Chapter Thirty-One
Faith stood. Smiled carefully at Charlie. Thad was still watching her, a quiet tick to his jaw.
“Anyway, thanks for giving me what I came for, brother-mine. Pays to know the lead singer of a band. My friend’s gonna be over the moon. He’s such a fan, and everyone is curious who this girl might be.” Faith winked cryptically at Charlie, and held up a CD demo, sealed in shrink-wrap.
Charlie noted it was a single by … McClintock and the Disclaimers. “Flower Girl.” His new song.
The song he’d written about her. Guilt assailed.
Charlie’d thought the worst and yet, here he’d been, talking her up, giving his sister his song about her.
God, she was a mess. She wasn’t girlfriend material.
Someone like Thaddeus Rex McClintock deserved someone who wasn’t so damaged, and she suddenly wanted to go home—
“Best get ’m unloaded,” Thad said.
Get what unloaded?
“Wanna ride down the hill with me, Daze?” He ruffled Daisy’s hair.
“Yes!” Daisy pumped the air, her world right again, and took Thad’s offered hand.
Together, they began to walk past Charlie, when he skimmed her fingers with his and slowed. He brushed a thumb through the mist still glistening in her eye, and then … leaned in, pressing a kiss to her forehead. Her eyes dropped closed at the tender touch. When a kiss pressed to her nose.
His hand a cradle to her face, his lips a balm on her guilt, and then the barest hint of a whisper in her ear.
“Put your car keys and wrenches down, Flower Girl. I ain’t Jason.
Don’t you dare ever question my fidelity again.
Don’t you dare let him keep hurting you.
He don’t deserve your tears. Just let me love you. ”
Let me love you. Faith was watching them, a fond smile on her lips. She swallowed at the sweet declaration, as his hand on her face tightened, validating his sentiment, then slipped away to hoist Daisy up into his truck.
“She’s your sister?” Daisy was asking. “So, if you marry my momma, would she be my auntie?”
Marriage? Faith went stone still. Eyes darting between them, Charlie could feel her curious burn.
Thad chuckled, summoning his characteristic nonchalance at will. “Faith, hop in.”
But Faith held still, then smiled wanly at Charlie. “I’ll ride with your girl.”
Thad paused. Glared at his sister.
And under his breath, muttered, “Don’t you dare, sis.”
Something passed between the two of them, because Faith softened and then backhanded his arm playfully, waggling her brows at him. “What’d you think I’m gonna do? Just want to get to know her. Chill.”
Was Thad worried about what Faith might say? Their exchange prickled Charlie’s nape, but Thad’s tension eased as quickly as it had torqued.
“Suit yourself.” He walked around his hood, having not answered Daisy’s question. “I was gonna surprise you, Daze,” he said as he hopped in his cab and cranked shut the door, firing up the engine. “But seeing as you’re early, my wing girl can help me with a special delivery…”
Charlie eyed Faith. So the sister wanted to corner her about her kid brother. She supposed she deserved the hot seat and unlocked her passenger door.
Faith slipped past her and climbed in, and Charlie noticed for the first time under Faith’s arm, a bundle of papers tucked in a folder emblazoned with a logo of a horse running and an old western script, McClintock Equestrian on Legacy Creek.
“She’s adorable,” Faith said, nodding toward her brother’s truck as Charlie followed Thad downhill. “He’s talked nonstop about you for two weeks, you know, frustrated. And then he called yesterday. and I swear he sounded about as stoked as a man who’d just won the lotto.
“Our, uh, sister had the pleasure of losing to you in the Miss Lone Star Pageant. I don’t know if you remember a girl named Charity…”
“Oh my God, yes! I—” Charlie quieted, then laughed wryly. “Although that scholarship might have been put to better use awarded to her.”
Faith shook her head, her fiery expression softening as she glanced at her. “What happened to you was bullshit, Charlize. You needed that scholarship just as much as she did. And look at you. An associate professor? Dang, girl. You should Legally Blonde the hell out of every naysayer.”
They laughed together. Faith seemed so easy and forthright, and yet, Charlie knew an admonishment was coming.
“They’d be shocked to realize I’m really just a nerd,” Charlie replied.
“It was a well-deserved scholarship and an archaic rule about the divorce. Only old folks who clutch their pearls care about those things. And what bearing do they have on you? You should know that, uh…”
Here it was. Charlie gripped the wheel to withstand the scolding.
