Feels Like Home (Southern Bride 5)

He closed his eyes and then opened them again. “I overheard him telling Jenny he didn’t want the baby. He said he was going to leave Mindy after she delivered but didn’t want to be an asshole and leave her now.”

“He’s going to leave her?” I asked.

Drake nodded.

“She needs to know that, for sure.”

“I wasn’t sure if I should tell her alone or have you there too.”

“Um…I, um…We should probably tell her together.”

Drake nodded. “Sooner rather than later.”

A light knock caused me to look over at the door. “Come in.”

Mindy poked her head in. “Hey, I feel better now. I’m heading out there.”

Her eyes bounced from me to Drake then back to me. “Is everything okay?”

Drake and I exchanged a look before he looked away. “Yep,” I said. “All’s good. I’ll be right out.”

When she shut the door, I faced Drake. “I’m closing the tea room after the Red Hat meeting. Do you want to stay? It will be over in about an hour.”

“I can stay. I’ll help out with the kitchen clean up.”

He went to walk out the door, but I reached out to stop him. “Drake, is she going to be okay? I mean, will this hurt the baby with the stress of it all?”

His throat bobbed. “She’s going to be fine, because she’s got a hell of a lot of people who care about her. She’ll get through this.”

He nodded as he said it, and I couldn’t help but wonder if he was trying to convince me…or himself.

I glanced at the date on my desk and stared at it.

April 2nd.

“Why on this day?” I mumbled to myself. “Nothing good ever happens on this day.”

April 2nd was the day Anson left me. Six years ago, he dropped me off at my folks’ house and didn’t look back.

I reached for the door to my office and jerked it open.

“Hate this freaking day.”

Anson – April 2nd

“I HATE THIS fucking day. Everything about this day sucks,” I mumbled as Robert shot me a warning look. It was his way of telling me to not lose my temper with the reporter.

I wasn’t trying to be a dick. But I liked my privacy, and they pushed me constantly for information they didn’t need to know. Ask me anything about the songs, the albums, the tours. Don’t ask me about my personal life. It’s the only thing I asked. Most reporters were good about respecting that wish. Some, not so much.

A reporter sat down across from me and smirked. I sighed internally. It was a young kid, probably a new reporter who figured he had what it took to get me to open my heart up and spill it all for him.

I smiled as he looked down at his notes then back up at me.

“Mr. Meyer, thank you so much for agreeing to meet with me. I know you’re busy, and your manager said we’re on a time crunch.”

I nodded. “Yes, Sir, we are indeed.”

He cleared his throat. “Let’s get started, shall we?”

I motioned for him to go ahead and said, “Please do.”

Robert sat behind the reporter while Lanny sat to the right of me. Both a good bit of distance away, but close enough. I had two things that were off limits during interviews. One, do not ask me about my family. Period. It wasn’t that I didn’t enjoy talking about them. I had mentioned my family before in early interviews, when I didn’t realize people would actually go snooping around my folks’ ranch. Or take pictures of my grandparents’ house. I’d quickly learned that talking about my family was my own No Man’s Land. My grandparents didn’t mind as much as my folks did. Especially my father. I couldn’t count how many times my father had threatened to shoot a reporter. It got to the point where the press finally stopped harassing people in Comfort because they were afraid they’d get shot.

I had also never mentioned Bristol. Not once. And no matter how many times reporters snooped around Comfort, no one gave up Bristol as the girl I dated in high school. I knew some folks in Comfort were upset with me, but it was still home. Honestly, I was stunned that after six years it hadn’t come out yet. Although, that may have been more for Bristol’s privacy than mine. Robert had told me it was going to happen one day. Hell, all they had to do was look up a yearbook from when I was in high school. There were plenty of clues in those.

“Let’s start off with what your fans really want to know the most. Did you write “Let It Burn” about your ex-girlfriend back in Comfort?”

Christ. Here we go again.

My smile faded. I’d been asked this question a million times before, and today, of all days, was not the day to ask it.