Lost in You: Petal, Georgia, Book 2 (21 page)

The truth was, he needed her. He could admit it as he rode alone in the dark. Needed her so much just the thought of her got him through many a rough spot in the last month.

She made him laugh. She didn’t take him seriously when he was pissy. Took a strong person with a sense of herself to blow off someone’s mood the way she did. It disarmed him.

He thought about her sense of humor. Bawdy. He loved that part of her. When it was just the two of them, she could be so dirty. Carnal. He was sure he’d never laughed so much and had so much great sex too.

More than that and just in general, she had a quick wit. An easy way with her siblings and friends. She was the one who tended to run interference when tempers flared. She diverted anger and annoyance and teased it away. William or Nathan got gruff and she handled them. They knew it, of course, but she was impossible to resist. If Beth wanted you to smile, it was pretty hard not to.

He growled inside his helmet.

Beth Murphy was a strong woman. A helpmate, his mother would have called it. She was the kind of woman a man could come together with at the end of the day and share with.

The kind of woman who’d kick a man’s ass six ways to Sunday if he acted a fool, but who’d defend him to the death when he was right. She was ferocious when it came to the people she cared about.

Strong. He’d never looked at her as another responsibility. Though he cared about her, she didn’t need him the way his mother did. She was her own person. Independent.

The way she’d gone out and done all that research, how she’d contacted Trey’s sister to get him more information about mental-health treatment and resources—it had touched him then, and over the month they’d been apart, he’d thought about it more and more.

She’d seen a need and had jumped to fill it. Though he’d dumped her. She’d done it, had brought him food. Had made him dinner while she had opened up some really private parts of her life to make a point.

And it had been a damned good point. At the time, he’d been so wrapped up in his dad and his guilt and shame that he hadn’t really seen all the facets to that story she’d told him about her life.

More than just a way to prove her point about not carrying other people’s actions, it showed him how tender she was. Despite the horror she’d grown up with. Despite enduring stuff that would make most people hard and angry, she was not.

She’d done nothing but show him love. Kindness and compassion. At the same time, she’d shown spine to keep coming back. Even as he rejected her over and over. She’d encouraged him to keep fighting to find the right course of treatment for his father. Even as he’d stopped answering his door when she came over.

She gave and gave without expecting anything in return. She did it because he needed it.

That was love.

He pulled off to the side of the road and yanked his helmet off.

“Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.”

If he let Beth go he was a total moron.

He loved Beth Murphy. Loved her persistence. Her strength. Her humor. Her sexy walk. The way she just bulldogged her way through everything. He’d never in his life met a more stubborn woman.

And it worked.

He put his helmet back on, turned the bike around and headed back to Petal.

Chapter Fifteen

“Man oh man, he’s totally going to hurt me tomorrow.” Trey cast quick glances at the back where Joe was.

“He won’t. He’s got too much pride. Anyway, when he finally wises up, I’ll let him know it was just a way to poke at him and then he won’t want to hurt you anymore.”

He’d better wise up. Here she was looking absolutely freaking gorgeous, sitting with another man who totally couldn’t stop looking at her boobs. If Joe didn’t come over to their table and declare how stupid he was being, she…well, she might just give up.

They chatted as they drank their beer. People stopped by their table to chitchat. Mostly though because the whole damned town knew she and Joe had broken up and that he was in the back playing pool. The drama of it was too delicious to pass up.

Whatever. She had no intention of giving them a show. That would have been too much like her parents.

“People in this town are nosy.”

She smiled at Trey. “No one can resist the excitement. This is going to be all over town tomorrow. Maybe I made a mistake doing this.”

Trey took her hand, kissing her fingertips. It brought her words to a halt. He gave her such a wicked grin too, knowing that he’d gotten her a tiny bit tangled up.

He laughed. “Ha! See, I can do it too. Now you listen here, if that dumbass back there doesn’t come to his senses, you’re better off without him. I’m not playing now. You intended to give him a lesson about how beautiful and desirable you were. That if you took his advice to move on, this is what it would look like. It’s got to be hard to swallow, a man like him. But he needed to understand what his words would mean. As for all over town? Well yeah. It’s Petal after all. But look, it would have been anyway, no matter who you started dating. There are only so many places in town to take a date. It would be bound to happen.”

“Thanks, coach. That was a good speech.”

“You use humor to push stuff away too, I know your game.”

“You’re right, of course. Really, thank you. I hope I don’t have to start dating anyone else. It would suck to break in someone else. All that work with Joe down the drain. Plus, I like the man’s dog. And his motorcycle. He orders extra cake when we go out so I can have it.”

“If that’s not love, I don’t know what is.”

“So is he looking over here? I’m trying to act like I’m caught up in your sexitude so I can’t look.”

“My sexitude? Cripes. Yes, he’s looking. Frowning. Glowering. William has looked too. They’re talking about you. That much is clear.”

They stayed a while longer but that butthead didn’t come over.

“Let’s go. It’s loud in here and I’m tired and if he’s going to make his move, he might need the push of me leaving.”

Trey leaned in a lot closer. “Maybe if he thinks we’re going back to your place to smooch, you’ll push him that last bit.”

Beth put on a little show for Joe, letting her eyes slide halfway closed. “Or more. We, Joe and me I mean, have some smoking hot chemistry in bed. If he thought I was giving that to you…” She shrugged, sliding from her chair and letting Trey help her into her coat.

She flipped her hair back over her shoulder, knowing how much Joe loved her hair, and turned, locking her gaze with his, feeling that connection they had straight to her toes.

