Healing Beau (The Brothers of Beauford Bend Book 6) (26 page)

“Of course, Nancy. Anything is possible at Firefly Hall.”

“Anything?” The voice came from the doorway of the dining room and startled her. He was supposed to have given up by now. That’s what she’d planned.

She slowly turned. “I didn’t hear the front door chime.” The breakfast table went silent, probably because they, like her, couldn’t take their eyes off those Carolina blue eyes and perfect bone structure.

“That’s because I didn’t use the front door. So, is anything really possible at Firefly Hall? Can a man get an audience with his wife?”

“As you can see, I’m serving coffee.”

“I’ve got it.” Emma Ruth appeared from nowhere like a jack-in-the-box popping up and took the coffee pot. “And Ms. Haygood, I’ll be right back with that quiche.”

Chatter at the table resumed.

She looked daggers at Emma Ruth. When Emma Ruth refused to look back, Christian directed them at Beau, who just smiled. Chatter or no chatter, there was no way to refuse to talk to Beau without creating a scene in front of the guests. She’d take him to office and give him five minutes. No more.

But Beau had other ideas. He gripped her arm and propelled her up the stairs before she could protest.

“Where do you think you’re going?” she asked. “Since when does Emma Ruth take your side?”

“Since my side is the same as yours and I’m going home.”

“This is not your home anymore.”

Beau stopped in the middle of the staircase and turned her to look into his eyes. “Home is where the heart is.”

Her insides turned to glass and shattered. That could have been her undoing if she hadn’t remembered that she couldn’t be undone. Not this time. “Beau, please don’t do this to me.”

“I’m going to do it
for
you. And for me. We’ve lost enough. We don’t have to lose each other.”

“If only that were true. But you’ve never been mine to lose.”

Suddenly all the softness went out of his face. “Stop it, Christian. Stop making decisions for us without consulting me. I am out of patience, and I am about to get very loud. Do you want your customers to hear it, or do you want to go through that door?” He gestured to the top of the stairs with his head. “It probably wouldn’t do my back any good, but I’m capable of throwing you over my shoulder.” He narrowed his eyes and reached for her.

“Okay. Fine.” She’d let him in, but not for long. She led the way and put the coffee table between them.

“Can we sit?” he asked.

“No, we cannot sit. I don’t know what you’re doing here, anyway.”

He laughed. “Ah, a little feisty, aren’t you? I’m here because I never wanted to leave in the first place. You’re the one who broke up with me. Remember? Made that decision without consulting me.”

She folded her arms over her chest. “It was for your own good.”

He raised his hands in the air. “For my own good? Why do you get to decide what’s for my own good? You don’t. Christian, you might mean well, but you’re a control freak where I’m concerned. You’ve got to let me make my own decisions.”

“That’s what I’m trying to do. That’s why I let you go.”

“Let me go? You didn’t let me go. You ran me off. There’s a difference.”

“Not much.”

“Let’s get something out of the way right now. I have done a lot of reading the past few days, and one of the things I read said that you loved me, that you’d always loved me. If that isn’t true, if my aunt was wrong, or even if it isn’t true anymore, tell me now, and I’ll leave.”

That ought to be easy enough. She set her jaw and let her eyes bore into his. She opened her mouth to say the words, but they wouldn’t come.

He nodded. “That’s what I thought. I’m not going to insult you by saying I’ve always loved you. I haven’t. Not like that. Maybe I should have, and would have, if I’d had the sense. I don’t know. But what I do know is I love you now—now, when it counts.”

Before, she’d been so ready to latch on to anything he said that had even remotely offered any hope. She couldn’t do that again.

She shook her head. “Beau, the night you brought me the ring, you said all the right things. The night in your workshop, you said all the right things. But you were doing it because it was the right thing to do. Not because you meant them. Now, you’re here doing it again.”

He took a step toward her. “Just because it was the right thing to do, didn’t mean that I didn’t mean it. If I seemed inconsistent, it was because I was on a journey—a journey that you already had behind you when you were eight years old, if my Aunt Amelia is to be believed.”

More like five years old.

