Chapter 14
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
“Cadee sure looks pretty with her hair catching the sunlight just right.”
Huck almost jumped out of his skin at Arlene’s voice so close to his ear.
He swiveled on his stool to see her standing behind him holding a half-full pot of coffee.
She glanced down at the cellphone he still clutched in his hand.
The photograph of Cadee he’d taken in Cam’s tree house filled the screen.
Arlene was wrong. Cadee didn’t just look pretty framed in the dappled sunlight coming through the branches surrounding Camden’s tree house. She looked stunningly beautiful. Like a dark-haired, magical woodland fairy.
And it hadn’t just been Cadee who’d been magical.
It had been the entire day.
Helping Cadee with the party and seeing how excited Camden got over the tree house made Huck feel important. Like he was needed.
It was a new experience for him. He had never felt needed by anyone.
And with good reason. He wasn’t a strong leader like Jaxon.
He wasn’t as tough and smart as Dawson. He wasn’t as confident and talented as Poppy.
He was just the charming jokester like his daddy who wasn’t particularly good at anything.
But the party had made him realize that he was good at things. He was good at cooking hot dogs, corralling kids, keeping bullies in line, building tree houses, and sleeping in that same tree house with his son and making him laugh until he cried with funny stories about his childhood.
When Huck had woken up on the floor of the tree house with Camden nestled against him, he’d started to believe that maybe he could be a good daddy.
And not just a good daddy, but also a good husband.
It was a crazy thought. Especially when he’d spent most of his life thinking he wasn’t good enough for Cadee—thinking that with his parents as role models there was no way in hell he knew how to be a good father and husband.
But now he realized that Rosie and Rory hadn’t been his role models. Jaxon and Dawson had been. They were the ones who stepped up to take care of him and Poppy. Even when they were kids themselves. They had protected him and made sure he had warm clothes and food to eat . . . just like Cadee.
Even if they had just been kids, Cadee had been a good role model for him too. She showed him what true love and caring meant.
In return, he’d ghosted her.
All because he had low self-esteem and couldn’t deal with his feelings.
He hadn’t lied when he’d told her he would never forget the night they spent in the treeboat. It had been the best night of his life. A night that had played out in his dreams over and over again.
It wasn’t about the sex. The sexual part of the night had been awkward and more than a little humiliating when he’d come only seconds after being inside her tight, sweet body.
No, the best part of the night had been getting to touch her and kiss her and release all the feelings he had bottled up inside him—all the love he’d been holding back because he didn’t think he was good enough.
The way she touched and kissed him back had made him feel good enough . . . until they woke the next morning and Cadee hadn’t looked at him with happiness and love shining in her pretty blue eyes. She’d looked at him with stunned confusion. Like she didn’t know how she’d gotten there.
Like she’d made the worst mistake of her life.
It had completely crushed his already fragile ego, and he’d run away when what he should have done was stay and talk things out.
But now he was able to put himself in her shoes and realized she’d had every right to feel stunned and confused.
She’d just lost her daddy and then had sex with her best friend.
If he had given her time to grieve and digest what had happened that night, maybe she would have realized she had deeper feelings for him too.
But he hadn’t. And now he wondered if it was too late. If she would ever give him a chance to love her like he wanted to love her. Love her like she deserved to be loved.
“Huck?”
Huck blinked out of his daydream to find Arlene looking at him with an expectant look.
“Umm . . . sorry,” he said. “What did you say?”
“Why do you have a picture of Cadee on your phone?”
Huck wanted to kick himself for mooning over the photograph in Grounds For Divorce while he waited for Camden and Cadee to come in for their Sunday morning donuts.
If he wanted to fix things between him and Cadee, he needed to take things slow.
And having the biggest gossips in Promise Springs spreading rumors about them wasn’t taking things slow.
Of course, neither was stalking her.
For the last week, he’d stopped by the ranch almost every day under the pretense of fixing things in the tree house he’d noticed needed fixing.
He’d spend thirty minutes sitting in the tree house twiddling his thumbs before searching Cadee out and following her around like a lost puppy begging for attention.
