“You’ll be okay, darlin’,” I told her. “It may not seem like it…but you will.”
She blew out a breath and pushed the table away from the couch, standing up and exposing her pantless self.
She was wearing one of my t-shirts that went all the way down past her knees, and I had a fleeting thought that she filled it out way better than I did.
She opened her mouth to ask how I knew that she’d be okay and I winced, hoping she wouldn’t go there. I wasn’t in the mood to explain myself. That, and I wasn’t sure that she needed my sadness added on top of hers.
“I was going to ask you how you know this, but your face went all closed off the minute I opened my mouth to speak,” she murmured.
I grinned.
“What time do you have to be at the church?” I asked.
“I have to be at Jubilee’s house in an hour.” She looked at her watch. “The church comes later.”
“Are you going to tell her what happened?” I questioned.
She shook her head. “No. I’m going to wait. She’ll figure it out eventually, I know, but for now, this is her special day. I’m going to help her get through it. Then I’m going to go home and have a good cry.”
***
She didn’t tell anyone.
She hadn’t told a single soul that her mother had passed away the night before.
When I arrived at the church at two in the afternoon, dressed so uncomfortably that I could barely find it in me not to fidget every ten seconds, it was with Pru rushing in after me with a bag in her hand and her face a line of stress.
“You’re late,” I pointed out.
She sighed in exasperation. “The spawn of Satan decided to puke all over me as I was walking out the door. The other spawn of Satan sat in his daddy’s lap and laughed. I’m exhausted already and only got three hours of sleep.”
The fact that I knew that she worked the night before, and on a patient that was dear to someone I was reluctantly starting to care about, caused my heart to stutter.
Which Pru saw.
“How is she?” Pru asked, slowing down slightly.
“Acting like nothing happened,” I said. “She’s put up a wall that’s keeping everything out. I saw her building it as I drove her to her truck this morning.”
Pru looked sick to her stomach. “She didn’t tell anyone?”
I shook my head. “Nope.”
Pru sighed. “That’s not going to last. Jubilee will figure it out. She’s very perceptive.”
I agreed, but it wasn’t my place to tell anybody anything. If Turner wanted them to know, they would. And that was the end of that.
“I’ll talk to her,” Pru said.
I didn’t show the frustration that streaked through my mind at having that excuse stolen from me. I wanted to see her. Badly.
Now that Pru would be talking to her, what excuse did I have to go over and see her?
I held the door to the church open and Pru slipped inside.
I spotted Turner from across the room and felt my heart skip a beat at how beautiful she looked in her bridesmaid dress.
When Turner saw Pru, they disappeared to have a conversation and had come back long minutes later, both of them looking a little less down.
I felt a little bit of relief at that, but I still couldn’t stop myself from going over to where Turner was standing—in the corner—and saying something.
“Hey,” I said softly.
She started, looking up in stunned disbelief.
“You can’t be over here,” she said, sounding worried now.
I frowned. “Why?”
“Because Jubilee will see you, and then she’ll wonder what we were talking about so amicably over here, and then she’ll know something’s wrong,” she blurted.
I blinked.
“You really think that she’s going to do that?” I asked. “Get all of that information out of one tiny conversation that we have that’s amicable?”
She nodded once.
“Really?” I started to laugh. “We don’t have conversations that turn into fights all the time.”
“Name one besides the ones that have happened in the last twenty-four hours,” she deadpanned.
I opened my mouth to list off the numerous times, then stopped.
Because she was right.
Every single one of our conversations always ended up going badly.
And I blamed that all on her.
On her lips that drove me wild.
On those goddamn hips that just begged for me to have my arms wrapped around them.
Those legs.
Even her goddam feet.
And don’t get me started on those breasts or her beautiful eyes.
They just drove me wild, and when I got distracted like that, it got me thinking of all the other times that I’d been distracted by beautiful women, and how they fucked me over in the end.
“I guess you’re right,” I admitted. “But Jubilee’s not here.”
“No,” she agreed. “But all the other Guardian girls are, and they’ll confront me just as much as Jubilee will.”