Chapter 10
Kitty had walked away.
The look on her face…That was a bad sign. One that tied his gut in a backwards buckaroo knot.
And he’d let her go. He had no right to kiss her, no right to tell her his feelings, not when he was still entangled with Maggie. But he’d been unable to hold his feelings inside. And there was that moment after he’d told her, after the shock of what he’d said wore off, when he could see longing in her deep brown eyes.
Beck knew his place in Kitty’s world. Her sisters came first.
And so, he didn’t press her. He didn’t talk about his declaration or what the future might bring. They met up at the agreed time in the morning and drove to the hospital without speaking. They broke Dotty out of the hospital around lunchtime and headed toward Atlanta, with Dotty filling in the conversational gap.
“I want to do so many things with you two when we get to Atlanta. High tea at Astor Court. The Botanical Gardens. They are lovely this time of year. The heat is bearable as long as you get there early. Oh, and we have to eat at The Hungry Peach.” Dotty had a long list of must-dos. “They have a peach cobbler cupcake that’s to die for.”
“We aren’t going to stay in town.” Kitty sounded reluctant to put an end to her grandmother’s wish list. “Beck needs to talk to Maggie.”
“But you’ll come back afterward,” Dotty insisted.
“No,” Kitty said gently. “Once I get my cell phone and purse back, I’m returning to New York.”
Dotty tsked. “You should never go anywhere without your purse.”
Kitty made a non-comital noise.
“By the way,” Dotty said, glancing around the truck. “Where is my purse?”
*
“This is it.” Kitty pointed to a gated driveway on Tybee Island, proud of the fact her hand didn’t shake. That didn’t mean her heart wasn’t trying to chisel a way out of her chest. There was so much she wanted to say to Beck, so much she wanted to know about him. And the details about how he’d met her father, who’d introduced him to Maggie.
But any relationship with him, even if Maggie dumped him, was out of the question.
The large, two story colonial was set back from the road behind dense trees and shrubbery. Further down the road was the Robertson enclave. Thankfully, it wasn’t July. Most likely, the only people inside the Summer house would be Summers.
They’d left Dotty with Great Aunt Rebecca in Atlanta and driven to Tybee Island in silence. Kitty had plenty of time to come up with a strategy. That didn’t mean she had any idea what awaited them.
Kitty rattled off a code that Beck entered into the keypad and the gate swung open.
“They didn’t lock us out,” Kitty said, unable to contain her relief.
Beck stopped the truck inside the gate. “You don’t have to come inside. I’ll talk to Maggie alone.” It was dark, but the dashboard illuminated the determined set to his jaw.
“Not happening.” Kitty met his gaze for the first time that day. “I’ll go in first. You wait in the truck for fifteen minutes, then go around the house and to the boat dock. I’ll have Maggie meet you there.”
“I’m not going to hide from your family.” Whatever soft words he’d spoken to her last night had stayed at the hotel in Florida. Jilted-at-the-altar Beck was back.
“I’m not worried about what my family will say to you. I’m worried that Maggie will have to listen to it.”
After a moment, he nodded and drove to the house.
“Fifteen minutes.” Kitty pushed the passenger door open when he’d parked. She drew a breath past the stabbing pain in her heart and said the words she should have said last night. “I want you to think about the commitment you made to her. People have doubts in relationships all the time, but they reassess and they move forward, stronger than before.”
“What are you saying?” His question had an edge.
“That I can’t let you love me, Beck.” Her chest contracted, making it hard to draw enough breath to finish this. “That whatever you think you saw in me is just a reflection of the kind, beautiful person my sister is. And that those feelings you think you have for me? They’re really for Maggie.” She blinked back tears, hoping he couldn’t see them in the dark. “Maybe you won’t love each other with the passion that sweeps two people off their feet, but you can be good together.”
“Kitty–”
“You promised to marry her, Beck.” Kitty made to swing the door shut.
“I’m not a candy bar someone called dibs on.” Beck had more steel in his voice than patients with Harrington rods in their spines. “For the love of Mike, Kitty. Why do you always have to put yourself second?”
“Ask yourself what your grandfather would do.” Kitty took a half-step back. “Think really hard about that over the next fifteen minutes.” She slammed the door.
It sounded like he pounded the dashboard.
Good. Mission accomplished. Beck was angry with her.
Kitty pushed through the door to the house. It opened on silent hinges to white pine floors and a white paneled hallway. The soft blue and sand colors were meant to soothe. They had no effect on Kitty.
“Oh, honey.” Kitty’s mother must have heard the car door slam. Her brown hair was in a limp bob. She wore white leggings and a white cable-knit sweater that reached mid-thigh. She hurried to hug her daughter. “We were so worried about you. How is Mama Summer?”
