“Benjamin James Morris!” Mama calls sternly, throwing her cards down as Elsie and Jake explode with laughter. Even Tara has a hand over her mouth, trying hard to contain her amusement.
“I’m gonna kick your ass,” Rob mutters, though it’s with a tight-lipped smile.
“Anytime, bro!” He and I are the closest in size, though I’ve got at least thirty pounds of muscle and two inches of height on him.
“There will be no kicking of any kind under this roof!” Mama warns with a finger.
Rob snorts. “Fine. Let’s take it to the barn. It’s better for fighting anyway.”
Dead silence.
“Shit. Sorry, I didn’t mean anything by it,” Rob backpedals, his hands up in apology.
“No worries, man.” I toss a casual wave his way. “You’re right, the barn is a good place. As soon as we sell the last of the tools and wood, we can start our own fight club in there and Baby Boy Morris will kick all your old asses.” I’ve been busy this week, clearing out the saws and other tools. There’s a ton in there. Add it all up and it’s worth a lot of money.
“Sounds good, man.” I feel a light squeeze of my shoulder as Rob passes by again, on his way to check the skies. “I wish that storm wasn’t coming. I wanted to take Tara out to the grove.”
“You’ll have plenty of time over the weekend.” Mama turns and beams as Rita, Jake’s girlfriend, comes waddling out of the kitchen, a cup of tea in hand.
“What’re y’all playing again?” she drawls with that thick Mississippi accent as Jake reaches back to pull her beside him until her belly is resting against his cheek. Of all my brothers, it’s strangest to see Jake settled down. He was probably the worst, next to me, for chasing girls. But then he hooked up with Rita at Mardi Gras a couple of years back and things changed quickly. Now he’s about to have a baby with her.
“Euchre.” He pats his knees. “Come on and sit. I’ll teach you how to play.”
“Maybe another night. I’m pretty tired.” Ruffling his hair—it’s a darker blond than mine—she turns to me and smiles. “Thanks for giving up Elsie’s old room for us.”
“Just to be clear, I did it for you and that baby, not for this joker.” I wink at her.
“I though you liked the attic! You always liked it growing up,” Mama chimes in.
Jake snorts. “What are you talking about? He was terrified of the attic! Always crying about ghosts. Wait until the thunder hits tonight. He’ll be shaking under his covers, all alone up there.” He grunts as the orange I whip at him hits his stomach.
“You’re eating that,” Mama scolds, wrenching it out of Jake’s hand before he can fling it back. She adds slyly, “I’m sure Reese could protect you from the thunder and ghosts if she were here.”
“Reese?” Jake and Rob echo in unison, their brows almost jumping past their hairlines.
“Don’t tell me . . .” A broad smile stretches across Rob’s face. “Benjy has as girlfriend?”
Fuck, I always hated that name. It makes me feel like a dog. Which I’ve been called many times before, but for different reasons. “Just a friend.” I shoot Mama an exasperated look, but she has picked up her cards again and is studying them intently, an impish smile on her mouth.
It doesn’t matter. Jake and Rob are already at it.
“What kind of girl could tie this asshole down?”
“What’s wrong with her?”
“Do you think she can do basic math?”
“Fake tits or real?” Jake got two slaps across the head and a kick under the table for that question, from every female within reach.
I stand and stretch my hand over my head but manage to get a hand down to block Jake’s fist sailing for my stomach. Stepping out of his reach, I wrap my arms around Rita, resting my hands on her belly. Up until my friend Storm got pregnant, I don’t remember ever touching a woman’s pregnant belly. “When should we tell him about us, Rita?” I say, putting on my best obnoxious grin as I watch Jake’s face turn red.
“Get the fuck away from her!” he yells, but he’s laughing.
Everyone’s laughing. Even Mama’s trying hard not to, her head shaking, no doubt over the language. I think she has given up for tonight, though.
And I grin. For so many reasons. It’s good to have everyone here.
Almost everyone.
“Where’re you going? We’re in the middle of a game!” Elsie whines.
“I’m going to see what the mature brother is up to.” Josh just got in about an hour ago and he’s spent most of that time in the barn.
