“Thank you.” I took the mint and popped it into my mouth. It wasn’t mint-flavored; it was cinnamon, spicy and hot just like I remembered. With one little mint, I was whisked back to the past: to a first kiss, to the first real kiss, to the first time I’d ever . . .
“Fuck me.” Boone whistled as we rolled to a stop in front of the house.
“What?” I asked, getting jettisoned from the past into the present. I preferred the other option.
“How many people are staying the week with your parents?” He craned his head out the window, focusing on something off in the distance.
“I don’t know. I didn’t ask. Both of my sisters obviously, probably my mom’s parents, and maybe Aunt May, but there shouldn’t be that many. That’s what hotels are for.” I was wringing the hell out of my purse straps, wishing I’d drained another shot or two, because from the feel of it, the adrenaline and nerves had burned it all up in the drive here.
“You better do a recount, Miss Abbott, because from the looks of the cars I can see parked around the carriage house, your place has become the Hotel Grand Charleston.” Boone pointed out the window, but I couldn’t see. Or maybe didn’t want to see.
The thought of dozens of family members and strangers ambling around the estate made this trip even more intolerable. The house lacked no number of rooms, but it lacked in other things. Notions like privacy, which I would need if this plan with Boone was going to fly. With dozens of people wandering the estate, that meant Boone and I would have to act the part of the loving couple around the clock, no slip-ups.
Even when we’d been together, for real together, we hadn’t been capable of that. How in the hell were we going to manage it now?
“You sure you want to do this?” Boone’s hand dropped to the door handle, looking just as ready to open it as keep it sealed shut.
I made myself look at the house. The one I’d grown up in for eighteen years until fleeing it like the devil was chasing me. I’d been back three times since, always fleeing in much the same way. Why did I keep coming back? Why did I continue to put myself through this? Oh yeah . . .
“I don’t have a choice, Boone. You of all people should remember that.”
His knuckles went white as his grip tightened on the door handle. “You’ve always got a choice. You have a choice now, and you certainly had a choice then. Don’t blame them for the choices you made.”
Here we went, mucking through the past again. This wouldn’t work. I should have sent Boone away right then. I should have paid him the ten grand just to leave, because showing up with Boone Cavanaugh as my date was going to drip a few more drops of nitroglycerin into the pot. My family wasn’t even on curt-greeting-while-passing-on-the-sidewalk status with the Cavanaughs. Boone should have been the last person I’d picked to pay to be my date this week.
But then flashes of my sister’s picture went through my head. Avalee was engaged. Charlotte was about to be married. Everyone was expecting me to show up with a date. Everyone had expected me to be the first to get married.
If I showed up alone . . . God, I didn’t want to think of the comments I’d get, or imagine the potential “suitors” my mom would line up for me. No, this was a good plan.
At least better than showing up alone.
“I’m not blaming anyone,” I said as the driver unloaded the luggage from the trunk. “I’m not blaming my parents, my sisters, you, Ford, or anyone else for anything. I’m just trying to get through this right now, so would you mind cutting me a little slack?”
His expression stayed frozen. “Does that mean we’re doing this? We’re going, willingly into a pit of vipers?”
I reached for the handle on my side. “We’re doing this.”
He sucked in a quick breath through his nose, then threw the door open. “Then let’s get started so we can finish already.”
His hand wove free of mine as he stepped outside to help the driver with the luggage. The luggage . . . there were only two pieces of it—my matching set. We had nothing to show for Boone, not even a small overnight bag.
This might have been the most ill-fated plan ever conceived.
“Boone!” I threw my door open and ejected from the backseat. “You have to hustle up to my room without being seen. We didn’t think to pick up a suitcase for you. My family won’t miss it. They’ll ask questions right from the start, and I’d prefer to delay them until at least day three or four.”
I threw my purse strap around my neck and shoulder, fishing around for my wallet to pay the driver. The fare had been steep, as in a couple hundred dollars steep, but I guessed that was what one could expect when they spent forty-five minutes camped out in some bar, drinking cheap tequila and bickering with an old flame.
The driver gave another low whistle after I handed him the bills. “Mighty generous tip, ma’am. Thank you much.”