CHAPTER 29
BLAIRE
I t was the hottest day we’d had since I’d been back, and I almost forgot how hot Tennessee could get as spring faded into summer.
The end of spring also meant the end of strawberry season, but there was still so much work to do around the farm and for our new jam business.
Even though my crazy grandmother swears it’s all mine.
Under our booth tent, a hand-painted banner read June’s Jams in pink script, ringed with strawberries, cherries, and raspberries and little green ribbons. Ruby helped me make it, and I couldn’t help grinning at all the little smiley faces she’d added to the fruit.
Sweat trickled down the back of my neck as I stared out at the fairgrounds, but it wasn’t just the heat that made me fidget. I shifted on my feet, leaning my hip against the booth while June handed a customer her change.
My body still thrummed with the memory of last night.
I couldn’t stop thinking about Colt’s hands on me or his voice when he said he’d thought about me every day since I’d been gone.
Last night hadn’t felt casual, not like the stolen hours when we pretended it was only heat, but that was the problem with Colt.
Even when I needed things simple, even when we both swore it would be, his touch always felt like a promise neither of us had the right to make.
Because even when I told myself I no longer loved Colt Calloway, my heart beat like a liar the moment he touched me.
The hope that filled me at the possibility was a physical ache beneath my ribs, and it scared me more than anything else. With every brush of his skin against mine, the careful boundaries I had between desire and good sense crumbled a little more.
I smoothed a June’s Jams sticker over one of the kraft bags and straightened the ribbon. The fairground smelled exactly like it did when I was a child, with sugar spun into cotton candy and funnel cakes frying a few booths away from us.
For years, Willow Grove’s Annual Spring Fair had been our ritual.
Mama would braid my hair tight so it didn’t tangle in the Tilt-A-Whirl.
June would bring extra napkins in her purse for when we finally made it to the funnel cake, and we’d laugh as the three of us ran all over the place, discovering what was next.
Later came summers with the boys, all of us stumbling off the Graviton we’d ridden three times in a row and laughing when Hunter threw up in a trash can.
Then there was that last summer, when Colt took me by the hand and led me behind the Ferris wheel.
That damn wheel kept turning like nothing had changed, and one glance at it and I could taste the sticky sweetness of caramel apples mingling with his mouth on mine all over again.
A steady stream of familiar faces stopped by our booth, each one armed with similar questions.
“How are you, darlin’?” “Are you home for good?” “June wouldn’t let you name her jams after you?
” Their voices blended together after a while, a chorus of curiosity I deflected with warm smiles and vague answers.
All the while, June studied me from behind her cash box, her eyes not missing a thing.
Only Mrs. Lee brought up Colt. She used to run a small boutique on Main before she retired, and now she spent her time gossiping at the beauty shop and playing bingo with June.
Her eyes lit up when she mentioned our “unfortunate” water leak and how I’d landed myself under the same roof as “Willow Grove’s most eligible cowboy. ”
I laughed. “Only temporarily. Repairs are underway, and we should be back at the farmhouse in a couple weeks.”
My cheeks burned, but I steered the conversation to Ruby instead, keeping my voice light as I talked about her. Mrs. Lee patted my hand before she winked at June and tottered off with a large bag stamped with our new logo.
June’s eyes cut to me, and she didn’t bother with the polite smiles everyone else had offered all day. “You’re not fooling me, sugar.”
I looked up at her nervously. “What do you mean?”
June leaned across the table, closing the cash box with a decisive click, giving me that look she reserved for when she already knew the answer and wanted to see if I’d lie.
“You’ve been dreamy-eyed all day, and you almost jumped out of your skin when Mrs. Lee brought up Colt’s name.
Anyone with half a brain can see you’ve been knocking boots with a certain Calloway who moves like he was born in a saddle.
” She wiggled her eyebrows, and I couldn’t help the laugh that escaped me.
“June!” I glanced nervously at the customer approaching our booth.
But she kept right on going. “Do you know how many years I’ve watched that man lose his sense over you, Blaire? I watched it when y’all were kids, and I’m watching it all over again.”