“She’s with Great Aunt Rebecca and under concussion watch for another few days.” Although Kitty suspected she’d be fine. “You aren’t mad at me.”
“I could never be mad at one of my girls.” Her smile was dreamy and her eyes dilated. Mr. Anti-Anxiety had come to call.
“The fallen daughter returns.” Tim Summer leaned against the doorframe to his study and stared at Kitty before taking a sip of red wine. “I’m almost glad you ruined your sister’s life.”
Mom drifted to the living room across the hall.
For once, Kitty was glad her mother had no fight in her. Kitty had enough fight for two people. It raced around her veins and put barbs in her demand. “When did you offer Beck the horse?”
“What does it matter? He won’t get it now.” Dad retreated to his office and sat behind a massive walnut desk.
Kitty followed him inside and leaned on the back of a leather chair. “Did you dangle it in front of him as a way to get him to date Maggie?” It had occurred to her on the drive up today that Maggie would never have met Beck on her own. She hadn’t wanted to challenge Beck on this point. But Dad? Oh, yeah.
On his blotter, his cell phone lit up with a photo. A redhead with pouty lips who didn’t look to be older than Kitty. Her father paused to look at the screen before raising his smiling face back to her. “They made sense, you know. A horse breeder and a vet.” He rested his thumb and forefinger on the phone.
Hurt threatened to take over. Make her shout. Make her take his cell phone and fling it across the room. His women were his toys. She wouldn’t let his daughters be his toys. “They made sense like you and Mom made sense? A pretty accountant and a millionaire?”
“He made it known he was looking for an investor and a mare.” He sat back in his chair, but not far enough that he couldn’t see his phone display if it lit up again. “I invited him to a party. You have to admit, for a while there Maggie was really turning out to be normal.”
“Maggie…” Kitty choked on her sister’s name. “Why can’t you love us for who we are?”
He narrowed his eyes and downed the rest of his wine. “It used to gall me that our friends thought you were perfect. I never had to bail you out of jail. I never had to forbid you from seeing the wrong sort of boy. You never needed me.”
“Mom needed you,” she said softly. “She still does.”
He waved a hand. “I’m a businessman. I don’t deal in lost causes. I’m assuming you got rid of the horseman?”
“No.”
There was shock in his brown eyes, so like her own and yet, so different. “Why not?”
“Because Maggie deserves the best.” Kitty left him to his cell phone.
She found Maggie standing on the back porch. There was a red streak in her brown hair. She wore Army boots, black leggings and a zebra striped blouse. Maggie was back. “You’re a day late.” And mad at Kitty if her tone was any indication.
The threat of tears and the smell of the ocean filled Kitty’s nose. “Grandma Dotty…” She didn’t want to blame every delay on her grandmother. “Beck tried to catch you at the airport and there was a fender bender with a shuttle bus. Then yesterday Grandma bumped her head. He tried to get here as soon as he could.”
Maggie’s gaze was cool and assessing. “You kissed my fiancé.”
“He’s a good man, Maggie.” But Kitty couldn’t look at her sister when she said it. Instead, she stared out at the dark horizon and the ocean.
“He was only marrying me for a horse.” There was bravado in her tone.
“I’m pretty sure that was part of Beck’s decision process.” Kitty wasn’t going to deny it. “But he loves you.”
Maggie hugged a porch post, half the defiant Maggie of old, half the fragile woman whose wedding had been ruined.
“I know you have doubts,” Kitty said evenly, thinking about job prospects in Alaska. “You didn’t want to admit them before the wedding. But I’m here to tell you, if you’re not sure, it’s okay. But if you’re ready to settle down, he’s a great guy.”
“So you keep saying.” Maggie twirled a lock of red hair and continued to scrutinize Kitty.
Kitty sighed and sat in a white rocker, not daring to remember the look of love in Beck’s eyes. “And yet, you don’t believe me.”
“Maybe because he kissed you back.”
Kitty flinched at the hurt in Maggie’s voice. “Chalk it up to his nerves.”
“You ruined my wedding.” Maggie’s face contorted, but in anger, not a battle against tears. “Everyone’s talking about it.”
That sounded like Dad, not Maggie. “Since when did you care what people think?”
Maggie looked away.
“I ruined a wedding, Maggie,” Kitty said softly. “Not your wedding. That dress…That church…I bet your pictures even look like Mom and Dad’s wedding. What were you thinking?”
“They do,” Maggie said miserably. She came to sit in the rocker next to Kitty’s.
