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  “Is that her?” Annabelle said, sounding overly delighted. She moved past Duncan as if compelled to take a closer look. Duncan, apparently under the same compulsion, moved in step behind Annabelle. Admittedly, he was just as intrigued. He only hoped his voice wouldn't come out sounding quite so delighted.

  Matt Collins turned to indicate the two of them. “Piper Beaumont,” he said. “This is my colleague, Duncan James.”

  Oh, Duncan thought as he took her hand. Not a ball of fire at all, but a Kewpie doll come to life. Yellow-blond curls, large blue eyes, and pink cheeks. Forget her mouth. He couldn’t chance another look at her mouth, for Christ’s sake. He was standing next to Annabelle.

  “Ms. Beaumont.” He grinned. “It certainly is a pleasure to meet you.” He cleared his throat and then remembered the woman standing to his left. “May I introduce Annabelle Devine? She’s from Henderson. Like you.”

  “Oh, really? Henderson?” Piper asked, gazing at Annabelle as if Annabelle had come from the moon rather than just an hour’s drive away. “It’s got to be my favorite place in all the world. I grew up there. Well, I didn’t exactly grow up there, but I was there through fourth grade.”

  “I lived there most of my life,” Annabelle gushed. “I’m in Raleigh now, but my parents are still there, and I go back all the time.”

  “Oh, I’ve been meaning to go back. I keep tellin’ everybody that the Research Triangle may as well be the Bermuda Triangle. Once I moved in, I never moved out. Except for college—I did manage to get out of the state for college. But that inexplicable pull, that force of the Triangle, had me back here before I knew it. How is ol’ Henderson?” Piper asked. Her southern drawl became noticeably stronger the more she talked to Annabelle.

  “Just as lovely as ever. You really ought to come back for a visit. The center of town has been transformed by a few boutique shops and two nice restaurants. There are a couple of small businesses, too. Other than that, I bet you’d find it just as you remember.”

  “Ms. Beaumont, the reason we’re here,” Duncan interrupted, “is to reintroduce an old friend of yours from Henderson. Maybe you remember Van—” Duncan looked behind him and saw nothing but empty space. “Wait. Where’d he go?”

  As they stood gabbing, the lobby area had cleared out. Except for the security detail, they were the only ones left.

  Vance Evans had disappeared into thin air.

  ***

  Vance’s phone didn’t buzz inside his pocket until he was halfway back to Henderson. He pulled it out, noted that it was Duncan, declined the call, and threw the phone into the passenger seat of the Corvette. Then he floored it.

  At least Duncan hadn’t tried to contact him in front of Piper.

  It was bound to happen, he thought as he shook his head. Pick up a hundred girls and the odds start to turn against you.

  When he saw her enter the courthouse lobby, he’d recognized her immediately. And there was no way he was waiting around for an introduction because she would have recognized him as well. Not from fourth grade, but from a night five years ago when no names had been exchanged. A night in Raleigh, celebrating Cinco de Mayo in a dive bar with a Jimmy Buffet cover band. They’d maneuvered each other into a dark corner and—

  “Christ.”

  He hadn’t thought about that incident in a very long time, but boy, it was all coming back to him now. Standing halfway down the bar when she walked in, he remembered her eyes searching the crowd and landing on him. And on him they stayed. He didn’t know what he’d done to deserve the attention of a blond-haired, pink-cheeked picture of innocence but he stood his ground willing to find out.

  Two drinks and an hour later, she finally navigated her way to him. He’d admired her ability to brush off all the come-ons with such finesse that the sons of bitches still smiled in her wake. She stopped directly in front of him. He looked down, she looked up. He said, “Hello.” She said, “Hi.” He asked if she wanted to dance. She took his hand and pulled him on to the dance floor. Forty-five minutes later, she had her hands under his shirt and was backing him up against a wall.

