Bury the Hatchet (11 page)

WE’D BARELY PASSED
the
You may now kiss the bride
part—Hunter’s lips were still on mine, actually—when all hell broke loose with the cameras still rolling.

It took the two of us a few moments to realize anything out of the ordinary was going on since we were still putting on a good show for the audience, both the ones in the auditorium and the others who’d be watching at home once it aired. Hunter recognized there was an issue before I did, breaking off the kiss and spinning toward the sea of faces behind us.

Even through the overwrought ordeal that had been the ceremony, I hadn’t recovered from the verbal attacks on Hunter that Lance had been tossing around all the while my beauty team had been preparing me for the big day. The things he said when Hunter was present couldn’t hold a candle to the language he used in private, and listening to the string of vileness had taken a physical toll on me, leaving me stunned and shaking. Needless to say, my head was still swimming from all of that, not to mention the toe-curling kiss Hunter had just planted on me, so it took me a minute to gather my thoughts and piece together what was going on around us.

And there was a
lot
going on back in the rows of seats. Mama would call it a commotion—shouting, maybe a tussle—but whatever name you put on it, it was big. And bad. My gut clenched as Hunter took off down the steps without a second glance at me, diving into the fray in a way that made me expect him to rip off his tux and reveal a Superman costume. Most everyone was on their feet, particularly the small group on Hunter’s side of the aisle.

His mother was in the hub of it all, her face ghostly pale. “Call 9-1-1. Oh, God. Someone call 9-1-1.”

Hunter was heading straight for her, pushing people out of his way like a man on a mission. It didn’t matter how many of them there were, they weren’t going to keep him from getting to his mother right now. Enough of the crowd cleared away that I could see Hunter’s brother on the floor at Mrs. Fielding’s feet. But then she passed out. Mr. Fielding caught her by the shoulders as she dropped. He lowered her into a chair, and the camera crew closed in on them and Hunter as he leaped over two rows of seats.

I couldn’t just stand up here gaping. This was my husband and his family—whether the marriage was meant to last or not—and I ought to be by his side, whatever was happening. It didn’t matter that I barely knew him and I’d only had long enough with the rest of them for a brief hello prior to the ceremony. Before I had an inkling as to what I could do to help, I was on my way to join him. I didn’t know how to do anything. Nothing useful, at least. I didn’t even have my cell phone with me to call for paramedics. It was in the dressing room along with everything else I’d brought to the church that hadn’t been put on my person, which, considering how skimpy my gown was, wasn’t much at all.

I’d barely gotten down the steps when Lance grabbed my arm hard enough to leave a mark and jerked me to a stop. “Stay right here,” he demanded. “You’ll mess up your hair or ruin your dress.”

Tears sparked to my eyes from the pain of his grasp, and I tugged myself free. “It’s just a dress. It doesn’t matter.” None of it mattered—the dress, my hair, my makeup, whether I could walk straight enough to keep a book on my head or answer pageant questions with enough polite but meaningless babble to satisfy the judges. I couldn’t do anything with any of those pointless skills, but at the very least I could get over there with my new family and hold Hunter’s mama’s hand or something. Any buffoon could do that, unless that buffoon’s name was Lance, it seemed.

He grabbed hold of my arm again. “Now you listen here—”

“No, you listen,” I interrupted him, surprising even myself with the force of my conviction. I never interrupted him. Not ever, not for any reason. Mama would tell me it was rude and unseemly, and she’d smack my wrists and demand that I apologize. But I was done apologizing to him. I was done doing everything he wanted of me without question. There were no more pageants in my future, so there wasn’t any more need for a pageant guru to run every facet of my life. One at a time, I pried his surprisingly strong fingers free and jerked my arm back to my side. “Today’s it. The wedding is the end of your reign over my life. I get to decide what I want to do and how I want to do it.”

“Your mama—”

“My mama isn’t in control of me anymore, either, and I don’t care what she has to say about this, Lance. I’m done letting you run roughshod over me every minute of every day. You should find someone else to micromanage, because it ain’t going to be me anymore.”

With that, I left him staring at me with his jaw on the floor and headed down the aisle, shaking the ache out of my arm where he’d grabbed me. A couple of tears were still pricking behind my eyes from the force of his grip, but I willed them away. Now wasn’t the time for me to fall apart. I could do that later, when the cameras were gone. I gently touched people on the back or arm to get them to move out of my way so I could get through the gathered crowd without having to leap tall buildings in a single bound the way Hunter had done moments before. When they saw it was me, they parted like the Red Sea, opening up a clearing for me to pass.

