by Jillian Neal
“Honestly,” Charlie grinned, “he’s the greatest guy I know. He’d do anything in the world for me, and he was there for me during the worst time in my whole life. He was little back then, and he’d sit and hold my hand while I cried. What twelve-year-old boy does that? Plus, he’s got the best lips. Don’t you think?”
“Oh, I agree,” Lena assured her. “So masculine. Nice strong jaw too.”
Personally, Jamie thought his pecs were more impressive than his lips, but he wasn’t going to be picky. Mildly concerned that Lena was going to try to kiss him, Jamie yanked his “wife” out of the diner. She put a whole lot of space between them as soon as they were out of view of the diner windows. Disappointment sank slowly through him. It turned the two loaded cheeseburgers he’d eaten into a brick in his stomach.
A few hours later, they pulled into a Target in Junction City, Kansas. Charlie swore she’d never been so thrilled to see a store. Once again, Jamie helped her keep the train off the pavement. “All right, how long are we staying at Colt’s so I know how many pairs of underwear to buy?”
Charlie considered. “I don’t know. How long do you think we’d be allowed to stay?”
He shook his head. “We’re allowed to do anything we want. You’re not breaking any rules. How long did you take off work for the honeymoon?”
“A week. Kind of. I turned in my notice before I left because Ed didn’t really want me working, so I guess I don’t have to go back other than to clean out my office.” She shuddered involuntarily and wondered if part of her desperation to run wasn’t the thought of spending an entire week alone with Ed. Really should’ve considered that before today. She felt like the walking embodiment of the head slap emoji.
“What the actual fuck? You love your job. And why the hell didn’t you tell me you were doing that because I would’ve stopped it.”
“I know. I was…really, really stupid. Okay, there I said it. I was a complete idiot. After Dad’s heart attack last year, I’ve been so worried I thought it would be better if I did what he wanted me to do. I’ll call them Monday and beg them to give me my job back because not having it makes me want to cry.” She’d lost so much in her life. She’d told herself that bowing to her father’s wishes would be better for his health. She wasn’t certain she could survive burying another parent. Reverend Tilson was doing very well health-wise lately. She hoped her stunt didn’t set him back. But losing her job felt like a death to her. She cherished it. Loved it way too much to have ever let Ed discourage her from it. Not to mention, she’d worked awfully hard to get where she was.
Once again, Jamie seemed to be damming back a flood of words with the might of his teeth. It took him a full minute before he unhinged his jaw. “All right, we’ll start with a week. Do you need my help or are we grabbing what we need and meeting back up at the registers?”
“I’ve got it. I’ll meet you back up here, but I want to change out of this gown before we get back on the road.”
“Then we’ll make that happen.”
Charlie got a cart and headed toward the women’s section. She’d picked out one shirt and was looking at the jeans when Jamie returned with a full handbasket. “I’ve been up front five minutes. Are you okay?” He sounded genuinely concerned.
Completely unable to believe that he was ready to go on a week-long trip in less than ten minutes, she inventoried his basket. Large pack of boxer briefs, two pairs of Wranglers, a stack of T-shirts and a package of socks. Toothbrush, toothpaste, some of that dude combo body and hair wash, and deodorant. She rolled her eyes. “Women’s clothes don’t come in packs. It takes us longer.”
“Women are objectively the smarter sex so that sounds like something y’all need to get to fixing.”
“You didn’t get pajamas, so see, you’re not finished either.” Victory rang in her tone, but she tried not to sound too smug.
“I don’t wear pajamas.” He chuckled at her expression.
“Well, whatever you sleep in, you didn’t get it.”
“I don’t sleep in anything, unless I’m at the firehouse and then I sleep in skivvies, so I’ve got everything I need except you.”
It took Charlie entirely too long to get her mind to focus on anything but what Jamie would look like completely nude tangled up in bedsheets. She blinked several times trying to clear the erotic imagery from her mind. Nothing worked. “Um, well, okay then. I’ll hurry.”
“Here, let me help. What size jeans do you need?”
“I’m not telling you that.”