  “Jesus Christ.” He was getting turned on just thinking about it. It’s what separated her from every other woman he’d been with. She was the aggressor. She took control the moment she laid eyes on him. He wasn’t particularly aware of it at the time, but his body sure recognized it when she started kissing him. All he did was sidle them farther into the dark and then slide his feet out a bit so he wasn’t so much taller. She took control of his mouth, her hands holding his head as her sweet tongue swept over his lips. He didn’t have to think, plot, plan, or implement. For the first time he was not in control, and he relaxed into it. He enjoyed the sensation of being seduced instead of seducing.

  Which is probably why it all went to hell.

  That kiss. Her kiss. He’d never been kissed like that in his life. He shook his head just thinking about it. There wasn’t anything particularly different about it. There were lips involved, tongues involved, hands—great hands. Her hands were all over the upper part of him. He remembered that.

  He remembered she’d physically tilted his head and then moved hers the opposite way. That’s when he’d wrapped his arms around her tiny waist, practically crossing them at the elbows, and pressed that luscious round rack of hers to his chest. Once their tongues touched, she opened her mouth farther and he did too.

  The feel of her tongue, the moisture of her mouth, the plumpness of her soft pink lips was all so good that he wasn’t thinking about anything. He simply allowed the sensations to wash over him. And that magical combination sent him to a place where everything was right with the world. Where his mother still ran her fingertips through his hair as he fell asleep at night. Where Piper’s smile greeted him at school every morning.

  “Holy fuck!”

  He hadn’t even known he was kissing Piper at the time, yet his mind went to that place. That comfortable, easy, let somebody else take care of me place. Her kiss took him there. And he’d reveled in it. He had accepted it and enjoyed it until his brain betrayed him by slowly bringing him back to reality. And that’s when he remembered that anything that could make him feel this good was not going to be sticking around.

  And he hadn’t enough heart or soul left inside him to pay that kind of price.

  Vance couldn’t remember what happened after that. He only remembered the emotion tied to it. Desperation. Self-preservation.

  He bet Piper could describe what happened in great detail. That’s why he ran today. He didn’t ever want her to know that Vance Evans was the one who’d left her standing there.

  He had no recollection, but somehow he got himself out of the bar and home. And then—

  “Holy shit.”

  He’d put on workout clothes and gone out for a run. And he’d been running ever since. The fact that he was doing eighty miles an hour speeding away from the current situation did not escape him.

  An alert from his cell caught his attention. As he exited I-85 and cruised up the ramp, he reached over and checked the text message from Duncan. At the top of that ramp, somewhere between home and everything else, Vance Evans was forced to stop running.

  “That night in the bar. Cinco de Mayo. She knew it was you.”

  ***

  As twilight deepened, Brooks strolled along the back of the clubhouse and watched as a lone figure on the driving range continuously drove golf balls over and over and over. The driving range was closed, but apparently plenty of balls had been left for Vance to take out his frustrations.

  After the call came in from Duncan that things had not gone as planned in Raleigh and Brooks couldn’t get a hold of Vance on his phone, Brooks headed to the batting cages. He’d pinned some of his own hopes for Vance on this Piper Beaumont, so Brooks wouldn’t have minded spending some time cracking a ball with a bat himself. But Vance was in the middle of the golf tournament with Lolly, so it made sense that he was here. Hiding. Or whatever.

  Brooks stood for a
while, waiting to see if Vance would give up. But as the minutes ticked by and darkness fell across the green lawns stretching out before him, he took the initiative and walked out to Vance and stood off to the side. Three swings later Vance stopped, looked at the ground, and then started to scuff his foot like he was a pitcher on the mound.

  “She’s amazing,” he said. “More than I could have ever dreamed up.” He brought the club up and swung it like a baseball bat. Hard. “I picked her up at The Charlie Horse five years ago not knowing who she was.” He stopped for a moment. “Actually, maybe in the back of my mind I did recognize her. Because when she kissed me, I distinctly remember thinking about her smile. Back in fourth grade. The one she waited to give me every morning when I walked into that classroom.”

