“You haven’t missed anything but a bunch of vomiting and with the way it’s going, they’ll be plenty more of that. I would really like it if you would move in my trailer with me. I was thinking I could hold your hand on foggy nights and then you could hold my hair back when I get sick in the mornings.”
“You make an offer that’s impossible to refuse. Not even throw up would keep me away.” He kissed her belly. “This is really happening.”
She nodded and couldn’t stop the smile. “It is.”
THE END
Chasing Her Trail
Acknowledgements for
Chasing Her Trail
KJ Reed, as always, you keep me on track, let me skirt the
crazy line
without letting me go over.
Thanks to Amber Green and Jarrah Dale for the over wintering gardening help. I had no idea! My husband gave me “the look” when I mentioned gardening over winter, so I doubt I’ll get to try it anytime soon!
Jessie McBride barely survived the unexpected death of her loving parents. Forced to fend for herself with few people to depend on while raising her younger cousin, Jessie learned to be self-sufficient. She kept a few friends close and pushed the rest of the world away, along with that helpless, dependent girl she was once. Been there, done that, never again.
It works until Henry Green enters her life, with sentimental tales of his grandpa and family. Jessie is drawn in as Henry strives to take care of the man who raised him. But while Henry is putting things in place for his grandpa to retire, his well-intended controlling ways are smothering Jessie.
Can Henry’s invitation back to life and love tempt Jessie to drop the emotional wall, or will Henry give up on chasing the girl she once was?
Chapter One
Jessie stood on the front porch, two steps back from the loose board that had threatened to splinter last time she’d stepped on it. It was her invisible barrier and current protector. Or maybe in this case, that crumbling board was
his
protector.
Heart throbbing in her throat, anger coursing through her veins, she had to remain behind the step or else she might claw his eyes out.
Damn garden. She had always imagined looking her best the next time she saw Quinn Flannigan. A passing bit of beauty to make him sorry for the way he’d treated her. Not that she was a stunning model by any means, but at least shaved legs and clean clothes making her
feel
beautiful would have been nice for this moment.
As Quinn drew closer, happy-go-lucky smile on his slender lips she’d like to make fat, little bounce in his step like he ruled the world, she rather wished she wasn’t staring at him at all. She’d just as soon as rot in hell than speak with this…this ass.
She put her hand up, halting him on the path to her home. She would scrub every single one of those stone steps he stood on with bleach and for good measure, sanitize the air. It would be worth sparing her few cleaning supplies to remove all trace of his presence. “Get the hell off my property.”
“
Jessie
,” he cooed and the purr from the back of his throat rolling over his tongue did nothing to her.
Well, nothing
pleasurable
. Itched her to step over that rotting board, that was for damn sure. But doing so would mean she would have to touch him. She nearly shuddered at the thought of that alone, but refused to give in, would not let him see anything about her. “Get. Off. My. Property.”
The screen door at her back creaked. Wind from it swinging wide and then slamming closed with a hair-raising crack slapped against her back. Air collected in her lungs and held there while she hoped and prayed the door would not fall off the hinges from the rough treatment. Thankfully it held.
Her cousin, Tiffany, was at her side, rifle set against her shoulder, bullet being clicked into place and the supposed charming smile—though Jessie rather thought it smarmy—finally faltered on Quinn’s face.
Tiffany eyed down the new gun her husband had bought her a month ago. The gun her cousin had just learned to handle and shoot straight. Jessie would well imagine she had the sights targeted directly on Quinn’s balls. Cruel to some, but perfectly fine with Jessie.
Tiffany rolled her head, cracking a single joint in her neck and reset her sights. “What do you know, Mike was right. This thing is useful after all.”
“Mike…Gable?” Quinn asked, his color paling to a satisfying shade of sickly white.
Everyone in these parts knew Mike was the local law. And everyone, including Quinn who hadn’t lived here in some five years, also knew Tiffany’s whims and decisions ran about as hot and cold as weather in South Arkansas. You never really knew what you were gonna get, and if you weren’t happy with it, it’d change in an instant anyway.
Confidence curled like warm, soothing liquid through Jessie’s tight muscles. She knew one day she’d likely run into Quinn again. This moment just turned, well,
awesome
at the sight of him squirming his legs like he was trying not to shit his pants. “Yes. They’ve been married for six months now.”
“Seven.” Tiffany corrected, one of those dreamy love boat smiles curved her lips and made Jessie’s heart squeeze in painful delight.
“Right. Seven.” Jessie’s middle was cramping, stomach contents rolling and churning her all-over-the-place emotions. Heartache. Pride. Fear. Confidence. It all twisted her earlier lunch around in her belly, but as Quinn continued to back away, it was worth putting up with. Quinn had never been afraid of her and he knew damn good and well if she told Tiffany to put a bullet between his legs, Tiffany would do it without hesitation. “Now leave.”
