A couple of hours later, Tabitha swung one side of his workroom doors open.
“There’s a man in the showroom asking to speak to the owner. He said he doesn’t have an appointment.” Clay could tell by her tone that she was slightly peeved and hoping Clay would tell her to send the man away.
Repositioning the magnifying light he was working with, Clay shook his head. “I’ll talk to him. I could use the break.”
He raised his arms over his head and stretched. No acknowledgment came from the doorway, and Clay glanced in Tabitha’s direction. He cringed inwardly when he saw the way she was gaping at him with her jaw hanging open.
Switching off the lamp, he pretended he hadn’t noticed her hungry expression. He glanced at the “No Dating Policy” tacked to the bulletin board and mentally thanked the friend who had suggested it when Tabitha had first come to work for him. She’d been visibly disappointed when he’d mentioned the policy to her one day when she’d hinted that she found him attractive.
“Did he tell you what he wants?”
Tabitha curled her lip as she focused her attention on her manicure and whispered, “He doesn’t look like he can afford much in here. I don’t know what he wants. He wouldn’t say.”
That was the real reason she was being pissy.
Clay slipped past her and walked directly over to the man who stood looking at the engagement rings inside one of the showroom cases. He had on faded jeans, a plain white T-shirt, and work boots. He looked like the average working man, not necessarily polished or well-off but not a bum like Tabitha had suggested with her attitude.
“Hi, I’m Clay Cook. What can I do for you?” He held out his hand and the man looked up, smiled, and shook with him in greeting.
“Beck O’Malley. I’m pleased to meet you, Clay. I was just looking at your engagement rings.”
“Tabitha said you asked to speak with me directly.”
Beck looked at him and smiled, evidently appreciating the direct approach. “I’m new in town. My girlfriend and I just moved here. At least she’s my girlfriend right now. I’d like to propose to her. We moved here so I could start a new venture, and it’s…slow going.”
“What business are you in?”
“Beekeeping. Honey harvesting.”
That raised Clay’s eyebrows a bit. “I’ve never met a beekeeper before,” he said with a chuckle.
“Not many of us around here, I guess.”
“So what can I do for you?”
“I wondered if you were open to bartering…for a ring.”
“To be honest, I’m not sure I’d ever use that much honey, Beck.”
Beck grinned. “The beekeeping is my fulltime business nowadays, but I’ve also done mechanic work, auto body and interior repair, carpentry, you name it, I can probably do it.”
Chewing the inside of his lip, Clay thought about the little silver Mazda parked outside the shop. “You drink coffee?”
Momentarily taken aback, as though he’d been prepared to be turned down, Beck’s eyes widened, and he nodded. “Sure.”
Clay gestured to the coffee shop located just a few hundred yards away in the shopping center. Above the small building was a cheerful, busy, red sign declaring “Divine Drip” on it. “Why don’t we get some coffee and talk? Tabitha, I’ll be back in a bit.”
“Sure thing, Clay,” Tabitha called out as Beck followed him out the door.
Obviously picking up on the way Tabitha had of drawing out Clay’s name like a caress, Beck asked, “That your wife? Should we bring her a coffee?”
Suppressing a shudder at the thought of Tabitha as his wife, Clay replied, “No. She’s an employee. And, no, she doesn’t drink coffee. So you’re a beekeeper?”
They walked across the parking lot as they talked about bees, honey, and engagement rings.
* * * *
Lily struggled to full alertness. She’d learned years ago that it didn’t pay to lie around once she’d awakened. Not if she didn’t want to start the day with a hard hand across her buttocks. Her eyes felt like they’d been glued shut, and a painful ache drew her attention to her abdomen.
Disoriented, she looked around the unfamiliar room. She heard an echoing voice over an intercom system outside the doorway, and it dawned on her that she was in a hospital. An IV was still attached to her left forearm. She raised her right hand and rubbed her forehead and her eyes. Her arms felt stiff, and when she tried to stretch her legs, she was assaulted by a searing pain in her abdomen. It hadn’t been just stress or food poisoning she was suffering from. Something had been seriously wrong, and she wracked her brain trying to remember how she’d even found her way to the hospital.
