Chapter Eighteen
Not waiting for Colt to come around and open her door, Holly pushed it open and stepped out onto the blacktop, staring at Scott’s daddy’s house. A massive lump settled in her stomach, akin to how she’d felt a lot of Saturdays waiting for her daddy to show up . . . or not.
Now that she’d almost killed any promise the night had, she still had to go in there.
At the hood, Colt gave her his “really?” look, mouth tight, one brow up, and she wrinkled her nose at him. This was not a normal date night, so he could just put those cotillion manners of his away.
She took a step toward him and winced. These shoes had been a mistake, too. They looked great with the skirt in her mirror, gave her a kickass attitude, but how on earth did Caitlin walk in these things all the time?
And she didn’t have the option of taking them off and walking barefoot on the grass here anymore. Mr. Ben’s home no longer counted as her second home, so making herself comfortable like she lived here would only be weird.
Swallowing a frustrated scream, she tucked her hand through Colt’s arm, mentally cursing her fashion choices all over again when her heels sank in the thick grass. She didn’t have Caitlin’s dancer-like grace, doomed to face-plant or break an ankle before the night was done.
The soft ground of a mole trail sucked her heel further down, and she clutched Colt harder, trying to stay upright.
Smothering a growl, she brushed her hair from her face.
She hadn’t even seen that, since Andrea had strung up like one set of lights so dark shrouded most of the yard.
Tick and Mackey lived to give her a fit about her brighter-than-Hallmark lighting, but the festivity served a purpose.
The noise was subdued, too, quiet chatter, the occasional laugh, blended with some kind of instrumental jazz that might be Christmas music. Closing her eyes while Colt reached for the gate, Holly mentally chanted her newest mantra over and over – this wasn’t her party.
And she would not cry.
Colt curved his hand over her butt in a gentle nudge forward. His whisper rumbled against her ear. “Your face is saying it for you.”
She glanced at him over her shoulder, lowering her voice to the quietest murmur possible. “It’s awful.”
In other circumstances, maybe not so much, but this sparse, trying-to-be-elegant farce wasn’t a celebration to kick off the holiday season.
This was . . . who knew what this was, with trays of spindly canapes set against white cloths, a few strands of lights, and servers clad in austere white and black.
Servers.
She’d actually hired a mediocre caterer and traditional servers.
Oh, this was bad . . . and Holly had worn the wrong shoes.
“Holly, you’re here.” Oh, it got worse because that was Andrea approaching, in sleek black pants and blouse, her mouth set in what was probably supposed to be a smile, but more closely resembled a feral grimace. “Hello.”
“Hey.” Holly controlled her cringe as Andrea leaned in to blow an air-kiss on her cheek. She curled her fingers about Colt’s arm, half-turning into him. “You remember Colt Calvert? Colt, Andrea Yates, Scott’s partner.”
She didn’t choke on the word or its layers, from law partner to life partner, and that was growth for sure.
“Good to see you again.” Colt extended a hand, and Andrea held on for a moment, examining his face.
“Yes, it is.” Andrea gestured toward the tall tables scattered about, white cloths gathered with gold ribbons. “Your mother did the floral arrangements. She’s very talented.”
“She is. I’ll tell her you liked them.” Colt spread his hand at the small of Holly’s back, then glanced behind them at Kathleen and Tom McMillan. “We should move on so you can greet your guests. Excuse us.”
A few awkward steps onto the grass, Holly released the breath she’d held. “Oh, I might just love you for that.”
His startled gaze jerked to her face before his mouth firmed. “Yeah. You’re welcome.”
She pinched him. “Don’t be a jerk.”
“Hey.” He caught her fingers. She expected a retaliatory pinch — instead he lifted her hand and dropped a kiss in her palm, the whispery contact shivering up her arm.
Curling her hand to preserve the heat of his mouth against her skin, she stared up at him, at the enigmatic light in his eyes.
The night narrowed around them, and she moistened her upper lip with the tip of her tongue.
A different light flared in his gaze, and he glanced away on a rough laugh, rubbing a hand across his jaw. “I probably shouldn’t kiss you for real here.”
“Probably not.” The prospect intrigued, but they already drew curious appraisal, simply being together here. She surveyed the crowd, heart lightening when she spotted Tick and Caitlin a few feet from the food table, each holding a clear plastic cup, Tick with a plate in hand.
Holly brushed a hand over Colt’s arm. “Let’s say hello.”
His gaze tracked her line of sight, a cringe traveling through his body before he straightened. He scuffed a hand over his nape.