What he said sounded good. She just wasn’t sure she ought to try to dance to it. She wavered, just a bit, just enough. Beau was beside her in a split second, taking her arm.

“Can’t we sit down? Please? Sit and talk?”

She let him lead her to the sofa, and he settled beside her.

“Have you ever had a dress that you liked, that you knew looked good on you, but you weren’t quite comfortable with it at first? It took a few times wearing it to own it, to feel comfortable wearing it?”

What? They were talking fashion now?

“That’s what falling in love with you was like. It was happening even before … before.” He looked at the floor and trailed off.

And here they were. She didn’t want to go there, but how could she not? Didn’t her child who would never get to live to play Candy Land deserve that?

“Before the baby?” she asked softy.

He nodded but didn’t look up. “I know I didn’t talk about it much, but I had begun to think about him. It was just so new and so fast. I was so scared of having someone else to lose, and then I did. It was because of me you were hurrying down those stairs that day. You were trying to save me. You have to blame me.”

The horror of that settled around her. “That’s what you think?” She clutched his arm. “Listen to me, Beau. I fell because I was clumsy. I fell because I didn’t take care of him. I was so eager to fix things for you so I could have you that I didn’t take care of him. Of course I don’t blame you. If anything—”

Beau gently covered her mouth to muffle the words. “Don’t say that, Christian. Never say that. It might not have shown, Christian, but in case you think I didn’t care … well. That’s not true.”

He raised his head, and when their sad, grieving eyes met, she knew the feel of common ground.

“It was the same for me,” she said softly. “At first, I was so shocked and scared. And then things moved so fast. I thought there would be time.”

He nodded. “I know. Even the cradle—it was about making the cradle. At least before. Now, I could theoretically go forward with the project. Maybe sell it. But that’s only in theory. It was going to be
his
cradle.
You
were going to get it ready with the little mattress and things, and later rock it. So I could never make it now.”

She looked at his hand and was surprised to see he still wore his ring. Then she looked at her own. Both hands looked so empty. And maybe, just maybe, after all this time, they didn’t have to be. She held out her hand, and he met it halfway.

She drew a ragged breath. “Do you know what the hardest part was? Coming back here to nothing. Not only were you not here, but there was also nothing for him. Not a blanket, a little outfit, nothing. Most people would have bought
something.
He never had anything.”

Beau shook his head. “That’s not true, Christian. He had you. And me. And now we can have each other if you’ll let that happen, if you can stop making decisions for me for my own good. Years ago, you decided for my own good that I didn’t want to go the prom with you. I never even had a chance to know the truth of that, because you were so busy telling me I didn’t. But that was one thing and I was a kid. But I’m not a kid anymore and I know what I want. I want to be married to you. Now, if you don’t want me, that’s another matter.”

She laughed, and a few tears got in on the act. “If you only knew how utterly impossible it would be for a world to exist where I didn’t love you.”

He smiled and pulled her to him. “That’s good news.”

“And I suppose I have to stop trying to save you? You said I had to stop trying to save you.”

He shook his head. “No. We’ve got some tough times to get through. I’m going to need saving and so are you. I want you to save me. And I want to save you. Every day for the rest of our lives.”

Maybe this place where she’d lived so long, longed for Beau, lived with him, had him, and almost lost him, was hallowed ground, too.

“Now, about another decision you made for me.” He reached into his pocket. “I gave you this once.” He held up the ring she’d sent back. “You gave me credit for giving it to you because I knew it was special to Aunt Amelia. I didn’t know it then. I admit it. But I know it now and I’m giving it back to you.”

Christian extended her left hand, but he reached for her right and slid the ring on. “You’re going to need to wear it on this hand, because there’s not going to be room for it on your left hand.”

“What? I don’t understand.” And to her astonishment, Beau reached back into his pocket and pulled out the Beauford bride wedding band.

She knew the significance of that ring.

“I couldn’t give it to you before, because I couldn’t bear to look at it. But I can now. You gave my mother back to me, Christian. And my father and my sister. And you know what? It wasn’t so much finding out that they knew I wasn’t in the house that night, as realizing that they wouldn’t have blamed me anyway.”

