by Jess Bryant
He knew his twin had always tried to protect him and he’d thought he did the same but now he couldn’t be sure. What didn’t he know about Colt’s life? What had he missed? What hadn’t his twin told him? He couldn’t protect him from things he didn’t know about, damn it.
He picked himself up and headed for the shower, knowing full well that no matter how hard he scrubbed, he would never be able wipe away that feeling of dirt that clung to his soul, the Bomar filth that he would never be able to wash away.
Chapter Fifteen
“What do you mean you’re staying?”
Jemma twirled the straw in her glass of iced tea and silently wished the brown liquid was liquor. She needed a drink. Unfortunately, the tiny burger joint in her equally tiny hometown didn’t serve liquor, or beer, or even that abomination called Diet Coke. She’d settled on a classic sweet tea knowing nothing, not even a bottle of whiskey, could help her get through this lunch with her mother.
The first time she’d seen her mother after coming home had gone too well. She’d known it then and she still knew it now. When she’d gone to see her mom that first time, weeks ago, her face had still been bruised and her mother had gaped at her with horror and sympathy. She’d listened as Jemma relayed a short and vague version of the events that had led to her return and her mother had actually surprised her.
Terri had been supportive. She’d been angry on Jemma’s behalf. She’d cursed Hoyt and his entire family and then complained that her daughter hadn’t felt like she could come to her sooner. Saying that Jemma had been in shock that day would have been an understatement. Terri had acted like the caring, doting mother she’d always wanted her to be.
She hadn’t told her mother that she intended to stay in Old Settlers during that first meeting. Mostly because she hadn’t been sure she was staying at that point. And she hadn’t wanted to fight about something that might not be an issue. But now it was and a fight was exactly what was coming.
“I mean that I’m moving here, permanently. I went to Houston to get my stuff yesterday.”
“I don’t understand.” Terri blinked at her in dismay.
“I don’t really see what you’re not understanding. I told you already, I’m back for good. I’m going to live here, in Old Settlers, with Skylar and I’m looking for a job.”
“I don’t understand.”
Jemma groaned, “Mom, seriously? Stop.”
“I don’t…”
“Oh my God!” She whined, “You know most mothers would be ecstatic if their only daughter told them she was moving back home where they could see her anytime they wanted and they could spend holidays and birthdays together.”
Terri’s full lips pursed, “I am not most mothers.”
“Clearly.” Jemma felt her lips do the same, though she fought the instinct to roll her eyes.
“I want more for you darling.” Terri reached for her hand and patted it softly, “I want you to have everything you’ve always wanted.”
“What I want is right here.”
“No. I don’t believe that.” Terri pulled her hand away, “You’re hurting and you’re scared. You’ll get over it and you’ll come to your senses. Give it some more time won’t you?”
“I don’t need more time, Mom. I’ve had a month. This is how I feel. This is what I want. That’s not going to change with time.”
“You just need to take some time to put yourself back together, figure out what you want and get back on your feet.” Her mother spoke as if she hadn’t heard a word Jemma said, because she probably hadn’t.
She didn’t understand. She hadn’t just been saying that. Her mother truly didn’t understand why she would choose to stay in this town because nothing would have kept her here if she’d had the opportunity to leave. If she hadn’t gotten pregnant and then married, Terri would have fled Old Settlers like her heels were on fire and never looked back.
Just like Jemma would have if she’d never left. If she’d never left, she would still think that the answers to all of her dreams were out there somewhere. But she had and she knew the truth now. What she needed wasn’t out there, it was here. Call it her Dorothy moment but it had taken leaving for her to see that this place was her home.
“I’m trying to put my life back together and get back on my feet but I’m doing it here.” She said firmly.
“You can’t make this kind of decision when you’re upset, Jemma.”
“I’m not. I’m not upset and I’m not running away. Maybe I was at first but I’ve been back for a month and… I missed it here. I missed you and my friends. I missed who I was when I lived here so I’m going to stay and I’m going to build a life here.”
Terri looked at her as if she’d grown a second head, “You’ve really thought about this?”
“Yes.”
“And you intend to stay?”
“Yes.”
Her mother narrowed her gaze, “With Skylar?”
“Uh… yeah.” She lifted her glass to her lips, trying to figure out what her mother was getting at now.
“So you’re not moving in with that Bomar boy?”
Jemma choked on the drink she’d just taken. Sweet tea burned her throat and up into her nose. She sputtered and gasped, her eyes watering, but she didn’t miss the look of satisfaction that crossed her mother’s face. If she’d been looking for a reaction, Jemma had just given her exactly what she wanted.
“Here, use this.” Terri offered a napkin and Jemma used it to wipe liquid from her chin.
“Thanks.”
“Nearly choking to death doesn’t negate the question darling.” Her mother perked an eyebrow.
She should have known her mother had heard about Cash. It wasn’t as if they’d been hiding out. They’d been seen together at the pool and grabbed dinner more than once the past couple of weeks. In this town, rumors probably had them engaged already.
Jemma frowned, “Whatever you think you know about me and Cash, you’re wrong.”