“What happened to the Maggie Summer who wore Army boots beneath her debutante gown?” Kitty took her hand and squeezed. “What happened to the Maggie Summer who couldn’t stand country club stiffs?”
“You left me.” Maggie’s chin went up. “You all did. You moved on with your lives. And Dad…We argued…And afterward, I overheard him tell Mom that he wished I was more like you.” She sagged in the rocker. “So I thought I’d give him what he wanted. You know, be careful what you wish for, and all that. Except, just like that, I landed a normal, decent guy and became Dad’s favorite daughter.”
“What do you want to do?” Kitty tried to keep her voice neutral and supportive. When her sister remained silent, she urged, “Take him back. He’ll love you in a cotton dress or camo sweats.” Or Kitty would crucify him.
Maggie gripped the arms of the rocker.
“He’s waiting out by the driveway. He’s going to meet you in the boathouse so you can talk in private.” Kitty stood and opened her arms. “Come here.”
Maggie stood, accepting her hug, but didn’t hug her back. “You’re leaving?”
“You don’t need the woman who ruined a wedding hanging around the house.” Kitty tugged on her Big Al T-shirt. “As soon as I get Grandma’s purse and my things, I’m outta here.” She didn’t miss the look of relief in Maggie’s eyes. There were extra cars in the garage. “I can backtrack to Atlanta and spend the night at Great Aunt Rebecca’s with Grandma.”
“You really think I should take him back?”
Kitty’s heart panged a protest. “I think you should do what your heart says is right.” Kitty turned to go, and then hesitated at the door. She looked back at her sister. “Just…Don’t hurt him.”
*
A figure was huddled at the end of the dock. For a moment, Beck thought it was Kitty.
His heart eased. Maggie didn’t want him. He’d convince Kitty they had a future together. He’d tell her he’d take it slow.
Beck hurried forward, only to stop when the figure turned, and a face came into focus–Maggie’s. His soles flattened on the dock. “I’m sorry.”
Maggie still wanted him. His breath caught in his throat.
His fiancée stomped to her feet in clunky boots and crossed her arms over her chest. Her eyes were heavily lined and there was a mutinous set to her mouth. She looked nothing like the sweet young woman he’d asked to marry him.
Honor raged against love. He had to stand and hear her out. Kitty was right. He had to stand by his commitment. But simultaneously, he wondered if Kitty was near. If she was listening. If her chest felt as hollow as his.
Maggie marched toward him. “Do you remember the day we met?”
He nodded, bracing himself for whatever Maggie was going to dish out.
She stopped a few feet away, so familiar, yet so different in both appearance and attitude. “My dad was hosting a big house party. He’d invited all kinds of single men. Most of them were like Dad. Corporate suits, interested in making the right connections and the right impressions. But not you.”
Beck cleared his throat. “To be honest, I was there to find an investor.”
“And Dad conveniently appeared.” Maggie waved his comment aside. “I knew you were different. You smelled like hay, not expensive cologne. You listened when people spoke to you, without checking your phone or scoping out the room to find someone better to network with.”
“We talked on the porch stairs for hours.” He’d been relieved, because talking to Maggie took the pressure off trying to ask people for money.
“You were nice. And you thought I fit in.” Her hands speared through her hair.
Was that a glint of red?
“I haven’t been honest with you.” Defiance leaked from her voice, and then disappeared altogether. “Do you know why it always takes me so long to get dressed?”
He shook his head, feeling the pitch of the waves rock the dock beneath his feet.
“Because I can’t stand the clothes you seem to like. I try stuff on. I take it off. I try something else. I mean…”
“You’re not you when you’re with me.”
“No.” She sounded as relieved as he felt. “I was trying to be…well…I was trying to be Kitty.”
Who Beck was now convinced he loved with an intensity as deep and sudden as a Florida thunderstorm. “You don’t want to marry me,” Beck said, trying to sound as if he wasn’t about to drop to his knees and thank her.
She shook her head, stepping closer. “Are you heartbroken?”
“It would be impolite to say no.” He tried to wear his poker face, not wanting to hurt her.
She wrapped her arms around his neck in a gentle hug, and laid her head on his shoulder. “I know I shouldn’t say this. I know I might regret it someday, but…”
*
Kitty hadn’t slept a wink on Great Aunt Rebecca’s chintz sofa. Between a broken heart, the overly-happy birds and cicadas, she’d been up since a rooster should have been crowing.
There was a knock on the front door. It wasn’t even five a.m.
Kitty padded to the door in a tank top and blue checked boxers. It felt good to wear her own clothes again. She turned on the foyer light and opened the door, not worrying about crime since Great Aunt Rebecca had a condo in a gated retirement community.
