A Dark & Stormy Knight: A McKnight Romance (McKnight Romances) (18 page)

Georgia
wouldn’t either when Missy got her revenge. The thought sobered her, and she
looked around to make sure Missy wasn’t sneaking up on her before she started
for the safety of Tommy’s truck.

###

Even with Sol and Tommy fighting and her
run-in with Missy, Georgia had to admit she’d had a good time. Getting out of
the house and away from her parents and their problems seemed to have recharged
her batteries. Maybe not all the way but enough that she wasn’t dreading the
morning. She felt good enough, she didn’t notice right away that Tommy had
gotten quiet after they left the drive-in.

“You okay?” she asked as he pulled up to
his house.

He shrugged. “Sure. Come on in and get
your flowers.”

Georgia
had forgotten all about them, but it was a good excuse to go inside. She had to
tell Tommy about her confrontation with Missy anyway, or the whole night was
pointless.

Owning up to her own immature behavior
was not going to be fun after the grief she’d given him. Not that she expected
that to be his main focus. It would probably be easier if it were. What would
Tommy’s response be to the evidence that Missy still had an emotional
investment in him?

Lost in her own thoughts, she followed
him into the house. When she looked up to see him offering her the mayonnaise
jar of flowers, she forced herself back to the present. She took the flowers
and set them on the counter.

“You got any beer in your fridge?” she
asked. “We need to talk.”

She had a feeling it was going to be a
long night.

###

He should have gone straight home after
he dropped Eden and his share of the younger McKnights off at his parents’, but
Sol was too restless, so he hit the back roads for some late-night thinking.

Damn but he’d been a fool tonight. What
was it about Georgia that brought out his inner numbskull? He’d baited Tommy as
if he were one of Georgia’s Dallas boyfriends who didn’t know anything about Georgia’s ex except that she said he was crazy. Nor was Tommy some big-city bozo whose
gonads shrank when they realized they were dealing with a bull rider (proving,
at least to their testosterone-starved pea brains, that Georgia’s assessment of his sanity was spot on.) What in the world had made him think he
could get away with pulling his usual tricks on Tommy, who’d known Sol since
first grade?

Somehow in his wanderings, he ended up on
Georgia’s road. He slowed as he drove past. The movie had been over for more
than an hour. She should have been home, but where was her tin can?

Sol’s stomach tightened.

It stayed tight all the way to Tommy’s,
where he pulled up on the opposite side of the street to stare at Georgia’s car.

A light was on in the front room, which
meant—maybe—that they weren’t in the bedroom. Sol didn’t find much comfort in
that.

Was he too young to have a heart attack?
He’d heard it felt like an elephant sitting on your chest, and that was exactly
how he felt.

Gideon’s assertion that Georgia would remarry soon flitted through his mind. Ruthlessly, he shoved it away. She wouldn’t
marry Tommy. She couldn’t. His insistence didn’t banish the ache in his chest.

Aw, Georgie. Don’t do this.

The urge to go pound on Tommy’s door and
drag Georgia out of his lair was almost overpowering, but he’d already screwed
up enough tonight. If he tried to stop whatever was going on, Georgia would dig her feet in and keep seeing Tommy just to show her ex that he didn’t own her.

He wanted to stay, needed to see Georgia walk out before Tommy turned out the lights, but what if she didn’t? He really
would have a coronary. The junk food he’d eaten at the drive-in felt like it
wanted to come back up.

Stop this. You keep torturing yourself
like this, you’ll do something really stupid. Go home.

So he did, but his heart hurt like it
hadn’t since that day twelve years ago when he’d come home to an empty trailer
and figured out that Georgia had left him.

For a few seconds, Georgia thought Tommy might cry.
Oh, man up.
The thought surprised her. She had expected to
feel more sympathy. Then again, she had no clue what to do with a weepy man.
Girly tears were so undignified. They wouldn’t suit Tommy at all.

She was about to reach out and pat him on
the shoulder, awkward as that would be, when his expression changed. Emotions
flashed over his face, one replacing another so rapidly, she couldn’t pin them
down quickly enough to name them. At the end of the emotional slide show, he
surprised her by throwing his head back and laughing.

She’d been sitting on the edge of his
couch, ready to cut and run, but with his laughter, some of the tension drained
away. She sat a little more firmly on the seat, pasted a tentative smile on her
face, and waited.

“So you slapped her with my wet shirt,
huh?”

She nodded.

He grabbed a fistful of his shirt at the
collar and tucked in his chin to look down at it. “This shirt’s been through a
lot tonight. I may have to have it bronzed.”

A little more tension flowed out of her,
and she settled back further. “I’m glad you’re not upset with me.”

“Upset with you? Why would I be upset?
You did exactly what I hoped you’d do. You got a reaction out of her.”

“So what now?” She adjusted again,
tucking one foot under her.

Tommy released a long, satisfied sigh. “I
don’t know yet, but I feel . . .” A deep breath, drawn and
released. “A little more free. I was a fool for her, but maybe I can let it go
now.”

