Southern Fried Blues (The Officers' Ex-Wives Club)

by Jamie Farrell

But it couldn’t. She wouldn’t let it. She had to get through tonight, get through tomorrow, and then she had finals and work. Whatever this was tonight, it would fade. They’d go back to being friends who liked to be naked together, nothing more.

  “Guess it’s time for me to clean up that mess, huh, Anna Grace?” He reached for a towel, but she stopped him.

  “Give her time.” Her teeth chattered. Jackson reached for the towels again.

  Anna stopped him once again. “No more money. No more tickets. Just your time. She’ll see. She’ll see you, and she’ll see him through you.”

  Jackson hauled her out of the tub and wrapped a rough white towel around her body. “Got some experience there, Anna Grace?” He rubbed her arms with a second towel.

  “When Beth got married and had babies… I just wanted some time.”

  He smiled at her with those beautiful eyes, those perfect lips, and she realized it was still what she wanted.

  Just a little more time.

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  She’d traveled far but still had hills to conquer.

  —The Temptress of Pecan Lane, by Mae Daniels

  ANNA WAS SLEEPING so deeply Saturday morning, her lashes didn’t flutter a wink when Jackson nudged her. He dug through the drawers for a notepad and a pen, wincing every time a hinge squeaked, but she kept right on sleeping.

  He left a note on his pillow and slipped out of the hotel, phone in his pocket in case she woke up and didn’t see the note, then headed for Louisa’s place.

  He had to bang three times on the door of the old manor she and three of her girlfriends rented before she yanked the door open, bleary-eyed in her pajama pants and a white tank top he wouldn’t have let her wear in public. “What?” Her lip curled out. “Not all of us keep military hours.”

  He handed her a slip of paper. “You owe Anna an apology.”

  Louisa’s hair fell in her face when she looked down at the note. “What’s this?”

  “Cost of your ticket.”

  He didn’t know hair could spontaneously combust, but the temper that shot through Louisa left the tips of her curls smoking. “Excuse you?”

  He angled himself in the doorway so he was blocking her chest from view of any passing cars and caught a whiff of something that reminded him of his granddaddy’s moonshine. It put his own temper on a short fuse. “You disrespected a guest in Momma’s house. Your guest. You know what Daddy would’ve done to you? You’re lucky you can walk today. You want to go to that game, find a way to pay for yourself. You got four hours.”

  And even though Daddy would’ve whipped his hide for it, Jackson turned his back on Louisa’s shocked expression and took himself back to the hotel.

  For the first time since coming home, Jackson was finally doing right by her.

  ANNA HAD JUST FINISHED reading Jackson’s note when the hotel door clicked open. She swiped her hair out of her eyes, and an unfamiliar ache in her shoulder made her wince.

  Jackson grinned at her. “Feeling that game last night?”

  She didn’t bother giving him a dirty look. Because her stomach was growling and he had paper bags in one hand and a box with two to-go cups in the other, and the scents of biscuits and bacon and coffee wafted into the room.

  There she was again, holding back a declaration of undying love.

  He plopped on the bed. “Looks like you might need some feeding.”

  She gave him a playful shove with her left arm.

  But she let him help her eat.

  Because he liked to reward progress.

  Eventually they headed out for game-day activities. But first, Anna insisted that Jackson take her to the Confederate mausoleum so she could apologize to his mother.

  He gave in to that a mite bit too easily.

  Jackson’s jaw took on a mulish set when his gaze landed on Louisa’s car. He saw Anna into the house, then angled toward a side doorway she hadn’t noticed last night. “Okay for a bit, Anna Grace?”

  “Any place I should stay out of?”

  He flashed a grin that didn’t reach his eyes. “No, ma’am. Not you.”

  “Thanks.”

  He pressed a kiss to her temple, then disappeared. Anna heard the distinct sound of stairs creaking. She guessed he was going in search of Louisa.

  Which meant Anna had to search somebody out too.

  Deb was in the kitchen, wiping down the sink and humming a tune Anna didn’t recognize. Anna paused at the island and cleared her throat.

  Deb’s shoulders hitched, but she flicked them down and turned. “Good morning.”

