The Best Man's Bride (8 page)

“You’re giving up?” she asked, her eyes narrowed as she studied his face.

“I have to.” He couldn’t have what he really wanted.
Her.

“I don’t know if I believe you,” she admitted, her lashes blinking fast as if she was fighting tears. “You’re really going to stop looking for Molly?”

He shook his head. He had a duty, as best man, to help the groom. He had to find the bride. “No.”

Her breath audibly caught. “You’re just going to stop using me to find her?”

He couldn’t deny what had been his intention.

“Damn you,” she cursed. Then she amended, “Damn me. I thought I was smarter now, that I wouldn’t fall for a bunch of practiced lines.”

“I wasn’t lying to you,” he insisted.

She shook her head. “Stop. Just stop. I’m not falling for…” She dragged in a breath. “Just leave my sister alone. The wedding was only yesterday.”

“No, thanks to your sister there was
no
wedding.”

“It’s only been a day,” she pointed out. “Molly will come home when she’s ready.”

“Josh deserves an explanation. She can’t just stay away until she’s
ready
to come home,” he argued. “That’s not fair.”

“Sometimes life isn’t fair,” she said wearily.

Surely she was too young to know that already. But then he’d been young when he’d discovered that truth. “Colleen, I’m sorry.”

“Just leave Molly alone,” she said. “And leave me alone, too.” She ran again.

And this time he didn’t chase her. He only watched as she fled through the shrubs and then through the gates of the park. When he could see her no longer, he dropped his attention to the colonel’s head.

Sighing, he squeezed the muscles at the back of his neck. The colonel wasn’t the only one who’d lost his head. But Nick’s heart wouldn’t be beating so hard with fear and dread if that were all he’d lost. He’d come so close…not just to making love but to falling
in
love.

An emotion he’d vowed never to experience. Like the colonel, he’d been broken long ago. But what was broken in Nick couldn’t be repaired by anyone. Not even Colleen.

Although the wind had died down, heavy clouds clung to the sky, bringing night on early. Colleen headed home, the fireflies lighting her way. Glancing at the illuminated dial of her watch, she realized that she’d missed dinner. But she wasn’t hungry despite the little food she’d eaten with Nick. She wasn’t particularly eager to face her family and their houseguests, either. Abby knew her far too well. She would realize that something had happened to Colleen.

She would know right away that Colleen had acted recklessly again. Colleen hadn’t made love with Nick, but it didn’t matter. She’d already fallen for him. Even knowing that he was only turning on the charm to find out where her sister was, she’d fallen.

Was she that starved for attention? That desperate? She’d thought herself so much older and wiser now.

She couldn’t face herself right now, let alone look her best friend in the eye. Then, turning away from the house, she noticed a couple standing at the front of the white-sided Dutch Colonial house. The man’s arms were wrapped tight around the woman and their lips met. Curious to see who else had fallen, Colleen crept closer, keeping to the shadows of the trees that lined the street and sidewalk.

They pulled apart, the man breathing hard. “Mary…”

Mary? Knowing she should look away, that she should give them their privacy, Colleen peered through the shrubs anyways. Her mother’s name was Mary. That was her
mother
making out with some man at the front door of the house she’d shared with Colleen’s father. The house where her husband had died, where she’d suffered from that loss for the past eight years.

“Wallace, I can’t…”

Wallace Schipper? Her mother was kissing Colleen’s old English teacher?

“I have guests,” her mother murmured.

“Abby Hamilton’s still here?”

Mary McClintock nodded. “We hope she’ll stay.”

Colleen seconded that wish.

“But even if Abby and Lara weren’t here, Rory is,” she pointed out.

Mr. Schipper snorted. “He knows.”

She sighed. “Probably. But I haven’t told him. I haven’t told any of my children.”

The pressure on Colleen’s chest eased a bit. Her mother hadn’t intentionally left her out.

“We’re a little old to be sneaking around like this,” her mother’s boyfriend said, the frustration deepening his voice.

“Mary, I want…”

“I realize,” she said, “that
you
know what
you
want.”

“But you don’t know what
you
want.” He sighed heavily, with resignation.

“I need more time.”

Maybe that was all Nick needed, time to change his mind, time to give love and Colleen a chance. Maybe Josh was right and she was the woman who could get him to fall in love. And Josh was right that Nick would fall hard. As a friend, he cared so deeply, was so loyal. As a lover, he’d be beyond any fantasy she’d ever had.

“It’s been eight years, Mary.”

Eight years since her husband had died, but still Mary McClintock mourned him. That was how much she’d loved him.

No, Nick was right about the pain that love could cause. Colleen didn’t want him to change his mind and she wasn’t changing hers.

Colleen crept from the bushes and made her way to the rear yard so that her mother and Mr. Schipper wouldn’t notice she’d been eavesdropping. And then she stumbled onto another private moment in the backyard.
Another
man and woman stood close together, their voices raised in a heated discussion.

