Too bad his gaze landed on the side of her face as he asked, “What does that mean?”

  17

  Travis had thought for a moment that he’d shake Flynn’s hand and they’d get along fabulously. He did make a decent first impression, and if he’d met the man years ago, surely he hadn’t done anything too remarkable.

  He had remembered Travis, though, and that wasn’t a great sign.

  Neither was the way Shay stood rooted to the ground, one hand wiping her eyes, which hadn’t left the closed front door of her momma’s house.

  “Are we fixin’ to go in or go home?” he asked, trying to be gentle. He wanted an explanation for what Flynn had said, but something told him to get through the party first. Meet her parents with a smile, pretend or not, and deal with what had just happened later.

  “Come on, darlin’,” he said, tugging on her arm. She stepped with him, and he led her up the front steps to the door. Thankfully, Shayla seemed to regain her senses by then, because she reached to open the door without ringing the bell.

  She took him inside, and Travis couldn’t see any sign of distress on her face. He didn’t like that, because it made him wonder what else she could hide away so easily. He’d never known Shay to cry, and she’d never acted terribly sad about what had happened with Kylie, her former partner at Sweetspot.

  Of course, she hadn’t told him the whole story there yet. He hadn’t asked, but from what he’d come to know about Shay over the past couple of months, he didn’t believe she had a malicious bone in her body. Something had definitely happened, because while Travis had been dating Kylie at the time Sweetspot had been taken from her—when she’d lost it? When she’d walked away from it? When something had happened between her and Shay—he didn’t know what had gone on.

  Kylie had broken up with him and left Sweet Water Falls. In fact, he’d thought he’d driven her out of town, and it was a text that had come in weeks after their break-up that had told him about the failed business and that she’d left town. He hadn’t even known that until then.

  The party around him entered his gray matter, and he closed his eyes against the orange glitter on the humongo spider hanging from the vaulted ceiling in the foyer. “Wow-wow-wee-wow,” he muttered to himself. There was no way for Shay to hear him, that was for dang sure.

  His first instinct was to turn around and walk out, but his feet kept taking him forward. The house held people, but it wasn’t stuffed to the gills, despite the amount of noise assaulting Travis’s ears.

  “There’s my mother,” Shay said, and she nodded to the left. Travis looked that way, and it wasn’t hard to find her mom. Regina Nelson wore a massive faux fur around her shoulders, a dazzling ball gown down the length of her body, with bright, silver heels on her feet. She’d donned a black wig, but it didn’t help Travis know who she was supposed to be. The dangling earrings that threw light all over the house from the mirror ball were a clue, but Travis felt like he needed a detective to figure out her costume.

  “Shay,” a man said, laughing immediately afterward. She squealed as she released Travis, and a man close to his age lifted her right up off her feet. They laughed together, and her brother’s smile looked almost identical to Shay’s.

  Travis grinned at the two of them. She’d said she loved her siblings, even if her sister made things difficult for her sometimes. “Introduce me to your Mister Darcy, Elizabeth,” he drawled.

  Shay clung to her brother’s arm, the way a proper lady would do, all while beaming at Travis. “This is Travis Cooper,” she said. “My Mister Darcy.”

  “I’m Sam, the brother. My wife and kids are around somewhere.” He didn’t look around to find them, but kept his dark eyes on Travis.

  “Nice to meet you,” Travis said, and he shook the man’s hand.

  “Shay-Shay,” another man said, and the roughness of his voice stood in direct contrast to the cutesy thing he’d said. She and Sam parted to let an older gentleman through, and Travis recognized the shape of his chin as the same one he saw on his girlfriend’s face.

  Her father.

  “Daddy,” Shay said. She tipped up onto her toes and kissed his cheek. “This is my boyfriend, Travis.” Her dad slung his arm around her back. “Trav, this is my daddy. Aaron.”

  “Howdy, sir.” Travis reached to shake the man’s hand, glad he was smiling so broadly. “Nice to meet you.”