  “I owe you an apology,” Anna said. “I’m not from round here, but I’ve lived here long enough to know when I’ve crossed a line, and I’m sorry.”

  Deb’s lips set in a thin line. Her chin wavered, and her gaze shifted away. “I wasn’t entirely fair to you.” She looked down at the dishrag she was twisting, folded it in thirds, and laid it across the sink. “Jackson’s never brought home a girlfriend.”

  Anna tried to swallow, but it felt as if she had sawdust in her mouth. “Louisa invited me.”

  “If he didn’t want you here, you wouldn’t be here.”

  “Regardless, you don’t need to worry about me.”

  Deb merely lifted a well-groomed and spectacularly colored eyebrow.

  “I was married to the military once,” Anna said. “I have no intentions of doing it again.”

  “My son knows this?”

  Anna flashed a wry smile. “It’s why we get along so well.”

  Deb turned and picked up her dishrag again. “Y’all go on and keep saying that, but when you realize you’re lying to yourselves, it’s going to hurt. And I don’t like seeing my children hurt.”

  Of course Momma Deb wouldn’t. What mother would? But after the year Anna’d had, she did have some appreciation for what came out of the aftermath of hurting.

  Not that she’d offer her opinion to Momma Deb.

  She stepped back. “We met over an ant infestation in my car. Jackson wouldn’t let me help clean up my own mess, because he told me you’d have his hide if he left a lady in distress. Even a divorced, undereducated, messy Yankee lady.”

  Deb’s face was turned, but Anna saw the plump of her cheek when her lips curved softly upward. “He’s a good man.”

  “One of the best,” Anna agreed. “Thank you.” She left Deb in the kitchen, found the most comfortable looking spot on the rocks that were the living room furniture, pulled her school notes out of her purse, and sat down to wait for tailgating time.

  JACKSON FOUND LOUISA digging a piggy bank out from under a loose floorboard in her old closet.

  “I ain’t ready for you yet,” she said without turning around, the pout evident in her voice.

  She’d moved out of the mausoleum when she started college, but Jackson hadn’t been around enough all the years before that to know if the butterflies fluttering around the walls and the lacy curtains were original to Louisa’s time in the room, or if they’d been added as a special touch for overnights when Craig and Maura’s girls came. The Power Rangers bedspread, he knew, was all Louisa.

  He made himself comfortable in the doorway and checked his watch to make sure he didn’t leave Anna Grace alone too long. She could handle herself, but that wasn’t the point. “Been thinking about some stuff.”

  “So?”

  “So got to reckoning you don’t do well in school because you don’t know what you want to be.”

  “So?” Louisa’s shoulders bunched so high they blocked her eardrums.

  But Jackson kept talking anyway. “So it’s my job to help LTs figure out their career path. Reckon I might be able to help you too.”

  She gave the piggy one last tug. It sprang free, and sent her skidding back on her rump. She gave him the same suspicious eye Momma was probably aiming at Anna Grace right about now. Louisa pulled herself up, dusted her jeans, hiked the piggy under her arm like a football, and crossed the room. “Yeah, well, I don’t want
your help.” She shoved the pig at him. “Here. Now where’s my ticket?”

  He ignored the pig. “How’s your engine running?”

  “Slicker’n Momma’s gravy down your gullet. Where’s. My. Ticket?” She poked him in the chest with each word.

  He went on and let her. “Craig said you’ve been filtering the oil yourself.”

  “What, now girls can’t pump their own gas? New millennium, dummy. Girls can do anything they want.”

  “You ever looked into Auburn’s environmental engineering program?”

  Her eyes went wide. She punched him in the arm. “Shut up. You don’t get to walk around here like you’re somebody. You don’t get a say in my life. You don’t care about me.”

  She was wrong, and he was pretty sure she was being a melodramatic female—perfection, indeed—but her opinion sliced him deep. “You’re too old to be a brat.”

  “That what your Anna Grace calls me?”

  Well, color him slow on the uptake. She was jealous. “You get me twice as much as she does, but she appreciates it three times more than you.”