“There’s nothing going on,” I lied, but heat crawled up my neck and my fingers kept fidgeting with the red-and-white checkered tablecloth, brushing away invisible crumbs. “He has Ruby. My life’s a mess, and?—”
“And he could help you fix it if you gave him half a chance,” she huffed. “If I were your age, I’d climb him like the last ladder out of hell.”
“June Wilma Cates!” I hissed through clenched teeth, but my scandalized tone betrayed me by the laughter bubbling up my throat.
“Blaire Wilma Monroe!” she mimicked, hands on her hips. “These old eyes still work just fine, and they see exactly how that man watches you.”
My smile vanished.
“We’re just having fun,” I protested, but the only thing going through my head was lie, lie, lie .
“Sure, sugar.” June’s eyebrows arched knowingly.
“And I suppose that’s why you’ve both spent the last ten years looking like heartbroken fools.
I’m sure y’all can just bump uglies, and there won’t be a single feeling involved.
” She let out a dramatic sigh and shook her head.
“Lord, you two can pretend all you want, but bodies don’t lie, even when mouths do. ”
I tried to focus on arranging the rows of strawberry preserves and treats, but her words clung to the inside of my skull, sticky as sap. My body sure as hell hadn’t lied last night.
June watched me before she turned her gaze to a man browsing jams only a few feet away. “You’ve loved that boy your whole damn life,” she said, softer now, picking up a basket of berries and straightening it with unnecessary care. “I don’t think you’ll ever stop loving him.”
The words hung between us, and I didn’t have the guts to answer her.
But I could feel every syllable sink straight into my rib cage.
If we’d been alone, maybe I’d have confessed.
Maybe I’d have told her how scared I was that she was right, that there’d never be anyone else for me.
That there never had been, never would be.
But the fair was bustling with nosy neighbors and customers, and I bit my tongue against the truth.
I smiled at a woman who asked about prices while my heart hammered traitorously in my chest. My eyes betrayed me every few seconds, scanning the fairgrounds for him even as I silently scolded myself for looking.
I didn’t want to need him. I shouldn’t want to need him.
Yet there I was, counting the seconds between each desperate glance toward the crowd.
This thing between us was supposed to be simple, but nothing about loving Colt had ever been. The first time he kissed me, I’d been barely seventeen years old and knew in my marrow there’d never be another person who could make me feel like that again, and I’d resented him for it.
Because Colt owned a piece of me I could never take back, no matter how hard I tried.
The way Grant had touched me felt like static compared to the way Colt could burn me right through my skin, but at least with Grant I’d been able to breathe, to think.
Even after all the years I’d spent building a careful, grown-up life that should have erased Colt, I caught myself ordering pancakes at the country club with strawberries and honey drizzled on top, the way he ate his.
Then hated myself for the habit I couldn’t break.
The scent of freshly cut grass would transport me to those July nights we spent out by the lake staring at the sky as we both danced around our feelings for the other—nights I’d spent trying to forget.
I’d convinced myself I could handle it now, that I was immune to Colt Calloway, but that was a stupid, dangerous lie.
Tonight was supposed to be easy. Just me selling strawberries at a fair booth like I’d done dozens of times before.
But my skin was electric with anticipation as my eyes frantically scanned the fairground for any glimpse of him.
I told myself I was looking for Ruby, due at our booth any minute, but that lie tasted bitter on my tongue.
Every cowboy hat in the distance made my breath catch, and every broad-shouldered silhouette sent heat flooding through me.
There were countless cowboys roaming around, but none with his unmistakable swagger. I’d know him anywhere, and that was the problem. I couldn’t stop looking, couldn’t stop wanting, couldn’t stop the flutter in my stomach every time I thought I spotted him.
“Blaire Monroe? Well, I’ll be damned.”
I turned toward the sound, nearly dropping a pint of berries as I blinked up at the man in front of me.
“Danny Watson?”
He’d been a year ahead of Colt, McCoy, and me in school, and he was known back then for being the best running back in three counties.
At our graduation party, he’d danced on Colt’s tailgate in nothing but boxers and cowboy boots as he sang a drunken rendition of “All My Ex’s Live in Texas.
” But he was all grown up now. He’d traded in his shaggy blond hair for a short fade and a sharp jaw.
“Damn, it’s really you.” He smiled. “Heard you were back in town, but didn’t believe it.”
“It’s me,” I said with a shrug.