“Tell him to come back inside,” Mama asks. “We’re gonna lose power as soon as the storm hits.” It’s pretty much a guarantee.
I round the corner just as Jake says, “Did Ben actually find someone stupid enough to—Ow! Who kicked me that time?”
Seeing the oldest Morris boy standing in the middle of the barn sets my hairs on end. It’s like bringing Joshua Morris Senior back to life and hitting rewind twenty years. Right down to the piercing, hard eyes.
“Hey,” I call out, holding my breath a little as I cross over the invisible barrier between the outside world and my father’s realm. I still don’t like being in here, even after a week of cleaning and airing the place out and changing all the lights. The dampness in the air with the approaching storm only makes the stench of wood thicker.
Josh turns to look at me, his face blank. Not only is he the spitting image of our dad, he also shares his demeanor. He was the quiet, serious one growing up. A bit of a recluse, preferring solitary hobbies like working on engines. He’s the one who taught me how to fix Granddaddy’s tractor.
“Hey, Ben,” he says somberly. After a pause, he steps forward and wraps his arms around my body, surprising me with a hug. Given our seven-year age difference and our polar opposite personalities, we’ve never been close. “I’m glad you were here when it happened.” Stepping away, he slides his hands into his back pockets, his eyes roaming the vaulted ceiling. “I forgot how big this barn is.”
“Yeah. You wouldn’t believe some of the shit I found hidden in here.” At least fifty empty bottles of whiskey tucked into various corners, along with countless packs of stale cigarettes—I didn’t even know Dad smoked—and some dirty magazines from the seventies—probably our granddaddy’s—that I shoved into Jake’s suitcase as a joke.
“I’ll bet,” he mutters to himself. “What do you think finally made him do it?”
“Mama was going to leave him.”
Josh turns to look at me, the shock on his face readable by anyone. “Really?”
“I heard it with my own two ears. She was done.” I hesitate, not sure if I want to admit the rest. “I heard him cry.”
Understanding flickers through Josh’s eyes as he turns back to the piece of black walnut that’s got Dad’s DNA in it. I had stood over it with a chainsaw earlier this week but couldn’t bring myself to cut it up. “I cried when Karen left me, even though I deserved it.”
I shake my head. “I don’t get it, Josh. You hated Dad for what he did to Mama—so much that you haven’t been here in eight fucking years!—and yet you turned around and did the same thing.”
“I know.” His cheek puffs out as his tongue pushes against the wall of his mouth. “I had it all and I threw it away. I wish I had a good reason, but I don’t.” He pauses. “I wonder, if Mom had kicked him out all those years ago, if maybe he would have gotten help . . . Maybe none of this—”
“I hear where you’re going with this and I don’t fucking like it one bit, Josh.” I feel my back getting stiff as I stand tall. “Don’t you ever try and lay blame on Mama. All she did was love that asshole too much.”
“I’m not blaming her, I’m just . . .” His voice drifts off as he walks a circle. “I’m doing this whole twelve-step thing right now and I’m supposed to say I’m sorry. I’ve got a whole lotta things to be sorry for. I’m sorry I haven’t been here to help. I’m sorry I turned my back on Mom.”
“You’re
not the only one,” I remind him, my sudden flare of anger fading fast.
“Yeah, but I’m the oldest. And yet here you are, standing by Mama through it all, still saving the day.”
“Not always.” I give the black walnut a light kick.
“I’m surprised the idiot didn’t lose something sooner, the way he drank,” Josh mumbles as a rumble of thunder sounds in the distance. “You know, I always wished I was more like you. Even when you were just a kid and I was almost done with high school.” Kicking at a remnant chip of wood, a small smirk curls his mouth. “You were always so damn happy and easygoing. Everything rolled off your back. Everyone loved you. You were so different from him. Not like me.” He grits his teeth. “It took losing everything—my wife, my kids, my house—to see that.” Sliding his hands into his pockets, he turns to look at me with grim determination. “I’m done being like him, Ben. I’m not going to live my life as if I was pre-programmed to be Joshua Morris Senior. I haven’t touched a drink in six months; I see my kids every chance I get. I take them places. I talk to them and laugh with them. I let them know that their father loves them. And Karen?” His head dips in submission. “I don’t know if she’ll ever give me another chance, but I’ll do whatever I can to change. I don’t want to be lying in a pool of my own vomit in twenty years because I didn’t live the life I could have. All of us need to take a good look at our lives. If there’s been anything about this man holding us back, now’s the time to let it go.”
