large. “Look, I’ve paid for a whole table over there. Will you have dinner with us?” That wasn’t enough of a motive, and he knew it. “And Bull is going to update me on April later. Stay.”
“Are you sure April’s going to be okay with Bull?”
“Of course. Why wouldn’t she be?”
She shook her head. “I don’t know him. I love my friend, and I absolutely have to make sure she’s going to be safe.”
He admired the way the woman wanted to shield April. “I assure you that she’s getting the best of care from Bull.”
Jenna closed her eyes and exhaled. She breathed in and looked straight into his eyes with tears in hers. “Okay. I’m trusting you on that.”
He touched her hand and said as seriously as he could, “You have my word.”
Jenna paused a moment, then perused the ballroom. He was still close enough to her to feel the heat from her face. Or maybe he’d just imagined it from the red that flushed across her cheeks. Emotion emanated from them…and her.
He needed her to stay. Needed time to fix the mess he’d made with his motorcycle and mullet. He looked around to try to see what she was straining to see.
“Are you looking for someone else?” He glanced behind him.
She closed her eyes and huffed. “Actually, I’m looking to avoid someone. My cousin. Family issues.” She whispered, “Heavens to Betsy,” then grabbed his arm and moved him in front of her. “I want to go, but I also want to hear how April’s doing when Bull calls.”
His arm tingled where she touched it. He didn’t mind being a human shield for her. Her citrus scent wafted up to him.
She stayed in his shadow, peering beyond him, looking in the direction of the exit.
He turned his head, not knowing what to look for.
“Well, we can hide you out at our table. Anyway, I wanted to show you what I’m going to win at the auction,” he said.
Her brow wrinkled again in such a cute way. “Um. It’s an auction. How do you know you’re going to win with your bid?”
“Because I’m getting ready to update my effort with a most generous number.” He smiled.
“Oh.”
That seemed to end all her confusion.
“Look. My table’s over there.” He pointed to the “Private Reserved for Platinum Sponsors” sign that was on a stand beside a roped off section of the room. “Let me get you seated. Inconspicuously, of course, and I’ll take care of the bid. It’ll only take a minute, and I’ll meet you at my table.”
The same hostess that was on the stage was seating people in the reserved section. Hogan reached in his pocket and pulled a twenty from his clip and inconspicuously handed it to the woman. “I don’t believe I got your name earlier.”
“Felicity Faye.” She flashed him a big smile, ignoring Jenna’s existence.
“Well, of course. Felicity Faye, look here.” He sidled up to her and whispered. “I need you to take Jenna here to the Thorpe table against that window over there and give her a seat with her back to the crowd. Think you can do that?”
She looked all confused at first, but then she slipped the bill into her bag at her hostess’ stand. “Of course.”
“Great. I’ll be right back.” He turned to Jenna. “You’ll be completely anonymous over there. I promise. As long as your cousin isn’t a sponsor and doesn’t have a special invitation to be seated in there, too.”
“Probably not.” She checked her phone. “I can’t stay long.” She glanced over her shoulder again, her hair brushing against her skin as sensuous as…silk.
Oh, he wanted to touch where a strand of her hair lingered. “I know. I know. Just trust me.” He had to get this right. To have a chance to spend more time with this woman.
Hogan turned quickly and nearly trotted out the room and down the hall, glancing into faces along the way, trying to discern who could be so awful that Jenna would go to such lengths to avoid. Oh, yeah. He sort of knew what she was thinking. He was a stranger. With a mullet. And a Harley shop.
He’d grown up on a farm in the deep South, so he knew about all the unwritten stuff about what was…proper and acceptable…and what was not. Fancy charity balls? Proper. Mullets? Not.
But mullets could be fun. And they could raise a lot of money for worthy charities—charities like this one. Something always dug in his gut about donating to moneymaking organizations that handed out assistance of their own accord. He believed charity to be…personal. He hated the antiseptic variety practiced from a distance and fueled by greed and commercialism. The kind that promised if you bought certain products, the company would see to it that a little would be given to something.
His parents took him to Sunday School as a child, and he’d learned that the Bible had never set up giving to be so…detached. Jesus fed the multitudes, touched the lepers, cared personally for people. That was another thing he liked about Jenna. Her hands worked with the little boy that she was trying to raise money for, and her actions and heart tried to protect her friend. It was her emotional involvement that had drawn him to her.
When he arrived at the silent auction room with its tall windows, covered by elaborate silk drapes, he knew what to do. He found the item that he’d bid on earlier and revved up his offer. The money was for that sick little boy anyway. Yep. He was definitely going to win it now and do a lot of good in the process.
His plan for the item had changed, though, since he’d met Jenna. He could use someone like her to add a little…class…and order to his life—at home and at work. The longer his life moved forward without a woman in it, the more it reminded him of a locker room. For many reasons, he needed to change that—for more reasons than he could count.
