Healing Beau (The Brothers of Beauford Bend Book 6)

by Alicia Hunter Pace

  Moments and decades ticked away as she tried to take it all in. She knew Beau, and he meant what he said.

  The words almost got past her, but she snatched them out of the air and replayed them in her head, and then in her heart. There was no word that could do justice to this moment with the possible exception of holy.

  Yes, this was a holy moment, and the floor of this old loom house was hallowed ground. Angels were singing and rejoicing, for they alone had known the depth of her sorrow and longing.

  He wanted her. He’d said so. And the baby. It would never matter to her how he’d gotten here, only that he had.

  “I shouldn’t have left the reception—but I promise I wasn’t running from you or being married. I might not have been smart enough in that moment to realize how lucky I am, but even so, I wasn’t trying to get away from you.”

  She believed him. “Then what?”

  The look that overtook his face told Christian that Beau was a man who’d just realized he’d said too much. Immediately, he pulled out that smile—the one that could make a rattlesnake forget it was mean.

  But she wasn’t a rattlesnake. She had to be stronger than that.

  He smiled again and hugged her to him. “See, I got dizzy. That’s what that much pink will do to a man. So if what we’ve got cooking here is a little girl, could we go a little easy on the pink? I’ll expect some, but—”

  She put her hand on his mouth to quiet him. It would have been easy to melt against him and finally rejoice in the child they were going to have, but she couldn’t. This was too important.

  “No. I don’t believe it was all the pink. Tell me.”

  He shook his head. “Really nothing. It was too loud and hot. That’s all.”

  “Beau.” That was all she said, all she had to say. The inflection in her voice spoke of the history, heartbreak, and happiness they’d shared for years and years. And he heard every bit of that and knew he wasn’t getting away.

  His eyes dropped to the floor. “It was the ghosts. I couldn’t be there with them anymore.”

  “Ghosts?”

  He barely raised his head and looked at her out of the corner of his eye. “Don’t worry. You’ve haven’t married a lunatic. Or maybe you have, but not one who believes in visitations from the beyond. It’s just what goes through my mind, what I would imagine they would say to me, if they could haunt me.”

  He was talking about his parents and Camille, of course. No one could survive such a horrific event and not carry some scars.

  “Who?” Christian asked gently. It was important that he say it.

  “Sometimes my parents and Camille, but mostly Aunt Amelia. I’ve always figured that in the afterlife, you become all knowing. Now that Aunt Amelia knows everything, she’d have a lot to say.”

  That was a surprise and puzzling. “Know what, Beau? What is it that you think Miss Amelia knows?”

  “Everything, I think. Everything I feel—plus, well, other things.”

  He narrowed his eyes and looked at her. He wanted her to ask, to make him tell her if she had to—else he wouldn’t have said it. He might have made one slip of the tongue, but he was too smart to make two in this space of time.

  So she would ask, though a part of her didn’t want to. There was a chill in his eyes that was permeating her soul and making her skin crawl. Something told her this might be the most important moment of their relationship so far.

  “What other things, Beau? You can tell me.”

  He nodded. “I don’t want to. You don’t want to know. But I have to tell you so you know what you’re getting into. There’s still time for you to get away from me. I should have told you before we stood up in front of all those people.” He gestured to the house with a jerk of his head.

  This was a Beau she didn’t know, one she couldn’t read. Was it possible that he’d really done something so horrible that it would make her want to run? That seemed impossible and yet … yet there were things she couldn’t get past, even for Beau. Rape, child molesting, cold-blooded murder. But he couldn’t have done any of those things? Could he?

  There was no greater hell than the space between afraid to ask and afraid not to.

  “What, Beau? Tell me, now.”

  He nodded. “I’ve never told, not Aunt Amelia, not my brothers—though I can’t see how they don’t know. They would if they’d think about it. They don’t want to know, because if they did, they’d have to hate me.” He closed his eyes and took a deep breath. Christian thought he would speak then, but at the last second, he swung his head up and let his eyes bore into hers. “I killed my parents and little sister.”

