by Taylor Hart
“Stop, Beau,” Sean said, glancing at Charlotte.
Ryan couldn’t see anything except red. His mind went clear, crisp, focused. His hands yearned to lay hold of Nathan. He’d sworn to himself he would never use his hands to do harm to another human being again. He sucked in a shaky breath.
Beau gave Ryan an intense look, then swiftly moved in front of him. “Take off, Nathan, before I teach you a lesson myself.”
Nathan chug laughed. “Right, and end up in jail?”
Sean calmly moved beside Beau and crossed his arms. “A true leader knows when retreat will let him fight another day.”
Nathan let out a reeling laugh. “This is rich. Things never change, do they? It seems this town is always on the verge of another Hardman or Hardmans going to prison.” He sighed. “Or you could just die and avoid jail time.”
Silence. Ryan pulled in a long breath and tried to remember to count his breath as he let it out slowly, as the therapist had recommended. Stupid therapist.
Beau clenched his fists and tsked his tongue. “See, now that wasn’t funny.”
A black Jeep pulled up and jerked to a stop.
Joe Watkins hopped out and paused as he scanned them. “What’s going on?”
Nathan’s smile widened. “I guess you got the deal done?”
Ryan didn’t like the smile on Nathan’s face.
Joe looked wary. “It’s done.”
“What did you do, Nathan?” Charlotte’s voice was shaky.
Nathan nodded to Joe. “Go ahead and give them the news.”
Joe coughed. His face went grim. “First of all, I’m sorry, Charlotte.”
“Get on with it.” Nathan sneered.
Joe cleared his throat and ignored Nathan. “Second,” he said, his eyes moving to Ryan. “Ryan, after watching tonight’s news story about your capture and escape, I just . . .” He broke off.
The pit of Ryan’s gut tightened and he thought he might be sick. He’d completely forgotten. He stumbled back and Sean caught him.
“What are you talking about?” Beau questioned.
Joe continued, still looking at Ryan. “Thank you for your service to our country.”
Sweat budded against Ryan’s forehead and his hands shook. No. No. No. They couldn’t have released that expose. Not while he was here. Not now.
Nathan shoved Joe in the shoulder. “Does it always have to be the Ryan Hardman show? Get on with it.”
Joe’s eyes fluttered and he gave Nathan a hooded glare.
Nathan glared back. “Tell them.”
Joe turned back to Charlotte. “Your dad put a life estate trust in his will. Your mother owns the land for the rest of her life, but she can’t sell the land. It goes to you no matter what. That's the terms of the contract.”
Charlotte shook her head. “How do you know this?”
Joe’s face looked pained. He frowned at Charlotte. “Your dad called me when I was home to visit a few years ago.” He shrugged. “I wrote the will for him.”
Nathan laughed. "Now tell them the best part."
The way Ryan could sense the storm that was about to come had more to do with military training than just a feeling. The military had trained him to be prepared for combat. It had also unofficially trained him to see the lay of a situation, to be ready for the worst. The pleasure in Nathan's eyes told Ryan that whatever was coming next was bad.
Joe cleared his throat.
"Spit it out, Watkins," Beau insisted, and glared from Joe to Nathan. “If you work for the Devil, you have to get used to doing his bidding."
"Shut your face." Nathan spit at Beau.
Joe’s lips pinched into a straight line. "There's three years of back taxes on the place. So," he said and handed Charlotte a brown envelope, “this is your official notice to pay the taxes or the property will be seized by the United States government. They’re due by the end of this month.”
Chapter 18
Joe Watkins sat in his car and watched Ryan take off on a horse.
A few minutes later, he watched Charlotte rush out of her mother’s house, fly down the stairs, and rush to the corrals. She lit out of the barn like a woman on a mission.
He closed his eyes and thought of Charlotte’s red curls, the way they flowed across her back. About how soft they would be to touch. About the way her aqua green eyes mesmerized him with their emotion and passion and zeal. He tried to push away the fact she was going after Ryan Hardman.
