Just as Stubborn Read online

  I shook my head. “You?”

  “The cashier said once in a while she spots a guy wearing a Red’s T-shirt.”

  I climbed into the middle of the seat. He hoisted my butt when my leg slipped on the wet running board.

  Caleb stepped backward off the bottom step on the bus. I watched his hand slide out of another hand that disappeared back into the bus. He had a bag with a box in it under his other arm and a wide grin plastered on his face. Gabe snickered, “Looks like he got his birthday wish. I knew he’d smell those girls from a mile away.”

  “Just like you did,” I muttered.

  “Nope.” Gabe leaned into me. I thought maybe he sensed my irritation and would apologize. Caleb placed his purchase in the truck bed and hopped in.

  “You were supposed to help us. We’re on a mission,” I told Caleb. He slammed his door and started the engine.

  “I was on a mission too,” he said happily. “A mighty important mission.”

  “Yeah, collecting numbers is way more important than helping Gabe.”

  The truck pulled back onto the main highway. “Who said I got phone numbers?” Caleb eyed me sideways and winked. He smelled of perfume.

  “Maybe Red’s is a band,” I told Gabe, ignoring Caleb. “Or maybe her last name could be Red. She wrote D. R. in her notebook. Look up Red’s on his phone.”

  “Sounds like a brand of smokes,” Gabe said. He set a hand on my leg. I almost pushed it off. I couldn’t let go of his sudden interest in ogling Barbie.

  “It’s a bar,” Caleb announced.

  I craned my head to look at him. “You just bought beer, but we’re going to a bar? Where are you going to drink that, anyway?”

  “It’s Coke, Avery. Helps with headaches. I never said you were going to a bar. Maybe it’s not technically a bar,” Caleb told me.

  “Then what about the girl?” I asked.

  Gabe leaned forward to address his brother. “Where are you driving to now?”

  “Okay, it is a bar. But she’s not going in,” Caleb told him.

  “I am too,” I replied.

  Caleb slapped the steering wheel. “Uh, no you aren’t. I can guarantee he won’t let you in either.”

  Gabe tipped his hat and set his palm on my knee again but addressed his brother. “You think you’re gonna find the little thief at a strip club? That’s what you mean?”

  “It’s called Red’s Tramp Box. You tell me.”

  * * *

  We found the bar sandwiched between a car lot and a barbecue restaurant.

  “It’s called Stomp Box. Guess you heard wrong, ding-a-ling,” Gabe announced. “Stomp box is a foot instrument.”

  “Reopens tomorrow. The sign here says they’ve been doing renovations,” I shared.

  It wasn’t a seedy joint as Caleb had hoped. He made his disappointment obvious.

  “Let’s ask in there. Then we’ll snoop around,” said Caleb, pointing to the restaurant. “Then we’ll eat.” The brothers had to eat on the hour, every hour.

  Gabe made a beeline into the barbecue place, and before we could pick a booth, he stood at the counter asking if they knew anything about a girl, my height. He held up the scrap of flyer that brought us to Memphis. When the owner didn’t have an answer, but made a face at a customer at the counter, Gabe gave up and asked for the nearest hotel.

  “Oh you won’t find a single room in this town for the next three days. No vacancy. There’s a beauty pageant filming at the complex center. Town’s swarming with media, girls, and stalkers. There’s more estrogen in this city than a packed sorority house,” said the woman sitting in front of the owner. She picked at her club sandwich. She wore her long gray hair pulled back into a knot. She didn’t turn around. “What do you want with the kid?”

  Caleb took a free stool beside the woman and spun his seat to face her. A dinner crowd filled the place, but it was fairly quiet aside from the jukebox playing in the background.

  “She broke into our house. Then she stole my brother’s truck and crashed it into a curb. It don’t run now. We need to find her. She hitched a ride with a trucker.”

  The woman shook her head. It was a crazy story.

  “Crashed, you say? Been a lot of that going on here. I just put my wall back on straight. Is she okay?”

  She turned on her stool and swung her eyes up to spot Caleb glaring at her. Her sandwich fell out of her hands, and she set them in her lap and took a deep breath. I watched her startled expression as it jumped from Caleb to Gabe.

