Thankfully, she just handed it to her.
It wasn’t going to be long before Wyatt and Harley left, so Georgia decided to go out and wait so she could finish this shoot and bail. Then go home and bury herself in her work and hide from the ripping sensation in her chest.
Outside, she started to scan through her images. One stopped her cold. Apparently, her grandmother had figured out how to work the camera. It was an image of her and Easton. Her heart hammered just looking at it; the way he held her, the look in his eye, the one telling anyone seeing it that he didn’t see anyone else in that room but her.
No one had ever looked at Georgia that way.
They looked so perfect side by side. They looked like they were in love, not engaged in some torrid affair. Life is so cruel, Georgia thought to herself.
She felt a calming energy spill over her and glanced to her side to find herself all alone with Easton. She eased away, wanting space, but all that did was give them more privacy, putting them in a garden all alone.
“What do you want to talk about?” she asked when he said nothing, yet she could feel his stare raining down on her. She dared to look up to see him pulling at his tie like it was a noose. He’d already unbuttoned his uniform, and his short, dark hair looked like he had rushed his hands through it a few times, something she could still feel herself doing.
“I want to know who you are now,” he finally said.
“You know me. I’m Georgia Armstrong, Memphis’s sister. Here for the wedding. Oh, and I’m handy with a camera.” She lifted her chin. “Creeks are still creeks, and I still think it’s cruel to lure in innocent little fish with bait only to torment them and throw them back.”
He stared at her like she had lost her mind. He started to say something three times over before he gripped her arm and pushed her farther back into the garden.
“This is what I know, Georgia. I know that every time I look at you I feel a burn in my chest. You twist my mind to the point where I can’t think. It took me forever to get over the last time I saw you. Hell, I don’t think I ever did. Then you show up out of nowhere…then…” His eyes rapidly moved across hers. “I know I can’t get you out of my mind.” In a whisper he said, “I crave you.”
She moved her head side to side as she breathed, hoping it would keep the angry tears at bay. “And apparently that’s the real issue.”
“Yeah it is,” he said, stepping up to her. “Are you still running? Or are you ready to come off the road?”
“Fuck you, Easton. I haven’t been running. I was surviving. You’d know that if you bothered to call.”
He jerked his stare away. “Answer me. Are you staying here or not.”
“That’s none of your fucking business.”
He looked right at her. “I’m making it my business. Even if last night had never happened I still would. Memphis wants you home—you know your daddy did, too.”
“Don’t you dare,” she raged as tears spilled from the corners of her eyes. “You want to talk about your phone call—your girl? We can do that instead of debating where my fucking address should or should not be.”
A defensive anger came to him. “She has nothing to do with this.”
Georgia thought she was going to puke. She wanted him to tell her she heard wrong the night before. Wanted him to explain or deny—not defend this girl.
“She has everything to do with it,” Georgia spat back.
“No, she doesn’t. This is about you and me—there is something here, Georgia. You do something to me.”
“Me?” The word left her like a dagger. “You could have stopped. I may have started it, but you didn’t stop it.”
“I didn’t want to.”
He was making her head spin. “You make it a habit of taking girls in alleys?”
“Do you make it a habit of pulling the closest guy to you when you get nice and ticked off? Who hurt you?”
You, she thought to herself as she went to slap him, but he caught her hand, her stare, her breath. They were only inches away from each other.
He slammed his lips into hers. She pushed against his chest for all of a hot second, but then she opened up for him. Once again, every ounce of pain vanished from her heart at once. She forgot her rage and found herself melting against him.
This kiss was not only as hot as it had been the night before, it was also sobering. It could have been because it was slower, because he was making a point to listen to every part of his mind, body, and soul as his hands slid down her back, eased across her body as if she were made of glass.
She was the only one that had ever made him feel like this, that much he knew. What was breaking his heart was the fact that he knew his life could not afford this reckless passion. Not after he had just put the pieces of it back together again.
The plantation doors pushed open, and the rumbling laughter seized the silence of the garden and stole her from his arms. She was gone in the blink of an eye. By the time he caught his breath, she was standing at the edge of the walkway clicking away on her camera.
Her skin was flushed and her hands were trembling. It was something he doubted anyone else would notice, but he did because he was well aware of every movement of her body.
Their conversation didn’t settle anything and that kiss didn’t end anything. All it did was prove to him that there was something unprecedented between them. It was raw, it was hot, and so powerful, that he could feel something stirring deep inside.
The moment he realized that was the moment he left, without a word to anyone. He was the one running at that moment, but he told himself he was running toward sanity, not away from it.
***
He ran, Georgia thought. He called her a runner and took off, surely afraid someone had seen them. He was a drug. Had to be. Some kind of wicked addiction that you knew was bad for you but still breathed it in.
She never could figure out why Hunter was set on self-destruction. Why he would go back, over and over, to his addictions. He told her once that it was the high. That once he felt that high, the world stopped being a hellhole, nothing could bring you down, and all you could think about was when you would feel that way again.
