Beard Necessities (Winston Brothers, #7)(56)

I knew he was joking, trying to lighten the somber mood, but all I felt was a sense of despairing frustration at his words. “This is your problem, Jet. You’re too much like our momma, you forgive folks too easy. You think the best of people, even when they don’t deserve it. I just spent ten years rejecting every single one of your attempts to make things right. I say sorry once—just once—and I’m forgiven?” I did my best to keep my volume under control, but with every word I spoke I felt myself losing the battle.

But it pissed me off. Time and time again, our mother forgave our father. And time and time again, so had Jethro.

“What do you want me to do, Billy?” Jethro threw down the laundry he’d been folding, crossing the length of the kitchen to stand in front of me. “Make you walk through hot coals? Make you suffer? Why would I do that?”

“You don’t have to make everything so easy for everybody all the time!”

“And you don’t have to make everything so hard!”

My mouth snapped shut at that and I took a step back, glaring at him, working to shackle this directionless fury. I didn’t know why I was so angry, but I wasn’t mad at Jethro, not anymore.

I loved him. I loved his two boys and his charming, gregarious wife, and her family. I wanted us to be close, I’d never stopped wanting that. And I was tired of this chasm between us, one that I’d helped create with every biting word and cold shoulder.

Meanwhile, my brother sighed, looking older than me—for once—as he rubbed his face. “If I’m so much like our mother, then let me tell you what I think she’d say right now.”

Opening his eyes, he gave them to me and I had to swallow around a stone of grief. Jethro and our mother had the same eyes. The same shade. The same shape. The same guileless gleam of unconditional and loving patience.

“She’d tell you, ‘People only hold grudges when they can’t forgive themselves.’”

I blinked against the sting behind my eyes and nose, glancing away and shaking my head. How many times had my mother said this to me and my siblings when we would fight? I’d lost count.

“Billy. You’re my brother.”

I exhaled another laugh. “Am I?”

“You’ve always been my brother,” he continued patiently, undeterred. “Now, sometimes I’ve been a shitty brother. And sometimes, yeah, you haven’t made it easy for me to make amends. But I honestly wouldn’t’ve had it any other way.”

My jaw working, I glanced at him. “Why?”

“Because I knew the day I had your respect again, well, I would’ve earned it. I’d deserve it.”

A rising wave of sadness and regret finally snuffed out the last of the anger. “I shouldn’t have withheld it in the first place, Jet.”

“No. No, you definitely should have,” he said quietly, his gaze sober. “Your intolerance for my bullshit was a great motivator.”

I kept shaking my head. “I was too harsh.”

“Maybe, sometimes.” He shrugged. “But your unwillingness to compromise your principles, your expectations for all of us, and your example—to reach our potential, to be better, to be good—gave us all something to strive for, to live up to. Especially me.”





Jethro made me sit at the kitchen table and eat something. And then, both of us carrying a load of towels, we’d walked up the hill toward the sound of kids and adults splashing in water, soaking up the summer sun.

As we walked through the gate surrounding the pool, I scanned the crowd searching for Scarlet and halting abruptly when I found her. Sitting at the edge of the pool, dressed in a long sleeve swim shirt, bikini bottoms, and nothing else, I was both rewarded and punished for waiting so long to seek her out.

“Okay, everyone out of the pool. Time to clean up for supper. That means you, Ben! Put down that pool noodle and stop splashing your brother.” Jethro grabbed my load of towels and walked on ahead, distributing towels to Ash, Drew, and Bethany, Beau and Shelly, Duane and Jess—though Jess didn’t need one, she was in the shade with Liam—and Sienna, Maya, Ben and Andy. According to Jethro, Cletus and Jenn as well as the Sheriff and Janet were off premises, sightseeing.

When my brother got to Scarlet, he shrugged. “Sorry, Red. I ran out of towels. But, hey, do you mind helping Billy get all these pool toys and such stacked up? We’re not supposed to leave them in the water.”

“Not a problem,” she said, sounding out of breath as her gaze searched for and then found mine.

She smiled from her side of the pool, giving me a little wave.

I waved from my side of the pool, giving her a little smile.

My family cleared out slowly while Scarlet and I—given our marching orders—picked up the patio area. At one point, she jumped into the pool to grab a few diving sticks at the bottom and I physically could not tear my eyes from the sight of her gliding through the water, her red hair flowing behind her like a mermaid.

I swallowed my lust as she resurfaced, wading through the shallow end until she made it to the corner with the steps. As she climbed them, I stared at the droplets of water rolling down the bare skin of her back and legs until she twisted at the waist, and I had the presence of mind to tear my eyes away.

God. Damn.

“It’s hot,” she said.