  “You boys own your own trucks?”

  “Yes, ma’am. She busted up my suspension and who knows what else. So you know of her? Mona? Is that her name? She wears a Red’s shirt,” Gabe said.

  The woman stood and showed us she was also wearing a shirt with Red’s silkscreened across the chest.

  “You know the place?” Gabe asked.

  The woman swallowed hard and stared at him as though he was a luminary or something. She didn’t answer, and we all stared back with the same questioning eyes. I noticed her gaze fixed on Gabe’s face, studying him.

  “Well, boys,” she said slowly and then stopped talking as if she couldn’t figure out what to say. Her eyes went to the counter and then back up to the man who was emptying a shipment of bottles onto a shelf. He caught her eye and waved her off.

  “Settle up later. Good luck tomorrow, Tess,” he said.

  The woman looked over again, and I knew something was off. She smoothed her hands over her thighs and fixed her jeans before thanking the man.

  “So you know the place? What about the girl?” Gabe persisted with rudeness in his tone. “I need to find her like yesterday, ma’am.”

  “Okay, here it is…that’s my place next door. I know someone who knows the girl in your description. If we’re talking about the same Mona, she’ll come around when I open shop tomorrow. Now give me your names.”

  I stepped behind Gabe.

  “I’m Tessa. I’m gonna help y’all out. What’s your name?” she said peering around Gabe at me. “You look like you could use some dinner.”

  “Avery. This is Gabe and this is Caleb.” I stepped out. My politeness got the better of me.

  The woman made a pleased sigh and then she clapped her hands. Her eyes dropped closed for a moment, and she sighed again. She was older than Meggie and a little more bohemian. “Well, well. Nice to make your acquaintance, Avery. Are y’all related?”

  It was pretty obvious with the two of them.

  “No, she’s not,” Gabe told her as he squeezed my shoulder and ran his finger up my neck and behind my ear. I couldn’t stay mad at him when he touched me like that.

  “I’m the older one,” Caleb boasted. “Excuse him. He’s got little brother syndrome.”

  “Where are y’all from?”

  “Benjamin,” Gabe answered fast. “She’s from New York. That’s why she talks the way she does.”

  “You say Texas? Oil country?” She nodded with a satisfied grin. She must have recognized Caleb’s HalRem hat. The whole world was getting wind of the business that spread from San Antonio to Williston. Halden-Remington was on the way to being a national household name. Gabe once said the HalRem headquarters near his Texas home was as big as the Pentagon. “Okay then, let’s get you fixed up with some dinner. Have a seat, and my lovely friend here will take your orders. I need to make a call. Be right back.”

  I used Caleb’s phone to call Meggie and Josh, but there was no answer from either of them. While we waited for our order, Caleb tried to book rooms at three different hotels. Nothing was available.

  We ate in complete silence. Gabe and Caleb ate ribs. I sat between them and nibbled on a pulled pork sandwich. Customers came and went and chatted with the owner. I heard two women behind me whisper about the lucky girl sitting between the two hot guys with cute butts. I tried to contain the chuckle that almost made me choke on my dinner.

  Caleb spent the meal overtly glancing sideways each time I took a bite. He licked his sau
cy lips and made eyes when I caught him. I tried to ignore his flirting, but he was almost making me laugh. I tried not to forget I was pissed at him.

  As the first to get up, Caleb slapped a hand over his stomach and then hit the back of Gabe’s head. “Pay up.” He left.

  “Why do you humor him?” Gabe asked. “You know what he’s capable of doing.”

  I heard the jealousy. I sort of liked how he had to suffer through what I felt earlier. “What? I don’t. Don’t worry, he’s not—”

  “He’s not what?” Gabe said as his fork slid off the counter and made a loud noise on the floor.

  “Nothing. It’s Caleb being Caleb. Why do you let him bug you?”

  “I don’t,” Gabe said and pulled out three twenty dollar bills and set them down. The owner brushed off the cash and told him it was on the house. Gabe didn’t respond and left the money where it was. “Come on. I want to look around for the girl.”