Easton must be a different kind of drug, Georgia decided. He brought her down, slammed her to Earth, but at the same time all she could do was think about the rush he always gave her. How he felt against her, how he was able to dip into her soul and command that she surrender to him. Downright dangerous.
The next day she stayed in bed until the last second, which was easy to do. Memphis had to work, so he wasn’t there to rouse her.
He had left her his truck, which she was grateful for when she started loading up props for this little girl’s photo shoot. Georgia had found helmets, jackets, boots, and everything she could think of to put in a picture to bring out the fireman image.
When she got to her house—Randal’s house, rather—she saw that he was not joking when he said he would have someone clean up the yard. The bushes were trimmed, the broken limbs were picked up, and everything was crisp. It would have almost looked new if it weren’t for the dead spots in the grass where the fallen limbs had lain too long.
She had most of her stuff inside when she heard a car door shut and a baby cry.
Baby, Georgia thought. Not good. She was nervous enough about a little girl, but she assumed she could at least reason with a child.
A baby, though?
Not a chance.
What was she supposed to do? Make faces or something?
She swallowed her nerves and put a smile on her face as she stepped into the open doorway. She saw Cynthia struggling to hold a toddler, not a baby. She wanted down, and Cynthia must have feared the road because she didn’t set her down until the gate was closed behind her, and even then the little girl cried. Georgia had to wonder how much time Cynthia spent with her granddaughter. She looked exhausted.
‘Tomboy’ was not a long shot when it came to this toddler. She had little to no hai
r and was dressed in overalls, dark jean ones at that.
Georgia sat her camera down and went out to meet them.
“Sorry we’re late,” Cynthia said. “I thought if she had a nap this would go over better. No such luck. Fought me tooth and nail and dozed for all of two minutes on the way over here.”
“Naps are no fun, are they?” Georgia said in the sweetest voice she could manage.
The toddler was moving to her feet but hesitated for a second. Then looked to the sound of Georgia’s voice and let out a squeal of a laugh before she wobbled as fast as she could to Georgia. Stopping to crawl when she discovered that would get her there faster.
Worried she would hurt herself on the broken sidewalk, Georgia walked toward her and knelt down. The little girl fell into Georgia’s arms and squeezed her tiny arms around her. So fragile, Georgia thought as she wrapped her arms around her. She lifted her as if she were made of air, then the toddler slid her legs around Georgia like she was used to being carried that way and laid her face down on her shoulders. Getting lost somewhere in Georgia’s long, raven hair.
“Maybe you are tired,” Georgia said, tickling the little girl’s side. Which made her laugh, then reach to hold onto Georgia’s neck as if she were clinging to life.
It was hard to call her a toddler; ‘infant’ came to mind. And she smelled so good. There was a hint of baby powder. But the scent that seemed to haunt Georgia was more prominent: lavender.
More than likely, she would have kissed this child that was a stranger a moment ago if she hadn’t caught Cynthia’s expression.
Her mouth was slightly open, her eyes, which were watering, were wide, and she was frozen in place. Georgia thought she had broken some kind of adult-child code for a hot second.
“I may faint,” Cynthia said, fanning herself.
“Are you all right?” Georgia asked.
Cynthia shook her head. “You don’t understand. Grace cannot stand women. The only ones she will even somewhat tolerate are me and my daughter, and you can clearly see we have our differences.”
“Grace,” Georgia repeated as the wind picked up and that scent of lavender all but drowned her. “Surely, you’re nice to your grandmother, aren’t you?” Georgia asked Grace as she tickled her side. Grace giggled and reached up to hug Georgia once more.
“It’s our fault, I think. We spoil her rotten,” Cynthia said into the echo of the house when she followed Georgia in. “She was premature, very premature. We almost lost her a time or two, so as soon as we could hold her we never put her down, fulfilled her every desire, or tried to. Her daddy is the only one that can reason with her.”
The idea of reasoning with any child was lost on Georgia, but she smiled anyway. She eased down to the hardwood floor with Grace in her arms and found herself making those baby faces almost naturally. She just wanted to hear Grace laugh. It was invigorating. And that smile, it was precious, something that she wanted to capture.
“I have some fireman stuff to play with. Does that sound like fun?” Georgia asked Grace, getting a giggle in response.
“Is this the outfit you wanted to use?” she asked Cynthia.
“I have others. Before, I would have told you it would be a long shot to get any of them on her. Any shot would be great.”
The first one Georgia took had Grace in only a diaper and pearls with a fireman’s hat in her lap. Grace loved the pearls, which shocked her grandmother even more. From that point on, Georgia’s ideas were endless. She had some with boots, the jacket, and managed to put Grace in every dress her grandmother had brought. Between her and Grace, she wasn’t sure who was having more fun because both of them were laughing constantly. This little girl rocks, Georgia thought.
Georgia used every aspect of the house she could, including the yard, steps, you name it. When it was all said and done, Grace crawled in her lap and closed her eyes like she didn’t have a fear in the world.
“You’re blowing my mind, and I haven’t even seen one image. I’m not going to lie, if you manage to stay in town I might beg you to babysit a time or two.”
“Trust me, you won’t have to beg. This was fun.”