“No. They wouldn’t have, Beau. And all because of love.”

“I don’t think there are going to be any more ghosts.” He reached for her hand. “Can you wear this?”

Christian nodded. “For the rest of my life.”

The kiss they shared was salty.

Four Months Later

July 4

Since Jackson had started the Camille Beauford Memorial Concerts more than a decade ago, Christian had only missed two—once when she was in Italy on a school trip, and once when an evil, aggressive stomach virus had taken over her life for twenty-four hours. Held at the historic Ryman Auditorium, the event always featured some of the biggest names in country music and raised millions for the Vanderbilt Medical Burn Center.

She’d always had a good seat, but never had she sat front and center before.

In her ice blue sequined dress, she felt like a princess. When she’d confided that to Beau, he’d said she was more like the Queen of Hot. That made her laugh a little. If anyone was queen tonight, it was Emory, but princess was more than good enough for Christian.

In fact,
wife
trumped princess. She caressed the Beauford Bride band on her hand.

Neyland, seated beside her, was dressed in a bronze creation with a tiered skirt that practically shouted
couture—
with good reason. Neyland had brought the dress back from her long-awaited honeymoon in Paris last month
.
Abby, as always, was beautiful in understated black, and Emory wore a dream of a blush-colored gown with a full skirt that she claimed was the only thing she could find that disguised she hadn’t lost all her baby weight.

Not that she or Jackson cared about that. They were too euphoric over little Laura Amelia to be worried about anything.

They all were. Last week, when Christian and Beau had stood in church and held Laura Amelia at the baptism font and made their godparents’ vows, they had been a little sad, but mostly joyful. Later that day, for the first time, they had spoken of “someday,” when they would stand at this font with another baby.

And there would be a someday—many of them. There were still dragons to slay, and they’d had some rough days, but they both knew those rough days would have been rougher still without each other.

Beau continued to find contentment in his work, and had gotten two more commissions for simple projects. Before long the projects wouldn’t be so simple.

It was hard not to laugh when he became enraged with himself over the tiniest mistakes. “Get used to it,” Gabe had told her. “That’s life with an artist. Nothing’s ever good enough.”

“Some things are.” Beau had run his hand down Christian’s arm. “Some things are perfect.”

It had been a spring and summer of family, loving, and sharing and putting old secrets to rest. They all said Christian was to be thanked for bringing some truths to light, but they made too much of it. All she’d done was find some old diaries.

Here, surrounded by her friends and family, Christian knew she’d held out for a blessing that would never stop.

“I hope Jimpson won’t get naked tonight,” Neyland whispered.

“He won’t.” Christian turned and waved to him where he sat in the second row with Heath, Hope, Miss Sticky, and Miss Julia. “He told me earlier that he and I were wearing the same color tonight. I told him we needed a picture together after the show. Besides Gwen’s keeping an eye on him.”

Also in the second row were those rambunctious hockey player friends of Nickolai and Noel’s, including Bryant. Bryant winked at her, stuck out his bottom lip, and pretended to wipe his eyes. Not a single one of them had a date. Noel, seated on the other side of Christian, said, “We sat in front of them so we can keep them in line.”

Christian laughed. “Good idea. I’d hate for Dirk to carry them out.”

“Isn’t it about time for the show to start?” Neyland asked.

And as if the universe had heard her, the lights dimmed, the curtains opened, and onto the stage stepped four men, three wearing immaculate formalwear, and the fourth suited up and ready to sing in jeans and boots. And somehow, though two were dark and two were blond and identical, Christian fancied that a stranger would have been able to tell they were brothers.

The crowd went wild, on their feet, cheering and clapping. That was for Jackson, of course, but Beau gave her a wink and a smile, and Christian imagined the celebration was for them.

“Hell, y’all.” Jackson stepped forward and smiled, which did nothing to calm the place. He shrugged, as his brothers rolled their eyes.

“Milk it, brother. Never miss a chance,” Gabe said, though until he spoke, Christian wasn’t sure which twin was which.