  Caleb was leaning over an SUV in the parking lot. He had his arm stretched out over the roof and his head angled into the window, zeroed in on some pageant contestant.

  “Sorry about that. I got hung up,” Tessa said as she crossed the front lot and greeted us. Her hands were in her pockets and she looked flushed. “I’m going to let you stay at my place tonight. If you want, you can follow me and I’ll set you up. There really is no room in any inn. Not a great week for a visit.”

  Tessa didn’t live far from the restaurant. Apparently the boys were more concerned about finding Mona than they were with staying at a stranger’s place.

  “It’s not much, just a one-room efficiency. But I hate to see you kids in some seedy hotel on the outskirts. Make yourselves comfortable. There’s a tent and sleeping bags on the patio. I sleep on the couch. I like the simple life,” Tessa explained as we carried our bags into her ground-floor apartment.

  “Thank you for having us,” I told her when she handed me a towel and pointed out the bathroom. It was the only door aside from the entrance and a slider on the back wall. The place smelled of incense.

  “These all yours?” Gabe asked.

  Tessa crossed the room to the card table he was stooped over. Gabe straightened up.

  “Nope. They’re a friend’s books. I let her store a few boxes. Why?”

  “I have some of these. This one is valuable. I’ve never seen another in this condition.” He flipped his thumb over the pages and examined the book up close. I saw him reach for his glasses, and a chill shot up my spine. As he was about to put them on, Caleb distracted me.

  “He eats books in his sleep,” he chuckled. “I’m gonna check out the patio. Come with me, legs.”

  A tent was set up in the corner. There was a small table and chairs and a fire pit in the center of the space. On the opposite edge sat a reclining lawn chair. It was a decent outside room for an apartment.

  “He likes his books better than he likes you,” Caleb whispered at my ear.

  I stepped back. “That’s a mean thing to say. What’s gotten into you?”

  “Nothing really. You know I call it like I see it, that’s all. I know what I see. Or what I don’t see, legs.”

  The sliding glass door opened. Tessa followed Gabe outside.

  “It could get a little chilly, but you can all bundle up. Come inside if you need to. I’m going to Red’s to get ready for my reopening. Feel free to help yourselves to snacks.”

  “Ma’am…excuse me, Tessa,” Caleb said in his most charming drawl. “Why are you so easy to trust us? Do you always invite strangers to camp out at your place? We could be a bunch of felons.”

  She grunted and tipped her head at Caleb as if she knew him well, but her eyes drifted to Gabe’s face. It was kind of strange how she kept staring at him. “You just look like the trusting kind. I know my way around a criminal. I like to help folks out. Plus, I can see in those hazels, you mean no harm. Nothing worth stealing here. Nothing but my pride and my soul.”

  “Can we repay you?” I asked.

  My mother would flip her top if she knew I was in Memphis, squatting on some stranger’s patio with the Halden boys, sons of the man she claimed ruined Meggie’s life. She would never get past the fact that Gabe was Joel Halden’s son. She couldn’t get past the fact that Meggie loved Joel no matter what kind of a man he was.

  “It’s getting late now. You all look bushed. How about you pay me back by lending a hand before I open up shop tomorrow? Come over around noon. I need tables and chairs hauled onto the porch. Maybe wash a counter or two.”

  “Yes, ma’am,” Caleb said.

  Gabe chimed in, “Then we’ll set a trap for Mona.”

  “This town is full of legs,” Caleb informed us after he returned to the patio with our bags. “I’m heading out. No time to waste. Are you going out to look for the girl?”

  “Naw,” Gabe said. “It’s dark now. I don’t know my way around. She’ll show. I can tell Tessa knows something.”

  “I’d like to see a movie,” I said. “Let’s do something, Gabe.”

  He didn’t look up from the book he had his nose in. He wore his glasses, and I hadn’t taken my eyes off of his pose on the sleeping bag.

  “Are you mad about something?” I tapped his boot with my foot.

  “I’m mad about my truck. I’m fine staying here,” he replied, disinterested. “One of my guitars is in that toolbox. I forgot to take it out.”

  “Come out with me, legs. You didn’t crisscross the states to watch this kid read a damn book and mope about six strings.”

