by Casey Dawes
But none of them had sold—until now. Maybe this would be the sale that would change everything, maybe even lead to a commissioned work that would allow her to finally work with emeralds and diamonds.
Neyland hadn’t realized how wide her smile was until she stepped out of the workroom and that smile froze and melted.
Gabe Beauford—back in Beauford for his brother’s wedding next week, the same wedding in which Neyland would serve as a bridesmaid for her friend Emory.
How had Hannah not known who he was? Not only was Gabe the brother of country music superstar Jackson Beauford, he was a two-time, Super Bowl-winning San Antonio Wrangler. And it was no coincidence that his last name was the same as the town’s.
Only a man with extraordinary self-confidence or one spoiling for a fight on the playground would have the nerve to wear those orange seersucker, go-to-hell shorts covered in football helmets—even if he did pair them with a luxurious, gently wrinkled, white linen shirt.
Too much. That was Gabe Beauford all over—too tall, too ripped, too good-looking, too much blond hair. And too, too beloved by Neyland’s father, Conrad MacKenzie, revered football coach of the Beauford High Blue Devils.
And here Gabe stood like a Viking warrior who’d recently finished looting a village, nonchalantly swinging Neyland’s precious Annabelle from his index finger like a pendulum high on speed and good times.
The lapis stones perfectly matched his eyes.
She’d have to speak to Hannah about leaving scoundrels alone with valuable, unguarded merchandise. Neyland reached out, caught the necklace, and pulled it from his finger. She knew what he intended to do with Annabelle, and she was having no part of it.
And, though it wasn’t entirely rational, Neyland wanted no part of Gabe Beauford either. Being the daughter of a successful and revered high school football coach had never been easy, but it had been down right intolerable when, at fifteen, Gabe Beauford had burst onto the scene, catching uncatchable passes, setting records, and—worst of all—taking up Conrad MacKenzie’s time—time that should have been Neyland’s. She had been ten at the time.
Gabe’s deceased parents had been best friends with Neyland’s, so she had always known the Beaufords, but Football Player Gabe was a different story from the Gabe who was simply one of those older and not-very-interesting Beauford brothers. She had long been accustomed to the energy her father gave his team, but never before had she been confronted with a player who was allowed to come to the house whenever he wanted and stay as long as he liked. He was always there—at the dinner table, on family movie night, and locked up with her father in the den watching game film.
Even Neyland’s mother, who was usually sympathetic to Neyland’s jealousy of Conrad’s time, had no tolerance for Neyland’s attitude. Once, when Neyland had burst out that the only reason Gabe got so much attention was because he was such a good wide receiver, Vanessa MacKenzie had told Neyland she should be ashamed of herself, that Gabe needed a father figure since his was dead. At the time, Neyland had thought her father might as well be dead, too, for all the attention he paid her. While that might not have been true, it was how she had felt—and evidently how she still felt.
The day Gabe Beauford graduated from high school and left for the University of Tennessee was the happiest of Neyland’s life, but, still, hardly a day went by that her father did not bring up Gabe’s name. He didn’t even seem to have any opinion on Gabe’s legendary womanizing.
Too bad she hadn’t been a football player.
“Hey, Neyland.” Gabe’s slow, lazy tone matched his slow, lazy smile. “Bad storm last night. We lost some trees out at Beauford Bend.”
“Nothing that will impact the wedding, I hope.” Emory deserved the perfect outdoor wedding she’d always wanted.
“Nah. They were up nearer the road. I went down to your shop, but the sign said you’d temporarily moved back in here.”
“Yes.” And she rattled off the story she and Noel had agreed on. “Noel and I used to share this shop before I opened Sparkle. Nickolai’s getting out of the hospital today, and Noel needs my help minding the shop so she can take care of him.” Noel’s boyfriend played hockey for the Nashville Sound and had gotten a nasty neck laceration in a game last week. “Also, once the Stanley Cup Playoffs start and Nickolai’s able to play again, Noel wants to be free to go to at least some of the road games.” Noel had insisted that part was true and refused to accept money for the space Neyland was using. Of course, Noel had more commissions than she could handle.
“Glaz is tough. He won’t be out long.” Gabe pointed to Annabelle and extended his credit card. “Nice.”
Did he really think she didn’t know what he was going to do with it?
“Hannah said you wanted us to ship it. So I assume it’s not a wedding gift for Emory?”
Gabe laughed, and the dimple in his left cheek flirted with her. “Don’t forget I’m the nephew of Amelia Beauford, founder of the Beauford Bend charm school, otherwise known as A Fortnight of Refinement and Training for Young Ladies. I don’t think she would have thought it appropriate for me to spend this kind of money on jewelry for another man’s fiancée. And I think Emory would agree, as Amelia’s faithful follower. I know my brother would.”
“So, you’ve gotten engaged? It’s for your fiancée? Or are you going to wear it yourself?”
“No.” He didn’t even have the decency to look sheepish. “Fact is, I had a little something to settle before coming here, and I need to soothe some hurt feelings.”
“So it’s one of your famous kiss-off gifts?”