He needed to get a grip.
He lowered his cellphone and pinned on a smile. “Why wouldn’t I have a picture of Cadee on my phone? She’s one of my oldest friends.”
A frown settled on Arlene’s face as Adele yelled from behind the coffee machine. “I told you, Ar! Just because people have been gossiping about Huck spending so much time at the Stockton Ranch that doesn’t mean Huck has finally fallen for Cadee. Some women can just be friends with men.”
Ada came out of the kitchen with the bag of donuts Huck had ordered for Poppy. “Unfortunately, not us.” She set the bag on the counter in front of him. “Every time I tried to be friends with a man, I ended up in bed with him. And we all know sex screws up a good friendship.”
Sex had screwed up Cadee and Huck’s friendship, but he hoped they could figure out a way to have both.
Cadee still loved him. He could see it in her eyes whenever he caught her looking at him.
He’d thought it was just leftover friendship love .
. . until the porch kiss. He didn’t believe for a second she’d just kissed him to see what kissing a man with a mustache felt like.
She had wanted to kiss him. And the way she’d kissed him, like he was a double-dipped cone, still made him horny as hell.
If she could kiss him like that, maybe there was hope that their friendship could turn into something more.
Because he was through lying to himself.
He was head over heels in love with Cadee Stockton and had been ever since they were thirteen and she’d kissed him under the old oak tree behind the dancehall.
It had all been a fun lark to see if the tree held any magic.
It didn’t. The magic was in Cadee. Had always been in Cadee.
From the first day they had met, she had weaved a spell around him.
Now all he needed to do was figure out how to do the same to her.
“Mornin’, sheriff!”
The A-Sisters’ chorused greeting pulled Huck from his thoughts and had him glancing at the door Sheriff Gentry was stepping in. The sheriff pulled off his hat and nodded at the sisters and then Huck.
“Mornin’.”
Arlene flipped over one of the cups sitting in saucers on the counter and filled it with coffee. “You want your usual order of donuts, sheriff?”
Sheriff Gentry slipped onto the stool next to Huck and placed his hat on the counter. “No. Just an egg and plain toast today.” He patted his belly. “I’m trying to lose a little weight.”
Ada bit back a smile. “I’ll get that right out.” She headed back to the kitchen while Adele exchanged a look with Arlene as she took the coffeepot from her, then headed to the coffee counter.
“So . . . sheriff,” Arlene said as she wiped an invisible spot on the counter with her apron.
“Have you talked with Laura lately?” Laura was the sheriff’s estranged wife and Tully’s mama.
Tully had high hopes that her parents would get back together.
Arlene seemed to have those same hopes. Her eyes gleamed as she glanced at the sheriff.
“I hear she’s thinking about moving back to Promise Springs now that Tully is married and no doubt will be giving y’all some grandbabies soon. ”
Sheriff Gentry took a sip of his coffee. “Tully isn’t pregnant, if that’s what you’re fishing for? And as for Laurie’s plans, you’ll need to ask her.”
“Well, I might just have to do that. We’d all love for her to come back to town . . . as I’m sure you would.”
Sheriff Gentry scowled at Arlene’s retreating back. The man had one mean-assed scowl. Huck had always been nervous around the sheriff. And with good reason. But his love for Cadee and Camden overrode his nerves and he smiled at the sheriff.
“So how’s everything going? Catch any criminals lately?”
Sheriff Gentry didn’t seem to think his joke was funny. The scowl stayed in place as he took a sip of his coffee then directed his steady gaze at Huck.
“There’s something we need to talk about.”
The words had all Huck’s plans with Cadee splintering like weathered wood.
The sheriff knew. Somehow, he’d figured out Huck was responsible for robbing the gas station and was about to spill the beans in front of the A-Sisters.
Because even though Adele, Arlene, and Ada were busy making coffee, wiping down tables, and cooking the sheriff’s eggs, they were still listening.
And once they heard all the sordid details, they would be spread around town by nightfall.
Huck didn’t care about the townsfolk knowing. He cared about Jaxon’s disappointment when he found out. And Cadee’s. How would he explain robbing the gas station to them? How would he explain it to Camden?