“Oh for fuck’s sake. All right, how ‘bout what do you sleep in? I’ll go over there and get that.” He pointed to the adjacent section in the store.
Charlie had no idea what possessed her to say it, but she smirked. “Maybe I don’t sleep in anything either.”
“Good to know. Looks like we’re gonna get to know each other real, real well on this trip.”
But thoughts of actually having to sleep in the nude in the same house with Jamie had her backing down quickly. “I don’t actually sleep naked,” she whispered. “Just grab me some sleep shorts and a shirt, please. I’ll get everything over here.”
Chapter Seven
Jamie wandered into the women’s lingerie section and realized he’d made a grave mistake. First of all, what the hell were sleep shorts and how were they different from not-sleep shorts? Far more importantly, how the hell was he supposed to pick out what Charlie was going to sleep in?
It was going to be like walking a minefield. If he picked something too sexy, she’d either be pissed or figure out that he couldn’t seem to get his thoughts out of her crotch. If he picked some kind of granny nightgown thing, she’d really be pissed. Then there were sizes. Jesus. Why had he volunteered for this?
He passed a display of panties, and his mouth went dry all over again. Did she ever wear thongs? That seemed so un-Charlie like. For as long as he’d known her, she’d been a one-piece swimsuit, high-collared shirts, keep-all-the-best-stuff-covered kind of girl. Apparently Ed got to see her in lace panties, however. His fists clenched tight around the basket in his hands.
He wandered around and found some short flannel shorts that had to be sleep shorts. All right, well, she had asked him to pick them so he located the shortest style he could find and gambled on a medium. If he could get a few glimpses of those lush cheeks of hers again, it’d fuel his fantasies for the next twenty years.
Now for a top. They had a hundred different T-shirt things that said stuff like Tiaras and Coffee. None of them seemed to fit Charlie though. As far as he knew tiaras were not something she had any interest in. She liked coffee, but he saw no purpose in advertising that on clothes only the two of them were gonna see her in. They already knew she liked coffee.
He located full-on, zip-up, adult-sized footie pajamas on the clearance rack. What the actual fuck? Must be what nuns wore. He moved on to shirts that had those tiny little straps on them. Now they were getting somewhere. The shorts he’d gotten were blue and green plaid, so he grabbed a white top and congratulated himself on a job well done.
But as he headed back to Charlie, praying that she’d made some headway or they were going to be there all damn day, he got a text from Wes. Went by the preacher’s house after I checked your cattle. No car in the carport. Drove around town and I don’t see evidence of him anywhere. If he left town, I have no way of knowing where he’s heading.
Fuck. They were far enough away from Oklahoma now that Jamie wasn’t too worried, but it pissed him off nonetheless. Guy just didn’t know when he was beaten, did he? The fact that he might’ve had the audacity to come after Charlie when she didn’t want to be found pissed him off even more. Of course, preacher man could be anywhere. Maybe he went on his honeymoon alone. Were preachers allowed to have revenge fucks when they got left? Probably not. Not that he deserved one anyway.
He responded to Wes, let him know how far they had to go until they were on Camden Ranch, and rushed back to Charlie. “Hey, so Ed apparently left
the building, and no one knows where he is. You ready to get back on the road?”
“Do you seriously think he’s going to come looking for me? That’s just…so unlike him.” She grabbed a bunch of T-shirts off a display and tossed them in the cart.
“He didn’t want you working, didn’t want you hanging out with me, didn’t want you doing anything you like to do. Sounds to me like he’s a controlling prick, so yeah, I do think he’d come looking for you. He better pray I don’t find him first, or I’ll beat my opinion of him ordering you around into his self-righteous face.”
“You seem to have a lot of pent-up anger. I wish you’d told me you hated him a long time ago.”
“You wouldn’t have listened. You were too worried about your daddy. What else do you need? I got these.” He offered her the pajamas hopefully, the way a kid gives his mama a dandelion from the front yard that he stuck in a mason jar for her.
“Um,” a harsh swallow contracted her delicate neck. “These are fine.” She tossed the shorts in the cart. “Just not this.” She held the shirt like it might’ve been some kind of wasp nest. “I’ll hurry.”
