Raising Ricky appealed to him more than anything else about living with Mary. He certainly didn’t care for her parents. They still doted on their only daughter, treated her as though she was barely sixteen. But hey, lots of people didn’t like their in-laws. He could tolerate having Gene and Barb over for various holidays. If only he could see himself feeling anxious to tell Mary about his day. If only he could see himself wanting to make love to her over and over again, the way he wanted to make love to Rebecca….
Besides, if he didn’t want to hold Mary now, didn’t even really want to see her, how was marriage going to change that?
It’s just too soon. I’m trying to force it when I need to give myself time. We’ll fall in love eventually, and then we’ll marry and everyone will be happy.
They were perfect for each other. Everyone said so, even his own parents.
Golden Boy marries Golden Girl… Rebecca’s words niggled at the back of his mind, but he pushed them away. Now that he’d talked himself into proposing to Mary—eventually—he couldn’t see any reason to avoid her tonight. He might as well go in, he decided. He had nothing better to do.
The snap of a twig drew his attention to the back of the building. Someone stood in the shadows beyond the Honky Tonk’s floodlights, at the edge of the dirt and gravel that comprised the bar’s overflow lot. Someone who seemed sort of familiar…
He closed the Suburban’s door and sauntered closer, but by the time he reached the walkway, whoever was lurking behind the bar had disappeared into the darkness. He wondered where he or she had gone but didn’t think much about it until he rounded the corner of the building and nearly ran into Booker Robinson coming out the front entrance.
They both stepped back and regarded each other warily. “Where did she go?” Booker asked, his voice clipped.
“Who?” Josh asked.
“Rebecca.”
Immediately Josh thought of the person behind the building, remembered the flicker of recognition he’d experienced and knew it had to be her. But he didn’t want to give her location away before finding out what had driven her into the cold. “I don’t know. Why? What’s wrong?”
Booker slanted him a withering glare. “Why don’t you ask your girlfriend?”
“Did Mary say something to her?” he asked, alarmed to think that she might have involved herself. He and Rebecca had enough difficulty keeping peace between them without the interference of others.
Booker didn’t answer. He was too busy scanning the area. Then he brushed past, straddled his bike and roared out of the lot.
Josh let him go. He needed to talk to Rebecca, had wrestled with himself over calling her ever since she’d set fire to his truck, and figured now was as good a time as any. At least he knew they’d be alone. For a while, at least.
Shoving his hands in the pockets of his coat, he walked to the back edge of the building. There he leaned against the corner and searched the darkness until he made out the shape of someone sitting on a fallen log in the frosty grass.
“Booker’s looking for you,” he said. He knew his voice had carried across the distance, but he received no answer.
“Come on, Rebecca. I know you’re there.”
“Maybe I want to be alone,” she said.
If she didn’t want to be with Booker, she sure as hell wouldn’t want to be with him, especially after everything that had happened. But Josh couldn’t bring himself to leave. He had something he wanted to say, something he hoped would finally erase the image of tears streaming down her face.
“I want to talk,” he said.
“We don’t have anything to say to each other. I’ll make my first payment at the end of the month.”
“This isn’t about the money.”
“Then what?”
He crossed the gravel lot and lowered himself onto the log, careful not to sit too close for fear he’d chase her off. “Bit dark for those, don’t you think?” he said when he saw she was wearing sunglasses.
She shrugged.
“Mary told me about Buddy,” he said. “I hope you know I never planned for that to happen.”
“That’s exactly what you wanted,” she said. “Why else would you have called him?”
That was a good question. One Josh couldn’t answer simply. He hadn’t wanted to hurt her. He knew that much. He’d just wanted to…what? What could he possibly have hoped to achieve?
“I didn’t think it would go that far,” he said, resting his elbows on his knees.
“Well, it did. And now you can gloat.”
“I’m not gloating.” Truth be told, he felt lousy, deluged by a jumble of emotions he was half-afraid to name. Guilt played a part, of course, for causing Rebecca so much pain. But he envied Buddy, too. After only a few short months, Buddy had been able to capture Rebecca’s heart—all of it, judging by how upset she seemed over the breakup. He, on the other hand, hadn’t been able to garner anything more than her dislike, and that was after twenty-some years. Even when they weren’t fighting, even when he tried the charm that generally worked on other women, she wanted nothing to do with him.
The only exception was that night almost fifteen months ago. If not for those few minutes in her arms, he probably wouldn’t care so much. He wouldn’t know what he was missing, would never have dared hope he could breach her defenses. But now Rebecca was all he thought about, and it angered him that he cared, that he had to talk himself into seeing Mary, that he had to rely on the expectation of coaching Ricky to make marrying her palatable.
Picking up a smooth, round rock, he tossed it into the trees. “I want to call another truce,” he said.
“There’s no need. I’m not going to do anything to you. You can go ahead and move on with your life and never think of me again.”
How he wished it could be that easy. He’d tried putting her out of his mind, but no amount of effort seemed to make that possible. Thoughts of her came to him at the damnedest moments—like when he was trying to make love to Mary.
“Then what about being friends?”
“That didn’t work out so well the last time.”
He tossed another rock and listened to it bounce along the ground until it came to a skittering halt. “Well, whether you agree to be friends or not, I don’t want any money for the truck. I started the fight, I’ll accept the loss.”
Rebecca remained still and silent for so long, Josh turned to see if she’d somehow slipped away into the trees. The rustling of his coat as he moved was the only noise, besides the music drifting toward them from the Honky Tonk. But she was still there, hugging herself for warmth and staring out across the parking lot.