She understood. It would take him a while
to think through the things she’d told him, to internalize the knowledge he now
had. Maybe he’d relapse and maybe he wouldn’t, but even if he did, he wouldn’t
fall all the way down that hole of doubt and insecurity. Crawling out the next
time would be a little easier. She was glad she’d been able to give him that.

Tommy took her hand in his and squeezed. “You’re
a good friend, Georgia.”

“Thanks.”

“But ya gotta stop picking fights with
other women.”

“Wha—?” Then she saw the glint in his
eye. “Okay, I deserved that. Maybe we were both a little out of control
tonight.”

“Well, you maybe. I was in perfect
control. I, after all, walked away a winner. You ran like a turkey the day
before Thanksgiving.”

She wasn’t about to let him get away with
that. “
You
walked away with blood dripping down your face.
I
didn’t
have a mark on me.”

“Because you
ran.
”

“And because I wasn’t wearing four-inch
heels.”

They laughed together. As their laughter
cycled down, he bounced their still-clasped hands lightly against her thigh,
and suddenly, his hand holding hers didn’t feel so chummy.

Before she could find a genteel way to
withdraw, he pulled her into his arms. Her body went stiff then relaxed. It was
only a hug. Friends could hug. She put her arms around his shoulders and hugged
him back. After a few seconds, he loosened his grip, and she drifted away. She
answered the smile on his face with one of her own.

See?
she told herself.
Friends.

Then he leaned in and kissed her.

Oh, hell.

If his arms had been made of galvanized
steel, he might have been able to hold on to her, but the next thing she knew,
she’d shot to her feet, leaving him alone on the couch, his arms still shaped
for an embrace.

“Oh. Wow. Would you look at the time?”
She scanned the room, searching for a clock. There wasn’t one. “I’ve really got
to get home. My daddy—” She choked off the excuse, mortified that she’d almost
implied that she, a grown woman and mother of one, had a curfew. Her face felt
like an open flame. “I’ve got to go,” she said again.

Tommy appeared to be fighting off a
smirk. “Here. Don’t forget your purse.”

She took the bag from him, slinging the
strap over her shoulder. “Thanks. It was fun. We should—”
What? Do it again?
Not in this lifetime.
She started for the door.

“And your flowers,” Tommy said. “Don’t
forget your flowers.”

He brought them to her from the kitchen,
mayonnaise jar and all.

She tucked the jar inside the curve of
her left arm. “Thanks.” She had the urge to shake his hand, but she beat it
down. “See ya,” she called back as she fled down his front steps.

It was all she could do not to gun the
engine and leave a strip of rubber from the tires, a feat some would have said
couldn’t be done in a Kia.

###

Don’t think about Georgia
was the advice Sol gave himself the next
morning.
Just stay busy, don’t think about her, and pretend your heart isn’t
bleeding into your chest cavity.

Part of him regretted not staying to see
when she left Tommy’s, but knowing would complicate things since he’d decided
to focus on the night she’d spent with him not so long ago. She couldn’t get
serious about Tommy that quickly. The argument made sense to his head;
convincing his heart wasn’t so easy.

So stop thinking about her, he told
himself again.

Following that advice was how he found
himself standing at the paddock railing, stopwatch in hand, timing his daughter
as she ran the barrels Daisy had set up.

He knew what dedication looked like. He
saw it every day. His mama was dedicated to raising strong, moral, independent
children. His daddy was dedicated to providing for that family. Like Sol
himself, his little brother Levi was dedicated to becoming a bull rider. Daisy
was dedicated to the horses she loved.

So he didn’t think he was just being a
proud parent when he thought they all took a backseat to Eden’s dedication to
training with Spitfire.

He wondered where it came from. Was it
because she knew Georgia could put an end to it so easily? Or maybe this was
the first thing Eden really wanted where she’d met encouragement.

It didn’t matter.

Eden
clearly loved it. And she was falling in love with Spitfire.

Even a blind man could see it. It was
there in the way she talked to the mare when she was grooming her, the way she
stroked her neck between runs without thinking about it, and the way she was
out in the stables almost before she’d wiped the sleep from her blue eyes.

Sol wanted to warn her: love hurts. But
he knew she wouldn’t listen. His attempts to get her to spread her affection to
some of the other horses had met with limited success. She was a McKnight, so
she liked horses in general, but Spitfire was fast becoming the only horse she
really saw.

His daughter was tenderhearted, and Sol
didn’t want to see her heart broken. Not yet. Not so young.

Daisy was clear about her master plan:
get a few horses trained so they performed well and start selling them to
serious barrel racers. If everything went according to Daisy’s plan, Spitfire
would belong to someone else in less than a year. Eden didn’t need to be
grieving over a damned horse when she was trying to adjust to a stepdaddy. Sol
shook his head in a futile attempt to shake off his sense of impending doom and
focused on his daughter.

The seriousness Eden displayed in the
arena made her look older, as if she were growing up in time-lapse photography.
It caused a bittersweet pinch in Sol’s chest. She was only ten, but in flashes,
he saw a young woman tearing away the cocoon of girlhood. How could he possibly
be responsible for the existence of this miracle?