“Okay,” he shrugged, “I’m gonna grab a hairbrush. I did forget that.”
Refusing to meet Jamie’s eyes, Charlie laid the tank top on the cart and loathed its existence. She watched her best friend trail off toward the groceries, while she grabbed another pair of jeans and threw in a pair of shorts just in case.
She shoved the offending top on a random rack in the pajama section and picked out a full coverage T-shirt instead. Everyone had chapters of their own books that they didn’t want anyone to read. She just didn’t want to think about the scars right then. She didn’t want Jamie to see them. He was the only person in her whole life who’d never treated her any differently after he found out what had happened to her mother, to her whole life. She never wanted him to feel sorry for her.
The scars told the part of her story she didn’t want anyone to read, not even him.
She grabbed a week’s worth of panties and another bra. Then she headed Jamie’s way. Next time I run away, I need to remember my suitcase.
That thought made her cringe. Did she always run from her problems? Maybe. Ugh. She so did not want to be that kind of woman. She just needed everyone else to quit telling her who to be and what to do. She didn’t run from anything she’d ever personally chosen. That soothed her somewhat.
Twenty minutes later, they were both standing outside the Target restrooms looking much more themselves. Charlie had her stupid wedding gown wadded up in her arms. She didn’t know what to do with it but felt bad dumping it somewhere. Maybe she could donate it to one of those places that made them into other things. It struck her that as much as she loved to keep things, she’d never once kept a menu from any of the restaurants Ed had ever taken her to, and she had no desire to keep the gown at all. Once again, she lambasted herself for not realizing all of this earlier.
She tossed the dress in the back of Jamie’s truck, thrilled to be done with it.
Jamie chuckled at that. “Want me to cram it in the toolbox?”
“I don’t care what you do with it as long as I never have to wear it again.”
He stopped at a gas station and filled up. When he returned from the store, he had two Dr. Peppers, a bag of Jalapeño Cheetos, and Red Hots. “If we’re gonna road trip, we gotta do it right.”
She suspected he didn’t want her to worry about Ed’s whereabouts so he was acting like it didn’t matter. But she wasn’t worried about Ed or anything else, except maybe her father. She almost never worried when she was with Jamie. He was like a sanctuary away from everything in the world that might hurt her. “You are the best!” she gushed.
“I told you, I know.” He winked at her, opened his Dr. Pepper, and they were back on the interstate.
Chapter Eight
They made good time and got to Lincoln just a few hours later. With every state line Jamie put between Charlie and Ed, his breaths came a little easier. Just another couple of hours and they’d be at his cousin’s ranch. No one would come looking for them there. Hell, he doubted Pleasant Glen even showed up on most maps.
“Oh look, they have gas stations here named after most of your relationships.” Charlie pointed to the Kum and Go Gas Station and giggled.
“Ouch,” Jamie pretend to be wounded.
“Aww, I’m sorry. But you cannot deny it.”
“I didn’t say I could, but still ouch. You only get vicious when you’re hungry. Do I need to stop for supper ‘cause there ain’t nothing between here and Camden Ranch. And when I say nothing, I mean literally nothing but cornfields.”
She studied him for a minute. “Why don’t you ever go out with anyone for more than a few dates?”
He hated lying to her, but he couldn’t give her the actual truth—because none of them are you. So, he shrugged out his lie. “Just haven’t met the right woman, I guess.”
“So, you do think she’s out there somewhere then? I’m not so sure I believe in that anymore. I’m thinking of just becoming a spinster, like in old books. Becca can get married and have kids and I’ll just be their favorite aunt or something. I’ll keep candy in my purse.”
“So, you’re just giving up on love and kids and the whole deal? You always wanted to be a mom.”
“I know, but it’s not worth it. Plus, I’d be terrible at it.”
Jamie paused but went on with the question, “What’s not worth it exactly?”
“Having to give up a life I love for a guy I don’t. I could have a kid without a man, if I wouldn’t be a terrible mom, but I would because I didn’t have one for a long time so I probably missed some kind of crucial information you’re supposed to have or something.”