“Boss?” a voice said from behind.
He turned. It was Wilder, one of his employees that he’d dragged in on the whole mullet challenge for charity. He and some of the o
ther guys already had a head start on the challenge. Which was what had given him the idea in the first place. “Hey, guy. Where’s your wife?” Hogan shook his hand and patted his back.
“You’re going to get a kick out of this, boss. See. We had to make a decision between this here hoity-toity thing you got us roped in to or the race in Darlington. We only had six tickets to the race. So, you see—like I said, you’re gonna get a kick out of this—” He sort of snorted as he tried to suppress a chuckle. “We thought we’d surprise you by letting the wives and girlfriends take the race tickets, and we all showed up to support you.” Wilder bit his lips in an attempt not to smile. “You should see some of the guys in there.” He couldn’t hold it in any longer and laughed. “They don’t have a clue how to dress for something fancy like this.” He looked around the room.
Hogan rubbed the back of his neck and shifted his weight in his too-fitted Italian leather shoes. “So, who’s at the table?”
“The twin turbo team, Hickey and Dickie. Sea Pig, Diamond Jim. And Fred.”
Oh, no. Hogan thought the guys were going to divide the tickets and bring their wives or girlfriends. Who would have kept them a little straight. If at all possible. But when the whole crew got together, everyone knew. The motor team was in the house. They could be quite loud. And crude. And even obnoxious.
“Gotta go, Wilder.” He needed to get out of there like his pants were on fire.
He had to save Jenna. Or it was going to be over even before it had begun. And he’d never get the help he needed. Or the girl he suspected would fit in perfectly in his life.
⸙
Jenna would have preferred not to even have been at the country club, but at least she was going to be safe from Dudley and his faux fiancé by sitting in the private section.
And then Felicity Faye stopped her at the wrong table. She pulled out a chair that faced the window, away from the crowd. She nodded. “Yes. It’s the Thorpe table.” She lifted her eyebrows in commiseration.
It had been bad enough that she’d been standing beside Hogan with his mini mullet that was slightly disguised by his dark suit, but these guys had something way more serious going on with their business-in-the-front-party-in-the-back haircuts. Long, unruly, and in some cases, it appeared…uncombed, and maybe even…unwashed. And she wasn’t about to get started on their clothes. This wasn’t some oyster roast or NASCAR race.
This was…the Oaks Country Club—grand, historical, proper.
“Hey, Miss,” said the mullet man with the red wiry hair to Felicity Faye. “We didn’t order no socialite for an appetizer.” He looked at Jenna.
The whole group burst into laughter. People in the reserved section looked her way. But she didn’t think anyone paid attention beyond the tables around them.
In the distance, she caught a glimpse of Dudley at his table, and to her horror, he was sitting with none other than Mr. Slithers, the family’s sneaky, snaky legal advisor. Great.
Jenna could handle harmless grass snakes, like the one in the parking lot. Like the many she and Jasper protected from lawn mowers and other predators on the plantation.
Mr. Slithers was another thing. He’d been expecting either a “Letter of Intention” or a “Letter of Means” concerning the estate for six months now, but Jenna had creatively wormed her way out of seeing him and answering his calls. Every time. Though she’d been trying to find the right fit for the plantation, she still had no idea about how to turn the property into something profitable, and she certainly didn’t have the “means” which basically meant that she’d snagged some guy with money.
What was she to say in the stupid letter anyway?
I’m a single twenty-six-year-old Old Maid with absolutely no prospects of marriage, a teaching certificate that I don’t really use, a silly part-time job at a frilly dress shop, and a handful of less-than-approved-of charitable endeavors. Save one, the venerable Summerbrook Ladies League, which she’d been avoiding attending until she could get her best friend in so as to have a real ally in that den of slippery eels. And, Mr. Slithers, No. I’ve not even started the paperwork to drop my surname of Bellingham and to use DeBordieu, and I don’t have a clue as to how to devise a plan to make the plantation profitable. Not exactly a glowing application for the people who’d have to approve her as heir to the DeBordieu estate, plantation and trust—at least what was left of it.
Willa Cather had once said, "The land belongs to the future.” Maybe her controlling ancestor was right. The plantation probably should go to someone who knows the economics of running a successful plantation, and that was not her. Even the prospect of infusing the family with new money though a marriage was basically off the table now. Time had run out—for her, for her parents, for Jasper and Amberlee.
She’d have to sit with the mullet party for now. If she’d known Hogan well enough, she’d kill him. But it was a bit bold of her to think about killing a virtual stranger.
Maybe she’d kill April later—that is—if she ever recuperated. Jenna had been a bad friend tonight. If it were her raffle ticket that caused April to win that motorcycle and caused her to be thrown into a full-fledged panic attack, she’d never forgive herself.