  Vance turned toward Brooks, but it was too dark to see his face. “It felt so damn good that I ran away from it. From her. Now, any normal person would run toward something like that. But not me. No, I'm so screwed up I couldn't get out of there fast enough. She was right there in my arms, and I threw it away.”

  “You didn’t know who she was.”

  “It didn’t matter who she was! For the forty-five minutes I was with her, I was happy. So happy I forgot I was me. And when I came down from this rare high, when I remembered that I am the kid whose mother left him, that I didn’t matter enough for her to continue a relationship with me, that nothing I did, no amount of money I made, no amount of academic honors, not even winning the fucking College World Series was impressive enough to bring my mother back. When I remembered who I was, I didn’t have the courage to be happy. And that is on me.”

  Even if Brooks had possessed the wisdom of Solomon—even if he’d been able to conjure the perfect words to miraculously heal Vance from the damage his mother had inflicted, he could not have given them voice. The length and breadth of emotion seizing his chest and throat wouldn’t have allowed the words to pass. So he did the only thing he could. He strode forward and placed a solid hand on his buddy’s shoulder.

  Chapter Seven

  Late Friday afternoon, Vance leaned against his father’s lapis blue Maserati Gran Turismo with its convertible top down exposing the fine caramel leather interior. Dressed in a pair of jeans, a red V-neck T-shirt, and a pair of leather flip-flops, he watched the courthouse doors some twenty white stone steps above him with his feet crossed at the ankles and his arms crossed over his chest. When he saw Piper and her lackeys exit the building, he took a step forward and tucked his hands in his pockets.

  Piper spotted him halfway down the steps and froze.

  He watched as she slowly tucked a few wind-blown curls behind her ear while steadily meeting his gaze. His solar plexus tightened as the rest of the world fell away.

  One of the men-in-black said something to divert her attention. He watched as they spoke briefly—watched as she checked the time, opened her yellow tote, and dug out a group of files to hand over to one of her minions. With her finger tapping the top of the file, she gave instructions and received a few serious head-bobs.

  Then the suits moved off.

  Vance reminded himself to breathe as his gaze lingered over Piper, standing alone in the middle of the broad staircase, clasping her pretty briefcase with both hands. She looked soft and vulnerable with her sleeveless yellow dress fluttering about her knees and her yellow-blond curls dancing in the warm summer breeze. Vance drank her in, every memory he ever had of Piper colliding into this one perfect moment.

  She raised one tentative hand in greeting.

  He did the same.

  Then she ducked her head and descended the steps, the end of a curl brushing her lips as she made her way to him. She stopped less than an arm’s length away and used a finger to drag the bit of curl away from her lower lip. She took a quick glance around and then focused all her attention directly on him.

  “Hi,” she said shyly.

  “Hello,” he responded, taking a short step forward and briefly touching the tip of his index finger to the side of her arm. He caught himself and forced his hands into his back pockets. “Did you come down here to see me or to check out the car?”

  She blinked up at him—her eyes pure Carolina blue. “What car?”

  Vance licked his lips and let his eyes dart to the right before a slow grin spread across his face. “I’ll bet you are very good at your job.”

  She laughed and came into her full voice as she said, “I am.”

  “Any chance you have time to take a ride?”

  “Any chance you’d let me drive?”

  “This from the girl who said, ‘what car?’” he said, feigning heartbreak as he opened the driver’s door for her. He’d have handed over the title if that’s what it took to get her to come with him.

  Her smile spread from pretty pink cheek to pretty pink cheek. She reached back to slip off one tall, yellow heel and then the other, tossing them on the floor behind the driver's seat. Then she turned to face him, flatfooted.

  Oh. Dear. God.

  Vance gulped for air. He stood towering over the most petite, most precious, blond-haired, blue-eyed baby doll of a girl, whose lush round curves claimed she was no baby at all. This darling, five-foot-nothing female—looking up at him like he was some freaking A-list celebrity—was all woman. Overtly feminine and softly plump in all the right places—starting right there with those red ripe lips. Something about her being so tiny and standing this close made him want to beat his chest and roar. Because all he could think about was tangling his fingers in all those bouncy curls and dragging her back to his cave.

