Chapter Twenty-Five
He hadn’t known he was sitting on the fence until he toppled over onto the wrong side, only to discover what was wrong had been right all along.
—The Temptress of Pecan Lane, by Mae Daniels
Jackson could count on one finger the number of times he’d been furious with his momma.
He was still deciding whether he added another finger to that count, but at the moment, his primary mission was getting himself and Anna Grace out of that house.
He was on his feet hauling Anna out of her seat fast as he could manage, given the way he was choking back a snort of laughter the likes of which this dining room hadn’t ever seen. “Great dinner,” he said. “Promised Mamie we’d meet her for bowling, and golly gee, wouldja lookit the time.”
Momma’s eyes narrowed into slits. “But I made sweet potato pie.”
“Might could have some for breakfast instead.” He tugged on Anna Grace’s arm to get her to move.
She wouldn’t look at him, but he recognized the slump of her shoulders and the tilt of her head.
Reminded him of the day he’d first laid eyes on her.
Made him angrier than a rabid armadillo that his momma and sister would hurt her. “Night, y’all.”
Anna’s feet finally moved in the right direction. He let up his grip on her arm and instead steered her by the shoulders through the house and into the cool evening.
He barely made it down the front steps before he swung her against him. Tears glittered in her eyes.
“Jackson, I—”
He sealed his mouth over hers, gripped her waist and hauled her close until they were chest-to-chest, stomach-to-stomach, knee-to-knee. And he kissed her.
And kissed her.
And kissed her until she wrapped her arms around his neck and kissed him back, her tears touching his cheeks, her hold on him so tight his lungs couldn’t breathe, but he didn’t feel that they needed to, because he didn’t need the oxygen.
He just needed Anna.
He kissed the wet trails down her face, threaded his fingers through her soft hair, cradled her close. “Ah, Anna Grace,” he murmured, “you are one magnificent woman.”
She pushed her hair off her forehead with a shaky hand. “I just insulted your mother.”
Sweet Lord, she had. She’d done it good too. Shouldn’t have been funny, an outsider insulting his momma in her own home, but Momma’d started it, thinking he’d bring home any woman who couldn’t hold her own.
Anna Grace, he’d decided, could hold her own with the devil if she had to.
The laughter welled up inside him again. This time, he didn’t try to hold it back. “Darlin’, you did it right good too.”
“I need to go apologize.”
“Oh, no, ma’am.” His fingers flexed at her waist. “You go on and let her stew on that for a night. You do whatever you need to in the morning, but tonight, you go on and let her stew.”
“But—”
“Trust me on this one.” He cradled her closer. “Besides, we got somewhere better to be.”
“Promise?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
And he felt only a mite bad that she probably expected somewhere quiet and alone.
When he pulled into the parking lot of Mamie’s favorite bowling alley, Anna Grace looked at him as though he’d just told her all the ketchup factories were closing up shop. “You were serious.” Her voice broke.
He almost shifted the truck back into gear.
But this was the closest he’d get to introducing her to his daddy. “Five minutes,” he said. “You still want to go after five minutes, we’ll go.”
She looked at the building, then back to him, a silent plea in her eyes.
“Trust me?” He brushed his thumb over her ear and followed it with a kiss.
She scrunched her eyes closed, then blew out a sigh. “Five minutes.”
He checked his watch. “Ready?”
“Don’t push your luck.”
But she climbed out of the truck. He had three minutes and forty-three seconds left when he spotted Mamie’s crew. Took another thirty-three seconds to pass the eight lanes to get to them.
Miss Dolly saw him first.
Then she saw Anna. Her eyes went wide, and she tilted her head at Mamie. “You didn’t tell us Jackson was bringing a friend tonight.”
Mamie’s head popped up from where she was lacing her designer bowling shoes. “You’re late, sugarplum.” She frowned. “What’s this? You make this poor girl go to dinner at that old house? Ophelia, get this sweet thing a Coke. You like root beer, honey pie? Jackson, what did your momma do?”
Anna Grace still had that wary, shell-shocked look about her. He squeezed her hand. “She tried that old nobody’s-good-enough-for-my-baby thing, but don’t you worry none. Anna Grace here blessed her heart and set her straight.”
Anna’s cheeks went all sweet and embarrassed.
Mamie wrapped her in a hug. “Don’t you give Deb any mind.
” The top of Mamie’s tightly rolled hair barely hit Anna’s shoulder, but she patted Anna’s back and said all the right Mamie things, and he felt the tension leaving Anna as much as if it’d been his own.
Miss Ophelia dove back into the pit with a root beer.
“Hope y’all don’t mind sharing,” she said with a wink.
“They’re plum short on cups tonight. Y’all done introductions yet?