He hadn’t known what to expect of the broken woman when Nathan had told him they were getting divorced. He hadn’t known he would feel so driven to come back to Hidden Falls or that he would agree so quickly when Nathan offered him the job.
It felt wrong, but it also felt right. He would do anything for her. To help her. She couldn’t have known what all those little kindnesses had meant to him when he’d moved here as a foster kid their junior year.
She’d been nice to him. She’d defended him when kids made fun of him. That had been Charlotte Talon—beautiful, happy, the nicest girl in school.
Until Nathan.
He had ruined her. Anger boiled through him. He hated Nathan for that. For that and so many other things he would never talk about.
Then there had been the will he’d been summoned to write for her father so many years ago.
He honestly hadn’t thought it would matter until he’d gotten the call that Ryan Hardman was back in town and wanted to buy the ranch. He rubbed his temple.
Nathan opened the passenger side door. “Typical.” He slouched into the seat.
Joe didn’t want to deal with Nathan right now. It had gotten harder being in this town than he’d thought it would. Sure, he’d had hope that Charlotte could heal and they could start dating. He’d hoped things would be different and that, somehow . . . some way . . . It had been his dream. Fantasy. Fairytale.
But it wasn’t happening. Dealing with Nathan daily didn’t help. It didn’t help that the silence that kept him free—kept him in bondage to Nathan.
“Joe!” Nathan barked out. “You’ve got to fix this.”
“I’m trying!” He shouted it. He rubbed absently at his eyebrow and steadied his glasses. Joe liked to think his glasses made him look dignified, lawyerly. He imagined they had a JFK effect to them. At least, that’s what one of the girls at the bar had told him one night. He had to admit he’d liked it, a lot. The girls at the bar had only been temporary. They’d just been something to pass the time with.
“Don’t talk to me like that.” Nathan’s tone held a warning.
Joe squared to him. He thought of the Dr. Phil relationship books he’d been reading lately. He’d been thinking they would help him when he got in a relationship with Charlotte and he could be honest, open, and everything he wanted to be with her. It talked about not letting others treat you in a way that you didn’t want to be treated. He needed to apply those things now, with Nathan. “I don’t think we should pursue this.”
The vein in Nathan’s head that bulged when he was angry enlarged. “What?”
“I—I just don’t think this is right.” He had to stand up for himself. How would Charlotte ever respect him if he didn’t stick up for her? In reality, he was the only one who could control Nathan.
“What the—”
He put his hand up. “Get out, Nathan.”
Nathan stopped.
“I mean it. I think you’ve crossed a line.”
Nathan let out a breath and shoved the door open. He laughed then ducked back in. “You might think you have something on me, on my family.” He let out a breath. “But my dad made something clear when he took his last breath that day in the hospital . . . the secret gets buried with him. Do you understand that? Don’t forget, we’re not seventeen anymore. If I go down, you go down. And I hear attorneys have a much harder time in prison.” He slammed the door shut.
Panic filled Joe’s chest. It was true. He turned the key and eased the car forward. He swallowed and tried to keep his hands steady
on the wheel. All it had taken was one fateful night. That accident had changed his life, too.
He had to get home and make a new plan. A plan that would somehow change the past.
Chapter 19
Sunny stumbled beneath Charlotte. She’d always been a good horse, but Charlotte hadn’t ridden in a while. She shook the reins and egged the horse forward. “Come on, Sunny girl, you got this.”
The dense smell of trees, earth, and thick brush changed to fresh, cooling mist as the forest opened up to the falls. They weren’t large and ominous like some falls could be. No. They crested off the top of Hidden Mountain—hidden because of the thick forest. The early settlers claimed they hadn’t even realized there were falls until they had gotten to the top of the mountain. The thing that made them unique was the way they wound down the mountain. The way the mountain curved with rock formations that finally fell into a large pool at the bottom.