  Hell, yes.

  He pushed his hands deep inside the pockets of his jeans, wrestling with his inner Neanderthal while Piper, blissfully unaware of the danger she was in, dug out a pair of sunglasses and a yellow headband before placing her briefcase next to her shoes. The headband made her look all of eighteen, but the dark shades were so damn cool they made her look like she owned the Maserati.

  “So…yellow.” It was all his lust-addled brain could stammer.

  “Annabelle told me it’s my signature color. I didn’t realize I had a signature color.”

  “Annabelle?”

  “My new best friend.”

  “Perfect,” Vance grumbled, wincing as he shut her door. “Damn Keeper of the Debutantes needs to keep her nose out of other people’s affairs,” he muttered, moving around to the passenger’s side. He opened the door and slid into the luxurious leather interior.

  “Key?” She held out her palm. Vance stared at her delicate little fingers and fought back the urge to bite them. Wondering from what scary depths of his rusted-out soul that little desire had sprung from, he dug the rectangular device from his pocket and placed it in the center of her palm instead.

  “Hit the button and the key will pop out.”

  Piper did as directed, smiled and slid the key into the ignition. Then she laughed out loud at the blood-stirring VAROOM the engine made. “Wow.”

  The noise settled him. In fact, Vance laughed at her reaction—happy his father’s car could bring such joy. “Just wait ’til you hit the gas,” he promised.

  And she did—all the way to Henderson. With Vance pointing out the potential speed traps, Piper took full advantage of the horsepower beneath her and drove like she was Dale Earnhardt in a skirt. Vance spent most of the drive glancing over at her and grinning behind his hand. It was a bit disconcerting to observe how much this tiny, yellow feather of a woman loved going fast—loved weaving in and out of traffic and throwing the Mas into sport mode to really move out. Nothing about the way Piper drove was tiny or delicate, shy or hesitant. It was full throttle all the way. It brought back memories of their full-throttle night when they’d been out on the dance floor, her hands all over him—backing him up against a wall.

  Two thoughts occurred at once. One, the against-the-wall-thing was his signature move, and two, how the hell was he going to get her to do it again?

  For forty-five minutes they let the wind whip over the
m and carry away the summer heat. When Piper asked him to turn up an old rock ballad on the radio, they both sang at the top of their lungs, laughing. The sound of her laughter smoothed over Vance like a soothing balm, and for a moment everything stopped and became crystal clear. Thank God he’d taken the chance to see her today. Thank God he’d found the courage to do it. Because even if this drive was all that there would ever be between him and Piper Beaumont, it would be enough. Because in that one fleeting moment, Vance felt joy.

  He directed her off the interstate and into Henderson proper, then down roads and into turns, realizing she didn’t remember any of it and had no idea where he was leading her. When she pulled up in front of their elementary school, her baby-blues went wide and that plump, sexy mouth of hers formed an O. She looked between him and the front door, and raised her sunglasses to the top of her head. “I remember,” she whispered.

  It looked nearly the same as it did when they were students here together twenty years before.

  “Take me to the playground.”

  Vance nodded and indicated with his fingers that she should turn the car around and park in the teachers’ lot. “It’s changed,” he warned.

  “Not completely,” she said, walking barefoot to the swings. “These aren’t the exact same swings, but they are in the exact same place.” She sat in the rubber seat, both hands gripping the metal links at her sides. Vance joined her, sitting in the next swing over.

  They surveyed the grounds as they used their feet to gently sway back and forth. The new playground equipment was just a fantasy to kids of their era, with all the climbing structures, hideouts, and cozy nooks here and there. Slides and monkey bars all made of the latest non-corrosive, non-life-threatening materials.

  “You liked the merry-go-round the best,” Vance remembered. “You liked to go fast on that, too,” he said, throwing her a wink.