“I thought you were cool,” Rory shouted. “I thought you wouldn’t try to tell me what to do like everyone else around here does.”

“Everyone else, or just Clayton?” Abby asked, her usually vibrant voice subdued as if she didn’t want to make Rory angrier.

“Yeah, Clayton. He acts like my dad.”

“No, he doesn’t.” Abby words echoed Colleen’s thought.

“Your dad was one of a kind. He was so…”

“I know.” Bitterness filled the teenager’s voice. “He was the greatest guy in the world. Everyone says so.”

“Don’t you remember?”

“Sure, I remember him,” Rory said defensively. Then he continued, his voice thick with emotion, “But I was six years old. I don’t have as many memories of him as the rest of you do.”

Colleen’s heart ached for her younger brother’s understandable resentment. He’d been cheated. They all had.

“I’m sorry,” Abby said as she placed her hand on Rory’s shoulder.

He shrugged it off. “I don’t want your pity.”

“I’m sorry your dad died, but I don’t feel sorry
for
you,” she insisted. “You feel sorry enough for yourself.”

“Hey!”

“I’m jealous of you. You had six years with a wonderful father, and that’s more than I had.” She swallowed hard. “Sure you lost your dad, but you still have all these great people who care about you. Your mom is so…” Abby’s voice broke. “I’m jealous of your mom, too.”

“I bet you’re not jealous of Clayton,” Rory quipped.

“No, I am. I’ve never had anyone who cared about me like he cares about his family. He gave up so much for all of you, for his father,” she said, her voice rising in defense of the man who’d always given her such a hard time. “He was just a kid, himself.”

“He was in his twenties.”

“He was just a kid. He could have run off, like I did. But no,
he
stayed.” Her throat moved as she swallowed hard. “He gave up whatever dreams he might have had in college.”

“But he went to college, when dad was home sick. He took off…”

“Only because your dad insisted. And then he skipped all the parties, all the fun, and he came home every weekend to take care of things around here. To make sure all of you were okay.”

Abby had always understood Clayton far better than he’d understood her, but part of that was Colleen’s fault, for letting her take the blame for the colonel. Yet Clayton would have been the one least likely to believe the truth.

“How do you repay him for everything he gave up?” Abby asked. “You’re spiking punch bowls and sneaking cigarettes in the backyard.”

Rory. Regret twisted Colleen’s heart. She’d been so busy working for Clayton and volunteering at the hospital that she hadn’t paid enough attention to him—she should have tried to stop him from going down a bad road. She stood hidden, waiting out the rest of Abby’s lecture. But then her friend left the teenager, with a hug and a playful rumpling of his curly dark hair, and headed back into the house.

Colleen waited until the pungent scent of cigarette smoke drifted toward her, then she stepped out to confront her brother. “You didn’t listen at all,” she said, gesturing toward his lit cigarette.

“Spare me, Col,” Rory griped. “I don’t need another lecture.”

“No,” she agreed. “Clayton lectures enough.”

“Even Abby. And I thought she was cool,” he said, snorting, then coughing with the smoke.

Colleen joined him on the patio, pulling the cigarette from his hand to drop it on the bricks and crush it beneath her heel. “So, you don’t need another lecture,” she said again. “You need your ass kicked.”

A laugh sputtered out of him. “And you’re going to do that?”

“No,” she said, shaking her head. “You’re still a tattletale. You’d run right to Mom. And since you’re her baby, she’d take your side.”

“So what are you going to do?” he challenged. “Tell Clayton?”

“What’s the point?” She shrugged. “You obviously don’t listen to him.”

“Hey, he’s gotta pay you to listen to him,” Rory said.

Colleen’s lips curved into a smile. “And I still don’t always do it.” Maybe she shouldn’t ask Clayton for a raise.

Rory laughed.

“But I do better now than I used to,” she insisted.

Like Abby, she’d come to respect her older brother for all the responsibility he’d assumed when their father died. Still feeling guilty for thinking about running off when Clayton had done so much to support their family, Colleen had gone to work for him to help ease some of his burden. Unlike Clayton, she’d never wanted to join the insurance agency their father had begun. Yet she knew that Clayton had wanted to work
with
his father, not
in place
of him.

“C’mon, Col, you always do what you’re supposed to,” Rory scoffed, with disdain, not respect. “You work for Clayton. You volunteer at the hospital…”

“You know?” She had only told two people, Brenna and Abby, about her volunteer work. Molly had found out when she volunteered herself, and Eric, a paramedic, eventually had run into her in the hospital. She hadn’t wanted anyone to make a big deal of it.

“I figured out you weren’t reading the little kids’ books for yourself,” Rory said with another derisive snort. “Then Mom told me.”

Mom knew. Of course, she did.

“Mom said I should be more like you,” he muttered, reaching into his pocket for his pack of cigarettes.

Colleen grabbed the pack from his hand. “You’re already too much like me.”