Beth willed him to come over. Willed him to just admit he needed her.

But he stood there, not making a move.

She covered her disappointment the best she could, turning and letting Trey lead her outside.

“I surely did think that last thing you did would get him. Hard to resist a woman when she does that thing with her hair.”

Trey was a sweetie pie. She smiled at him and tried not to cry.

He slung an arm around her shoulders. “Don’t cry, doll. Don’t let him see your tears. I’ll take you home.”

She heard the motorcycle and her heart skipped. She’d tried to sleep and had ended up watching
Mary Poppins
instead. Eating an entire bag of Doritos and drinking two Cokes. Diet, naturally, as if that would combat the eleven billion Doritos calories.

So she was zinged up from caffeine and boyfriend annoyance, and it had taken five minutes to scrub the orange from her fingertips.

Sitting on her couch in her pajamas, she listened to the sound of the engine cutting and wondered what to do. It’d been nearly four hours since she’d left the Pumphouse.
Four hours.
He’d taken his sweet time. She could be sleeping! She could be sleeping with another man in her bed for all he knew.

She frowned.

She should just not answer her door. Yes. It would serve him right if she told him to fuck off and turned the porch light off.

She rolled her eyes at herself. She’d open the door, even if just to see his face, to know he was all right. But that didn’t mean she was going to make it easy.

Still, she made herself wait until she heard the knock before she got up, keeping her pace to the door under a rush.

She opened it and he stood there, looking so beautiful she had to fist her hands to keep from touching him. She remained in the doorway, blocking his path.

“Hi. Did I wake you?” He looked her over.

“It’s one in the morning.”

“I know.” He shoved a hand through his hair, sending it into disarray, and she wanted to fix it. But she couldn’t fix this. He had to want to fix it himself.

“What are you doing here?”

“Are you alone? I mean, is there anyone else…”

She looked him up and down. Did he really, truly think that even a month away from him would be enough to fuck someone else?

“No. I guess there isn’t. You’re not that type. I mean, I hope…” He licked his lips as she kept him standing there. “I’m not doing this right.”

“Five minutes ago you weren’t doing it at all.”

One of her brows rose and he wanted so very much to kiss it. Wanted to draw her into his arms and hold her tight, tell her with words and with his body that he would never fuck up again. That he loved her.

“I went for a ride. I was about ninety minutes out when I realized. No, when I accepted the truth. I had to come back and then I needed to get gas and then I drove around wondering if I should wait until the morning and then I wondered if you were alone and I knew you were, of course, but it was killing me, imagining Trey with his lips on yours, his hands on your body when it was my fault it wasn’t my hands instead.”

He halted, looking at her. She blocked his way, but she hadn’t slammed the door in his face. So there was that.

“You’re mad.”

“Yes.”

“
You
came into the Pumphouse on a date. A date, Beth. And
you’re
mad?”

“I’m going to help you. This one time. This is not a useful or helpful line of argument for you.”

She was so icy and fierce, it made him hot. Christ, he was in so deep with her.

“You’re right. I’m sorry.”

“For what?”

“Can I come in? It’s cold out here.”

“I’m sure you were colder on the bike. Also? No. Maybe later if I like what you have to say. But you’re nowhere near being invited in at this point.”

Damn.

“Can I tell you it makes me hot to see you this way?”

“No.”

He sighed, licking his lips again.

“I’m sorry for being an ass and not seeing what is so plainly right in front of my face. You. Beth. I love you. It doesn’t matter what I tell myself about how much baggage I have. It doesn’t matter that I tell myself that you’re better off with someone else. Because I love you. I love you so much and I messed up so badly and I hurt you.”

“You didn’t believe in me. Or us.”

“I was so caught up in everything else that I couldn’t risk it. Didn’t want to risk it.”

She leaned against the doorjamb, watching. She looked a little less like she planned to knee him in the junk, which was a step forward at least.

“I was ashamed. Scared as hell.”

“Ashamed of your dad?”

He nodded. “It’s better now. I’ve had a few sessions with a therapist too. My mom as well. I understand it better. I guess you knew it all along. But it took me a while to get there.”

She blinked quickly, he knew tears were close and hated that he’d done it.

“You shared yourself with me. Took a risk and opened up such a private part of yourself and I didn’t…I wasn’t appreciative of it. Not to you and I should have been. I should have let you know how much it meant that you came to me that day. I did appreciate it. It did help. A lot. But I should have told you then. I made you feel bad. That I pushed you away because of that story. And it wasn’t true. I’d never do that.”

“At first I felt like that, yes. I told you something I rarely talk about. Not that I hide it, but I don’t go around laying out my fucked-up childhood for all and sundry.”

“I know. I was messed up that day. I…it felt like if I didn’t push you out the door that I’d never be able to keep up my strength in protecting you from the insanity of my life. And I shouldn’t have. I should have gone with my gut instinct, which was to pull you close and never let go.”

She sucked in a breath and stepped back. “You can come in.” She turned and walked back inside, leaving him on her doorstep.

Grateful.

He walked inside and noted she’d been on her couch watching movies.

“Thanks. For letting me come in, I mean.”

He hung his jacket up and came into the room.

She moved to sit back on the couch, pulling the blanket around herself. To keep him back because she wasn’t ready yet. All the things he’d said had mattered. A lot. But there was more that needed saying.

“In all my life, I’ve never let anyone who wasn’t my sibling get as close as I let you get.” She played with the hem on the blanket, noting that she needed to fix where it was beginning to fray.