  And the world detached itself from its axis and flew into deep space where no one had ever gone until now. What could he mean? Had he literally and deliberately set the fire to that beach house? Was it possible that he could have been one of those clinically antisocial children with no conscience and no soul, who killed people for a toy or a piece of candy? Could he have been that and hidden it?

  No! The sure, strong answer came as fast as the question had—no, faster. Not her Beau. She didn’t even feel shame for letting the question go through her mind. Blind trust took no real trust at all. Questioning and knowing was what mattered.

  She put her hand on the soft, fine fabric of his shirtsleeve, but that wasn’t good enough. The need to touch him without a barrier was overpowering. She deftly removed his cufflink and ran her hand up his arm and back again.

  “No. You did not. That isn’t possible. Tell me what you think happened.”

  “I know what happened. I’m not likely to ever forget.”

  She snaked her other hand up his shirtsleeve and held on tight.

  “I had a cold?” She had never known Beau to end a statement with a question.

  She nodded. “You had a cold.”

  “Jackson, Gabe, and Rafe had always camped out our last night at the beach—though I guess always boiled down to a few years. But it was always to me because that’s how it had seemed. The little campsite was right below my parents’ bedroom window, probably closer to them than our bedrooms. Jackson was no more than eight and the twins six when they started, but my mother had always found one reason or the other to not let me camp with them.”

  As Beau talked, his eyes withdrew from Christian’s. It was almost as if he were back there, seeing the same sights, hearing the same sounds, and tasting the same flavors from that time so long ago.

  “But the year before, when I was seven, she had let me stay out with them until it was time to go to sleep and promised I could sleep out the next year. We’d told ghost stories, roasted hotdogs, and made s’mores. I thought it was the best time ever. And my brothers never even acted like they didn’t want me around, like I was the little kid in the way. They were always great that way, especially Jackson. But Mama was always protective of me. Dad and even Aunt Amelia teased her about it sometimes. The closer we got to the end of our vacation, the less she wanted me to sleep outside. Then I started sneezing, and that’s all she needed. I even heard my dad try to talk her into letting me. He said it was warm out, I’d be in a tent, and it wouldn’t hurt me. But, no. She wouldn’t even let me go out for the ghost stories. Made me go to bed early.”

  The disappointment on his face was that of an eight-year-old boy who was being denied the one thing he wanted. It would have been endearing had it not been so sad.

  “What happened then?” Christian was immediately sorry she had broken the spell with her question. Beau was no longer that little boy looking back, but a grown man regretting what he’d done.

  His next words came out fast and hard. “I decided I’d show her. I sneaked out, unrolled my sleeping bag behind the tent where my brothers couldn’t see me, listened to them for a while, and went to sleep. I didn’t even hear the fire trucks when they came, if you can believe that. Maybe it was the cold medicine she’d given me. The next thing I knew, there were flashing lights and a lot of people around. By the time I stumbled from
behind the tent, they were all already dead. My brothers fell on me like I was the Holy Trinity, Buddha, and Zeus all rolled into one, come to do them a favor. They thought I had been in the house, too.”

  And how easily he could have been. The thought took Christian’s breath away. But she didn’t have time for that. She had work to do here.

  She squeezed his arm tighter and slid her thumb up and down on the soft part that was the underside of his forearm. “I don’t understand. Why do you think the fire was your fault?”

  He shook his head. “I don’t think the fire itself was my fault. But don’t you see? It’s my fault they didn’t get out. They were in there looking for me. If it had been Gabe, or maybe even Jackson, they would have considered that they might have gone outside. Hell, with Gabe, they would have probably assumed it. But Rafe and me?” He shook his head and put a hand up palm out. “Not us. We never disobeyed. Only I did that time. I know when they didn’t find me in my bed, they looked in the bathrooms, the kitchen, then the other bedrooms, and on and on until it was too late. Mama threw Camille over the balcony so she wouldn’t burn. Though I guess dead is dead—and she was. They all were. If I’d been where I was supposed to be, we’d all have gotten out.” Dark phantoms moved into Beau’s eyes, haunting him.

