So small and slight inside my fingers, his hand trembled with the energy of youth. “Likewise, ma’am.” He sent a hopeful glance at his grandmomma, clearly asking if he was dismissed.
“Scat.”
Flying down the porch, he landed in Reardon’s welcoming arms. Amidst the hollering and hugs and kisses, Reardon grinned up at me.
Inside the gorgeous abode, its rustic decor blended with the tall Southern pines and briny marshes.
I received a refreshment and a hug from Cash. “Nice to see you again, Shay.”
Jane’s greeting was effervescent as a sloe gin fizz. “I’m so glad you’re here.”
“Hey, Charley! Anything you need doing up here you little women can’t handle yourselves?” Cash conspiratorially leaned between Jane and me. “Wait for it, in three, two, one…”
Charley hustled from kitchen with her smacking hand raised. “Cash Alan Sloane, you know better than to think y’all men are irreplaceable round my house. Now you git too.”
And
,
he was named, shamed, and sent packing.
I took a swig to gather my courage and approached the Queen Bee’s hive. “Miss Charlotte, anything I can do?”
“Y’all can drop the Miss, dear. You’re a guest, and I don’t expect you to be kitchen help.” My offer ignored, she slashed through the fresh fruit piled beside her, ranting, “I tell ya. Those days when the men tended the rice fields and the women reigned over the range, how I miss ’em.”
“It’s called feminism, Mom.” Jane lounged against the fridge.
“Don’t you be givin’ me that Betty Friedan bullcrap.” Tail ends of strawberries somersaulted into the farmhouse sink. Her knife, she pointed at us. “God made us different for a reason. I liked my space just fine, before Norris started thinkin’ he knew how to cook. Always makin’ a mess in my domain.”
I wanted to yell
Hallelujah!,
kiss her feet, and call her my new heroine, but I suspected she’d probably make mincemeat of me, so I nodded along with her awesome rant and kept mum.
“Ma!” came a call from outside.
She cranked the window open. “You best be high tailin’ it up here, boy, if you wanna talk to me.”
On the deck quickly, a wick of sweat dripped from Reardon’s temple to earlobe. I stared and he made a slow show of wiping his brow on the bottom of his shirt, revealing drum tight abs in the process.
I chewed my tongue in order not to moan out loud.
His lush mouth parted with the stroll of his pink tongue.
Charlotte looked between us.
I peeled my eyes off him, fanning myself.
“Where do you want the cooler, Ma?”
Her tone altered from bruising to blushingly sweet. “Why, thank you for askin’, Day-Day. Go’n put it out by the tables.” Brushing her hands on her pinafore, she watched him walk away, as did I. “Always so considerate, that one.”
Wasn’t he just?
Once Charlotte followed the men outside, Jane said, “Mom’s not usually like this.”
“I think she’s fantastic.”
She narrowed her eyes.
“All right. It’s just, I feel like such an imposter.”
“You’re not.”
“Took my rings off today.”
“Saw that.”
“It feels weird.”
“Because you don’t want to be here, or because of Palmer?”
“I want to be here. My only wish is that this was all real.” I set my drink down.
“We’re real.”
“Can’t argue there.”
“What you and Reardon feel together, too. And I imagine all the pain you’re goin’ through over Palmer.”
“Yeah.”
“Can’t be easy.”
No.
“You know, you’re welcome here. Even if they knew the circumstances.”
I didn’t buy that, but I nodded all the same.
“You stay put for a bit. Come down when you’re ready. As long as Mom doesn’t send up the search party first,” she warned.
The quiet didn’t calm me near as much as my drink. Strolling around, I peered out the windows and into open doors before I really got my nosey on. I snooped at the pictures. Hundreds of them, from faded Polaroids to graduation photos to old-as-time sepias. The room was a time capsule of weddings and births and eras remembered. Amidst the jumble, one in particular beckoned me. The stunning young couple looked happy. Reardon and Leila. I searched for more and found him in a football uniform, reeling in a fish, as a teen with his brother, sweaty and in the middle of a two-on-two basketball game.
Then, a beach and a baby with a mouthful of sand. Max.
The whole family on a picnic blanket, the baby the center of attention.
Tiny fists holding tight to a man’s hand and a female one filled the entire frame of another. The type of pictures I’d imagined having years to take of Delilah.
The photos started swimming and I swiped my eyes. My pain couldn’t detract from the joy I was seeing. Leila and Reardon as aunt and uncle.
Reardon throwing the blond toddler into the air.
“Well, ain’t you just a buttercup? Mah boy did say so.”
I spun into a tall man who steadied me. He smelled like my daddy used to. Familiar, capable, all rolled into Old Spice and the scent of the ocean.
“You okay there, Shay?”
Hey Tiger Lily, what you doin’ out there?
“Yessir. Mr. Boone?”
“Name’s Norris. We’ll have none of that mister business. We look like the type to insist on company manners?”
In jeans and biker boots, with a sharp beard and shaggy frost-colored hair, his appearance shouted not-so-retired Hell’s Angel.
I put on my charm. “I do apologize. I thought y’all were South of Broad Boones, not backwater Boones.”