“Stop it,” Jamie demanded. “You’d make a great mom, and you shouldn’t have to give anything up. That’s not how love is supposed to work.”
“And you know this how?” she countered.
“I don’t know it specifically. I just know that ain’t how it’s supposed to go. You’re supposed to make each other better. It’s supposed to be like you don’t ever want to not be with the guy you fall head over boots for. You should see Ford and Callie,” he reminded her of his older brother and his wife. “She still looks at him like he’s some kind of cattle-ranching superhero or something.”
Charlie shook her head. “You’re the only person I never get tired of being around, so that doesn’t work. I just don’t want to get some kind of reputation for being a runaway bride, like in that movie.”
“If it was the right guy, you wouldn’t run away.” Jamie mentally corrected— if it was me.
“Maybe.” Her eyes lit a moment later, set off by the sinking sun behind the Lincoln skyline. It set her hair ablaze, made the bronze flecks in her green eyes dance, and made him ache with need. “We should have one of those deals!”
“What kind of deal?”
“Where if neither of us gets married by the time we’re like fifty-five, then we marry each other.”
Another sucker punch right to the chest. The pain made his heart trip over the next beat. His mind, however, began coming up with ways to keep her single until they were fifty-five so she could finally be his. But God, he didn’t want her to be alone. He didn’t want to be alone either. But letting her know what he really thought of that wasn’t a gamble he could risk. What if it didn’t work?
They’d had one fight in their twenty-plus year friendship, and it had started the day he’d signed on the dotted line at the fire department. She hadn’t spoken to him for weeks. She’d never told him that she didn’t want him to be a firefighter. She didn’t have to. Every time he got near her in an effort to get her to scream at him or hit him or something, tears would pierce those gorgeous eyes and she’d walk away. He couldn’t live through something like that again. He’d finally gone and sat in her office at the old folks’ home where she worked and had refused to leave until they talked. He’d offered up never talking about
his other career. She just kept saying how much it scared her to know he was in danger and that she never wanted him to go through what she’d been through. The thing she didn’t get, the thing she refused to see, was that she wouldn’t be sitting beside him, they never would’ve met at all if it hadn’t been for the fireman that got her out of that house. “Fifty-five, huh?”
“Yeah. Don’t you think so? You’ll retire around then.”
And there it was. So blatantly obvious and yet she still refused to acknowledge its presence. “If that’s what you want, you know I’m in.”
“Okay. Good.” She paused again and stared out at the main drag through the city. “Would it be bad for us to eat again? I don’t want to make your cousin wait up on us, but I am kind of starving. I don’t know why I’m so hungry.”
“Because you’re finally relaxed. There’s a place downtown that Maddox goes to with a bunch of his army buddies when he’s up here. He says it’s great food and it’s fast. I’ll call him and get directions. We’ll eat quick and get right back on the road. I need to stretch my legs anyway.”
After a quick call to his cousin and a few turns, they were heading to something called The Hi-Way Diner. “Did Maddox say anything about Ed?” Charlie couldn’t help but wonder. She didn’t want drama over any of this. She wished the whole town would forget about it. Ed especially. But Holder County wasn’t known for forgetting much of anything ever.
“Just that no one knows where he is. I’m surprised he hasn’t tried to call you.”
“He might’ve but I turned my phone off. I just don’t want any ties to anyone there. I guess that’s irresponsible, though.”
“There’s nothing irresponsible about wanting a break. Keep it off. You wanted an escape so let’s take the one we have.”
“I should at least check to see who all might’ve called.” Charlie eased the phone from her bag like it might’ve been some kind of feral cat and turned it on. There were six missed calls, so it could’ve been much worse. Three from her father, two from Becca, and one from Louann. None from Ed. Somehow the only thing she found surprising about that was that she’d expected it. Nothing about Ed not attempting to phone her was shocking at all, and shouldn’t it have been surprising? Communication had been something she’d told herself they’d develop after the wedding. Again, so stupid on her part.