Epilogue
“You better let me fill ’er up, because we’ve got a lot to toast to tonight.”
Cheri giggled and held out her champagne glass, pleased that the full moon had provided the finest romantic lighting available anywhere. And all she’d had to do was get in her own little rowboat and head out to the center of her own family’s lake.
She sighed, absolutely content.
“First, to us,” J.J. said, raising his glass to clink with Cheri’s. “To forgiveness and patience and love—and sex hot enough to melt house paint.”
“I’ll drink to that. And to living together,” Cheri added. “To the happiness found in waking up with and falling asleep with the one you love.”
“Amen to the Bugle,” J.J. said. “To its remarkable publisher and to continuing growth in its sales, revenue, and excellence in news reporting.”
“And to Tanyalee,” Cheri said.
J.J. lowered his chin and sighed. “Here we go.”
Cheri laughed as she watched J.J. steel himself for the jab he knew was on its way. “Well I’m sorry, but you guys took your sweet damn time rescuing us, so here’s to Tanyalee and her tequila bottle!”
“And for checking herself in to rehab!”
Clink. They each took a sip.
Everyone knew it had taken a lot of courage for Tanyalee to make the decision to seek inpatient treatment for compulsive stealing, codependence, and a few other “issues” she didn’t want to share. Granddaddy said he didn’t need to know the details, then whipped out his checkbook.
“To the memory of brave Artemis.”
“Of course.” Cheri sniffled. It still hurt that her friend had died protecting her home, her friends, and her babies. They found the squirrel shot through near the fireplace, the night’s only victim, killed when the gun in Wim’s hand discharged. Cheri and J.J. had been hand-raising her babies in the week since, but knew they’d need to send them out into the world eventually.
“To my debt repayment plan.”
J.J. smiled. “To your courage.”
Cheri shrugged. “Oh! And to Wim.”
J.J.’s laugh echoed across the lake and was answered by at least three loons. “May he enjoy his three-hots-and-a-cot while awaiting trial.”
“Which one?” Cheri asked.
“All of ’em,” J.J. said.
“I’ll drink to that.”
Wim was being detained in Charlotte on federal kidnapping charges for holding the women at gunpoint at the lake house, but according to Turner, he also would face a federal grand jury on multiple blackmail and extortion charges.
“Oh, and we can’t forget to toast Candy.” Cheri raised her glass high. “To my best friend and her willingness to stay in Bigler and keep me company—at least temporarily.”
J.J. giggled. “For as long as she can stand rooming with Gladys, you mean.”
“Yes, there’s that,” Cheri acknowledged.
Candy had chosen Gladys’s offer of housing over Aunt Viv’s, but was beginning to regret it. “She keeps borrowing my clothes without asking,” Candy reported just the other day. “It’s disturbing.”
“And to the memory of Barbara Jean,” J.J. said.
“And to Carlotta and her brighter future,” Cheri added.
They clinked their glasses, but Cheri hesitated before taking another sip.
“J.J.,” she said. “I think what we’re toasting tonight is the truth, making things right. You know what I mean?”
He smiled at her then, the moon bright in his dark eyes, and he leaned closer and tugged on her free hand. The boat began to rock. A bit of champagne splashed from Cheri’s glass.
“I know exactly what you mean,” he said, planting a kiss on her lips. “Now, I got a little surprise for you. Here, give me your glass.”
J.J. poured what remained in both glasses into the lake, put them aside, then began to roll up the sleeve of his denim shirt.
“What in the world are you doing?” Cheri asked, giggling.
“I think the moon’s bright enough for you to read this.”
Cheri burst out laughing. Written in big bold letters along the inside of J.J.’s forearm were the words, “I’ll love you forever, CNN.”
“I can’t believe you did that,” she said, shaking her head and smiling.
“It’s in permanent marker, and that means it’s forever.” J.J. flashed a devilish smile as he began to roll the sleeve up even further. “Just like I hope this will be.”
Cheri leaned forward in the moonlight, not sure she could trust her eyes. It almost looked as if J.J. had taped a ring inside of the crook of his arm.
It dawned on her that she’d seen correctly as he pulled off the tape and slipped the ring on her finger.
“Say yes,” J.J. whispered, cradling her hands in his. “Say yes to putting things right with the world and with us. Once and for all.”
She gazed at the sparkle on her left hand and then at the sparkle in J.J.’s eyes.
“Yes,” she whispered. “I thought you’d never ask.”
Read on for an excerpt from Susan Donovan’s next book
I WANT CANDY
Coming soon from St. Martin’s Paperbacks
It took a few attempts, but the gearshift eventually slipped into reverse, and the car began to lurch down the driveway. Candy bit her lip in concentration and craned her neck out the window. This was going to be a challenge, she knew. The driveway wasn’t straight, and it was lined with boxwoods. Plus, it was the dead of night, and she’d opted to forgo the headlights so her escape wouldn’t be detected.