The river went on to feed into the Santee River before it headed out into the Atlantic Ocean. Charlotte liked to think about how this part of the river had always belonged to Hidden Falls. How it would forever be a place of beauty and peace and clarity.
Unless it was developed. A wave of nausea pulsed through her. Her eyes wandered the baseline of the falls. She couldn’t count how many times she and Ryan had clung to the rock face and edged themselves behind the falls. It’d been dangerous but worth it. Definitely worth it.
She slid off Sunny and noticed Bruno tied to a tree. She knew Ryan would end up here. She carefully made her way down the edge and then began the short rock climb down. She remembered it being a lot easier than this, but she kept her fingers tightly clamped to the walls and her core muscles tight. She liked to work out, and found pleasure in the feeling of her muscles working.
She was almost behind the first fall when she heard Ryan curse.
His hands were on her waist, pulling her off the wall and down next to her. “What are you doing here?”
She brushed her hands down her pants. “I didn’t need your help.”
The side of his lip rose to a half smile. “Of course you didn’t.”
She took a long, deep breath in and almost hummed her mother’s yoga chord. It was hard to be so close to him. “I—Mom told me about the news story and I came to find you.”
He shrugged and turned away from her. “Oh.”
“I’m sorry, Ryan.”
He put a hand up. “Don’t. Please.”
She moved to a bench that was carved out of the cave wall and sat. “Ryan, do you want to talk about it?”
“No.”
“Okay.”
He swerved back to look at her. “Okay.”
The intensity of his blue eyes made her heart pick up speed. “I get it. Everyone has things they don’t want to talk about.”
He looked steadily at her and moved to sit on the stone bench next to her. “Did he hit you, Char?”
Char.
She didn’t want to answer. “Well.” The smell of him was nice, fresh—like rain. It was different than in high school. Back then he’d worn his dad’s Old Spice. This cologne was new, to her at least. Charlotte turned, letting the ice blue of his eyes make her insides tremble. This cologne fit him better. “It’s not what you think.”
He didn’t flinch at her closeness. He maintained that searing, intense, militant look. “You didn’t answer the question.”
She paused. Ryan had always had a way of getting information out of her. Even when they’d been younger and he’d acted more like the know-it-all older brother, she couldn’t hold out. “It wasn’t like that.”
Ryan folded his arms. “Let’s see, Nathan didn’t hit you around. That’s not what happened?”
“He didn’t at first.” She shot back too quickly.
“At first?”
She couldn’t look at those accusing eyes, at the eyes that would break the inside of her soul if he knew the truth.
“Char.”
“Quit calling me that.” She snapped it out and stood, moving closer to the falls. They were beautiful at night. Even more beautiful when looking at them from the inside out.
“Why did you let him get away with that?”
She wouldn’t answer that question. It’s not like she’d let him. It wasn’t like she could have controlled it. “Why didn’t you come home after boot camp?”
The side of his lip turned down. He hesitated. “I couldn’t.”
“Couldn’t or wouldn’t?”
He pinched the bridge of his nose and then released it. “I could have stopped my father that night, and I didn’t. I realize that wasn’t a good enough reason to leave you, but it felt like one at the time.”
She narrowed her eyes. “That accident wasn’t your fault. Your dad was an alcoholic. He was drunk. No one blamed you.”
He cleared his throat. “I could have stopped it, but I didn’t.”
“So that’s why you didn’t write me, either?”
He looked at his hands. “I thought you were better off without me.”
“I see.”
“I realize now that I was wrong. Not that you gave me time to reconsider. What was it, two months later I got that…” He trailed off. “That engagement announcement?”
An unwilling tear fell down her cheek and she swiped at the traitor angrily. “I still remember how you looked the last time I saw you. Solemn. Purposeful. Proud. Like you would single-handedly restore honor to the Hardman name.”
He scoffed. “Guess I blew that.”