“Is that so?” Terri settled back in her chair, “I know that boy is nothing but trouble. I know he hurt you once already. What I don’t know is why you would give him another chance to break your heart.”
“It’s not like that.”
“Oh, I know exactly what it’s like. Darling, I got caught up in a cute boy once too. I thought he hung the moon and I gave up everything for him. Look what I got in return.”
That old, familiar hurt sprouted in her chest, “Oh, you mean a daughter?”
Terri frowned right back at her, “I just don’t want to see you make the same mistakes I did, Jemma. You almost stayed for him once before and he broke your heart. Why would you give him a chance to do it again?”
“We were kids before…”
“You’re still kids darling.” Terri scoffed.
“We’re adults now.” She shook her head at her mother, “We’ve grown up and it’s different now. We’re different now. We hurt each other but we’re dealing with it and just for the record no, I’m not moving in with him, not yet at least.”
“But you’re staying in town for him.”
“Yes. No.” Jemma rubbed her eyes, “It’s not just Cash that I’m staying for. It’s you and Dad and Skylar and Billie. It’s because this place, with all of you, feels like home. And yes, Cash is a part of that, but he’s not the only reason I’m staying.”
“Jemma…”
“I love him.” She admitted and was actually pleased to see her mother’s jaw fall open.
“That’s ludicrous, you’ve only been back in town a month, you can’t possibly have fallen in love with that boy again already.”
“You’re right. I don’t think I did. I don’t think I ever really stopped loving him.” She smiled when her mother flapped her mouth but said nothing, “He’s taken care of me these past few weeks. He’s been a safe harbor amid this storm in my life. I needed somebody and he was there and I love him.”
“Jemma… darling…” Her mother shook her head, “He�
�s bad for you.”
“No. He’s not.”
“He’s a Bomar.”
She narrowed her gaze at her mother, “That’s his last name but it doesn’t define him. He wasn’t born bad or whatever the rumors say about them. He’s dealt with a lot of shit simply for being part of that family and it isn’t fair. He’s not his father.”
Terri rolled her eyes, “Well considering he doesn’t even know who his real father is, I’d suspect not.”
Jemma almost laughed but she didn’t find the conversation funny, “You just proved my point. Even you don’t think he’s really a Bomar. How can you hold it against him if you believe the gossip that Decker isn’t his father?”
“Oh, darling… don’t be naïve. I never said a thing about him not being a Bomar just because Decker isn’t his daddy.”
That drew her up short and Jemma stared at her mother, trying to make sense of what she’d said. All of her life, she’d heard the rumors. Hell, Decker had all but confirmed them that day he trapped her in his house. He didn’t believe the twins were his sons.
There had been all kinds of gossip about that but she’d never heard anyone mention who might be responsible for the other half of their DNA if it wasn’t Decker Bomar. Not once. Which was weird she realized now. Because people in this town loved to talk and gossip, particularly about that family, so it was weird she’d never heard mention of who might be able to claim paternity for the twins.
“What are you talking about?” She leaned forward, suddenly wishing that they weren’t having this conversation out in the open.
Cash hated the way people talked about his family. She knew that. Hated that they were the biggest target of gossip and jokes. Hated that they were all lumped together as one entity and there was nothing he could do to separate himself from them. She loved him so she wanted to respect his feelings and not have this conversation where others might overhear but at the same time, she wanted to know what her mother was getting at.
“Oh, you mean to tell me you really don’t know?”
She shook her head, “No, I’ve never heard a single peep about who might be Cash’s father if it isn’t Decker.”
“Well, that’s probably because people in this town are even more scared of that man than they are his boozy brother.” Terri had the decency to lower her voice when she confided, “Decker was hitting the bars big time and running around on Chrissy even back then, leaving her at home with their son for days, weeks sometimes, and do you know who it was that took care of her? Hmm?”
The only person that people in Old Settlers were more scared of than Decker Bomar. The person that had taken care of Chrissy in place of his drunk brother. The person that had taken care of Chrissy’s sons… almost as if they were his own. It clicked at the same time Terri answered her own question.
“August Bomar.”
“Auto.” She gasped and then covered her mouth.
Jemma’s mind whirled as a hundred foggy memories and distant conversations tried to fill in the blanks. Was it possible? She had no idea. Her mother’s reasoning didn’t sound impossible though.
Auto had taken care of the twins when they were young. Hell, he still took care of them if Cash’s job at the garage was any indication. She remembered the weathered, dangerous looking older Bomar showing up at parent/teacher conferences for the twins and Cash confiding in her about how he was the only adult in the family who had ever seemed to give a shit about them.
It wasn’t just possible, she realized. It was plausible. And the fact that nobody in this tiny town full of big mouths had ever talked about it hinted that there just might be some truth to it as well. Because if it was a rumor, it would have been discussed openly, but if people thought it was fact, they just might have been keeping their mouths shut so as not to risk the ire of the most dangerous man in town.
“Nobody has ever confirmed it of course, but that’s always been why I thought it was true.” Terri shrugged as if she hadn’t just dropped a bombshell on her daughter. “I mean, Decker and Duke were twins but it was Auto that popped out twin baby boys like a factory there for a while.”