Laying her head back on the pillow, she closed her eyes, trying to piece the memories together. She’d been lost and decided to stop somewhere. Clay Cook. Had she seen Clay Cook? No, she didn’t think so. All she could recall was pulling into the parking lot Stigall’s was located in, and then everything had gone dark.
Groaning out loud, she hoped she hadn’t hurt anybody, surmising that she must’ve passed out behind the wheel. She was lucky she hadn’t been on the highway when that happened. She lifted the blanket and placed her hand on her abdomen.
Appendicitis? She’d felt nauseated for so much of the trip and the pain had been increasingly hard to ignore. Luckily she had a high tolerance for pain. Being married to JT had taught her to ignore pain. Otherwise there would’ve been so much of it she would’ve collapsed under the weight of it years ago.
More memories intruded. Earlier that morning, before fleeing from Durst, she’d realized that she’d forgotten the auto repair shop ledger at home. The brothers hadn’t wanted to spend the money for a computer and Internet access, so Lily did their books by hand. She’d driven back home to pick it up. It was still early, and when Lily saw his truck still parked in front of the house, she’d assumed JT was getting ready for the workday.
JT had told her he’d be coming in late because he’d needed to shower that morning. The fact that he’d showered the night before should’ve been her clue that something was up. She’d felt ill and hadn’t given his words another thought as she’d left for work before it was fully light.
The thumping sound of flesh pounding against flesh had greeted her as she’d walked into their rundown, singlewide mobile home.
“Oh, yeah! Fuck me, JT! Gimme that big fucking cock!” Smack! “Oh! Baby, yes! Harder!” There had been no mistaking the abrasive voice of her sister-in-law, Natalie, who was married to JT’s brother and business partner, Dirk King.
JT had growled a response, and the pounding sounds had intensified as Lily had come to a standstill in her bedroom doorway.
She’d wondered if she was hallucinating at first. That hadn’t been her house. That hadn’t been her bed. That hadn’t been her husband spearing his cock into her sister-in-law Natalie’s cunt. But it had been.
He’d roared in orgasm a few seconds later, thrusting brutally, and then had flattened Natalie beneath him. He’d looked over at Lily with pure fury in his eyes. He’d pulled his cock out and leaped from the bed, stark naked, and had strode toward the door where she’d stood frozen like a statue. With the odor of another woman on him, he’d fisted the collar of her faded gray polo and the waistband of her worn blue jeans and had knocked the air from her as he’d flung her bodily out of the bedroom doorway.
JT was very strong, and she’d sailed across the small living room, knocking a lamp and everything else off an end table as she’d landed against it. She’d seen stars for a moment and cringed in fear as he’d charged at her and picked her up from the floor by the front of her shirt and her blue jeans once more. His cock had been rock hard again, and a deeper fear had flashed to life inside of her.
He’d gotten right in her face, spittle flying with his words as he’d said, “I’m ready for round two, and unless you want to join in the fun I suggest you get the fuck out of here, you worthless, fat fucking bitch! I’ll deal with you tonight.”
/> She had known exactly what that meant and had wondered if she’d survive. JT’s sexual appetite was rapacious, and his habits were well known in the community of Durst. There had been plenty of rumors which she’d learned to ignore, but this had been the first time she’d caught him fucking another woman. Roughly, he pushed her away from him, his fists as hard as rocks against her chest and her abdomen. At least that time she’d stayed on her feet.
Lily had done exactly as she’d been told. Like an automaton, she’d backed from the door as Natalie’s raucous laughter filled the air. Only someone who really hated her could’ve found amusement in a situation like that. Given the way Natalie had always treated her, Lily couldn’t have said she was surprised.
She looked around the hospital room and thought it odd that relief didn’t course through her at the notion that she was somewhere safe. Away from him. She was free, but all she felt was…empty. Alone.
The latch on the door clicked, and a kindly looking older man with white hair walked in the room. “Ah, you’re awake, I see.”