Faith watched her brother’s truck, something wistful in her gaze, as they arrived down the switchbacks to the farmhouse and Thad pulled his truck up beside it.
“T.R’s the best guy in the world. Doesn’t realize it, though.”
“I’m sorry I thought the worst,” Charlie said, as he got out and trotted around his tailgate to lift Daisy down.
Faith waved her off. “It’s not like he don’t have a reputation, Charlize, but a lot of it’s just for show.
Boost his image, still hoping with every fiber in his bones he can make at least one of his songs big.
” Faith held up the single of “Flower Girl.” “He’s got a past, yeah, but that’s because he never saw a future.
D’you know, he wrote this song in one night?
He, Jack, and Bo dragged Hunter to a recording studio, pooled their dimes, and recorded it in one go.
My bro overnighted it to the Texas Homegrown Music Awards, which of course got him all bundled up in knots because of his last music fiasco. ” Faith rolled her eyes.
Charlie’s brow furrowed. “What happened?”
“He didn’t tell you?”
Charlie shook her head as Faith wrestled with what to say.
“His band was hoping to make it big. And then, he got a huge chance. Got an appointment with Country Roads Records in Nashville. He hustled hard to save the money for that trip. Bought a suit and everything. And then he got screwed outta several grand after doing a huge gig in Austin by some band he’d partnered with.
All that money he’d intended to roll into recording demos to take with him to his big meeting.
” Faith was talking about Jason, and God, she hated Jason for what he’d done to others, how Jason used people for his own gain and burned bridges every chance he’d gotten.
“He took that guy to court, but he’d needed that money then, not when the courts finally decided to deliberate his case. Country Roads slushed his file.
“He’d been living on the streets since sixteen.
Dropped outta high school because he knew the admin would bust his balls about his residency and probably put him in foster care if they knew.
I went toe to toe with our daddy about kicking him out.
Patience flipped them off and moved out, never looked back and told ’em she was cutting ties until they brought him back home.
He worked odd jobs for people, transient labor, anything to put some food in his stomach, and … he deserved that break.”
And yet, despite how he’d been screwed, he still took the stage with that megawatt smile, not letting the bad guys win, and her heart ached for the boy he’d once been.
“He was too ashamed to tell us for over a year and he spiraled alone. And then Charity up in New York and the fallout from that…” What had happened to Charity?
“Something changed about him after that. He stopped giving a shit … until you.” Charlie’s eyes met Faith’s.
“He talks about you with that same excitement he used to talk about his band in the early days, like you and that little girl have given him some sort of purpose again.”
Faith swallowed, watching T.R. through the window, neither of them getting out of the Rover as Thad led Daisy to the Silverado and pulled a rope from the truck bed.
He proceeded to take Daisy between his arms from behind, showing her how to tie a lariat, repeating the over-under pattern of the knot and helping Daisy’s fingers figure it out. Like such a dad.
“Grades in school don’t always mean shit.
Our parents could never see past that. But my sisses and I are the luckiest girls in the world with him as our brother.
Not a lot of good has happened to him, Charlie.
And yet, he’s always there for the people he loves.
” Loves… “He told me about your ex,” Faith said, her face turning to stone, even if she smiled curiously.
“It’s keeping him up at nights, worrying about you and Daisy.
” Faith swallowed hard, as if swallowing shards of glass, and placed a hand on Charlie’s arm.
God, should she tell Thad about the letter from the attorney today? He’d blow a gasket, when all Charlie had ever wanted was to shield him from getting dragged into this drama.
“I get that you’re scared,” Faith said solemnly. “But don’t make him pay for another guy’s shortcoming. Don’t hurt him. Be there for him, too, okay.”
Charlie thought on that. Be there for him.
His band needed a banjoist. And he’d asked her.
She … could overcome this fear of being seen, put herself out there for the public to pick apart, for his sake.
She could find a way to cope with the way the flirting and the chest flashing and the social media comments about him hurt.
With Hunter quitting and without her, he didn’t have the dream anymore.
Thad walked Daisy around the dually.
A smile sprang to Faith’s face. “Come on, Charlie. You don’t wanna miss this secret delivery. For which this is part of the payment.” She held up the demo.
Charlie pushed out her door and walked side by side with Faith, just as Thad, still holding Daisy’s hand, opened up the horse trailer.