The Sometimes Sisters(71)

She reached out and adjusted the water to a warmer level, washed her honey-blonde hair, and used conditioner twice before she got out of the shower. With a towel around her head and one around her body, she padded out into her little office area. She waltzed around the room to Alisan Porter singing “Deep Water” on the radio.

The song was about a girl not wanting to swim the deep waters of life alone, but one line seemed to stand out—it said that she was a child who was hungry and wild, trying to find her way home. Tawny noticed the items on her bookcase as she swayed to the music. One red feather from the first days she was there. A dried yellow dandelion flower from the evening when she was walking home from that first movie night at Dana’s along with three kernels of caramel corn that were stuck firmly together. The wrapper from the candy bar that she’d brought home from the store when they’d had the conversation about Marcus Green.

“And I still don’t trust that man even if he did do the right thing for Brook and apologize for being a jackass,” she muttered.

She picked up the little stuffed bunny from her Easter basket and hugged it close to her face. Bless Zed’s heart for remembering them all on the holiday. She’d had a whole room full of stuffed animals when she was a little girl, but none of them meant as much as the little purple bunny with a yellow bow around his neck.

Then there was the smooth rock that she’d picked up at the edge of the lake when Harper had scared the hell out of her. She set the bunny back down and ran a hand over the rock to remind herself that the inner demons were sometimes far worse than anything else. Her heart ached for her sister who’d never know what it was like to hug her daughter like Dana did Brook every single day.

And the latest thing on the bookcase was her own cell phone, dead as a doornail but there to remind her of Brook’s punishment, not so much for getting in trouble, but for losing control of her temper.

“I’m so jealous I could just spit.” Tawny backed up from the bookcase. “Dana has someone and Harper has someone. I know, Granny, that jealousy is a terrible thing. You don’t have to get in my head and fuss at me.”

She got dressed in a pair of pajama pants and a tank top and went outside to air-dry her hair. She’d barely gotten settled in her red chair when a shiny black sports car whipped into the space between her cabin and number six. Her chest tightened when the almighty Matthew Richmond IV crawled out of the vehicle. He wore a pair of designer khaki shorts, a shirt that probably cost as much as a week’s salary at the coffee shop where she used to work, Italian loafers, and an air that let the whole world know exactly how important he was.

“Hello, Tawny,” he said.

“Matt.” She nodded. “I didn’t see your name on the register to rent a cabin.”

From the first time she’d met him, he’d sent little waves of desire shooting through her entire body, but then, she’d always had a weak spot for guys with dark hair and pretty green eyes. And that night was no different. She was still attracted to him like a moth to a flame, but her wings had been singed. She’d realized just how dangerous that pretty yellow flickering fire had been.

“Honey, I wouldn’t spend a night in one of these things if you gave me double what one costs for a week.” He stopped at the bottom of the steps.

“What are you doing here, Matt?”

“I tried to get over you. I even let my ‘girlfriend’”—he made quotes in the air as he said the last word—“plan a wedding, but I couldn’t go through with it. Don’t look at me like that. I didn’t leave her standing at the altar. I called it off six weeks into the planning stage. My folks were not happy with me.”

“I don’t imagine she was, either.” Tawny should have been happy that the sweet little angel didn’t win in the end, but she felt sorry for the woman. She thought she knew Matthew and had loved him, probably even more than Tawny, and there she was left with embarrassment and a broken heart.

“I missed the excitement and fun I had with you, darlin’.”

“How did you find me?”

“Easy. I went to the coffee shop where you worked and the owner said your grandmother had passed away. You talked a lot about her and this place, so I gave it the first try.”

“And you drove all the way here from Austin to tell me that you missed me?”

“I tried to call first, but it kept going to voice mail and there’s not a listing for Annie’s Place or the lake. Come on, Tawny, forgive me. Come home with me.”

“All the way from Austin?”

“You are worth it. Life’s been so dull without you in it. I had to do a few months’ work with my father in the company, and now he’s sending me to Paris on a weeklong business trip. Come with me, Tawny. We can have so much fun exploring Paris together.”

“You said it was a business trip. And do your parents know that you are inviting me?”

“Business only lasts a few hours a day. We’ll have the evenings free, and what they don’t know won’t hurt them.”

“What makes you think I’d trust you? I haven’t seen you since court, when you threw me under the bus. I was at that coffee shop for months and you never even called.” He was probably telling the truth about a business trip, but when they got home, he’d leave her high and dry in some hotel on whatever coast they flew into. She knew him well enough to know that he used people to get what he wanted. And Matthew always got what he wanted.