  “And you. We haven’t had Shay bring anyone home for a while.”

  “Daddy,” Shay warned.

  “Has he had your breakfast burrito?” Aaron asked. “You could get him to propose if you’d just serve him that.”

  “Daddy,” Shay said again, her brother warning him too, but Travis had started to laugh internally.

  “That’s how my wife roped me into walking down the aisle,” Aaron continued on as if no one had spoken. “Breakfast burritos. With tater tots right inside the tortilla.” He smacked his lips, and Sam pulled him away.

  “We’re trying to keep him in the back room,” Sam said. “Come with me, Papa. Let’s get you one of those chocolate oat pies Uncle Merlin brought.”

  “Thank you,” Shay called after her brother, and when she turned back to Travis, he let his laughter out.

  “Breakfast burritos?” He leaned down and inhaled the scent of her neck, still chuckling as he exhaled. “How come I haven’t heard of these before now?”

  “Because my father is a little nutty,” she said, pushing against his chest. “He wants the laugh, Trav. You don’t play into that hand.”

  “Sorry,” he said, but he wasn’t. He had a feeling he could sit with Aaron Nelson for hours, rocking as the evening sun set and the older gentleman told stories about his life. And Shay’s life.

  “Okay,” she said, and she took a deep breath. “Let’s meet my mom.” She took him across the room, and the two women her mom had been chatting with both turned toward them as they approached. “And my aunt, apparently.” She grinned as she stepped into her mother. “Hey, Mom.”

  “You made it,” her mother said as if they were hours and hours late.

  Shay said nothing, and she didn’t hold onto her mother for long. She joined the trio of women as she faced Travis. “Travis, this is my mother. Mom, this is Travis Cooper.”

  “The boyfriend,” Regina said, her eyes traveling down the length of him. He wished he wore his jeans and spurs and boots—though he didn’t really wear spurs around the dairy farm—and his favorite plum-colored shirt.

  Rather, it was Shay’s favorite plum-colored shirt. He hadn’t even known plum was a color a shirt could be until she’d told him. He’d gone with purple, but she’d told him the fashion word for purple was plum.

  Instead, he wore a pair of saggy pants, the worst boots on the planet, and a too-tight jacket.

  “You make a fine Mister Darcy,” Regina said. “Doesn’t he, girls?”

  “My, yes,” another of the older women said.

  “My aunt, Michelle,” Shay said, and though the music had just switched to some creepy chorus with frogs ribbiting in it—legit frogs—Travis detected a touch of dryness in her tone. “And this is my momma’s very best friend in the whole world, Shirley Bent.”

  “A pleasure to meet you all,” Travis said, really drawing out the words and enunciating them in his strong Texan accent. He swept his top hat off his head in a big show and bent at the waist, the way he’d seen the actor playing Mr. Darcy in the movie do. He and Shay had watched it last weekend, and Travis had only fallen asleep once.

  “How long have you two been goin’ out?” Shirley asked, picking up what looked like a spider, with eight mini-pretzels extending off the body—a chocolate truffle. “Have you had these delectable spiders? They’re divine.” She bit off half of the spider, and bam, four legs disappeared.

  “Caramel,” she said. “Salt. Chocolate.” She smacked her lips and popped the rest of the spider into her mouth.

  “Who made these?” Shay asked, reaching for one.

  “Who says I didn’t?” Regina asked, and Travis detected the undercurrent of…something there. It was almost like Regina was competing with Shay.

  “I know you cater this party,” Shay said without missing a beat. “Right down to the Dracula punch.” She grinned at her mother like her attitude hadn’t penetrated some happy bubble Shay had encased herself in.

  “Gretchen Bellows from Sweet Water Taffy made the spiders,” Michelle said, selling Regina out. “And the werewolf brownies. You have to try them, Travis. They’ve got raspberry filling, and you’ve never had a brownie this chocolatey.”

  “Yes, ma’am,” Travis said, wondering if he could load up a plate of sweets and take them to Will. His brother had some sort of connection to Gretchen Bellows, whether he’d admit it or not. If Travis sweetened him up first, maybe Will would talk.