A man lurked in the shadows just outside of the porch light.
Kitty’s heart banged into overdrive before the man stepped into the light. “Beck? What are you doing here?” She didn’t give him a chance to answer. “Oh, for heaven’s sake. Did you ruin things with Maggie? If you dumped her, I never want to see you again.” Despite the strongest urge to wrap her arms around him.
“No.” He stood in the doorway, staring at her the way he had in the restaurant hotel, as if he couldn’t live without her. “She dumped me.”
“You were honest with her, weren’t you?” Maggie tossed her arms and circled back to the living room, turning on lights as she passed. “Why did you have to tell her anything? You know you’ll forget me once you get back to the rhythm of your life.” That thought had torn her apart all night.
“Kitty–”
“No. I can’t talk to you until I’ve had coffee. And a shower.” Or maybe after a shower while she had coffee. “I need to figure this out. Where’s Maggie?”
“Kitty.” Beck hooked her arm and gently guided her to a seat on the couch on the blanket. “Maggie doesn’t want to see you–”
“Oh?” Kitty thought she might cry.
“–or anyone else in the family.” He smoothed back her hair. “I dropped her off at the airport.”
“But…Was she angry? Was she crying?”
His arms came around her tenderly. “After years of pretending to be someone she wasn’t, Maggie was relieved. She loves me about as much as I love her. She just wants time to find herself.”
“Where?”
“She didn’t want anyone to know.”
Kitty tried to shift out of Beck’s arms, because she still couldn’t be with him. It would hurt Maggie. “Thank you for telling me.”
“What is your prom date doing here so early in the morning?” Dotty appeared in the doorway. She wore a pink silk kimono. Had a bad case of bed-head and a pillow crease in her cheek.
“He’s trying to profess his deep love and undying affection to Kitty.” Beck smile was as sweet as a newborn’s face. “If she’ll let me get a word in edgewise.”
For once, Kitty had no words.
“That seems inappropriate.” Dotty dropped into a chair. “Given you’re in high school. How many dates have you been on?”
“Three,” he said without hesitation. “Make that four because I’m here to take her to breakfast.”
“Hey.” Dotty sat up taller. “Nice.”
“Beck, get out.” Kitty could barely get the words past her thick throat. She pushed him away. “I can’t do this to Maggie.”
Beck didn’t budge. “Do you know what Maggie said to me after she dumped me?”
Kitty cringed. “I don’t want to know…do I?” Was it painful? Could Maggie find it in her heart to forgive her?
Beck brushed the backs of his fingers over her cheek. “She said, ‘Don’t hurt her.’”
“Don’t…” The same words Kitty had said to Maggie when she left. She didn’t dare breathe or look at Beck or believe it. “She gave us her blessing?”
Beck nodded.
Kitty should have felt better. She should have felt as if she was blossoming like a rose beneath his gaze. But she didn’t, because she’d never been in love before. There were too many pitfalls. Too many places for her to screw this up. Or Beck–
“Don’t even think I’d ever stray,” Beck said, reading her mind. “What I feel for you won’t let me look at another woman. In those fifteen minutes you gave me to think, I decided I’d listen to whatever Maggie had to say, but I’d have to tell her I couldn’t marry her. I’d have to tell her I didn’t love her the way she deserved to be loved. I may be a good man, but I’m not the man that could make her happy.”
“I should warn you.” Dotty interrupted Beck’s beautiful speech. “Summer girls are a handful. Your affection might be tested.”
Kitty rolled her eyes, feeling the tension ebb, feeling the confidence in she and Beck and what they could be together fill up the broken, hollow places inside of her.
“Thunderstorms, fender-benders, gator close calls. This Summer girl has already been challenging.” Beck stood, claimed Kitty’s hands, and brought her to her feet. “I didn’t follow my intuition with Maggie. Correction…” He tapped his chest. “I didn’t follow my heart. I viewed her with a logical lens. Checks and balances. Pluses and minuses.”
“Men,” Dotty huffed.
Kitty was content to let him continue.
“But with you…Every breath, every heartbeat, every instinct I have is telling me to be with you.” He raised her hand and kissed the back of it. “We can take it slow. We can go at a traditional pace. Dates. Meeting the parents.” He tilted his head from side to side. “Re-meeting the parents. But I know for certain I want you in my life. If we don’t mess this up, this could be the deep kind of love your grandparents had. Just tell me–”
Kitty was done listening. She tugged his lips to hers and kissed him.
THE END
Keep Reading for Your Special Thank You (Free Reads)
And a Sneak Peek at Taste of Tara (the next sweet romance in Magnolias & Moonshine)