Mutely, Lily nodded.
“I’m Doctor Burns,” he said, holding out his large hand to her. “I performed your laparotomy last night, young lady.”
Hardly young anymore. “Pleased to meet you, Doctor. Will I be all right? What happened to me?”
Doctor Burns spent the next few minutes filling her in on the details. She was stunned when he told her that she’d been suffering from internal bleeding caused by a ruptured ectopic pregnancy. Pregnant?
When she explained where she’d come from, he replied, “You, Mrs. King, are one lucky lady. A four-hour drive, alone, in your condition? It’s a miracle you’re alive. Someone must be watching over you.” He smiled at her from behind bushy, white eyebrows. “Your chart indicates that law enforcement has already contacted your husband, and I would imagine he’ll be here soon.”
A cold, hard knot twisted painfully in her chest. “You called my husband?”
“I wondered about that,” he replied softly. “If you don’t want to see him, you don’t have to. I’m sorry, my dear.” He pushed a button located on the side rail of the bed. A nurse entered the room and smiled at her in greeting. With Lily’s permission, he gently lifted the edge of the gown. “When I saw this bruising on your sternum, I wondered if they should’ve waited. My main concern then was stopping the bleeding.”
“I left my husband yesterday. I’m filing for divorce as soon as I can see a lawyer.”
As he checked the dressing over the incision in her abdomen, she paled even further. Doctor Burns and the nurses who had taken care of her had undoubtedly seen JT’s mark, which was permanently tattooed on her lower abdomen, above her mound. Imagining the revulsion in their eyes at the sight of it made her heart burn with shame. What must they be thinking of her?
Doctor Burns replaced her gown and the bedcovers and nodded to the nurse as she went about her work. They had a brief talk once the nurse left the room about domestic abuse, and he told her he was proud of her for getting out of a bad situation.
He suggested that she document her current condition, including the fresh bruise on her breastbone and the old, numerous bruises and scars on her body. She agreed, knowing she needed the official documentation and hoping it wouldn’t be necessary to show those photos to anyone.
He promised to have the sheriff contacted so the situation could be handled appropriately, if JT showed up. She doubted he’d just let it be. She’d hoped to fade into the woodwork in Divine and he’d never hear from her again, unless it was to serve him divorce papers.
“I’d like to keep you for observation for a couple of days. You’ll want to set a follow-up appointment. Do you have a doctor here yet?”
“No.”
“Then I’ll refer you to Doctor Emma Guthrie. I have a feeling you’ll like her a lot. Once you’re released, do you have anyone you can stay with, to help you?”
Desolation crept in on her again. “No. I—”
“Yes, she does,” an unfamiliar, deep voice said from the doorway.
She heard the scuff of footsteps as a tall man stepped into her room. A man she remembered as a little boy. Her heart pounded and tears clouded her eyes as she took in the sight of him. She was vaguely aware of Doctor Burns asking for his name and then patting her hand and telling her he’d see her the following morning.
Clay Cook stood there in all his full-grown glory, as handsome as she’d always fantasized he’d be. He’d grown tall just like his father, who had been at least six foot five inches, and Clay was every bit as powerful looking, too. When he smiled at her with that little crooked grin of his, the tears overflowed her eyes. She remembered that smile, too. He sat in the chair beside the bed, took her right hand in his and squeezed gently. His moss-green eyes were also the same, so unusual with their gold coronas ringing the pupils. At that moment, they flickered with concern.
“I’ve missed you, Lily. We all missed you.”
Lily’s lip trembled, and suddenly the dam she’d held back so long burst open. Clay listened quietly as she told him everything, just blurted it all out. It occurred to her that she’d had no one to talk to since her early days of college, before she’d met JT. Like when she was little, she told Clay everything. Well, almost everything. Some parts were just too humiliating to share.
“So you left the no-good bastard?”
“Yes. Yesterday. I’m in here because of what he did to me.”
“What happened?” he asked as the nurse returned and administered pain medication into her IV before quietly leaving.