I nod quietly as another low, long rumble fills the sky. “We should probably get inside. It’s gonna be a big one tonight.”
“Yep,” he agrees. We both turn and walk to the edge of the barn, standing side by side as we look out on the trees, the tendrils of Spanish moss swaying as the wind picks up and the rain begins to fall, first in random, heavy drops until, within ten seconds, the sky suddenly opens up and sheets of it start pouring down.
A single light crests over the hump in the driveway. Squinting, I mumble to myself, “Is that . . .?” My stomach does a giant flip as the Harley races up the driveway, its low rumble competing with the thunder above. Streaks of blond and purple poke out from beneath a helmet.
“Who’s that?” Josh asks.
I smile, my insides tightening up with excitement. “That’s mine, is what that is.” And right now, I mean it.
We move to the side as Reese keeps coming, not stopping until she pulls her bike right into the barn, her clothes drenched. I watch her pull her helmet off and brush the hair off that gorgeous face of hers. I’ve never wanted to kiss a girl so bad in my life.
Caramel eyes peer up at me with hesitation. “You know me and mornings. I just figured I’d be better off coming up here tonight.”
“And because you couldn’t handle being away from me for another night, of course,” I throw back, testing her.
When I see that hard swallow, the pink creeping into her cheeks as she averts her gaze to the ground in a very un-Reese move, I know I’m right.
And I’m damn happy about it.
Her attention flickers to Josh and she sticks a hand out. “Hi, I’m Reese.”
“You can do all that hello shit tomorrow.” I reach out and wrap my hands around her waist, hoisting her up and off the bike like a little kid.
And then I throw her over my shoulder and march out into the rain. I barely feel it.
Chapter 33
REESE
“Ben! Put me down!” I cry out with a laugh as the front door clatters behind us.
I was hoping he’d be happy to see me, but the way he was looking at me out there in the barn, I’m thinking he’s going to devour me. I couldn’t have asked for a better reception.
“Reese?” I hear Wilma’s voice from somewhere in the back of the house.
“Tomorrow, Mama!” Ben’s already moving up the stairs.
“Benjamin, you bring that girl down—” The house is thrown into darkness as the lights cut out, distracting Wilma from her scolding, leaving me dangling upside down over Ben’s shoulder on a staircase, in the pitch black.
“Shit.” Ben stops to pull his phone out and set the flashlight app before he continues, not putting me down until he has climbed a very narrow set of stairs up to a third-floor room in the attic. “We’re sleeping up here tonight,” he announces. My feet hit the wood floor just as a dull glow fills the room, the by-product of a small battery-operated lantern that sits on a simple wooden table.
“Wow.” I can just make out the space. It’s quite large, though most definitely only a fraction of the attic’s full size. Everything has been painted white—the floors, the slanted walls, the trim—which makes a nice backdrop for all of Ben’s dad’s wooden furniture, including a rather stately bed, covered in a colorful quilted duvet. The two large dormer windows must offer ample light in the daytime. Right now, though, they’re protesting noisily against the winds and pelting rain. “It’s so cozy up here. Very cottage-like.”
My knapsack sails through the air past me a second before strong hands grab my shoulders and spin me around. I find myself facing Ben’s giant grin. He doesn’t hesitate to lay a heavy kiss on my lips and I don’t hesitate to lean into it, the feel of his tongue against mine intoxicating. When he finally breaks free, his arms still coiled around my waist, he murmurs in that low crackle, “This was a fantastic surprise.”
“Really? Because I’ve been known to surprise people in rather unpleasant ways,” I tease, though inside I’m a basket of live wires. I let my hands rest on his broad chest as I fall into it to inhale his clean, soapy smell. I can’t believe how much I’ve missed it.
He chuckles as he rests his cheek on top of my head. “That’s one of the things I love about you.”