  He let himself get whisked away by Aunt Michelle, and he sampled the “bloody brownies” and anything else the woman put in front of him. By the time he circled back to Shay, he’d met a whole bunch of people whose names he couldn’t remember, and his stomach ached from all the desserts he’d eaten.

  “There you are,” she said. “Come eat dinner, and then we can go.”

  “Can we?” He took the plate with the hamburger on it. It was all meat and bun, without any fixin’s, and Travis wasn’t sure he could take more than one bite.

  “Yes,” she said. “My sister’s husband made that, and he’s three steps away.” She pasted a smile on her face, and Travis turned just as a man and a woman stopped in front of him.

  “My sister Claudia,” Shay said. “And her husband, Jackson.”

  Travis deftly put the plate with the sad, naked hamburger on the counter beside him and made to shake their hands. He mentally recited that he wanted to meet her family. It was important. He could smile and shake hands for another hour if he had to.

  He channeled his inner golden retriever, picturing Queenie’s blissful doggy face every time she met someone new. All he lacked was the panting and sniffing.

  He congratulated Claudia on her pregnancy. Laughed with Jackson about one of the silly names his wife wanted if the baby was a boy. Choked down as much of his hamburger as he could, and filled up on potato chips.

  So by the time Shay said they could leave, Travis’s stomach rolled and grumbled at him for his dietary choices—and the conversation he needed to have with Shay.

  After helping Shay into the passenger seat, he put the plate of treats her mom had fixed for him in the back seat of the truck and looked up at the October moon. “Help me,” he prayed, and he rounded the vehicle and got behind the wheel.

  He sighed and started the engine. As he buckled, he glanced over to Shay. She had her head tilted as she worked on taking out one of her earrings, and their eyes met.

  “I’m sorry,” she said at the same time he said, “What did Flynn mean?”

  “What?”

  “Flynn,” he said, making the name very hearable. “He said he dated Kylie, and then you, and that you just went around doing everything Kylie had done first.” He’d heard all of that, and not just in his ears.

  He’d dated Kylie before Shay, and it seemed like Flynn had too.

  “I just want to go home,” Shay said.

  “We’re goin’,” Travis said. “But it’s a half-hour drive, Shay. It would be great if you could fill me in along the way.”

  “I don’t want to.”

  “I deserve to know,” he said.

  “Do you?” she challenged. “Why’s that?”

  He looked over at her, the lights from the house illuminating her face enough for him to see the anger there. “Because,” he said.

  “Because I’ve stuck around the longest?” she provided for him.

  “No,” he said quickly. “Because we’re together, and that’s what couples do, Shay. They tell each other things.” He didn’t mean to put the truck into gear too violently, but he still did. His ugly, plastic Mr. Darcy boot pushed too hard on the accelerator too, nearly throwing him back into the seat.

  “Travis,” she barked.

  “Don’t yell at me,” he said. “You’re the one who won’t do any talking.”

  “I’ve told you things.”

  “Not some very important things,” he said. “I still don’t know what happened with you and Kylie. I don’t know the history of this huge company you devote so much of your life too.”

  “Hey, you work a lot too.”

  “I didn’t say I don’t,” he said, his temper rising along with the volume of his voice. He breathed in harshly through his nose and worked to tamp down his frustration and the level of his voice. He just needed to stop and think. Give her some time to explain.

  He wished he hadn’t had to attend the party for so long, because he already felt at the end of his rope.

  Shay sighed, and he expected her voice to be pinched and higher-pitched when she spoke. But her tone was steady and strong as she leaned her head against the window and said, “I just want to run away.”

  “I know the feeling,” he said darkly. That was what he’d been doing when he’d first met Shay, stranded on the side of the highway—running away from the farm for a few minutes.

  “That’s what I do, Trav,” Shay said in a freakishly calm whisper. “I run away from things when they get hard. That’s what I did with Flynn. It’s what I did with Kylie. It’s what I’ve always done."