No, this wasn’t the most mature way to deal with a roommate conflict. There was just no way Candy could handle another scene with eighty-year-old Gladys. The old gal had been kind to take her in rent-free when she came back to town, but when she’d started to “borrow” Candy’s lingerie, it was time to hit the road.
Almost there.
She squinted into the dark, delicately adjusting the car’s course as it scraped against the bushes. Not that anyone would notice additional scratch marks on this beast, a 1997 discarded police cruiser she’d bought at auction with her last three hundred bucks. Candy sighed. Sometimes she couldn’t even believe how fast—and how spectacularly—her perfect life had imploded.
Just a few more feet.
Slowly, the Chevy’s rear end slid onto the dark country road. Candy wrestled with the gearshift until it slipped into drive. She carefully pressed down on the gas. If she could just make it to the state highway before the thing backfired …
Bam!
“Shee-it.” Candy floored it. The old car’s worn tires screamed against the asphalt as they fought for traction, just as the engine released a series of cannon-fire belches, each one more obnoxiously earth-shattering than the last.
She fought for control of the wheel as the car careened forward, an automotive version of the 1812 Overture providing the soundtrack for her escape. A peek over her shoulder revealed that Gladys’s bedroom light had just come on.
Candy hunkered down, put the pedal to the metal, and headed toward Highway 25. She took a right at the stop sign, careening away from the Town of Bigler, proper. Her heart pounded in her chest. Her hands shook. And suddenly, it occurred to her that she was having difficulty seeing. Well, duh! She’d forgotten about the headlights! With a groan of frustration, she turned them on. That’s when red and blue flashing lights appeared in her rearview mirror.
“Shee-it,” she said, louder this time. “You’ve got to be kidding me!” Candy’s gaze darted from the alarming swirl of color in her mirror to the contours of the winding country road. Where was she supposed to pull off? It was guardrail and woods as far as the eye could see. The quick blast of the siren made her jump in her seat.
“OK! OK!” she yelled out. “I’m fixin’ to pull over, you idiot! God! Give me a freakin’ break!”
Suddenly, in her peripheral vision, she noticed an open patch by the side of the road. It happened to be on the other side of the side of the road, but she decided it was still her best bet, and whipped the car around to a skidding stop. Unfortunately, all the whipping and skidding hadn’t set well with the engine, which began to spew smoke into the air along with another volley of backfires.
“Uh-oh,” she whispered. It seemed the officer wasn’t happy with all the commotion either, and the large, black SUV did a U-turn, the siren now whoop-whooping, and slammed to a stop in front of her, blocking any attempt she might make to get back on the road. Then a spotlight flashed on, so blindingly bright she had to shield her eyes.
Briefly, Candy thanked God for small favors. At least this wouldn’t be Turner Halliday pulling her over. He was the actual sheriff in Cataloochee County, and the sheriff didn’t work nights. He had deputies to take those less desirable shifts. So at least Candy would be spared the additional misery of being pulled over in the middle of nowhere at four in the morning by her childhood friend, especially since they were supposed to get together that night with Cheri and J.J. out at the lake house, and, boy, wouldn’t that make for some interesting dinner conversation.
The siren went silent. Candy heard the door of the SUV slam shut, and she blinked against the intense light. She could barely make out the figure of a man advancing toward her, but she heard him cough and saw him wave his hand in front of his face, chasing away the smoke. She cut the engine, thinking … wondering …
Since this wasn’t going to be Turner strolling up to her window, she might be able to buy herself some mercy. She decided to get out the big guns. Shameless? Absolutely. But what choice did she have? Candy began undoing two additional buttons of her blouse and arranged her weapons to their best advantage. Then she fluffed her hair and licked her lips. She hated to do this, but she didn’t have the money to pay for a simple parking ticket, let alone a moving violation. She took a deep breath and prepared herself for the dumb-blonde-from-out-of-town defense.
That’s when the officer reached the driver’s-side window, leaned in, and grinned at her.
“License and registration, ma’am,” Turner said, his eyes and smile gleaming in the spotlight. “And you can put your ta-tas away. They’re not gonna do you much good in this particular situation, and besides—I’m more of an ass man, myself.”
Candy groaned and fell back against the driver’s seat. “Ah, come on, Turner. Have mercy on me.”
He shook his head and chuckled. “Candy Carmichael, this car you’re driving is a public safety hazard of the first degree—and that’s with the lights on! Lord have mercy, girl! What are you doing driving around in the dark in this piece of shit with no headlights? You could’ve killed someone, or gotten yourself killed!”
She sighed as she reached up to button her shirt. “Yeah. I know. Sorry. I was trying to escape Gladys and forgot to turn on my lights once I hit the main road.”
Turner laughed again and leaned an elbow on the open window. “She finally scare you off?”