  Where to start? “Beau—”

  He put a hand up. “I know you, Christian. I know what you’re going to say before you even think it. You’re going to say that it was an accident, that I was only eight years old, and that I can’t know for sure that any of us would have gotten out. They might have been heaving me over the balcony, too.”

  It was true. That was exactly what she’d been going to say, except for the throwing him over the balcony. Her heart had probably stepped in and forbidden her brain to have such a horrible thought.

  “Then you already know all that’s true.”

  “No, I don’t know it’s true. It isn’t true,” Beau said. “But I know what you would say, because you always want to make it all right for me, to save me. Most of the time I appreciate it, but please don’t try to save me this time.”

  She would never stop trying to save him, but clearly her words wouldn’t do it, so she wouldn’t speak them. Maybe in time, with enough love and the baby, he could move on, accept that the deaths hadn’t been his fault, or if not that, forgive himself.

  “Have to talked to your brothers about any of this?” she asked.

  He couldn’t have looked more surprised if he’d found her stripped naked and covered with chalk powder on the library steps—one Jimpson’s favorite posing spots.

  “No, Christian. I haven’t told my brothers. And I’m not going to. Please don’t ask that of me.”

  Christian removed a hand from his arm and turned his face to hers. “All right. I won’t ask you to tell them or say any of those things that I know to be true. But I’ll never believe it was your fault either.”

  “Here’s the other thing.” He leaned his forehead against her. “I don’t deserve a family. I destroy. That’s why I became a Ranger. I thought I could at least put my talent for destruction to good use—visit it on evil. But here I am with you. How am I supposed to protect you and the baby?”

  “That’s not rational, Beau.”

  “Tell it to Camille. She should have been one of your bridesmaids. Tell it to my parents.”

  “Then, how’s this?” She laid a hand on his cheek. “How about you learn your craft, make beautiful things, and think of what’s good in life? And I’ll protect myself, our baby, and you?”

  He laughed a broken little laugh. “At least you can be trusted.”

  She knew him well enough to know he considered himself a caretaker, but none of that really mattered, because nothing was going to happen to them. Maybe she could get him to smile. “Bet your sweet ass I can.” And he did—a smile sweeter and purer than that glamour boy one he pulled out to get his way and throw the world off track.

  He wrapped his arms around her. “Christian, I do find that I love you.”

  Yes. Hallowed ground was this place filled with history and a promise for the future where Beau could learn, create, and heal. It was fitting that love was born here.

  “And I love you, Beau. I suppose you know that.”

  “I didn’t, but I do now.” He kissed her long and sweet. When they parted, he said, “I guess we need to go back to the party.”

  “Or not,” Christian said.

  “What? Abandon our guests?”

  “You sound like Miss Amelia. But haven’t we already done that?” she asked.

  “You have a point.” He looked hopeful. “You think we can ditch the pink?”

  She wrapped her arms around him. “We’ve had a lot of sex.”

  “Yes, we have.”

  “Really, really good sex.”

  He kissed her temple. “Incredible sex.” He let his lips drop to her ear. “The best sex ever had by anyone.”

  “Yes. We’ve done all that. I say it’s about time we made love.”

  And that’s what they did. Between Firefly Hall and Beau setting up his shop, there was no time for a trip, but they held hands all the way to Nashville, where Jackson had booked the presidential suite for them at the luxurious Hermitage Hotel. The rooms were impressive, but it wouldn’t have mattered if they had been in the smallest room in an economy hotel.

  After the day of a surprise wedding, up and down emotions, confessions, and declarations, all they wanted was quiet and each other.