His deep belly laugh made me chuckle. “We gonna get along right fine, yes, we are. Now, let me get a beer. Want one?” He lumbered to the fridge and took out two. “My woman didn’t rattle you none, did she?”
“No, sir.”
He lifted an eyebrow in a very eerie Reardon move.
“I mean not at all, Norris. Your wife is–”
“A wildcat? A harridan? One hell of a woman?”
“Absolutely. I mean one hell of a woman, ’course.”
“She sure is.” At the counter overflowing with the fruit salad casualties, he swept up the trash, wet a sponge, and washed it all down, a secret smile on his lips. “She sure is that.”
Charlotte appeared, winding her fingers through Norris’s. “Kennel down now, Norrie.” Her youthful blush belied the bite of her comment.
He winked at me, squeezing her against his side.
“Come have some barbeque, y’all.”
Outside, the bright sunshine blinded me as much as Admiral Hightower. Resplendent even in casual dress, he shook the hand of a man who resembled Reardon so much I looked twice.
Reardon’s doppelganger curtly saluted and addressed the Admiral. “This is an honor, sir.”
“Captain Boone, I should be paying homage to you. You do your country and your family proud.” Breaking rank, he clapped his hand to Ransome’s shoulder. “Good to see you looking well, son.”
Oh, but he was as good lookin’ as his brother. Force in his expression, such a strong upper body the fact he was in a wheelchair was easily overlooked. It was only when he turned my way I noticed the long jagged pucker of skin curving from his right temple, ending where his dimple would be.
Testing the scar on his cheek with the flat of his hand, Ransome winced, his eyes hitting mine and holding fast.
Reardon appeared at my side, his arm around my waist. “He’s with us today.”
“Here’s the real main event.” Ransome’s intense gaze changed to playfulness as he swerved past his brother. “Meanin’ your date, ’course.”
Stooping for one of those man-hugs, Reardon was taken off guard when Ransome curled him close for a harsh skull rub. “You little shi–”
He released Reardon. “Who you callin’ little? I can bench twenty more than you,
Day-Day.
”
“Shay, this is my kid brother, Ransome.”
“Rub in the six year age difference, old man.” He sat forward, manually moving his legs farther back on the foot rests before giving me the Boone wink and smirk I recognized all too well. “Miss Shay, it is purely my pleasure to make your acquaintance.” Enveloped in his fingers, my hand started to perspire
,
and I beat back the impulse to duck my head and giggle.
What the hell? Reardon, Whistler, Badger, and now Ransome? It had to be in the water round here.
“Alright, you got her blushing, brother, so you can let her go now.”
“Touchy?”
“Well, you’re a bit too goddamn touchy-feely for your own good.”
“Why don’t we ask the lovely Miss Shay what she thinks?”
“Why don’t you shut the fu–”
“Boys!” Miss Charlotte didn’t have to say anything else, her voice was all things leather hiding.
While she yelled at her brood, I sidled over to the Admiral.
“Why, Miss Shay, you are the height of femininity this afternoon.”
“Thank you, sir.”
“What do you make of these goings-on?”
I observed the good-natured scuffle between brothers. “They always like this?”
“Used to be. Back before Ransome’s trouble overseas, you couldn’t break the two apart for their ribbing,” he whispered, “usually over girls. Good to see them like this again. Reckon you got something to do with bringing Reardon back to us.”
I frowned. “I don’t think so.”
“Pork Pullin’!” Norris’s shout brought a halt to the commotion.
A hand low on my back made me catch my breath.
The others marched off to the picnic table set beside a huge magnolia dripping with fat white blossoms, and he did that thing he did. “I want you.” In a mere three words, I was a bundle of desire.
“I want you too.”
“We can’t.” He dipped to my mouth. “Not here.”
“Well, no.”
“Soon as we get away, though.”
“Yeah.” Off-roading took on a whole new meaning.
We hung back from the rest. “You are so your ma’s favorite.”
“I’m not.”
“Are too.” I pushed my palms into his back pockets and squeezed, loving it when he groaned.
“Not, but she likes you.”
“You sure?”
“She used to get so nervous with Leila. I don’t recall Ma ever bitching us out in front of her. She’s comfortable around you.”
“Really? Because I’m pretty sure she wanted to give me a spankin’.”
He grabbed my rear. “Only one who’s gonna spank this luscious ass is me.”
Holy hell yes, please.
His lips brushed mine. I couldn’t hear anything but the blood rushing through me. His tongue teased mine into his mouth where he sucked its tip, a tantalizing tug-of-want.
Still couldn’t hear anything.
I peeped an eye open, over to the picnic table. I leaned into Reardon. “We got an audience.”
’Course it was frigging quiet, because they were all agog at us.
Looping an arm over my shoulders, he flashed a cocky grin. “Show’s over, y’all.”
We settled at the table laid with coleslaw and beer, barbeque and red rice. Shouts for “Jane, Jane, Jane!” began before anyone tucked in.
Reardon butted his chair against mine. “We’ve got this family tradition.”
“Sounds quaint.”
“Well, if it’s Jane’s turn, it probably ain’t.”
“My year, is it?” She laughed, looked to her clasped hands, glanced at Reardon, settled on Ransome. “Ransome is the handsomer of the Boone boys.”