“You sure you got the right table, lady?” said one of the mullet twins across from her. “This here’s the table for Thorpe’s Custom Motorcycles.”
“I believe so,” she said. It just made sense now that Hogan had a mullet, too. What a mess. Motorcycles and mullets. She glanced back at Dudley and Mr. Slithers. No place to go right now. Un, deux, trois, quatre. The hostess left.
“Okay,” said the man with the red shock of hair. “I’ll introduce you to our cast of characters.” He held out his hand. “This is our mullchanic, Diamond Jim.”
The man with the curls on top of his head and the stained fingernails nodded in her direction and said, “How ya doing, ma’am?” She couldn’t stop gazing at the tightly twisted little ringlets crowning his head. Oh, no, he had not. Oh, yes, he had! It looked like he’d actually permed the top. Who would do such a thing? Just take a deep breath.
She smiled at him in the polite way she’d been taught by her mother and grandmother. They used to augment her etiquette classes with their special lessons on genteel manners because a girl could never have too many manners. It was all she could do to keep hers in check right now. Oh, how she longed for those simple days with her mother and grandmother and their lovely teas under the huge old magnolia tree in the formal gardens. They would lounge away the hours, sitting on the lacy wrought iron furniture, sipping tea and eating cucumber sandwiches and the miniature rum cakes that Amberlee had prepared. Her fondest memories of those times were when Amberlee joined them and told them colorful stories her great-grandmother had told her that her great-grandmother had told her about the plantation.
“And the twins over there are Hickey and Dickey, who are also known as Salesmullet and Loitermullet.”
They both smiled. She couldn’t believe it, but they were actually wearing matching T-shirts that had been screen printed to look like tuxedos. Faux-sedos. Great.
“They are both in sales, but Salesmullet actually sells stuff. Dickey Loitermullet there just stands around the showroom with his fingers in his ears for the most part.
The whole table burst into laughter. She glanced behind her to see if her cousin was looking her way.
Good. He was enthralled by something Mr. Slithers was saying. Probably explaining—once again—how the heir of DeBordieu Plantation had to be named, vetted with his or her plan for sustainability approved by the board, and standing ready to take on the role of overseer by the time the current heir reached sixty-five—which for her mother was going to be pretty soon. Time was running out for Jenna’s family. And Cousin Dudley looked more than happy to step in and assume the plantation. The last thing Jenna or her parents wanted for the plantation was for it to be turned in to one of those…tourist circuses like Dudley was planning to do.
She examined the ballroom quickl
y to see if she could spot Hogan. At least he had on decent clothes. Sitting next to him might assuage the impact the T-shirt tuxes had upon Mr. Slithers and Dudley—if they ever saw her—not that it should matter. But somehow, it did. Still. She supposed it was from her being a product of a proper Southern upbringing. Appearances mattered.
The introductions continued. “Sea Pig over there—” He pointed to a guy who was balding on top, had short hair on the sides and a shoulder length mullet in back. “We call him Mullanonymous. He takes care of finance and hides behind those glasses and that computer of his about twenty hours a day.”
She’d keep her own glasses in her purse, hidden from nearly everyone but April—the only person who knew all of her. Well…almost. She felt a pang of guilt for not thinking of April more than she had since she’d left. Her precious best friend had better be okay.
The balding man smiled and nodded.
“Ain’t that right, Sea Pig?”
She wasn’t about to ask how he got the name Sea Pig, though she just assumed that part of it came from the upturn of his broad nose. He’d actually attempted to dress up—with his plaid shirt and striped tie that didn’t match. Grandmother taught her everything she ever needed to know about proper attire. No mixing patterns. Wear linen in spring and summer, and wool and corduroy in the fall and winter. And, of course, the perennial rule about white being worn only between Memorial Day and Labor Day was eternally in effect—no matter what those Yankee women say, bless their hearts.
One of the twins spoke up. “And Ryan Seacrest here goes by McMullet. But you can call him Sam if that don’t suit you.”
He did look a little like Ronald McDonald gone redneck. And a little Rebel Angels, with his black boots and leather vest. Good thing April wasn’t here. Anything that dealt with Rebel Angels upset her so. Jenna had gotten really good at shielding her best friend from anything associated with the gang that ruined April’s father—that is, until lately. April was creating her own discomfort lately, and it seemed Jenna was helpless to control her friend’s distress.
Now that she’d fulfilled her obligations to April, all she could think about was getting out of there, but with Dudley’s table by the entrance to the grand hall, she’d never make it past that roadblock and down the hall lined with all the ancient paintings and decorated with gilded Neo-classical credenzas and chairs and through the front door toward freedom. It simply seemed impossible.
Fireflies and Lies (A Summerbrook Novel Book 4) Page 4