She explained the ectopic pregnancy and JT’s actions that had caused the accident, and Clay’s jaw set in a rigid line. The surgeon had told her that the damage from the rupture had been too severe and she’d lost the use of that Fallopian tube. That cut her chances of having a baby by half, not that she’d ever wanted to bring a baby into the situation she’d been in.
“And now?” he asked, seeming to want to give her the opportunity to let it all out.
“Now? I rebuild my life. I find my parents’ old house, and just…live my life. I’m filing for divorce as soon as I get out of here, and I’m never looking back. I’m going to finish my education, get a job, and move on. I can’t believe I wasted twelve years with him. I’m swearing off marriage, relationships, and men in general. Remember what you used to say?”
Clay chuckled and flushed a bit. “As I recall, it was ‘Girls are disgusting and I’m never getting married.’”
Lily smiled at the memory. “That’s right. You were right all those years ago.”
“Lily, I’d like to help however I can.”
Lily felt like she was levitating and realized the pain medication must be taking effect. “I always felt like I was safe and could be myself with you. I need that kind of safety right now, until I’m on my feet.”
“You’ve got it. I couldn’t believe it when I opened the car door and got a good look at you.”
“You were there?”
“You could say that again,” he replied and explained about her collision with his building. Lily was mortified at that news, but Clay shook his head and said, “Insurance is taking care of it. The situation with your car is even under control, but we’ll talk more about that later. Did you find your house?”
Feeling bleary, Lily replied, “I never did find it. I’d given up and gone in search of someplace to ask for directions when I saw your sign, and…Well you know what happened from there. Oh, shoooot.” She tried to put a little oomph into her exclamation but she was feeling kind of “floaty.”
“What?”
“All my things were in my car.”
“Not anymore. I took them all home for safekeeping. Everything’s fine.”
Lily rubbed her forehead. “Ugh. My car.”
Clay patted her hand and said, “It’ll keep for now. You concentrate on your recovery.”
“Where’s Del?”
“Last I heard, Afghanistan. I don’t get a lot
of details from him since he works for a private contractor. He’ll be happy when I tell him you’re back.”
Clay pulled his wallet from his back pocket and sorted through receipts and business cards until he found a folded picture and pulled it out. “He sent this about a year ago.” He handed Lily the creased photo. It said a lot to her that the picture was as worn as it was, most likely from repeated handling.
Clay and Del had been a year apart in age, and Lily knew they had been very close to each other. She unfolded the picture and felt tears prick her eyes when she looked into the smiling, gray-green eyes of her friend. The grin on his face was achingly familiar and made her heart clench with sadness for losing touch with him. In the photograph, he was wearing desert camouflage and looked wind- and sandblown. He was stroking the back of a small kitten that was perched on his shoulder, licking at his ear.
She wanted to ask him more about Del, but exhaustion and drowsiness from the painkillers claimed Lily as Clay bent over and kissed her on the forehead. His scent was clean and spicy and eased her into more peaceful rest as he let himself out. He was right. It would all keep for now.
Chapter Three
Clay woke before dawn the following morning with dreams of Lily in his head. They were an odd mix of her as a little girl and her as a woman now. She was such a contrast from the feisty, spirited, protective little girl he remembered. Sad and brokenhearted, she’d said that love was for fools and it was better to be alone than with the wrong person, claiming that love wasn’t worth the risk. That could have been the pain medication talking, but she’d seemed sincere.
It had made him sad that she’d make such a declaration. Her bastard of a husband had hurt her instead of cherishing her and protecting her. He couldn’t blame her for feeling that way. Fear had shone in her eyes when she’d mentioned that her husband had been notified of the accident. Clay had stopped in at the nurse’s station and they’d told him, when he asked, that Mr. King wouldn’t be allowed to see her without her express permission and that they planned to move her to the room at the rear end of the wing, behind their station. Law enforcement had already been notified as well.
Divine Phoenix [Divine Creek Ranch 10] (Siren Publishing Ménage Everlasting) Page 3