He didn’t leave. “I have a proposition for you.”
The cracking in her chest somehow shattered even further. Ribs on the edge of breaking. Lungs gasped for a way to keep breathing. She would not crumble before him. Would not. “Not a snowy chance in hell.”
The other man, who had emerged from Quinn’s car, and had so far been leaning against the side of the vehicle all this time, stepped forward. Jessie raised her chin higher, wanting this man gone too.
“Quinn.” His voice was strong, powerful and it offered no argument. “Get in the car.”
Quinn obeyed and a sliver of relief eased through Jessie. Though not much as the man moved closer. He looked nothing of Quinn. His dark hair was neatly cut short. Silver rimmed glasses sat on his nose. His build was slender, but shoulders back. The way he carried himself was all very subtle, but she was no fool. His steps may be careful and slow, but one couldn’t be too different from the company you keep.
Birds of a feather…
and all that. “And you can leave too.”
“Ms. McBride. Please. Just a moment of your time is all I ask for.”
She shook her head. “No.”
His eyes behind his glasses softened, looked heavy. Lips parted and his proud shoulders drooped. He looked momentarily broken, as though a piece of him just chipped off and hit the ground. She shouldn’t care. She didn’t want to care, but as he walked forward anyway, the sadness that had briefly hung his body tucked away, all evidence of it was gone. “I have an offer for you. Something I think we can both benefit from.”
She gestured toward the car with a tilt of her head. “What is he to you?”
He slipped his hands in his straight front khaki pant pockets. “A man I don’t much care for first, an employee second, and third, my cousin.”
Jessie’s eyes narrowed, fearful he’d only listed Quinn in that order for her sake, to earn her trust and confidence. It wouldn’t be the first time a smooth set of lines had been tossed at her. It would not however, sway her. Carefully spoken words hadn’t budged her in years, they weren’t going to start now.
The nose of Tiffany’s rifle that had begun to lower shot back up to quick and steady aim as the man stepped closer still.
Jessie wanted to rub the chill off her arms, but she wouldn’t. She knew it wasn’t from the brisk winter air, but instead from this man closing in on her space, invading her property and home. She wanted him gone. Now. “You keep poor company and even poorer employees. You can leave.”
He stopped his walking, and a long breath slid out of him in a simple, quiet exhale of exhaustion. “Well, thing is, he belongs to my grandfather’s sister. And there’s not much I wouldn’t do for my grandpa.” His palms flashed up, shoulders shrugged and Jessie got the idea fairly clearly.
Also he mentioned the one thing to smack her in the gut, fizzle off a piece of her firm resolve. He mentioned family. His grandpa. And in those two things, he and Jessie agreed. There wasn’t too much she wouldn’t do for her dad, even with her daddy in the ground for nearly a decade now. “Get that piece of trash off my property and then we can talk.” Jessie spun on her heel and marched inside her home.
She leaned against the wall as the door swung closed. Breath was gone from her chest, vomit threatened—then again, that would surely clear the lump in her throat. But it was no use. The past churned and rolled. The memories of those months of empty blackness coated through her and left a chill in its wake. She ran, zig-zagging through the maze of the house, slapped her hands on the back door and sent it flying off the hinges with a crack for the second time this year.
Just as she hit railing, her stomach clenched and she heaved into the bushes as the whine of an engine rumbled down her drive.
“Jessie?” Tiffany called from somewhere in the house, her voice drawing closer as she continued calling her name.
Jessie coughed the last of it out, wishing the blackness was as easy to be rid of. Even though the memories were receding, they were always there, lurking in the back of her mind, ready to take her again. “Out here.”
Tiffany rushed out, ponytail swinging as she glanced at the door in the yard, the mess and shook her head. “Bastard.”
“Agreed.” Jessie nodded.
Tiffany’s hands were on her hips and she stared in the house, toward the front. “If he had been alone, I think I would have shot him. Not like anybody would have missed him if he died.”
“True, not anyone here anyway, but he’s gone now.”
“And the other is coming back. Let’s get you cleaned up.”
Jessie allowed Tiffany to guide her inside and déjà vu crumbled down around her. When Jessie should have been taking care of an underage Tiffany just a year after putting both their parents in the ground, but had been into much of a shock, then fog, to do anything but be led around for months.
She straightened, pulled her hand from Tiffany’s, refusing to become that helpless, lost person again. She’d crawled her way out of it and she would not allow the look of that damn Quinn Flenning send her back. She was Jessie McBride and whoever this man was coming back would know it when he left. “I need a shower and something pretty to wear.”
