He realized his slip an instant after I did. His expression stayed flat though. The mistake only registered in his eyes, whereas my whole body and face went rigid with an oh shit! feeling.
“You don’t know what Clara Belle does?” Ford wasn’t focused on dissecting his ham and eggs anymore. “How long have you been seeing each other again?”
My dad pressed his forearm into the table and leaned forward. “Yes, how long?”
I took a sip of my orange juice, stalling. Boone stayed quiet, peaking his brow just enough to let me know he was heeding my warning to let me do the talking when it came to our relationship.
“Do you want to know about my business or about Boone and me?” I asked, circling my fork at my plate that had mostly gone untouched thanks to the Q & A firing squad. “Because I’d like to be able to take a bite of my breakfast sometime this morning.”
My mom’s eyes drifted to my half-eaten piece of toast. I knew that in her eyes, I’d already eaten enough to get me through lunch.
“Why don’t you just sum it all up for us, Clara Belle, since it seems there’s a whole lot of fuzzy area surrounding you, and we’ll throw in the clarifying questions if we have any,” Dad said.
Dad ignored Charlotte when she said something to him, no doubt trying to get his attention as she had for her entire life. What I’d come to expect was that the only thing that garnered our father’s attention when it came to his family was potential scandal and anything that might tarnish the supposed pristine Abbott name. Between the three of his children, I’d been the most “problematic,” and therefore received the most attention.
What Charlotte failed to realize in her jealousy was that there was a difference between good attention and bad attention.
“Well, the business’s sales have tripled over last year and are expected to—”
“How about you start your summary with why Boone Cavanaugh is sitting at my breakfast table beside my daughter, whose heart and innocence he crushed a lifetime ago.” Dad held his smile for the other guests nibbling at their breakfasts in silence, no doubt feeling like a bunch of third wheels. “That is what interests me most at the present moment. I’d like you to look me in the eyes and explain to me why that boy is the one you chose to bring as your date this week.”
“My plus one,” I corrected automatically.
Boone gave me a sideways look, like I’d somehow just betrayed him.
“Pray do tell, just how long have you and your ‘plus one’ been reacquainted? Because the last time you were able to squeeze us into your busy schedule and fly back home, I was under the impression you’d forgotten the name Boone Cavanaugh, and certainly the man behind that name.”
A couple of conversations were starting to circle the table, and I was thankful I didn’t feel the pressure of two dozen sets of eyes aimed my way anymore. It made thinking on the fly much easier.
“I don’t know. It’s difficult to say, exactly, when we got reacquainted . . .” I fumbled for the right words to cut and paste together an airtight lie. “I guess we just sort of started talking a while ago, emails here and there, sporadic phone calls, that sort of thing . . . and you could say one thing led to another led to us sitting next to each other at your breakfast table this morning.” When I finished massacring that explanation, I picked up the other half of my toast and stuffed it into my mouth to shut myself up.
Dad’s forehead was creased with lines of confusion, as were Ford’s, Charlotte’s, and Mom’s. Even Boone’s forehead was creased, although his expression was less confused and more what the hell? I gave a just-detectable shrug, and he stabbed a chunk of ham and stuffed it into his mouth, chewing on it like he had a serious beef with his pork.
“So are you two just friends? Or is there more to it?” Dad pressed. “Because your mother tells me you two shared the same room last night, so that tells me there’s something.”
And how about that breakfast?
I felt like I was slowly slumping into my chair, one pointed question at a time. In a few more, I’d be falling out of it, and somehow, that sounded like the most appealing option.
“I think that’s difficult for either Boone or me to answer,” I said once I’d finished my toast. “So maybe we could move on to discussing something more exciting . . . like the big wedding coming up.” When I threw my hands in Charlotte and Ford’s direction, I got nothing more than a glare and a hair swish from my sister.
“Please, darling,” Boone’s voice filled the room, sounding a bit more game-show-host than backwoods-Southern-boy. This wouldn’t be good; the darling part gave that away. I slumped deeper into my chair. “You don’t have to go and understate what we have just because few people ever get to experience the connection you and I have.”
I tipped my head at him and forced a smile that was anything but benign. “What are you talking about Boone?” I added under my breath, “Why are you talking?”
He aimed a wink at me. “If you’re going to keep on with this modest approach, let me take over and explain how it really is between us.”
“Please don’t,” I muttered through clenched teeth, ramming my knee into his beneath the table.
He patted my leg a few times in return. “A few of you at the table know that Clara broke my heart when we were kids. Broke might be an understatement, but you get the idea. She crushed me.”
Ford exhaled sharply, shaking his head. My dad was doing the same thing.
Boone continued, ignoring the varied responses circling the table, “When we reconnected, I thought I’d give us another go and, if nothing else, see if I could repay her the heartbreaking favor.”
“What exactly do you call what you did to her back then?” Ford said, aiming a look at Boone like he was contemplating the quickest route to get to him so he could wring his neck.
Boone ignored Ford, holding his smile and staring at me like I was his whole world. My knee kept ramming his, but it was getting me nowhere besides a sore leg.
“But boy, did my plans for revenge backfire,” he said, almost cooing.