  Travis kneaded the steering wheel, trying to find the right thing to say. She’ll get tired of you soon enough. He wasn’t going to ask if Flynn was right, and she’d abandon him when she got tired of him. He knew Shay better than that. He did.

  He took a breath and kept his eyes on the dark stretch of road as his headlights illuminated it. “You didn’t with Sweetspot,” he finally said. She didn’t answer, and Travis finally dared to look over to her. “Right, Shay? You didn’t with Sweetspot. You fought for that. You kept that. You stayed with that, right?”

  When she didn’t affirm right away, Trav’s discomfort grew. He reassured himself that Shay wasn’t going to run. She wasn’t going to leave Sweet Water Falls.

  After all, her new permanent storefront for Sweetspot sat right downtown.

  18

  Shayla stared out her window, the night landscape rushing by. She closed her eyes and saw no difference. Run streamed through her mind.

  Run, run, run.

  She pulled against it. Yanked. Dug her heels in.

  “Right,” she said, finally getting control of the wild horses in her head. The ones trying to get her to abandon her house, her dog, her business, and her boyfriend here in Sweet Water Falls.

  “Right,” Travis repeated. “So you won’t leave town.”

  “No,” she said. She just wanted to leave her life behind for a little while. “Could you take me to Elaine’s? She’s got Sweetie anyway, and I don’t want to be home alone.”

  “I’ll stay with you,” he said.

  “You can’t stay over with me,” she said. “I know your mother—and mine—and she wouldn’t like that.”

  “Mama won’t know.”

  “No?” Shayla challenged. “Are you saying you won’t need to go over to the farmhouse and help her out of bed in the morning?” She swung her head toward him, and she saw the answer right there, though he didn’t look directly at her.

  “Do you want to change, at least?”

  “Yes, please,” she whispered. She pressed her eyes closed again, reaching down deep inside herself to find her courage. She did want to keep Travis in her life. She absolutely did.

  “I moved Sweetspot from Marble Falls to Sweet Water Falls a few years ago.” She cleared her throat. “Four years ago. A little over four years ago.”

  “When you split ways with Kylie,” he said.

  “Right,” she said. “We’d already been looking to expand here. A second location. That’s why she lived here, and you met her. Started dating and whatever.”

  “She wasn’t here long,” he said, his voice as quiet as hers.

  “A few months.”

  “I only went out with her for five or six weeks,” he said. “Then she…up and left. When she finally told me why, she said her business partner at Sweetspot had ‘stolen the company’ from her.”

  “That’s not true,” Shay said, almost yelling in the quiet cab of the truck.

  “I know that, Shay.” Travis’s warm hand came down on her arm, and he gently coaxed her hand away from her midsection and into his. “I know that.”

  “She was the one who wanted to bring on investors,” Shay said, her mind casting back to the time when Kylie had burst into their shared office, so much hope shining in her hazel eyes. Everything about Kylie had been a combination of two or three things. Eyes with brown and green. Hair with blonde and brown. A personality with sweet and salty. A mind with big ideas and even bigger fears.

  “She didn’t want to get a small business loan and keep the two of us as owners. I didn’t want investors coming in and taking over what we’d envisioned and then built. If she’d have had it her way, we’d have had twenty-five percent of the company to split.” Shay shook her head. “That wasn’t what we’d worked for seven years to build.”

  Travis said nothing, and Shay appreciated the time to just breathe for a minute. She tried to separate the thoughts in her head so she could articulate them. “We argued for a long time. She went behind my back and started meeting with huge investors out of San Antonio, Austin, even one in California. While she was on ‘vacation’ on the West Coast, I learned that if I didn’t get the business out of her name before she came back, I’d be the one left behind. She was going to sign people on whether I agreed or not.”

  “So she was going to steal it from you.”

  She liked that he hadn’t phrased it as a question. “I thought so, yes. Did you know her when she went to California?”

  “Mm, yeah,” he said. “That’s ringing a bell.”