He laughed like he thought he was charming. “I don’t know so much about famous, but I’ve found that a little something pretty goes a long way in making things easier for everybody.”
“I see.”
He frowned. “I’m getting a hint of displeasure here, Neyland. What do you care? I fail to see why you need to approve this little doodad’s future home. Am I buying this thing or adopting it?”
Little doodad! This thing? All of a sudden the world went red.
“Neither.” She popped the necklace over her head. “It’s not for sale. I’m keeping it.”
Gabe narrowed his eyes in puzzlement. Then he did something Neyland would not have believed had she not seen it herself. He dropped his eyes to the case and pointed to Daisy, the white gold filigree and camphor glass bracelet that she’d splurged and bought a few precious diamond chips for.
“How about that one, then?” He didn’t care one bit what he bought. He was simply on an errand to soothe his guilt and get a woman off his back.
“No, Gabe.” Neyland was proud of how strong she sounded. “You don’t understand. None of my jewelry is for sale to you.” And she meant it—not Daisy, Elizabeth, Victoria, Aphrodite, and especially not Annabelle.
He closed his eyes and sighed.
“You’ve always done this,” Neyland said. “You did it to my cousin, Hope, when y’all were in high school. Except it was some silver plated bracelet you bought at Belk. I remember.”
“Is that what this is about? Hope and I were sixteen. You were what? Ten? Twelve? People break up all the time. What’s wrong with being nice about it?”
“It’s not nice. It’s a bribe to keep from being badmouthed. You broke Hope’s heart.”
“Did I? Well, if that’s true, she’s over it. We’re Facebook friends. The last time the team was in Charlotte handing the Panthers their ass, she came to the game. We had dinner.”
“Please tell me this is not for her!”
“It seems to me if you’re so concerned for Hope, you’d know she and I have not taken up together. She brought a date that day.”
She had no defense. Truth was, Neyland hadn’t talked to her cousin since Hope had been in Beauford for Christmas. She had no idea who, if anybody, Hope was dating.
“Look, you have merchandise,” Gabe said. “I need merchandise. I need it today. Just sell me a damned piece of jewelry!”
; She folded her arms over her chest. “No. Go to the mall at Cool Springs. Annabelle is not going to be on GabesKissoffJewels.com.”
He showed no surprise. In fact, he looked a little proud. So he knew about the website some of his former women had put together.
Then he started to laugh. “Annabelle? You name this stuff?”
“Yeah? Well, if you’d name the passes you’re supposed to catch, maybe you would have caught that one in the last Super Bowl and your team could’ve been the first in history to win three straight.”
That came out of her mouth before she could stop it. He turned white and she felt a little shame.
Gabe pocketed his credit card. “Okay. Fine. Keep Annabelle and all her weird sisters. I’m going over to the school to see your dad.”
And, of course, her dad would be there—even on a Saturday morning in April. Long live football, the Beauford Blue Devils, and the University of Tennessee Volunteers. Neyland understood that well; after all, she and the Vol stadium shared the common distinction of having been named for the greatest coach in the history of UT, General Robert Reese Neyland. Though they didn’t always understand each other, Neyland loved her father—adored him—but she would never forgive him for saddling her with that name.
“Why are you going to see Daddy? Are you going to tattle on me?”
“What are you? Five? No, I heard there was some damage to the football stadium from the storm last night. I’m going to see how bad and if there’s anything I can do to help Coach—something I doubt you’ve done.”
So he got the last word after all.
• • •
Gabe got in his Mercedes, put the top down, and headed toward Beauford High School.
What in the ever-loving hell was that all about? Was Neyland MacKenzie completely off her rocker—naming inanimate objects and then refusing to sell them? Emory was always preaching about how important it was to support the artisans, and that’s what he’d been trying to do.
That, and it was handier than driving into Nashville.
But Gabe liked a woman who knew her way around some nice designer clothes and a makeup counter, as Neyland clearly did. Not that he would have explored that even if she hadn’t been crazy-acting. Dating Coach’s niece back in high school had been about as dangerous as he was willing to get—and that was saying a lot for a man who liked to jump out of planes and climb mountains. But damn, Neyland MacKenzie was a looker, and she had a fire about her that could consume a man if he let it. To Gabe’s surprise, apparently his penis hadn’t gotten the memo that Neyland was off limits, because it shouted at him, “Go back and get her!” and began to rise in preparation for the impending encounter.
Not allowed. Best to think of the trouble she was causing him by refusing to sell him jewelry. It was going to take the better part of two hours, round trip, to go to the mall and have something sent to Courtney.
Good. Thoughts of Courtney settled that lead pipe right down.
This breakup hadn’t been as bad as some. Since he’d dropped that ball in the end zone in the last thirty seconds of the Super Bowl last January, she hadn’t been as keen on him. That was okay. Being with Courtney hadn’t been bad; it just hadn’t been good. When she’d starting making noise about wanting to come with him on this trip to Beauford, Gabe had put the relationship out of its misery. He suspected Courtney’s distress had been more about being denied the opportunity to rub elbows with the music folks who would be at Jackson’s wedding than anything else. That, and maybe she’d figured the more distraught she seemed, the bigger the kiss-off gift would be.