Georgia
could be mad at him until the day he died; he’d learn to live with that as long
as he could give his daughter her shot.

She rounded the last barrel, leaving it
rocking, and raced toward him. He clicked the stopwatch.

“How was it, Daddy?” she asked when she’d
stopped Spitfire next to him.

“It was good.” Sol nodded his approval. “You
were off center on that last barrel.”

She made a face and patted the horse’s
neck. “I know. I wasn’t ready when Spitfire came out of that turn.”

“She came out of it too soon because you
were off balance. Why don’t you put her up,” Sol said, “and we’ll go work on
that?”

“‘Kay.”

Sol helped her brush Spitfire down, then
they headed for the barn. When he pulled the blue tarp off the mechanical bull,
Eden said, “You want me to ride Toro?”

“Sure. Why not?”

“Mama’ll have a fit.”

Don’t think about Georgia, he told himself firmly. Think of her as some woman Eden has to answer to.

He didn’t want to encourage her to lie to
her mother. Condoning that could bite him in ass in more ways than one, so he
didn’t say, “We won’t tell her.” Instead, he said, “It ain’t like you’re gonna
ride a real bull. We’re just workin’ on your balance.”

Eden
eyed Toro uncertainly.

“Here.” Sol scooped her up. She squealed
but it was a good squeal, and for a moment, all was right in Sol’s world. He
deposited her on the long slope of Toro’s back and showed her how to grasp the
bull rope.

“We’ll start out easy.” He set the bull
on the lowest setting. Eden found her seat quickly, choking up on the rope
where the ride was the easiest.

“Faster, Daddy.”

Sol tamed the grin that wanted to break
out and upped the setting.

Toro was spinning at a respectable speed
when Sol’s three youngest brothers materialized to watch. Gideon showed up
shortly after. When Eden’s cheering section got noisy, she lost her focus, then
her balance, followed by her seat. The thick padding on the floor surrounding
Toro cushioned her fall.

She got up and dusted off the butt of her
jeans even though she hadn’t landed on dirt.

“You okay, hon?” Sol asked.

She nodded. “They distracted me.”

“Competition don’t happen in a vacuum,
baby girl. Crowds get noisy. You gotta be able to shut it out. Wanna go again?”

“Hell, yeah.”

Sol felt as if he were going to swallow
his tongue. “Uh, honey?”

What was he supposed to say? Do as I say,
not as I do? Yeah. Kids smelled hypocrisy at a hundred paces. “That’s not
ladylike language.”

“Daisy says it.”

Ah, shit.

“Well, she shouldn’t.” He could see he
wasn’t convincing her. “It’s also adult language.”

She looked at him without expression.

“I know I use it, too, and I shouldn’t. I’ll
tell you what. We’ll both stop using it.”

A burst of laughter came from behind him.
He turned and shot a thunderous look at Gideon, who didn’t even try to act like
it wasn’t funny.

“I’ll believe it when I see it. Or maybe
I should say when I don’t hear it.” Gideon smiled smugly.

“I can quit cussing.”

Gideon raised his eyebrows.

“I can,” Sol said.

“You think so?”

“Yeah.”

“Put your money where your mouth is, big
brother. Every time you cuss, you put a dollar in the kitty. Every day you don’t,
I’ll put in five. At the end of summer, we take the kids someplace fun. Maybe
the water park in Flint.”

Sol scowled at his brother. It was one
thing to make sure Eden didn’t catch him swearing; now he’d have to make sure
Gideon didn’t either. But he couldn’t back down. Eden would sense something
shady. Even haggling would probably send her antenna up. Gideon had laid his
trap well, so Sol grit his teeth and said, “This is gonna cost you, little
brother.”

“I don’t think so.” Gideon looked at
their three youngest brothers, who ranged in age from thirteen to seventeen. “Y’all
spread the word. The first person to catch Sol cussing each day gets a buck and
bragging rights.”

“Hey, that’s not fair,” Sol protested.

Gideon shot him an innocent look. “If you’re
quitting, it ain’t a problem.”

Arguing with that kind of logic was
impossible.
Damn.
He was going to have to go out to the north forty to
even open his mouth.

He looked down at his little girl, who
was watching him with interest. “If I’m gonna do this, you gotta stop, too.
Deal?”

Her eyes glittered. “Deal.”

Gideon held out his hand, and they shook
on it.

Sol suddenly remembered that the reason
for the mustache on his lip was a bet with Gideon.
Damn.
He was so
screwed.

###

Sol found himself spending more and more
time at Daisy’s arena. Watching Eden was the only thing that kept the pain in
his heart at bay. So he watched his daughter ride, clocking her, commenting on
her form. He knew he was driving Daisy crazy, but she put up with him, hoping,
he suspected, to catch him swearing.

In the four days since he’d made the deal
with Eden, his bet with his brother had cost him fifteen dollars, and that was
only for the times he’d been caught. Gideon was out only the money he paid his
snitches.