A smile fixed on Tiffany’s face. “I’ll find you something.”
Tiffany started out the back, to her house next door but Jessie stopped her. “Get your hot rollers too.” Her palms rubbed against her thighs. “And your razor and—”
Tiffany laughed. “You just come with me. That’ll be ten times faster. Rebecca is home and between the three of us, we’ll have you dressed and back before he can even make it into town.”
Chapter Two
Henry looked at his obnoxious cousin and swore. “What the hell was that?”
Quinn simply leaned back and flipped down the visor. “I guess she’s still sore.”
“You think? Gun point. Damn it, Quinn, I was held at gun point.”
Quinn, the bastard, shifted in his seat. “Tiffany’s a real bitch and bulldog. You got to watch out for her, but Jessie is soft. She’s easy to bend over. Flirt with her and that’ll be the end of it.”
Soft? Like hell. That’d been one frosty gaze Jessie McBride had stared down at him. Now that he didn’t have a rifle aimed at him, he’d agree with Quinn to a point. She did have soft curves. But in those big brown eyes staring at them, no. Nothing soft or bendable there. “When was the last time you saw these women?”
Quinn did one of his common groaning and moaning bits to keep the attention on him. Henry had seen it often enough to know that’s what it was about and nothing more. Finally the man dropped the act. “Hell, eight years, I guess. Just before I married Amanda.”
“And what did you do to her.”
Quinn stared out the window. No moaning, shuffling or anything like he was evading in his normal lazy like manner.
“Quinn.” Henry reminded his cousin by simply calling the man’s name. He didn’t have to verbally announce that Quinn’s entire livelihood depended on Henry humoring his aging grandfather.
Quinn sighed. “I saw her at my bachelor party.”
Oh, God. He didn’t want to know. He could well imagine the rest, but he had to find out, to know what to expect from Jessie McBride when he returned. He needed her. He needed a piece of her land. “And?”
“And well, hell man, it was a bachelor party.”
Christ. Amanda was cheating on him, Quinn was also cheating elsewhere. It was disgusting. “She’s that angry over a one night stand during your bachelor party eight years ago?”
“It’s not exactly like that.”
The leather on the steering wheel creaked against his sweating palms. “What exactly is it like then?”
“She didn’t know I was getting married in the next few days.”
Henry slammed on the brakes and pulled off on the side of the road a few miles from town. It was nothing but road ahead and road behind and fields surrounding them. “You tell me, in detail. Now. Or get your ass out and walk.”
“Henry, seriously, it wasn’t that big of a deal.” His hand flicked up and pulled down the visor. “Women.”
Henry pinched the bridge of his nose, sensing more dread at his cousin’s evasive tone. “Quinn. The whole story.”
He groaned and straightened in his seat. “We dated a lot during high school. Then her parents died. We broke up. I met Amanda. I saw Jessie that night. It’d been a while and she smelled good, looked good. Just one last fuck was all I wanted. She’s insecure about her looks, didn’t take much to convince her into more.”
Henry’s hands were back around the steering wheel and turning numb and white by the second. “And she missed the fact you were engaged? Forgot it?”
“Not exactly. I told her the wedding was off. The party was celebrating saving me from marrying that harpy.” Quinn faced Henry. “That was a lie. The harpy part. I fucking adore Amanda.”
Jesus.
“I can tell.”
“Anyway. We had sex. I slipped out while she slept and I married Amanda. End of story.”
Henry put the car in gear and headed down the road. “You stupid fucker.”
“Dude, it was years ago.”
Henry shook his head. “When I drop you off, I don’t want to see you when I get back. Get out of this town. Get the hell out of my life. You don’t work for me anymore. You’re not to see my grandpa.”
Red tainted Quinn’s cheeks and up around his narrowed eyes. “This is bullshit! I’ll have a talk with him—”
And like that, Henry reached out to the side and grabbed Quinn around the arm. “You don’t speak to my grandpa. You don’t contact him.”
“Dude, what the fuck?” Quinn pushed at his grasp. “You’re acting like this over a girl. One you don’t know.”
“No.” Henry shook his head and stopped outside their motel. “I’m acting like this because I’ve had enough of you. Even grandpa won’t tolerate it when I tell him what you did. You know his soft spot for women.”
At that, Quinn stepped from the car and slammed the door. For the first time since the start of this trip, tension eased off Henry. For years, he’d been itching to be done with Quinn, but had held on as a favor.
Henry pulled back into the street, making a turn around the quaint little courthouse and heading back to Jessie McBride and the reason he was here. His grandpa would like this place. There was an old feel to it. A charm in the city and the silly apple street names.