  Her lips curled into a snide kind of sneer, the kind that usually preceded a slimy comment from a drunkard in a bar. He cut her off. “Never thought I’d meet a Yankee with better manners than my own sister. You go on and nurse your mad all day if you want. I’m gonna go enjoy a beautiful football game.”

  He plunked the piggy bank on the burnished oak dresser, then headed for the back stairs, half surprised, half relieved Louisa didn’t follow him.

  When he got to the kitchen, Momma was alone, but he could smell Anna’s shampoo lingering in the air.

  That scent stayed with a man.

  She had a couple of views on how the world worked that were sticking with him too. Including one or two about his family. She’d been good for him that way.

  Momma looked up at him with sad eyes that seemed to be going around the female population in his life. Her mouth settled in a grim line, and she went back to the pot she was washing. “Sweet potato pie’s all gone.”

  “Do you love Russ?”

  The pan slipped. Water and suds splattered the counter. She fumbled for a towel, her cheeks taking on a stain, her hands shaking. She twisted her face to him, but before their gazes connected, she dropped her chin and pointed her nose at the mess. “Yes.” Her voice soft but laced with steel, answering both the question he’d asked, and the one that had always lingered between them.

  Do you love Russ more than you loved Daddy?

  But he’d never asked.

  He’d never asked, because he hadn’t wanted to know. Hadn’t wanted to believe that this woman who’d stood shoulder to shoulder with Daddy—keeping Jackson straight, raising him to understand and appreciate the value of a clean house, of a good meal, of the backbone of a family—could have loved another man more than she’d loved his daddy.

  Maybe loved another man more than she loved her own son.

  “Does he make you happy?”

  He’d never asked her that before either.

  Never considered it part of the equation.

  But she was more than just his momma. She had her own life as much as he had his, and Daddy was gone, and Momma being happy or unhappy wouldn’t change that.

  She might as well be happy.

  She should be happy.

  Her shoulders trembled. She made a quick swipe at her cheek with the back of her hand. When she looked up at him, her nose matched her cheeks. Her chin wobbled. Her shiny eyes asked what would’ve been the world to him at seventeen.

  At thirty-three, he realized it was long past time to give her his blessing to have her own life, and to enjoy it.

  He felt as if one of those biscuits he’d had for breakfast was stuck in his throat, another one lodged up against his heart. “Reckon he’s done more right by you than I have.”

  “Oh, Jackson.”

  And suddenly she was hugging him with all her might, smelling like blackberries and biscuits, and he felt about six years old again, letting her titanium strength crush all the bad and turn it into hope and peace and an innocent belief in the good of the world. “My sweet baby boy,” she whispered. “You’ve always done as right as you could. Never could’ve asked for more.”

  The back door banged shut. Jackson broke away from Momma. Russ stopped in the threshold.

  He looked between them, mustache twitching, then settled his gaze on Jackson. “Wish your sister had your good taste in dates.”

  Momma’s cheeks and nose flushed deeper.

  Another door shut in a different part of the house. Jackson heard a squeal, followed by a barely-past-puberty drawl.

  Momma and Russ heaved a sigh as one.

  And that’s when Anna started talking.

  The shading dropped right out of Momma’s cheeks. Russ flinched like the Yankee accent hurt his ears, and they both started past Jackson.

  “Don’t trust Anna Grace to take care of the boyfriend?” Jackson drawled.

  “Well, he ain’t from our South, but he ain’t from her North either,” Russ said on a wince.

  Jackson reckoned that was good enough reason to check things out himself.

  Before the three of them hit the living room, Anna’s voice had gone past cheerful to what he would’ve classified as joyous in any other woman.

  He knew Anna Grace well enough by now, though, to know that whatever she was saying, she was doing it with a special kind of devilish delight. “I love your tattoo. Did you design that?”

  The fleabag molesting Louisa came into view. He tossed his stringy bangs back and looked down his nose at Anna. “It’s henna.” His voice came out nasal and a little high-pitched, as if puberty had slightly missed its mark.

  Russ was right. The guy talked as though he didn’t have a geographic home. Not one in the good old U-S-of-A.