I felt sick. What had I done? What was I doing? Why didn’t I just stand up and admit to everyone what had transpired to bring Boone to my side this morning. The truth would have been ten times better than this story he was weaving.
Dad shoved his plate away and leaned in, his gaze leveled on me. “Just how serious is this?”
He was waiting for me to answer him, but it was Boone who gave it to him. “I don’t know your definition of the word, but I gotta tell ya, Mr. Abbott, there have been plenty of times I’ve looked into those blue eyes of hers and seen my forever in them.” Flashing me another wink, he patted my cheek.
I resisted the urge to swipe his hand away. No need to further confuse everyone—they looked so confused already, eyes were close to going crossed.
“Clara Cavanaugh . . .” Boone said, nodding in approval. “It sounds pretty, doesn’t it? Like some fairy-tale made-up name or something.”
My dad’s face was red. My mom looked closer to hyperventilating. I was both.
“No need to rush things.” My father’s voice made each word sound like he was cursing instead of speaking.
Boone shrugged, stuffing a piece of toast into his mouth. “No need to slow things down either.”
I grabbed my fork and lowered it into my lap. If he kept going, I was going to stab him in the thigh with it.
“You don’t have a job.” Dad lifted one finger in the air, then another one. “You have no way to support my daughter.”
“Clara’s got a job,” Boone replied. “She could support me.”
Ford threw down his napkin and shoved away from the table. Dad looked another word from Boone away from doing the same thing.
“Isn’t that the way an equal marriage should work?” Boone asked.
At the word marriage, Mom looked closer to fainting than hyperventilating.
“I’m not planning on staying unemployed forever, or even for long, but in the meantime, good
thing for us both she makes some serious bank.” Boone nudged me with his elbow, his face glowing from the thrill of pissing off my family and throwing me for one hell of a loop at the same time.
“Which I’m sure is why she’ll have you sign a prenup before that ‘forever in her eyes’ turns into a reality.” When Frieda appeared with the coffee carafe to refill my dad’s cup, he waved her away. “Isn’t that right, Clara Belle?”
My dad was waiting for me to reply. To back him up. My voice, or more likely my will to project it, was gone.
“Whatever Clara wants. She’s a smart girl. I trust her.” Boone popped the last bite of his half piece of toast into his mouth before sliding the other half onto my plate. He must have remembered how much I loved all things bread.
My mom didn’t miss it, and would no doubt ensure whatever was on my lunch plate was adjusted to include no carbs.
I wasn’t sure what to think of the shared toast. Was it just another way of him messing with me? Messing with my mom because he remembered how she’d monitored every morsel that went into my mouth back then? Or was this the Boone I remembered? The generous, kind one who would have given a friend his life or limb if they asked for it.
I didn’t have time to process it though, because that was when Dad fired off more questions, hardly pausing to take a breath between each one. “Do you have an attorney back in California, Clara Belle? Do they even have any that take clients outside of celebrities? You’ll need one separate from your business attorney, one well-versed in prenuptial arrangements of the kind you and Boone potentially might be drawing up.”
“More like improbably,” Ford muttered, his breakfast untouched from the looks of it, mirroring his wife-to-be’s.
“Let me give Bill a call later this morning and see if he can recommend someone out in your neck of the woods. He’s got plenty of connections,” Dad continued relentlessly. “And remember, you want someone who represents you, not both of you.” My dad pulled his phone from his pocket, breaking a cardinal rule of no phones at the table, either making a reminder or about to dial up Bill right this minute. “I’ll ask him too if he knows of anyone who can help you with your business. While I’ve got him on the line.”
“I have someone who sees to the legal matters around the business,” I got in. My voice sounded so small, I don’t think Boone even heard me.
“And if you haven’t already, put together a will, Clara Belle. One that will protect your company, in the event of your death, from those close to you who might have less-than-honorable intentions when it comes to their interest in you all of a sudden.”
“Am I to infer from your tone that you’re referring to individuals outside of her own family who have less-than-honorable intentions?” Boone didn’t hide the accusation in his tone.
“I think we’ve all heard enough from you for one morning, Mr. Cavanaugh. I’m talking to my daughter directly—I’m certainly not going through the snake pouring poison into her ear.” Dad waved his finger between him and me, implying we had the tight bond that some dads had with their daughters. Most everyone at the table probably knew better though. “Besides, this is a family breakfast. You might be trying for a second time to weasel your way into it, but I can assure you if I have anything to say about it, you’ll be as successful marrying into the Abbotts as you were the first time you made your play.”
“Dad . . .” I said, but it barely registered a decibel.
Shouts and protests broke out around the table—my dad shoving out of his chair, still popping off insults at Boone; Ford beside him, adding fuel to the fire; and my mom bouncing in her seat, about to cry from the way her “perfect” wedding week kick-off breakfast was turning into a scene out of a reality television series. If the table hadn’t been so large, I didn’t doubt my dad wouldn’t have already thrown it over.
“Dad, stop,” I tried again, but it was useless.
Boone, who’d stayed calm during the first brunt of my dad’s attack, was shoving out of his seat, firing back insults and accusations just as lashing. That was the point I tuned out.