Men cluttered outside a diner, drinking what looked like coffee around a picnic table on the unusually warm winter day. Some of them wore jeans, others in dress clothes, still another was in overalls. He could easily see his grandpa amongst them doing nothing but enjoying the nice weather and a few laughs.
A hair shop and a hardware store was also on this little square. A modest gas station with only two pumps and then, nothing. Just beautiful land and rich forests. It was just like what his grandpa had always described as his childhood home, and Henry would do everything he could to see that given back to the man who’d spent his entire life giving Henry everything.
The drive back was reasonably short, though felt miles longer with the task waiting at the end of it. This Jessie McBride was not going to be an easy adversary and from what he saw, she had no reason to assist him. Sure, there was always money. And her home did appear to need some improvements.
New paint. New roof. But there was a lot of pride that had held her shoulders upright as she’d looked down at the man who’d crossed her all those years ago. By simple association, he was afraid she’d refuse everything he had to offer out of stubborn revenge.
He stopped in the same dirt driveway and stepped out of his car and took a moment to survey what he could about the place. Tried to learn something he could use to his advantage. The grass looked to have missed a cut at the end of the summer. Instead of short dead grass, it was a rolling field of crispy brown stalks. What he imagined used to be a large and expanding yard was mostly covered in dormant winter brush. Pine trees were breaking through the height of the bush. Nature, was basically taking over.
So, a tractor was needed. Either that or help to mow it. Both, perhaps. He pushed the thought away. He had a feeling if Jessie needed something done, she would simply do it herself. Call it intuition. Or just that he noticed an inner strength beating out through her hard eyes.
He approached the porch and the door swung open.
“Stop!” Jessie rushed forward and Henry had to catch his breath.
It was her, but different. She’d cleaned up. Showered, obviously, if the dirt that had been streaked on her cheeks was missing said anything. But she’d changed her clothes from those stained cotton sweats and oversized filthy sweatshirt into jeans that hugged her hips and a long sleeved t-shirt that cupped her modest breasts.
Her hair had been pulled up, barely, but now it waved against her face, draped over her shoulders. The strands were blonde, but shimmered in the sun and he shook, recalling her words. “Stop? I thought we were past this?”
The hard line of her lips faltered. “Watch out for the first and third step. They need to be replaced.”
He glanced down and noticed the edges of the boards flaking away from weather. The cracks. The heavy sway of the first and third steps. The missing nails. He stepped over them, a smile curving his insides. Jessie’s house may appear of needing a pick-me-up from a distance, but now that he was closer, he could see it was so much more and he knew before this meeting was over, he’d have what he wanted.
She pointed to a set of rocking chairs at the corner of the porch. “Sit, please.”
He followed her lead, did her bidding and lowered into a chair, satisfied when the thing only cracked and creaked at his weight instead of falling apart.
Jessie lowered into the chair next to him, perched along the edge of it and did not rock. Her head was up. That hard glint back in her eye. “What can I do for you, Mr…?”
“Green, but Henry is fine.” He rocked for a moment, enjoying the sudden easy breeze. Lord, Quinn may be a fool, but he was right. This land was perfect. “I would like to discuss your land with you.”
And somehow, though he thought it impossible, Jessie McBride hardened. It was in her mouth. The fake smile she had been projecting stiffened and pulled back. Her hands, clasped in her lap hardened and her knuckles whitened. “Then it seems we have nothing to discuss. This is my land. Many have tried buying it from me, but hear this, it is not for sale. If Quinn told you that, he was obviously mistaken.”
He swallowed. Okay, maybe not so easy. “I will pay you more than it’s worth.”
Her eyes narrowed. “There is not a price you could set to make it worth it.”
“Two hundred acres. A thousand an acre.”
She didn’t even blink. “No.”
“Two.” Money wasn’t a problem for him. His granddad’s happiness was worth anything.
“No.”
“Five.”
She shook her and stood. “No, no and no, Mr. Green. The land is not for sale.”
He swallowed the hard truth about the house down. “It’s not my place to say—”
“Then don’t say it,” the words rolled off her tongue sharply.
An unexpected smile tugged at him, but he swiped his hand over his face to hide it. “I see some improvements could be done here. We’re discussing a lot of money. It’s a win-win for us both.”
“Hardly,” she threw out with a toss of her head and leaned against a post of the porch, her side to him, she faced her property. “
Things will come and go, but land will always be worth something. Never let it go, Jessie
.” She looked over her shoulder at him. “My daddy told me that the day before he passed away. It’s like he’d known and wanted me to hold on to what he’d spent his life working for. I have busted my ass for years paying on the last land mortgage he bought just before dying. I survived a lot, and like hell will your money sway me. If this is all, you can go now.”