  Gabe rolled onto his back and pulled the glasses off his face. He rubbed the space between his eyes and yawned. “You really want to see a movie?” he asked.

  “I don’t want to stay here. I don’t even know this lady. We haven’t done anything fun yet.”

  “Isn’t that a big fat lie?” Caleb blurted and laughed.

  Gabe jumped up and offered me a perplexed look. Maybe he thought I told Caleb something happened in my room at the mansion. I made eyes at Caleb, warning him to keep his mouth shut about the cabin.

  “We’ll walk,” Gabe said as he shoved the book in his waistband and shouldered past his brother.

  * * *

  The movie theater was practically empty aside from a few single patrons sitting up front. It was the perfect place to make out if I could get Gabe to pay attention to me. We would never get caught. Besides, the kid at the counter looked way too slow to chase us if we had to run.

  Gabe had other ideas.

  For the longest time, only our elbows touched. When I couldn’t stand it any longer, I placed my hand on his and waited. I waited an eternity. Finally, he rolled his hand over and locked his fingers with mine. I could have sworn he was looking through the screen into the next dimension. He spent almost two hours daydreaming.

  Before the credits rolled, he was out of his seat, pushing the door open. I squinted from the light in the lobby. The smell of overly seasoned popcorn assaulted my nose. Gabe’s attention drifted to the chandelier hanging above the concession stand.

  “Gabe,” I stressed as he pulled my hand and led me to the counter to get a closer look.

  Had I missed something?

  “I’m going home.” I pulled out of his hand and planted my feet. “I don’t mean to Tessa’s. I mean back to Benjamin. Your truck will be fixed. Just forget about the girl and come with me. What are you going to do to her when you find her? Yell?”

  “I’ve been here,” he drawled, scrutinizing the room, floor to ceiling. “More than once. I got this strange feeling I’ve been in this place. I can’t figure out why it’s so familiar.”

  That was the last thing he said during the walk back to Tessa’s apartment. At least he held my hand.

  I settled on the floor of the tent and zipped myself into a sleeping bag after I tried calling Meggie’s number collect on the house phone. I hoped Gabe would get cold sitting outside the tent reading. He wore his glasses again, and it was difficult to be irritated with him when he looked serious in
that studious way that made my palms sweat. I tried to stick to my guns, but he made me want him more. I thought things would change if he missed me. Apparently, he was fine without my company.

  Molly said something that stayed with me for months. She told me Gabe was messed up, and Caleb didn’t have his head screwed on tight. I realized the burden of losing their brother was still raw. I had to keep reminding myself to stop expecting so much. I also had to remind myself that nobody pushed me onto the plane in the first place.

  My eyes were open when he crawled into the tent and unzipped my sleeping bag. I knew it was Gabe. I made sure it was his boot that stepped over me. I would never be careless with any of the brothers after what Caleb pulled.

  “Get the other sleeping bag, and we can zip them together,” I said quietly.

  He didn’t answer. I slid over when I realized he was getting into my sleeping bag.

  “This’ll work,” he whispered.

  “When’s Caleb coming back?” I asked.

  “Beats me. I don’t know where he went off to and I don’t care.”

  I inhaled deeply as he pulled my hair away from my face. “You don’t seem fine being here,” I told him. “You’re ignoring me again.”

  “I got a look at that girl at the cabin, Av’ry. I can’t get her out of my head. Why was she even there?”

  “We should head back tomorrow,” I said. “But you might have a problem getting your brother out of this town.” I rolled over.

  Gabe set his cowboy hat on my stomach and dropped his head near mine. “He ain’t my problem. You told me he isn’t bothering you. Is he now?” he asked.

  “Nope,” I lied and tried to distract him. “I like this.”

  “I wasn’t finished this morning before he busted in. We’re never alone like this.”

  “Really? I thought I went to the movies with somebody that looked like you. Maybe you didn’t notice,” I whispered smugly.

  “Yeah, I noticed,” he said in his unique inflection.

  “No, you didn’t,” I told him. “Tessa’s going to come back. So will your brother.”

  “So? He can sleep in the lawn. We were here first,” he said childishly.