I wanna meet this girl who got our Jackson’s attention without a single biscuit to her name.
Lots of disappointed mommas in these here parts over you,” she said to Anna, who was looking on the mend.
And he still had a minute and a half left.
“Did you really bless Deb’s heart?” Miss Dolly asked.
Anna looked to Jackson. He grinned at her, and one of her own popped back up. “Right there at the dinner table,” Anna said.
“Oh, listen to her,” Miss Flo said. “I love a good Northern accent. Isn’t that precious?”
“Ask her to say ‘about,’” Jackson said.
Miss Dolly clapped her hands. “She’s Canadian!”
“Minnesotan,” Anna said.
“Sugarplum, anything north of Kentucky’s all Canada to us,” Mamie said. “You bowl? We got us two lanes tonight.”
He saw the moment realization hit Anna Grace. She blinked at Mamie. A smile hovered on her lips, then her eyes went wide, darting between him and Mamie, her lips mouthing something that might could’ve been She’s Mae Daniels.
Anna squinted at Mamie one last time. Her cheeks flamed up and she turned an accusing glare on him. “Are you kidding me?”
“Oh, Lordy,” Miss Ophelia said. “Rabid fan alert, lane six.”
“But I like her,” Miss Dolly said.
“Would all y’all hush up,” Miss Flo said. “She didn’t know.”
He tucked his hands in his pockets and stepped back before Anna Grace decided to deck him with something stronger than a heart blessin’. “That’s about five minutes,” he said.
A squawk flew out of her pretty mouth. “We can’t leave now.”
When he grinned, she scowled. “You’re on my list, Jackson Davis. On. My. List.”
Couldn’t think of anywhere else he’d rather be.
“Aw, sweetie pie, don’t be holding it against him if he don’t like to talk about family,” Mamie said. “You saw the rest of it yourself tonight.”
And his Anna Grace, who could face down a hundred fire ant armies by now, got all flustered in front of Mamie. “I’ve been borrowing all your books from him,” she said. “I can’t read them fast enough. I’ve lost study time for you.”
Mamie winked. “I know, sweetie pie. Jackson told me. Told me more about you than he probably thinks he has, matter of fact. Now, we gonna bowl or not? Jackson hasn’t mentioned if you’re any good on the lanes.”
“Afraid to find out after she wiped me out in redneck golf,” he said.
When her eyes narrowed in that determined sort of way, he got a little kick in the gut.
So that was why Lance was always throwing games for Kaci.
“How about we find out the old-fashioned way?” she said.
“You got a right good way with plans, Anna Grace.”
They rented shoes and settled in for an evening with Mamie and the Misses, who treated Anna to the finest hospitality this side of the Alabama-Georgia border. Whether his Anna Grace rightfully kicked his rump on the bowling lane, well, that was between him and God.
And Mamie, he’d reckon.
Mamie cornered him during one of Anna’s last throws. He was lounging in the pit, watching Anna Grace’s hips swing as she approached the lane, her arm hanging lower than it had when they started. She was getting tired.
Mamie gave an evil chuckle. “You got it bad, sugarplum.”
“Yes, ma’am.” No sense in denying it. He’d fallen off the turnip truck and right into a pasture of love-patties.
Eight pins toppled at the end of Anna’s lane. She stomped her foot. When she spun back to wait for her ball, her face screwed up with gritty determination. Adorable woman.
“Your daddy would’ve liked her.”
“Been thinking that a lot lately.”
Miss Ophelia stepped up next to Anna. The two of them talked angles of attack for the split she had to tackle. If ever there was a woman who could knock those pins down with sheer willpower, it was his Anna Grace.
“I’m no expert on love outside the pages of a book,” Mamie said, “but seems to me the best husbands and fathers are the ones who can look at all the downsides and hardships of love, but decide to love somebody anyway.”
“Military life’s rough on families.”
Mamie tsked at him. “You’re halfway through your career. Day’s coming when the military can’t be your family anymore.”
Anna picked up the bowling ball and stared at the pins. Looking at how to put them in their places.
He wondered where she thought she’d fit once she was done with school.
“Never understood why Daddy wasn’t enough for Momma,” he said. “Best man I ever knew, and he couldn’t keep her happy.”
“She wasn’t the one he was supposed to make happy.
” Mamie’s voice was soft, but it echoed in his head louder than all the bowling pins in the building.
“You think your daddy’d be happy knowing you found somebody you want to make smile every day the rest of your life, but you were too chicken to go for it?
Sugarplum, they got married for you. Now I ain’t ever pushed it, because I thought you’d be doing better finding a nice girl from back home, but a girl who makes you look like that don’t come round all that often. ”