“We don’t have to hang out.” She stroked the tense line of his arm. “But we should speak.”
“Yeah.” He made another pass over his neck and exhaled. His throat moved with a swallow. “Let’s go.”
Holding onto his arm made navigating the thick turf in heels safer. Despite the tension, merely seeing Tick sent glee bubbling through her. He remained one of her dearests, and she missed him.
“Hey, you.” She caught the flare of surprise on his face before she threw her arms about his neck. Caitlin snagged the plate he held, and he wrapped an arm across Holly’s back in a hug. Joy fizzing in her, she leaned up to kiss his cheek.
“Hey.” Grinning, he chucked her chin, and she smiled so wide her cheeks hurt.
Caitlin waited, plate in one hand, her drink in the other, her normal polished self in a cashmere sweater and dark jeans paired with low-heeled boots perfect for tramping about Scott’s backyard.
Okay, so she’d become one of Holly’s favorites, too – how could she not when she made Lamar as happy as he was?
“Caitlin, hey.” Disentangling herself from Tick’s embrace, she wound a hug around Caitlin. Tick lifted their shared plate from Caitlin’s palm. What did he think, that Holly would send it flying? Well, okay, grace wasn’t her middle name, but still.
If those awful canapés hit the ground, the loss wouldn’t be great.
“Hi.” With her free hand, Caitlin brushed dark hair behind her ear, incisive green gaze skimming over Tick and Colt and back again.
Behind Holly, the cousins exchanged a greeting that was no more than an acknowledgement of one another’s names.
Holly rolled her eyes. Okay, she got it – they were both hurt, but she was ready to knock their heads together and make them move on.
Stepping back to link her arm with Colt’s, she studied the plate Tick held – roasted pecans, pimiento cheese, a few crackers, tortilla rollups from the freezer section at Sam’s. Really? “We might have made a mistake by not eating leftovers at your mama’s.”
“It’s fine.” He covered her hand on his arm, his smile forced, skin a little pale around his mouth. Concern curled through her. This was harder for him than it was for her – she’d let Scott go and was simply finding her way to being healed.
His loss cut fresh every time he saw Tick.
She flashed a smile at her friends, tightening her hold on Colt’s arms. “We’re going to grab a plate. We’ll see you in a while.”
Hitting the table served as nothing more than giving Colt a break and the two of them some space. Wait, was that store-bought pimento cheese? Good Lord Almighty.
“I know it’s not the way you would have done it.
” Colt added a scoop of toasted pecans to the clear plastic plate.
Hire a caterer, but use cheap plates? Holly could hear Mona now.
With a finger, he tipped her chin up so she met his serious gaze.
“But they are going to make decisions together you and he wouldn’t have made. ”
Bitterness crowded her throat, thick and pasty like that storemade cheese spread. “He and I never made any decisions together.”
Oh, she’d made plenty of decisions on her own — like roast beef sliders or rum punch or what shirt he should wear. But anything big or real? It had been Scott’s way, all the way down the line, and if she wanted to be part of his life, she accepted it.
Until he’d made the decision that Andrea would be his life, not her.
“You know, the way he looks at you, the way he looks at us together?” Colt plopped down a scoop of that godawful pimiento cheese and a few crackers. “You could have him back if you wanted to.”
She recoiled, a shiver of revulsion running down her spine. Give up what they had, return to life a month ago? “I don’t want him back.”
“Then by God act like it.” The low growl was Gene Calvert to the core, and she blinked. That hard expression was Mr. Gene when he wasn’t playing, too. “Look, you tell me you were miserable with him, that you never had him the way you wanted.”
“I didn’t.”
“Hard to hold something new when you can’t let go of a bad habit.”
Hypocrite — although she had to admit he was making progress. And he was working actively to free himself from the mire of his emotions tied to his past. She rolled her eyes. “You read that in a self-help article on the Internet, didn’t you?”
“I did.” He placed a few sauced sausages next to the pimiento cheese. “Doesn’t make it not true. I’m working on it, hard.”
“Fine.” Even she heard the petty pout in her voice.
She dumped a spoonful of ranch dip and some veggies to their food array, then stared at the plate, bracketed in his steady hands.
She lifted her gaze to his. “This is what he wants, what he’s willing to settle for.
I would never be happy like this, but I’m . . . what is wrong with me tonight?”
“Stuck in a loop.” He balanced the plastic plate with one hand and spun a finger in a circle. “We get comfortable there, so it’s hard to move forward.”