His brow furrowed. “What are you talking about?”

Her breath shuddered out. “I’ve been selfish and irresponsible, too.”

Rory laughed. “Yeah, right.”

“You know why Abby left town?” she asked, wondering how much he remembered from that time when they’d lost their dad. In addition to losing her dad, Colleen had felt as if she’d lost her friends, too, since they’d all left Cloverville shortly after the funeral.

“
Left
town?” Rory scoffed. “Abby was pretty much run out of town for crashing into the colonel.”

“She didn’t do it.”

“What?” Deeper furrows formed in his brow.

“I did it.”

His eyes widened with shock. “You?”

“Yes,” Colleen admitted with a heavy sigh. “And I let Abby take the blame.”

“Col?”

She cringed. “I was selfish and irresponsible.”

“You did that on purpose?” her brother asked. “You drove her car into the statue?”

Colleen shook her head. “I wasn’t trying to hurt anyone.” Not consciously, anyway. Maybe just herself. “But I stole Abby’s car.”

“Why?” Rory asked, aghast. “She was your friend. She would have loaned it to you.”

“No, she wouldn’t have.” Abby had had plans for that car, which she was going to use to drive herself out of town after graduation. But because of Colleen she hadn’t been able to graduate—she’d been expelled for malicious mischief. Abby had insisted to Colleen that she hadn’t been passing, thanks to her ADD. “I didn’t have my license. I was only fifteen, and I was running away.”

“God, Col.”

“I used to run away a lot,” she admitted, her face heating with embarrassment as she recalled her stupidity.

“I didn’t know.”

“No one did.”

His eyes darkened, and he shook his head. “No.”

“I did,” she insisted.

“Yeah, I
do
know,” he explained. “I remember. You’d sneak out with your backpack, with this look in your eyes.” His own eyes glistened in the moonlight. “I used to be scared that you wouldn’t come back, but you always did.”

She nodded. “I never got far enough away to stay away. That’s why I stole Abby’s car. I was determined to go farther that time. And I intended to stay away.” She sighed. “But the brakes failed and I ended up in the park.”

“And ran into the colonel.”

“Yes.”

His breath hissed out. “It was a bad crash.”

“I totaled Abby’s car,” she acknowledged. Her friend had had to take a bus when she’d finally left town. Colleen had insisted on paying for the ticket. In fact, she’d given Abby all of her savings. Abby, of course, had tried to pay her back, but Colleen had refused the money.

“You totaled the colonel, too.”

She nodded. “Yes.”

“I remember your bruises and cuts.” His voice cracked.

“You looked bad.”

“I wasn’t hurt that bad.” Not physically. But emotionally something had broken inside her. She’d finally stopped being so self-involved, realizing she wasn’t the only one hurting. “I never should have let Abby take the blame. But Dad was sick, and Abby didn’t want me getting into trouble. I was such a mess back then. I was lucky I didn’t get killed.”

“And lucky that you had a friend like Abby.”

“Yes, I could have been in real trouble for stealing her car, for driving without a license, for reckless driving. I could have really messed up my life.” Her voice cracked as she said, “Instead I messed up Abby’s.”

“From what she’s told me, it wasn’t that great back then, but she turned her life around.”

“Yes, she did.”

“And you turned your life around, Col. You’re like a saint now, or something.”

She shook her head. “No, I just grew up. I had to. I lost everyone then. Dad died. Molly and Brenna left for college. Eric joined the Marines and Abby just left.”

“And you blamed yourself,” Rory said. The teenager was far more intuitive than Colleen had realized.

“It was
my
fault,” she insisted. “I was so lost, such a mess. Like you are now.”

“Hey.”

“You can’t argue with me. You’re drinking. You’re smoking. You’re hanging out with the wrong kids. You’re going to wind up in a crash like I did. But you might not live through it.” She had been lucky that she had—as much for her family’s sake as her own. They couldn’t have handled two losses.

“Take Abby’s advice, Rory,” she instructed her brother.

“Turn things around before it’s too late.”

In the glow of the back porch, Rory’s face paled. “Gee, Col, dramatic much?”

A laugh sputtered from her lips. He could always manage a wisecrack, no matter how much he was affected. Maybe that was why no one had ever realized how hard he’d taken his father’s death.

“And now you’re spitting on me,” he said, wiping a hand across his face, as if her laugh had showered him with saliva.

“Gotta do something to make you listen.”

“I
heard
you,” he replied solemnly, sincere for once.

She smiled and teased, “I guess there’s a first time for everything.”

“You never
talked
before, Col, not like this.”

And maybe she hadn’t. She’d been scared to open herself up—even to her family. “Well, as far as I’m concerned, this conversation
never
happened.” She narrowed her eyes and mimicked his tough attitude. “If you finally grow up and stop being such a little jerk, blame someone else.” She swallowed hard. “Do what I did. Let Abby take the blame.”