I’m not sure whose limbs stiffen first but as soon as that sentence—that word—comes out of his mouth, there is definite tension shooting through both of us.
Ben relaxes first, his groan making me curl into him again. “You know what I meant by that, right?”
“That you’re madly in love with me, of course.” We’ve joked about it so many times. Now I’d give anything for it to be real. My breathing feels shaky as I force my head back to meet his gaze, hoping he doesn’t see the truth I’m struggling to veil.
That I have accidentally developed real feelings for him.
But he does. Instantly. Or he sees something, anyway. His knuckles graze my cheek as wariness flickers over his features. “What’s wrong?”
I open my mouth to respond—to say what, I have no idea! How the hell am I going to broach this subject without scaring him away?—but I’m saved by an incoming call on his phone. Ben holds the phone up and I see Mason’s name. “Did you tell him you were coming?” Ben asks.
“Yeah.”
“I’d better get that, then.” He drops a quick kiss on my head as he breaks away to answer. “Hey, Mace. What’s up? . . . Yeah, she just made it . . . Huh . . . No . . .” He glances at me and then takes a few steps away. “Okay.”
I listen absently as I unzip my bag and dump the contents out onto the bed, including the simple black dress for tomorrow that’s going to need ironing after sitting rumpled on the back of my bike for almost three hours. I almost beat the rain. Thanks to the torrential downpour that hit as I was riding up the driveway, along with Ben’s leisurely caveman stroll to the house with me slung over his shoulder, every stitch of clothing on me is soaked through. I’m freezing, and the lower temperature up here certainly doesn’t help. I unzip my jacket and toss it onto the back of a chair. My boots and socks come next. I’m intent on getting my pajamas on, even if it’s only for the short term.
“Are you sure this is . . .” He heaves a sigh. “Okay . . . yeah, I guess . . . See you tomorrow, man.”
I frown. “What’d he want?”
Ben’s arm drops heavily to his side, an unreadable expression turning his face eerily calm. There’s a long pause as he very obviously drifts off in thought, his eyes rolling over me, my bag, and all the clothes that have
spilled out, and then back to me.
“You’re kind of freaking me out, Ben. What’s wrong?”
I hear the tiny exhale he releases before he tosses his phone onto the table. “He was just worried about you getting here with the storm, is all.”
“Are you sure? Because he was acting really weird tonight. He hugged me.”
Ben smiles as he walks over to where I’m standing. Dipping his face into my neck, he lets his mouth linger there, sending shivers through my body. “What, like a big bear hug?”
“More like he was hugging a porcupine.”
Ben chuckles. “Mason’s a weird guy. Weird guys do weird things.”
“Stop talking about my stepbrother while you’re doing that,” I mumble, letting my head fall back as the rumble of his voice tickles my skin.
“Fine.” He disappears suddenly. I turn in time to see him make a sweeping move across the bed, scattering everything onto the floor.
“Hey!”
“Payback’s a bitch.”
I smile, a hazy memory of Cancún flashing through my mind. “Have you been drinking margaritas? Because I think that’s one of those times where two wrongs definitely don’t make a right.” I wonder, had I not thrown up on him, had we actually slept together that night, would I be standing here right now, wondering how on earth you tell a guy who avoids commitment that you’ve fallen for him, hard?
He reaches out to grab my hand and pull me toward him, until he’s able to push me onto the bed, his fingers deftly unfastening my belt. “Your clothes are wet. You need to get out of them and quick.” The guy has undressing women down to an art because somehow he manages to pull every last stitch of clothing off of me in record time and with no help on my part, until I find myself lying naked across the bed with his eyes grazing over my body.
“The attic needs reinsulating,” he confirms as a shiver courses through my body. I honestly don’t think it’s from the cold.
“I’m naked, again. And you’re not, again.”
Ben yanks the back of his sodden black T-shirt up and over his head before letting it slide down his arms, uncovering the smooth ridges of his muscles. As lightning zigzags through the sky in frequent bursts, filling the attic room with flashes of white light, I watch him undo his jeans and let them fall, pushing his boxer briefs off with them. I find myself lying on a bed and staring at a very naked, very appealing, and very aroused Ben in front of me. My breath hitches with the sight.