  Maybe not even in this whole world.

  “He paints them on himself,” Louisa said. After one look in the doorway where Momma, Russ, and Jackson were gathered, she seemed to make an effort to not look at them. And she snuggled up right closer under the boy’s arm.

  Anna grabbed the loser’s other wrist and tugged at his sleeve. “Oh, wow, are there more?”

  Amidst all Louisa’s not-looking in Jackson’s direction, she jiggled a foot, gnawed on her lower lip.

  Her yahoo boyfriend yanked his arm out of Anna’s reach, and Jackson discovered his stepfather was good for something more than making his momma happy.

  He was good for being a brick wall keeping Jackson from showing the little peon the importance of good manners.

  Anna Grace seemed completely unfazed. “So you guys met at school? What are you studying?”

  “He’s still deciding,” Louisa said, the note of pride in her voice making Jackson want to wince. “He can’t be boxed in, you know?”

  Anna Grace made her doe eyes fake-wide and heaved a sigh Kaci would’ve admired. “That’s so awesome,” she said. “I mean, to be young and carefree, the world still your oyster, having fun, experimenting. If I’d done that in college, I never would’ve ended up divorced halfway across the country, still figuring out how to support myself, you know? You guys are so lucky.”

  Louisa’s smug my-boyfriend-makes-my-parents-twitch gleam looked seemed to be coming down with food poisoning.

  “But I’m glad I didn’t do what my sister did,” Anna continued. She gave a fake laugh that sounded so funny in Jackson’s ears, he had to step back into the dining room for fear Louisa’d catch on to the joke. “She had three kids by the time she was your age. Can you imagine? I mean, that’s something people shouldn’t do until they’re like thirty-five, right? And you don’t want to know what daycare cost when she finally went to college.” Her voice dropped, like she was pretending she didn’t know Momma and Russ were still standing in the doorway with gaping jaws. “Hope you use protection. Double-or-nothing, I always say. Have you ever touched baby poop? Oh. My. God. But enough about that. Stone, you must know some awesome ar
t festivals. Jackson and I would love to go. We should double-date sometime.”

  Russ retreated from the doorway, mustache twitching.

  “Yep,” he said, “right smart for a Yankee.”

  Jackson cleared his throat, pretended he was in uniform about to face a flight of LTs fresh off their commissioning, and stepped back into the doorway. He gave Momma a gentle elbow nudge. She clapped her mouth shut.

  Anna Grace turned on the couch, grinning as if she were the one fighting that battle up there on the wall, and winning. “Oh, Jackson! There you are. Have you meet Louisa’s boyfriend? He’s an artist. Isn’t that cool?”

  Louisa was pale, like maybe it was already the fourth quarter and her beloved Tigers were staring at the backside of a scoreboard they couldn’t flip right.

  “World needs art,” Jackson said.

  Anna’s brow twitched at him. Anna Grace code for you’re welcome, now don’t be an ass.

  Her words, not his.

  “We should all go check out a museum sometime,” he said. He followed Anna’s lead and kept a straight face, but it hurt to keep his cheeks from showing his amusement.

  Louisa drew herself up, falling way short of Anna’s fourteen-feet-tall even sitting down, and wrinkled her nose at Jackson. “Stone has an extra ticket. I’m going with him. I hope under the circumstances, you’ll make sure Anna’s comfortable at the game.”

  “My pleasure. Anna tell you about the biofuels project she’s working on?”

  Yep, that was definitely Louisa’s best I-hate-you face. Jackson ignored it and held out a hand to the ar-teest. “Stone. Nice to meet finally you. Hope you make sure Louisa’s comfortable at the game, given the circumstances.”

  The kid had a limp grip that left Jackson moderately unworried about the state of his baby sister’s innocence. His gaze flicked to Jackson’s shirt. “Hope you don’t get beat up.”

  “Ain’t too worried.”

  Anna Grace’s foot tapped. Jackson let the kid’s hand go, and Louisa promptly wrapped herself back around the yahoo’s arm. “Maybe we’ll see you there,” she said. She looked down at Anna, and her composure faltered. “Nice to see you today, Just Anna.”