His first instinct was to run. To make some stupid excuse and get the hell out of there . . . and Promise Springs. But running wouldn’t fix anything. And he wasn’t some scared kid anymore. He was an adult. He was a father.
“Yes, sir,” he said. “There is something we need to discuss.”
Sheriff Gentry nodded. “I guess Jaxon mentioned me looking for a good carpenter to make me a porch swing. Since you made the bar at Honky Tonk Heaven, I figured you wouldn’t have any trouble handling the job.”
Huck stared at him. “A porch swing? That’s what you wanted to discuss?”
The sheriff’s cheeks turned pink and he cleared his throat. “Maybe you could keep it down.”
But it was too late.
Arlene had stopped wiping off tables and was grinning like she was the one getting a swing. “You mean a porch swing that’s perfect for cuddlin’ with a special someone, sheriff?”
The sheriff shot her an annoyed look before he returned his attention to Huck. “I’d be willing to pay you extra if you could get it ready by Thanksgiving.”
“Thanksgiving?” Adele peeked around the coffee machine. “Hmm? I think that was when Tully mentioned Laura is coming back into town.”
Ada appeared in the pass-through to the kitchen, grinning as brightly as her sisters. “I believe you’re right, Adele.”
Sheriff Gentry blew out his breath. “Fine! Since it seems that a man can’t get a decent meal, or even a bland one, without being interrogated like he’s some fugitive from the law, I’ll tell you. I’m trying to get my wife back! Now are my egg and toast ready, Ada, or not?”
“Almost, sheriff.” She glanced at Huck. “What’s this about you making the bar at Honky Tonk Heaven? Did you really make that long beautiful mahogany bar all by yourself?”
Huck didn’t know why he blushed. Maybe because no one in town had ever complimented him. “Yes, but only because the bar Tully ordered got lost in shipment.”
“And a lucky thing too,” Arlene said. “I doubt it would have been as pretty as yours.” She glanced at her sisters. “Are y’all thinking what I’m thinking?”
Before Huck could blink, all three sisters turned to him and spoke at the same time. “He can make our new coffee bar!”
Huck stared at them. “A coffee bar?”
“Yes,” Arlene said. “We’ve been dreaming of having one of those rustic wooden coffee bars like they have in big city coffeeshops. But Leroy, who helped us renovate Daddy’s newspaper office into Grounds For Divorce, is more utilitarian than creative.”
Ada nodded. “Which is how we ended up with a laminate countertop that looks more like a diner than the chic coffeeshop we envisioned.” Huck wasn’t about to point it out, but Grounds For Divorce would need more than a rustic wood counter to make it chic.
“So would you make us one?” Adele asked. “We’d be willing to pay whatever you think is fair.”
Since the thought of making a coffee bar intrigued him, he nodded.
“Sure. I’ll be glad to make y’all whatever you need.
But I won’t be able to get it finished quickly.
” He still had to work nights at Honky Tonk Heaven, and he wanted to spend as much time as he could with Camden . . . and hopefully Cadee.
“That’s okay,” Ada said. “There’s no hurry.
And of course, you have to get the sheriff’s porch swing finished first.” She glanced at the sheriff with a twinkle in her eyes.
“I’ll get your breakfast right out, sheriff.
And I’ll put a little fruit and cottage cheese on the side that will fill you up but won’t add too many calories to your waistline. ”
“And I’ll get you some skim milk for your coffee, so you don’t have to use that fattening cream,” Adele said.
Arlene came up and patted the sheriff’s back. “Now don’t you worry, sheriff. With our help, there’s little doubt you’re going to lose weight and get your woman back.”
When she was gone, Sheriff Gentry sighed. “Seven divorces between them and they’re going to fix my marriage. Now if that isn’t scary, I don’t know what is.”
Huck would have laughed if his mind wasn’t preoccupied. The Stocktons didn’t have a swing on their front porch. While he was making one porch swing for cuddlin’, it wouldn’t be hard to make another.
If the sheriff could have a second-chance romance, why couldn’t Huck?