Still reeling, Jemma only nodded. Right again. Auto had two sets of twin boys. Ford and Lincoln were the oldest. Royce and Bentley were the younger set. His wife had died in childbirth and he’d never remarried or produced any more children, at least to her knowledge. Twins, two sets… possibly three.
Decker’s own twin, Duke, had been in and out of prison since Jemma was a little girl but she knew all of his sons by name. They were easy to remember and not just because they were all as dangerously handsome as their cousins. They had their own special nickname, the Bible Bomars, because all of them were named from the good book. It was a joke unto itself being Bomars and they were all five boys, because that was all the Bomars reproduced, but Duke didn’t have not one set of twins.
If what her mother had said was to be believed, Auto was the only one that had produced twins.
“But…” Jemma swallowed hard, “But what about Remy?”
“Oh, he’s Decker’s for sure.” Her mother shrugged, “All you had to do was look at that boy and you could see his daddy in him.”
“Cash and Colt look like him though…”
“Do they? Really? I mean, they resemble but that’s because they’re family. Half-brothers. Cousins. I’m not entirely sure how to label that mess, which is exactly my point, Jemma. That entire family is messed up.”
Jemma was only just beginning to realize how true that was. Auto was possibly the twin’s father. Not their uncle but their father. And he’d never claimed them, hadn’t saved them from his brother’s abuse or Chrissy’s neglect. Which was terrible.
She tried to think of what Remington Bomar really looked like but it had been so many years since the last time she saw him. He’d been a teenager, younger than she was now, when he’d left town and he’d never come back. He’d been good looking but dark everywhere his brothers were light.
Then she thought about Auto’s sons. It had been years since she saw them but she remembered them nonetheless. She tried to imagine the boys she’d known of standing right next to her boyfriend and the visual sent a shiver up her spine.
They resembled just as much as they did Remy. Half-brothers. Cousins. God, if it were true, it really was a mess.
She winced, “There’s no way of proving that Auto’s their dad.”
“Probably not.”
“And he’s never claimed them.”
“Definitely not.”
“So, it might not be true.” She clung to that possibility for Cash’s sake.
She didn’t want this to be something else he had to deal with. Something he had to overcome. He was close to his uncle, or at least as close as he was to anyone in his family other than his twin. If he found out that Auto might be his dad and that the older man hadn’t ever told him, let alone claimed him, she had no idea how he would react.
“Might not be.” Terri shrugged again, “Who knows what sort of trouble Chrissy was getting herself into even back then, my point was, that family is all mixed up with secrets and lies. They’re trouble Jemma and I want you to stay away from them.”
She frowned, hard, “No.”
“Darling…”
“No. I won’t stay away from Cash, not because of some stupid gossip from twenty plus years ago. I don’t care what his last name is. I don’t care who his parents are. I wouldn’t care if he’d been raised by monkeys in the jungle and English was his second language. I love him and nothing is going to change that.”
Terri’s face fell and Jemma sat up straighter. Why were they even talking about this? It didn’t matter. Not to her. It might matter to Cash though.
“Nothing I can say is going to change your mind is it?”
“Now we’re getting somewhere.” Jemma forced a smile for her mother’s benefit, “And no, the answer is no. You’re not going to change my mind about Cash or about leaving Old Settlers. I’m staying so you can either
get on board or you can continue to be a person I only see on special occasions. Your choice.”
“Don’t get sassy with me. I can see that you’re going to be stubborn about this so I’ll back off, for now.”
“I guess that’s all I can ask for.”
Terri took a long sip of her drink and she seemed to be choosing her next words carefully before she spoke, “I just want you to be careful with that boy okay? I worry about you. He broke your heart once and I don’t want to see that happen again.”
It was the most honest moment they’d shared since they sat down so Jemma nodded, “Thank you for worrying about me.”
“You’re my daughter. Of course I worry. I only want the best for you.”
Her grin was real this time when she spoke, “Then you and Cash should get along just fine because he says that’s all he wants for me too.”
That earned her an eye roll and she fought a laugh, certain she was the only girl in the world with a mother that rolled her eyes at her.
“So tell me darling, if you’re planning to stay in town, what sort of job are you looking for?”
Jemma smirked as she dipped a fry into the ketchup on her plate. From life changing gossip to talk of something as mundane as job hunting. Terri really was backing off. She decided to take that small bit of good fortune and run with it, dropping all talk of Cash and the Bomar family seemed like a good idea right about now.
“Well, Sky has been nice enough to offer me a spot in her shop if I want it.”
“Doing hair?” Terri looked mystified and Jemma laughed.
“God no! Nobody would trust me with that.” She shook her head, “For my jewelry. She said I can sell my jewelry out of her shop.”
“Well that was sweet of her.”
“Yes, it was.”
“I’m glad you’re still working on your jewelry. You always enjoyed it and you were so good at it.” Terri held out her wrist, “I still wear the piece you gave me for Mother’s Day years ago.”