The first time I met Augusta Belle Branson, she was fixin’
on killin’ herself.
Said the minute I’d walked up, she was tryin’ to decide if
jumpin’ off the bridge in the center—where the water was deep and the current
stronger—would be a swifter end, or if she should jump near the edge, where
jagged limestone slabs anchored the slow-moving current.
I replayed the split second when the Indian summer sun burst
through the orange oak leaves, a halo of warmth enveloping her.
Like an angel. Stardust sparkling straight from heaven,
ploppin’ her in my path.
And then she turned, the most startling shade of liquid
amber eyes breathing something real and alive, like fire, into my soul.
That same something I’d been runnin’ from—or chasin’,
dependin’ on how you looked at it—just about every day since.
I settled myself on the lone wooden stool that awaited at center
stage, my thoughts drawing back to the present. My head swam, but the old
familiar chords floated on through the current of whiskey in my blood, and I
strummed the first few notes of a song I wrote a lot of nights ago by an act of
sheer muscle memory.
Old acoustic guitar resting on my knee, my first and third
fingers in position on the strings, the opening chords of “Whiskey Girl” bled
from my fingers.
Every chord, another dagger.
Every whispered lyric, my undoing.
I still didn’t know what the fuck had overtaken me the night
I’d written this song in a fevered rush.
Well, the booze might have played a part, but I happened to
think my best shit came out of uninhibited states.
I’d just had a fuckton of uninhibited states recently.
And the harder the liquor, the more she haunted me.
The crowd of a few hundred erupted into a standing ovation
when I ended with the final, emotion-charged words.
The irony of this song was it was the one that’d launched my
career. The first single to hit radio waves and then the top spot on the
Billboard charts, and brought reporters, music executives, long-lost family
members I wasn’t even really sure I was related to, and too much other scum
with an end game that carried dollar signs to my front doorstep.
I’d moved to Nashville a rising star and left two years
later, middle finger in the air as I tossed my once-promising music career out
with last night’s liquor bottles in favor of the open road.
Not finding the one thing I needed.
Playing local honky-tonks for a fraction of the money I
could have made.
But the truth was, the road was the only place I could find
my happy.
A familiar ball of pain formed in my throat as I stood,
pushing my guitar over one shoulder and bowing deeply. I couldn’t see a single
face behind the glaring stage lights, but still, some part of me pretended she
could be out there, that I was singing to her.
That she would hear her song and find her way back to me.
After hundreds of faceless crowds and too many bottles of
Tennessee whiskey to bother counting, I still felt the pull inside me to travel
to every town in America if that’s what it took to find her.
Hell, maybe she was happily married with a few kids, a dog,
and a fucking minivan by now.
I nodded my head, giving one last wave to the crowd in the
dark beyond, then left the stage, taking the steps two at a time and angling
past the curtains to head for the tiny-ass dressing room this dive bar
provided. Heading for another chug of amber gold before packing my shit into my
truck and hitting the road.
I pushed a hand through my hair, thinking maybe a shower
would be in order before I bailed, when a curvy little thing backed right up
into me.
My palms landed on her shoulders, warm blond waves falling
in a cascade over one side. The heady scent of peaches and honey filled my
nostrils. My eyes slammed closed and brought me back to summer nights under a
giant oak, fireflies melding together with the stars above like a painting.
“Sorry, I just dropped my phone.” The sweet-scented creature
spun, brilliant smile falling from her face when our eyes made contact for the
first time.
Every coldhearted memory slammed into my chest like a pallet
of bricks.
I narrowed my eyes, gaze tracing the familiar yet unfamiliar
angles of her porcelain face.
She was thinner now, cheeks sharp slashes of bone that
highlighted her always-devastating round eyes and full lips. It was her, all
right. I’d know this woman anywhere.
“Hi, Fallon.” I’d been dreamin’ of this moment for the
better part of a decade, and still, my heart wasn’t prepared for those two
words. My name on her lips left me with a toxic reaction.
My damnation and my salvation.
“I need a fucking minute.” I dropped my hands from her
shoulders, her skin still haunting my fingertips, and walked straight down the
narrow hallway, pushing the rusted back door open so hard the hinges protested.
Warm night air filled my lungs, replacing the empty feeling
seeing her again had left.
“Fallon…” Hell, she’d followed me out.
And hell if wanted her to, but I didn’t not want her to
either.
The emotions bombarding my mind were just a-fucking-bout
unbearable.
“I said I need a fucking minute.” The sentence came out as
more of a growl than I intended. Before she could reply, I stomped across the
potholed parking lot, aiming for my heavy-duty Ford.
I yanked the door open, digging behind the driver’s seat for
a fresh bottle of my favorite recipe.
I couldn’t be bothered to retrieve the half-full bottle I’d
left in my dressing room. I had to get as far the fuck away from her just to
clear my head and process what her being here even meant.
My hands circled the neck of the bottle, and I opened it in
a flash, chugging back the first warm bite of pleasure I’d been craving.
I tossed the cap on my dash and fished the keys out of my
pocket, about to climb into the cab and make hay, when fingertips painted a
dark navy filtered into my vision and back out again, my goddamn truck keys
hanging from one finger.
“Fuck,” I bit out, crawling out of the cab and swiping for
the keys.
My reactions were a helluva lot slower than I thought they
were. How much of that bottle had I drunk before the show? I shook the thought
from my head, realizing this was probably about close to my average state of
play on any given day. Runnin’ away from the life Augusta Belle and I’d had
took something out of me. Something only whiskey could fill.
“I don’t care what your stupid ass does on your own time,
but you’re not dying on mine, Fallon Gentry.”
My head pounded then. A whole fucking sentence out of her
pretty pink lips, and my body’s old dependable reaction to her infuriating
every cell of me.
I’d never been in control when it came to Augusta. Shouldn’t
have been surprised it was no different now.
“As irritating as ever, I see,” I said, swiping for my keys
one more time and missing before I stumbled off around her, whiskey bottle
clutched in my hand and hell on my mind.
Augusta was back, and there wasn’t enough whiskey in the
state of Tennessee to help me deal.
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