Her insides went queasy again, and she fought to keep control. The past was done. There was no way to tell him now, and really, there was no point. “I knew it wasn’t right for you here. I could tell this place was eating you up, taking your soul.” She scoffed. “Same look Kent had before he finally went to Africa to do doctors without borders.”
The look of distaste on Ryan’s face was hard and soiled and guttural. He took the pebble between his fingers and threw it into the falls. “I don’t want to talk about my brother.”
“Then who do you want to talk about?”
His face got hard. “Is that why you married Nathan, to save my soul?”
Charlotte thought about the night Nathan had come to her. The night he’d asked her to marry him. “Most things are complicated.”
She’d taken Nathan’s offer. She focused on her hands. Only God would know how to judge her actions, but she’d been trying to do the right thing.
His voice was soft. “Maybe I like complicated.”
She laughed, but it was an unamused laugh. “No, complicated has never been your thing.”
Ryan sighed. “Why’d you come after me tonight?”
Charlotte measured him and let out a long sigh. “I saw your mom the day before she died.” Charlotte tried to quell her inner turmoil. “She sent for me.” Even though Nathan had been angry, Charlotte had gone to the hospital.
Ryan’s jaw tightened.
“Your mom told me that one day you’d come back. She wanted me to tell you she never lost faith in you. She knew you would have come if you could have.”
His jaw unclenched. He blinked. “She said that?”
Charlotte nodded. “She said she loved you.” Charlotte wouldn’t tell him what else she said.
Ryan stared out at the falls then stood.
Charlotte closed her eyes and tried to let the calm of the falls seep into her.
“My mother had more faith in God than any sane person really should have.”
She opened her eyes and stood. “No, she didn’t just have faith in God, she had faith in you. In her son.”
Ryan shook his head and leaned an arm against the wall. “Maybe she shouldn’t have.”
Charlotte watched this man. The man who had once been the boy she’d fallen in love with all those years ago. He was so different and so the same. She moved next to him. “No, I think your mom was right.”
“You do?” He glanced back at her.
She shrugged. “What can I say
? I’m a mother now. I will always have faith in my son.”
They both stood there, staring into each other’s eyes.
Her phone buzzed in her pocket, and she pulled it out.
Star.
She pushed the ignore button. Angela must have called Star. Both of them had left a couple of messages and texts, but she didn’t have time to keep them informed at the moment.
Ryan reached out and put his hand over hers. “Thank you, Charlotte, for telling me what my mom said.”
His warm hand pressed to hers, it made her head light and everything inside of her mushy.
Ryan looked down at her lips. “Charlotte.”
Their eyes met.
Her heart raced. She thought of the last time she’d kissed him. Before she could stop herself, she leaned into his lips.
Chapter 20
Warm, soft, fruity—like the taste of an apple picked fresh from the tree. It all fell over him like a tsunami of emotion that had been trapped in a deep, dark ocean cave.
She eased back, her cheeks flushed, and she looked bewildered—like she hadn’t really meant to kiss him.
He put his hands on the cave wall behind her.
Her hands went to his chest.
Their lips met again.
He sank closer and drank her in like honey straight from a honeycomb on a warm summer’s day. His heart hammered against his ribcage.
Her kiss turned wanting, dangerous, desperate.
Ryan knew the longer he let himself drink her in, the harder it would be to stop. Her vanilla and light lemon scent, her mouth’s apple taste, her soft skin, and her tangled curls would pull him under.
He abruptly let go and stepped back. “I’m leaving.”
She let out a laugh. “I guess history does have a tendency to repeat itself.”
“That’s not fair.”
“Maybe it’s not fair, but it’s true.”
He flipped around and moved to the edge of the water. He held out his hand and splashed some water onto his face. He hadn’t anticipated feeling this way. He felt his hands shake, and he tried to pretend he was somewhere else. Funny, he remembered being in that cave and wishing so many times that he was exactly where he was now. The absurdity of it all startled a laugh out of him.