Unafraid (Beachwood Bay) (26 page)

“I can have my guys take care of things.” Hunter says.

What about me?
I want to cry. I need him, too.

I swallow back my protest, I’m just being selfish. “How long do you think it’ll take, to get things figured out there?” I try my best to sound supportive. “Another couple of days?”

He doesn’t answer.

My heart catches. “Next week?” I try.

Hunter exhales a long breath, sounding stressed. “I don’t know, Brit. It’ll take as long as it takes.”

I clench my fists into my palms. “I miss you, is all,” I tell him softly.

“I miss you too.” Hunter’s voice softens for the first time. “I’m sorry about all this bullshit, Brit, I really am. My family is a fucking mess.”

“It’s OK.” I pull myself together. “You do whatever you need. I’ll be here.”

“Thank you.” A voice comes, muffled in the background. “Look, I’ve got to go, I have a lunch with some of the partners. I’ll try and call you later.”

“OK.” I feel a stab of disappointment. “Love you.”

“You too,” he tells me, and then the line goes dead.

I slowly lower the phone.

Garrett looks over. “I’m sorry,” he grimaces, my disappointment clearly written all over my face.

I shrug, helpless. “I just wish there was something I could do. I mean, he’s just a couple of hours away, but it feels like he’s been sucked into a whole other world.”

His world, full of wealth and privilege, where girls like you don’t belong.

“So, if he can’t get away, why don’t you go to him?” Garrett suggests. “Take my truck.”

I pause, uncertain. “I don’t know, I don’t want to intrude…”

“It was just an idea.” Garrett shrugs. “Even if he’s busy, you’ll get to see him face-to-face. That’s got to be better than this, right?”

I stare at him, torn. It goes against all my instincts to go chasing after some guy—especially when he’s told me he’s got it covered. But this isn’t just some guy—it’s Hunter. Even if he needed me, I realize, he would never think to ask.

And to see him in person, look him in those beautiful blue eyes… I can make the distance between us disappear, I just know I can. It’s got to be worth a shot.

“You’re right,” I decide, my heart pounding. “I’ll go. I’ll take some things from his place, we left in such a rush, he’ll be needing clothes and stuff for sure.”

Garrett tosses me the keys. “Drive safe.”

“Now?” I pause. “But, it’s only half-way through my shift.”

“Like you said, I’m not exactly rushed off my feet.” Garrett gives me a warm smile. “Go get him. And good luck!”

I head out of town to the ranch. One of Hunter’s guys lets me into the main house, and I fill a duffel bag with toiletries from the bathroom and some clothing from his closet. I pause in his bedroom, overcome with a wave of sweet, sexy memories. The bed is still rumpled, sheets tangled from our last night there, so I strip it down and put them in the laundry, making the bed with crisp new linens that smell like fabric softener and him.

Hunter.

I breathe it in, finally feeling a sense of peace flood through me, calming all my insecurities and fears. Just being back in this place sets me right again, takes me back to the equilibrium I haven’t felt since that night. That night, that gorgeous, earth-shaking, soul-mending night together, when I felt him moving inside of me, and looked up into his eyes, and saw stars.

He was right. I have to grin at how smug he would be to hear it, as I grab the bag and head back to truck. But Hunter was right, making me wait for him. All these years of hook-ups and cheap flings, I’d become so desensitized to sex, I didn’t even know what it could be like when it mattered: sharing more than just your body with someone, when every movement is a revelation; every whisper, a song.

There’s no going back now, I smile to myself, turning onto the highway. Even if I wasn’t deeply, hopelessly, irreparably in love with the man, I could never give up the way his body makes me feel. And I know that once I’m with him again, holding him close, everything will be OK between us again.

It has to be.

I drive for hours, following directions out to the address Hunter left with his guy at the ranch. The route takes me through the city and out to one of the richest neighborhoods on the outskirts of town. Here, sycamore trees swathe the street with a green canopy and the road winds past huge estates, the kind where you can’t even see the house, just tall, wrought-iron gates and perfectly manicured hedgerows guarding against unwanted guests.

I feel a flicker of nerves as I reach the Covington turn-off, and find a set of gates at least twice as high as the rest, flanked by stone columns with matching gargoyles.

You’re here for Hunter
, I remind myself.
Just ignore all the rest.

I approach the gates, rolling my window down to call up through the security system. A moment later, a reply buzzes.

“Yes?”

“I’m, umm, here to see Hunter? I’m a friend. From home. I mean, not home home, this is his home,” I hear myself babbling, but I can’t stop. “Anyway, my name is—”

There’s a buzz, and the gates swing open.

I catch my breath. I’m already sweating, and I haven’t even stepped foot inside! I wipe my palms on my skirt, and put the truck back in gear, slowly driving through the gates and up the winding road leading back from the street.

At least this time, I’m dressed for the part. I stopped to change after leaving the bar, and now I’m wearing my most conservative outfit: a pale green 1950s sundress I cut from a vintage Vogue pattern. I usually wear it with a hot-pink bra peeping out, and chunky boots, but today I have on gold strappy sandals, my hair smoothed back in a neat braid. I look like a stranger, but I’ll do whatever it takes not to feel like a common tramp—or whatever it is his ice-queen mother thinks when she looks at me.

I drive around a wide bend, emerging from the trees, and see the house rising up in front of me for the first time.

Holy shit!