That was fine; she’d earned it. He could be hard to handle, and he had the money. He really didn’t care if she let herself be photographed for that website wearing her kiss-off jewelry.
He pulled behind the school, parked beside the field house, and got out of the car like he’d done a thousand times when he was kid. The field house looked okay, as did the bleachers on the south side. But the north bleachers—the home side—had completely caved in. No doubt the concession area beneath would also be damaged. Coach MacKenzie had taught Gabe and his teammates from the first time they’d stepped foot on that field that this was their house and it was to be respected and loved. It hurt to see his house in shambles.
Damned tornado season. There hadn’t been an actual funnel cloud, but straight-line winds could be as bad. There was a swarm of boys with garbage bags picking up debris. They’d chosen to wear their jerseys to clean up their house. Gabe walked onto the field, found a garbage bag, and joined them.
The team greeted him but were too subdued to be very jovial about it. When he’d been home last summer, Gabe had spent a lot of time working out with these boys, so he was old hat with them, something that he found oddly restful and reassuring. According to one of the assistant coaches, Coach MacKenzie was at an emergency school board meeting.
They all worked steadily for two hours, with Gabe pausing once to order fifty pizzas.
Finally, QB-One Lance Owens called out, “Hey, there’s Coach Mac!”
En masse, Coach MacKenzie’s players stood, put down their garbage bags, and removed their ball caps.
“Gentlemen,” Coach MacKenzie said to his team. “No one asked you to come here today, but here you are. I won’t forget it.”
He still looked good—solid and athletic. There was a little salt with the pepper but not much. Neyland had his chestnut hair and brown eyes, but it looked better on her.
Too good.
Just then, the pizza arrived. Coach MacKenzie almost smiled when he met Gabe’s eyes. “I might have known since you’re here, food would follow.”
“Two hours is a long time for a man to go without eating.” Gabe stepped forward to shake Coach’s hand, but they ended up in one of those shoulder-patting half-hugs.
“Gentlemen,” Coach called out. “Grab some shade, eat your food, and be sure to hydrate. I’m going to do a little catching up with your pizza benefactor. I’ll be back in an hour, and we’ll finish what you started.”
Gabe snatched one of the pizzas and two waters from the cooler. “Pepperoni all right with you?”
“Sounds good,” Coach said. “Don’t tell Vanessa. She’d have me eating tofu pizza if she could.”
Gabe followed Coach into the field house, through the locker room, to Coach’s office.
Gabe let himself down in the same green metal chair that had been in front of Coach’s desk for as long Gabe could remember. “I still can’t sit in this chair without being scared shitless of what’s fixing to befall me.” The wall behind Coach was filled with pictures of players who had drifted through this stadium, including one of Gabe with his Heisman Trophy and another in his San Antonio Wrangler uniform.
Coach helped himself to pizza and propped his feet on the desk. “It wasn’t that bad. I sometimes called you in to compliment you. And it must have done you some good. Here you are, picking up trash, nastying up your fancy, sissy-boy clothes.”
“You don’t like my shorts? They’re Tennessee Vol orange. I wore them just for you.”
That got a half-smile out of Coach. He loved the University of Tennessee, had played center there in the seventies. After graduating, he’d been drafted in the seventh round by the Buffalo Bills, though he was cut after the preseason. Then he’d come back to where he’d played his own high school ball to coach.
“I’ll get you a pair if you want them,” Gabe said.
“I think I’ll pass. But I appreciate your loyalty.”
“I’ve been in town a week. I meant to get down to see you sooner,” Gabe said.
“I heard about Nickolai Glazov. How is he?”
“Fine.” Gabe took another piece of pizza. “He’s been in the hospital all week because he was running a little fever. But they’re letting him go today.”
“The paper said he’d be out a few weeks but ought to be able get in on the playoffs.”
“Yeah. So you’ve been to a school board meeting? What’s the word on the
stadium?”
“We’ll get to that. I want to hear about you.”
Gabe had seen Coach when he’d been here for Christmas, but not since. “Well, you saw how it went in January … ”
The whole world had. But what the whole world didn’t know was why he’d dropped an easy, perfect pass that would have made NFL history.
It had been twenty years since that summer night when Gabe had stood helpless with his twin Rafe and Jackson, and watched the vacation beach house burn with their parents trapped inside. He’d trained himself to never think of his mother standing on the balcony crying with two-year-old Camille in her arms.
“Catch your sister, darling,” she’d called to Gabe. “You have to catch her. You can do it!” And she’d believed that—believed it because, even at ten, he’d been tall and his athletic ability uncanny. Catching came easy to him, but not that night. Thank God his mother had run back into the house before she saw Camille fall to her death at Gabe’s feet.
Growing up, whenever that memory had threatened to seep into his soul, whenever he’d remembered how Camille’s silky hair had felt when it’d brushed the back of his hand after the fabric of her little nightgown had slipped through his fingers, Gabe had distracted himself. He’d trained and practiced until he was the best, until he could be sure he would always catch what was thrown at him. The irony was that his sin had made him into one of the best wide receivers in the nation. He seldom missed, and never when it counted.