Hard Beat(88)

“Of course you’re flustered. Thank you for your service, sir,” she says, and I nod at the assumption she makes about my being in the military, hating myself for implying it but at the same time, a man’s got to do what a man’s got to do and everyone loves a man in the service. Especially a middle-aged woman who could have sons of her own and can appreciate a man trying to get home to the woman he loves. “Now what’s her name and I can look her up for you, see what room she’s in?”

“Thank you so much.” I set the vase of flowers down and keep up the act to look scattered by collecting my boarding pass and stuffing it in my pocket. “Her name is BJ or Beaux Croslyn… but she goes by Rookie, Rookie Croslyn. So I’d try that,” I say, my hopes lodged in my throat as I spell out the last name for her.

“Just give me one second, sweetheart,” she says. Her fingernails click over the keyboard as I watch the reflection of the screen in her glasses, the blue hue an easy thing to see, but it’s the slight frown on her lips as her eyes flicker back to mine that has my heart stopping in my chest. She knows something. The hesitation, the pause in her fingers, and furrow of her brow tell me more than any words could. “I’m so sorry. There’s no one by that name,” she responds, shattering any hope I’d had. A defeated thank-you is on my lips when she murmurs to herself, “Only a Rookie Thomas.”

“That’s her!” I all but shout as I’m overcome with emotion. There’s no need to continue my Oscar-worthy performance because my heart leaps into my throat when I hear the name. It can’t be a mistake. Beaux used my nickname for her and my surname – the thought that she’s kept a part of my feelings for her alive knocks me back a step.

She has to be telling me something. What it is, though, I have no idea.

The receptionist’s face smiles broadly, all trace of the hesitancy I saw moments before gone. “Well good news, Mr…”

“C-Clint,” I stutter, her comment giving me an instant high, that buzz that’s been nonexistent since I left Germany running rampant for the first time.

“Clint.” She smiles again when all I want to do is tell her to spit it out. “Rookie was discharged three days ago, so I guess that means she is doing much better.”

I contain the stab of disappointment that rifles through me because as much as my hunch that she was here was right, it does me no good now. We’ve just passed like ships in the night, the only thing left being the ghost of memories. The problem is that I can’t let the sweet receptionist know my disappointment and realize that she’s just been duped.

So I use the think-on-my-feet tactics that have propelled my career over the years and only have a split second to hope that this works. “Oh that’s such a relief to know she’s okay!” I say as I bring my hand up and accidentally knock the vase of flowers over.

She shrieks and jumps back as water and flowers spill across the desk and toward her keyboard, which she quickly pushes to the side. “Shit! I’m so sorry!” I round the U-shaped desk in an instant. “I’m so clumsy. So excited she’s doing better. Oh my God. I’m so sorry!” I repeat the comments over and over, making sure I play up the bumbling boyfriend, all the while hoping this act is all worth it and that what I’m hoping to find is actually there.

The minute I breach her space behind the desk, my actions reflect a contrite man, head down, hands busy helping to push the water away from her paperwork and electronics, but my eyes are laser focused on the computer screen. It takes a heartbeat for my eyes to find the name Rookie Thomas and to not sag in relief when I see the address listed below her name.

That damn buzz? It’s full-blown electric shock right now.

I read it several times to etch the street and numbers into my head. “Let me go get some paper towels,” I offer once most of the water has been pushed to the floor so that nothing on the desk is compromised. “I’m so sorry. I don’t —”

“Towels. Please,” she says, her patience wearing thin, and I’m perfectly okay with that. I rush over to the lobby restrooms. Once inside, I immediately pull my phone out and type in the address so that I don’t forget it before grabbing a handful of paper towels and heading back to help pick up the mess I made.





Chapter 27





S

o many emotions course through my veins as I get out of my car and walk toward the quaint little clapboard house on Elm Street. And I can’t help but feel now as I did last night sitting and watching the house that it doesn’t fit the Beaux that I know. None of it. She’s all hard lines and fiery edges and not a postage-stamp-sized patch of grass in the front yard in need of mowing, petunias in the planters, and a porch swing that sits a tad crooked.

Even though I sat parked on the street for a few hours last night, watching as the lights in the front windows went dark, it took everything I had not to knock on the door. But I knew I had to wait. I had to be patient until the morning to see if John got into his manly little Prius and went to work. Because a good husband goes to work every day, right?

So after a restless night of sleep when all I could do was think about what I was going to say to Beaux when I came face-to-face with her after almost three weeks of wondering and hurting and missing her, I sat for three hours this morning, waiting to watch John amble out of the house and into his car, briefcase in hand, with a wave hello to the neighbor before driving slowly away.