I gape up at it, dumbstruck. I always knew the Covingtons were wealthy, but this is something else: a huge, Antebellum-style mansion with columns and balconies, and white trim running around the whole place, like icing on a cake. Perfect beds of roses line the driveway, manicured lawns rolling gently away from the house to… I blink, squinting in the distance. Is that a lake?

By the time I pull up outside, my nerves have blossomed into a full-on panic. This is a long way from Beachwood, and I am so far out of my league. I put the truck in park beside a line of vans. There are people milling around in uniform, carrying trays and flowers like they’re setting up for something. Nobody gives me a second look as I get out of the cab and slowly climb the front steps.

“Excuse me,” I ask a passing man, with his arms piled high with paper lanterns. “Do you know—”

“Out back,” he waves me through. “And watch out, someone ordered lilac instead of mauve so Her Highness is on the warpath.”

I frown. “I’m not—” I start, but he’s already hurried away.

OK then.

I walk slowly through the house, my eyes wide at the luxury. Everything is silk-covered and gilt-edged, huge rooms opening up into each other with polished floors and thick Persian rugs, like something from a glossy magazine. I can’t believe that Hunter grew up in this place. Now that I’ve seen him in his jeans and boots, I can’t think of him any other way, but the family photos lined up in the halls show him in tennis whites and preppy blazers, reluctantly posing with his parents.

With Jace.

I stop to look at a picture of them together. It must have been taken right before the accident, because they both look fully grown, towering over Camille’s bird-like frame. Jace’s hair is darker than Hunter’s, his smile wider and less strained. But they both look like a matching pair, two bookends holding the family up: solid and full of life.

I swallow back a pang of heartache, and keep moving, stepping out of a long, gallery-style room to the wide verandah at the back of the house.

It’s chaos.

The immaculate gardens are a hive of activity. Staff in black uniforms scurry around, laying electrical wiring from the house all the way to the huge white canopy tents being constructed on the lawn. People are setting up a wooden dance floor by a half-built stage, and marking out the location of tables with ribbon and seating charts. Gardeners are on ladders up the old sycamore tress, stringing lanterns and tiny bulbs, and a dozen workers dismantle an elegant fountain in the middle of the lawn and move it to the edge of the gardens.

I watch for a moment, amazed. Then my eyes land on a figure in the center of the storm. Hunter. He’s wearing a crisp white shirt and khakis, his hair cut shorter than when I saw him last. He’s holding a clipboard, directing staff and consulting with a blonde woman at his side. She shifts, shielding her eyes from the sunshine, and I see that it’s Alicia, the woman from my interview, the one Hunter introduced as being an old college friend.

As I watch, she leans over to check his papers. He says something, and she throws her head back to laugh, her glossy blonde hair falling in waves around her face. She rests her hand on his arm, gazing up at him adoringly.

Her feelings couldn’t be clearer if they were flashed up on a billboard in Times Square.

This is why he didn’t want you here
, a treacherous voice whispers in my mind
. He’s got better things on his mind.

I’m wrestling with the whispers, when I feel someone arrive beside me. I whirl around. It’s Camille, watching Hunter and Alicia with a smug smile on her face. “Such a lovely girl,” Camille coos. She’s wearing a linen sundress, with a bright silk scarf knotted casually at her neck. “You know they went to school together? Her family is very well-connected, and of course, she has those wonderful manners: always helping out, the first to come and greet her hostess.”

That last part has a pointed tone. I flush bright red. “Hello, Mrs. Covington,” I stutter. “I’m sorry, they just waved me through. I was looking for Hunter.”

“Well, you’ve found him.” Camille trails her eyes up and down my body. Her lip quirks with amusement, and in that instant, it feels like I’m wearing an old trash sack, not my prettiest sundress. “He’s a little busy right now, with the party. Alicia is a dear to come help out.”

“Party?” I echo, feeling totally clueless.

“Richard and my’s anniversary. We’re throwing a big soiree tomorrow night. It’s the social event of the season, everyone’s coming.” Camille gives me a patronizing smile. “But of course, Hunter must have told you all about it.”

I stare at her, an icy chill spreading through my body.

“No?” Camille catches my hesitation. Delight dances in her eyes, but she quickly covers it with a sympathetic pat on my arm. “Never mind dear, I’m sure he just didn’t want to worry you. Parties like this can be so… stressful. Socializing in a different circle, wondering if you’re saying the right thing. Wearing the right clothes…” she trails off, but the message comes over loud and clear. I’m nothing, and there’s no way I’ll be able to make it through one of her fancy events without insulting a guest or accidentally flashing the crowd.

And clearly, Hunter thinks it too.

I feel a blade of rejection cut through me, sharp in my chest, but I’m determined not to let Camille see how much I’m hurt. “Oh, this party?” I manage to keep my voice bright, “I forgot all about it. Hunter hates these things so much, I wouldn’t drag it out for him. He’s so sweet to stick around here long enough to help before he comes home.”

“Home?” Camille arches an eyebrow. “Oh, you mean that little town of yours. But Hunter’s not going—No,” she stops, “It’s not my place to say. I’m sure he’ll explain.”

Explain what? I stare at her, frozen, but Camille knows that she’s won. She breaks into a syrupy smile.

“So nice to see you again, Brittany. Have a safe trip back.”

And with that, she waltzes away.

I turn back to the lawn, reeling over her words. Hunter’s not going—what, back to Beachwood? Is that what she almost told me, or is she just trying to mess with my mind, drive a wedge between us any way she can?