I shouldn’t have come back. No one really wanted me here anyway. Charlotte had only invited me because our mom had insisted and Mom had only insisted because I was the sister of the bride and what would the five hundred guests think if the sister of the bride wasn’t there? The Abbott Family Façade would no doubt be shattered for good over that scandal.
Invitation or not, I shouldn’t have come. I brought dissent and disaster upon this family. They brought the same upon me. We were better off without each other, something I’d accepted the day I stepped foot into my first apartment back in California and realized it felt more like home than the one I’d grown up in ever had.
Everyone still at each other’s throats, I quietly pushed out of my chair, stood, and silently left the room. If anyone noticed me leave, no one called out to me. If anyone cared I was leaving, no one expressed it.
I passed Frieda in the hall, her face settled into a concerned expression, but before she could ask me if I was okay, I nodded and kept going. I had to get out of this house and find some fresh air. Or some fresher air at least.
I went through the back of the house, shoving through the screen door the house staff were required to use. I’d always felt more comfortable passing through that old side door than the sweeping double ones at the front anyway.
The moment my feet touched the grass, I kicked off my sandals, pulled the bow out of my hair, and jogged toward the edge of the grounds. I knew where I was going, but I couldn’t get there fast enough. I felt as though I had a rubber band around my waist, and the farther I got from the house and my family, the harder it fought to pull me back. The harder I had to fight to keep pulling away. If only I could just find the point where that rubber band would snap and the connection could be cut once and for all, life could be so much easier down here.
For once, I could feel as apathetic about my family as I pretended I was.
The tire swing was still there, dangling from one of the big oak trees creeping along the streambed, more of the tire covered by Spanish moss than was exposed. I supposed without me around, there was no one to climb through it and swing away hours of the day, searching for the answers to their problems in the steady pendulum of a rope tied to a circle of rubber.
The morning was warming up but still cool enough to be enjoyed, the humidity not yet sticking to my skin like an impatient lover. I approached the swing and carefully swept aside the moss, just enough to climb through the tire and swing, but not so much it would damage the tendrils of moss. Time had frayed the rope and lined the rubber with cracks, but it was still there. Still serving its purpose and persevering.
The tire swing had been one of the few things my dad had added to the grounds with his own hands and sweat and elbow grease. It had been a present for my fifth birthday, the only one I said I wanted the morning I woke up and my parents asked me what they could buy me. Since it had been a Sunday and most of the staff was off for the day, Dad had no choice but to buy the supplies himself, hang the rope, and cinch the tire tight. It was either that or deal with a disappointed daughter, and back then, our relationship had been easier.
I’d picked out the tree, and Dad had done the rest. It had taken him most of the day, and my birthday was only a couple hours away from being over by the time it was done, but I got what I wanted that day: my dad’s attention—the good kind—and a tire swing I’d spent a year’s worth of hours on since.
The rope stretched and whined when I settled my weight into the swing, but it held strong. The outside of the tire might have worn thin, but the core was still strong. Winding my arms around the rubber, giving it a gentle hug, I leaned my cheek into the tread and used my toes to swing me gently back and forth. The dew-dotted grass tickled my ankles while the sheets of Spanish moss brushed across my back. If there was one place in this state I felt at home, it was right there.
Only a minute or two had passed, and I was just starting to p
ut the disaster known as breakfast with my family behind me, when I heard heavy footsteps crunching through the grass behind me. I didn’t look over my shoulder to see who it was; I already knew. In my lifetime, only one person had come looking for me when I’d gone missing. Only one had cared enough to find me, or cared enough to notice I was gone in the first place.
The footsteps came to a stop a few lengths back, then he cleared his throat like he was announcing himself. “So . . . I’m a prick.”
I continued staring at the world in front of me, refusing to look behind me at all that was there waiting.
“Already know that,” I said, feeling something more closely resembling exhaustion than the outrage I’d felt earlier.
Behind me, Boone sighed. “I’m sorry. I couldn’t help it. Those people . . . the way they think of me . . . the way they treat you . . . I guess I can’t help but try to even the score any time I see a chance.”
Back and forth. Forth and back. I kept swinging, though my toes were growing tired of bearing the weight of my body. “Already know that too”
“What does that mean?”
I caught myself about to look back. Not yet. I wasn’t ready for my moment of peace to be over. There’d already been too few and far between. Twenty hours of torture to every two minutes of solace. “You know what that means, Boone.”
He seemed content to let my words hang between us, not in a rush to move on or deny it. Just when I was close to checking to see if he was still there or if I’d scared him away, I heard his steps move closer.
“Enough with the heavy for one morning, okay?” he said, his fingers brushing my back when the swing swung his direction. “You want me to push you?”
I slid my hair back behind my shoulders to hide my neck. If he was paying close enough attention, I didn’t want him to notice the goose bumps dotting the skin there. “I want you to push me and keep your mouth shut.”
When I swung back in his direction again, Boone grabbed the rope to stop it. “I think I can manage that.”
I smiled, knowing Boone might have been capable of keeping his mouth shut momentarily, but never for long. If he managed a whole minute, it was a success.