  Beau didn’t say he loved her again, and neither did Christian, but when he came to her, it was different. Christian didn’t bother with the nightgown Emory had given her, but without hesitation or a trace of inhibition, she stripped naked and went into her husband’s arms.

  There was no frenzy or hurry. It was all soft, sweet, slow, and very, very thorough. When the moment was right, when they couldn’t wait a second longer, Beau took her hands so that they were palm to palm and entered her slowly until they were hipbone to hipbone. They rocked together, feeding the fire, their eyes open and faces inches apart, until at last, for the first time, she exploded just as she felt the hot sensation of him erupting inside her.

  It was the best feeling in the world, the best night, the best life.

  Truthfully, she hadn’t even minded all that pink.

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  “The next baby shower will be yours, Christian.” Noel handed Emory and Christian glasses of sparkling white grape juice and refilled Abby’s, Neyland’s, and Gwen’s wine glasses. She let herself down on the leather sectional sofa and put her feet on the large common ottoman where everyone else’s feet rested. The guests had left, leaving piles of baby gifts for Emory and Jackson, and the women had gathered in the library, their favorite room in Noel’s new house. “I still feel bad that you didn’t have a bridal shower.”

  “Don’t be silly. I couldn’t have asked for more.” Christian’s answer was automatic and trite. She tried to manufacture the expressions that her friends had worn as new brides—the same look she’d seen in the mirror the morning after her wedding night two weeks ago, but not much since.

  The same questions were on everyone’s lips: How are things? How is married life? Are you as happy as you look?

  And her answer was always the same: Things are wonderful—better than I could have possibly imagined. Considering all the years she’d spent imagining, better would have been a tall order to fill by anyone’s standards, but in truth, the answer was … fine. Marriage to Beau was fine, no better, no worse.

  She had thought they’d crossed a barrier on their wedding night and had landed in a good place, but sometimes she had to wonder if she had dreamed the whole thing and they had never said those things to each other, never come to a clearer understanding. For sure, Beau hadn’t spoken of love again, and neither had she.

  Still, she was with Beau, and some people would have sold their souls for fine. Fine was something to be thankful for. Wasn’t it? Maybe, and she might have been th
ankful if she had not had to watch Beau go off into what she had come to think of as ghost land, where she knew he was thinking of the past and punishing himself.

  To be fair, there were times—even beyond the sex—when things were better than fine. Sometimes he rested his hand on her stomach, asked how she was feeling, and smiled with real joy. Or he would become animated when telling her about how well his work was going. And then there was the day when he’d come in all excited and shown her a sketch of the cradle he planned to make as soon as he finished the commissioned jewelry box he was working on. She’d burst into joyful hormonal tears, and he’d laughed and danced her around the room.

  But it didn’t last; it never lasted. It seemed that just as he stepped toward the edge of happiness, a ghost would appear and snatch him away with a reminder that he didn’t deserve to be happy.

  So, no, fine was not okay. If that had been the only possibility, it might have been, but in her heart, Christian knew there was more out there. Beau did love her. He had to, because despite the ghosts and the world of fine, she felt that love. But love was meant to be celebrated, and Beau was never going to celebrate anything as long as he believed he’d caused the deaths of his parents and sister.

  Christian would have crawled across the Sahara Desert at high noon to obtain proof to the contrary if it were possible. Unfortunately, the past didn’t talk.

  “Nobody cares that I didn’t have a bridal shower.” Neyland brought Christian back to the present.

  “You didn’t deserve one,” Emory said. “You cheated us out of a wedding.” At seven and a half months, she looked adorable in her pale blue maternity top, leggings, and the Converse tennis shoes that she swore were the only shoes she could walk in these days. Leave it to Emory to be secure enough to wear Converse to a party in her honor where Taylor Swift, Reba McEntire, and Carrie Underwood would be in attendance. Of course, Emory had every reason to be secure. Her marriage went way beyond the bounds of fine, and Jackson celebrated every second of their life together and wrote songs about it.