Candy rolled her eyes. “I had to get out of there. She’s a nice old lady, but she has absolutely no respect for my personal space. Thirteen days was all I could take.”
Turner made a soft humming sound in his throat and looked away, nodding all the while. It seemed to Candy that he was contemplating her dilemma, and her heart leapt at the thought that he’d decided to take pity on her. Then she noticed that Turner had been scribbling on an official-looking pad of paper all the while.
“Please, no,” she whispered. “Come on, Turner. Would you just cut me some slack, just this once? I swear to God I will always remember to put my headlights on in the future.”
He carefully pulled the top layer of paper from the pad, and handed it to her through the open window. “It’s just a warning, but it’s not just for the headlights. You’ve got a serious exhaust problem, and I’m ordering you to have your North Carolina emissions inspection completed within seven days. Plus, you’re not wearing a seatbelt.” He shook his head, slowly scanning her. “You’re a hot mess, girl.”
“Yeah,” she said meekly, accepting the paper. Truer words had never been said, she thought to herself as she looked away.
Candy refused to cry. There was no way she’d let her old friend see her fall apart. That had never been her style. She was a survivor. A fighter. Hell, she was a woman who knew how to take care of business! She would simply laugh this whole thing off. That’s right. That’s what she’d do.
Candy looked up again—and stared. While she’d been busy with the self-coaching, Turner’s entire demeanor had changed. The corner of his mouth had curled up mischievously. His hazel eyes smoldered. His masculine face had softened and he’d tilted his head slightly.
She’d known this guy since elementary school. Sure, she’d noticed that Turner Halliday had taken the route from cute boy to handsome teenager to helluva-hunky man, but something about the sight of him right at that moment was a shock to her system. Exactly what was going on here? Was it the light? Was it the fact that Turner was an authority figure actually being decent to her, offering her the first break she’d had in what seemed like forever? Was it the way he was trying his best not to smile? Trying not to look down her shirt?
Maybe it was just the alluring shape of his mouth, that little dip in his top lip, the strong, full line of his bottom lip, those little dimples that bracketed both.
Who knew? But the fact remained that Turner Halliday was leaning into her car window all big and brown and sexy and powerful—and wearing that cute little badge—and Candy actually heard herself suck in air at the shock of it all.
She tossed the traffic warning to the car seat, and before she could give any decent amount of thought to what she was about to do, she pushed herself up, grabbed him by his fine-looking face, and planted a big, juicy kiss on her lifelong friend’s lips.
Hello.
Shee-it.
This was interesting.
The kiss kept going. That hadn’t been her intention. This was supposed to be a simple, friendly, spontaneous expression of gratitude, a genuine burst of affection for a fellow human being who had been kind enough to cut her some slack.
Right?
Which was perfectly understandable given the context. Candy was practically penniless. She’d lost millions in the Florida real-estate crash and was about to declare bankruptcy. She’d lost her luxury home in Tampa. Her Infiniti had been repossessed. She had no job. She’d mishandled her mother’s retirement nest egg, a pesky detail her mother remained blissfully unaware of. And Candy had recently crawled back to her hometown in the western hills of North Carolina, where she’d been taken in by her best friend’s receptionist, an octogenarian floozy who couldn’t seem to stay out of her guest’s underwear drawer.
Was it any wonder she felt compelled to kiss an old friend who’d just shown her a modicum of kindness?
Fine.
Then why were her arms now around Turner’s neck? Why was she hanging out of the car window with her boobs arched out and pressed up against his hard, muscled chest? Why was one of Turner’s hands buried up under her hair while the other was on its way down her spine, headed directly to her—?
“Holy hell, girl.”
“Hmm?”
Candy felt herself being pushed away from the heat, pressure, and exquisite juiciness of Turner’s mouth. She blinked. The spotlight nearly blinded her. She’d forgotten where, exactly, she was, and why, exactly, she was there.
Turner stared at her, his eyes wide and filled with surprise. He pulled one hand from her hair and the other from the small of her back and stepped away from the car. Candy slid back down into the driver’s seat.
“Oh, God. Sorry,” she mumbled.
“Right. No. I’m sorry. My bad.”
Candy looked up in time to see Turner execute a series of moves more suited to a baseball coach on the sidelines than a cop. First there was a quick removal of his ball cap. That was followed by a sweep of his hand across his close-cropped hair, the return of the ball cap, a fast rub of his chin and mouth, and a few taps of his feet in the dirt. The routine was topped off by an adjustment of his gun holster.
“Drive safely,” he said as he turned away.
Candy peered out the driver’s-side window and watched him practically jog to his SUV. “Uh, thank you!” she called out, feeling ridiculous. What exactly was she thanking him for, anyway? Not arresting her?
Or was she thanking that man for giving her the finest, hottest, most bad-assed-open-mouthed kiss she’d ever had in her freakin’ life?