“I think Grace and I can second that notion. Can I convince you to put her in her seat? Maybe she will stay down for a while.”
It was after dark. Georgia had spent almost six hours with Grace, but it felt like five minutes. She almost told Cynthia to go have dinner or something, that she would watch Grace, but she was sure that would make her look like a crazy person. So instead she rose, holding Grace in a cradled position, swaying her as she carried her to Cynthia’s car. When she set her down, she stole a kiss and breathed in the rich scent of her.
She let Cynthia strap her in, though. She was not even about to act like she understood those buckles.
“I still have to go through the wedding images, but I will get these back to you as soon as possible,” she told Cynthia.
“I didn’t even tell anyone I was going to try because they would have talked me out of it, but you know Marie. Your grandmother was very convincing.”
“She can be,” Georgia agreed, not able to pull her eyes off of Grace.
Georgia needed to go over those wedding shots and catch up on a few other projects. But she knew, as she waved goodbye to Cynthia, she would edit Grace’s first just so she could stretch out the emotion of this day. She had fallen in love with that little girl instantly.
The next morning, she was half-asleep when Henry called from the bank to tell her that she was approved, with flying colors, for the loan she applied for. He gave her a list of things he needed from her and he told her he was pushing to close that Friday, at the latest the middle of the following week. As far as Georgia was concerned, it was all happening too fast.
Memphis slept most of his first forty-eight off, and she used that time to work like her life depended on it, because if she went through with this deal, it would. She found an excuse to work on Grace’s pictures at least every other hour.
Grace had given her a reason to believe she could have it all. The house, the career, the roots. She took her back to the reason she picked up her camera in the first place…to capture bliss.
On Wednesday, Memphis laid on the guilt trip heavy enough that she agreed to come by the firehouse for lunch. She planned to make it short and sweet because she had plans to meet Cynthia and Grace later that afternoon to go over the images.
She wanted the drive to the fire hall to be a hundred miles long. Just so the butterflies in her stomach would have time to settle. But in Memphis’s massive truck she could have sworn it took her all of five seconds to get there.
Her heart was hammering. I can do this, she told herself. I can face him and act like he means nothing to me.
The garage doors were open and the trucks were in place, but she couldn’t hear anyone inside. She followed the distant sounds of men hollering in the back. Off to the side, looking like they had gotten their asses kicked, were Memphis and six other guys. On the basketball court, there was a one-on-one game going on. Easton and Truman were in a fierce battle. All either of them had on were fatigue pants and boots.
Georgia stood frozen like a kid in a candy store as she took in every feature of Easton’s chest. She had felt all of him pressed up against her, more than once. But seeing it, seeing the sun rain down on him and the sweat glistening on every sharp, rigid edge of the muscles in his chest and back, was bringing heat to all the wrong places in her body. He had tattoos, some kind of tribal pattern on his upper arms that branched out into gothic wings or flames on the back of his shoulders. She’d been around enough ink to know it was high dollar work, and the piece had meaning, a story behind it.
He was kicking ass, and was fast as lightning. Being aggressive as hell and taking shot after shot, not giving Truman a chance to come up for air.
They must have been playing to a certain number of points. Because right as he ducked, spun, and jumped up to dunk a basket, even hung there for another second a
nd a half, half the guys groaned and the others cheered.
“Holy Hell,” she said to herself when she saw Easton tuck the ball against his side and bow his head to catch his breath. Her drug of choice was feet from her, glistening in the sun, begging to be touched, congratulated.
Those words must not have been silent, though, because everyone, including Easton, caught her staring with her lips slightly parted; she might have been drooling, she wasn’t sure.
Memphis saved her, though, when he yelled, “It’s not as aggressive as it looks,” in her direction.
She knew he wasn’t talking about Easton because she had felt that raw male aggression slam into her before. It was the game. She had to tell herself to look away from those haunted green eyes that were sucking her in.
She found her brother’s eyes. “I, uh, am I early?”
“No, we’re late. We were trying to settle who was doing clean up, and it’s not Easton,” Memphis said, throwing a towel at Truman.
Memphis came to Georgia’s side. “Give me five minutes to rinse off, lunch in ten.”
Five minutes is a long time, she thought. She knew what Easton could do in five minutes. Get her nice and bothered, no doubt. But he soared past Memphis inside, so that issue was off the table.
It only took Memphis four minutes to grab a shower. Georgia was counting. The small talk with the guys made her feel like an alien in a foreign land.
Somehow, Easton ended up on the opposite end of the table during lunch, but she could feel him, knew exactly where he was. At one point, she was almost sure she could smell him. He had showered, too, and now that spice-mixed-with-fire aroma that had haunted her every fantasy was wafting through the air.
She could tell the boys were on their best behavior and tried to make a few jokes to break the tension a bit. She got a few laughs, but they didn’t loosen up until the meal was over and they all scattered to do their own thing.
Georgia still had an hour to kill before she met Cynthia, but she didn’t know if she could handle being at the same address as Easton for that period of time. Every time she looked his way, she found his eyes, and if she didn’t he lifted his stare just in time to see her checking him out.