When I reached Hunter, the stench of fresh vomit slammed into me like a semi. I covered my mouth and nose as I took in everything in front of me. Hunter’s brother was lying in a puddle of fluids, passed out cold even as his body convulsed.

I blinked a couple more times, forcing myself to stay calm. I didn’t even know his brother’s name. The realization hit me as hard as the smell.

Hunter’s agent was on his cell phone with the 9-1-1 operator. Another man who looked a lot like him was trying to sort out the brother on the floor by dragging him away from the mess and into a clearing. That was probably best, for when the paramedics arrived. Hunter and his father sat on either side of his mother, supporting her as she started to come around. They both seemed to be completely oblivious to what was going on with the brother.

He started to vomit again, but the man trying to move him was still dragging him by the feet and didn’t notice. Hunter’s brother was still on his back. He might drown in it if no one noticed. But someone
had
noticed. Me. I needed to somehow get him rolled over on his side. I remembered that much from sorority parties when some of the girls had had a bit too much to drink.

I sank to the floor and fought against his bulk to turn him, until the man who’d been moving him figured out what I was doing and dropped his legs so he could help me. After a couple of hard tugs with the other man pushing from behind, he finally rolled. I lost my balance and fell back on my butt, landing just inches away from a putrid puddle that gave me the heebie-jeebies because I knew exactly what it was.

I pressed my eyes closed and groaned inwardly. Somewhere off in the distance, I could hear Lance and Mama having a scandalized shouting contest about my ridiculous behavior and how I was bound to ruin my dress and all because of some drunkard relative of Hunter’s crashing the wedding. Daddy’s calming voice joined in the mix—probably trying to calm them both down so they didn’t turn it into a bigger scene than it already was. But it was the quieter, deep tone of Hunter’s voice that really got through to me.

“Kade isn’t worth the trouble, Tallie.”

He stood above me, holding down a hand to help me up from the heap I’d become on the floor.

I blinked again, those damn tears not giving up their efforts to pour down my cheeks and ruin my makeup. It’d fit with the way the day was suddenly going, so maybe I should just give in. For now, though, I pushed them down with every blessed ounce of gumption I could muster.

“But he’s your brother,” I said disbelievingly. I’d never had a sibling but I’d always wanted one. Mama went on and on about how she’d tried to get pregnant again and never could, so I was just going to have to be enough, even though Daddy told me that Mama had been on the pill the entire time they’d been married since not long after I was born. He said she’d refused to have another baby because the stretch marks I’d caused had been more than enough for one lifetime, thank you very much. Their stories conflicted, but I knew which one was easier to believe, whether it was the absolute truth or not.

He took the hand I lifted and helped me to my feet. I winced at the tightness in my biceps from where Lance had grabbed me, and I might have hissed as well, because Hunter narrowed his eyes and looked down at my bare arm. “Who did this?” he asked, his voice low and menacing.

I glanced down at the tender spot on my arm, shocked to find deep red marks from Lance’s fingers, and shook my head, trying to brush it off because there were more important things going on than Lance being Lance. Even as I did that, the paramedics rushed in with a gurney and started working on Kade.

Hunter eased me away from them so they could do their work, guiding me toward an alcove in the church, well away from all the onlookers who were busy gawking at the goings-on. “Don’t brush me off on this,” he grumbled. “Lance did it, didn’t he?” he added when I didn’t respond.

“It doesn’t matter.”

“Don’t tell me it doesn’t matter. The bastard calls
me
a fucking Neanderthal, and then he goes and bruises your arm the second I take my eyes off you?”

“It’s not as bad as—”

“Isn’t it?” His green eyes, as piercing as any I’d ever seen up close, were pinprick sharp. “Explain to me how that asswipe leaving bruises on your skin isn’t as bad as I think it is, because I’m leaning toward it being worse.”

“I meant it isn’t as bad as what’s going on with your brother,” I shouted at him. Actually, it wasn’t quite a shout. It was definitely louder than I should have been talking, though, because at least a dozen people spun around to gawk at us, including one of the camera guys. I probably should have kept my voice down and acted like a lady, like Mama was always telling me, but this was getting so far out of hand it was ridiculous, and I had lost all sense of self-control after everything Lance had put me through today. I was over it. Done. I’d had enough, and Hunter was just going to have to accept that I had no intention of being a meek little miss, sitting around and waiting for someone to give me permission to speak. I planted my hands on my hips and narrowed my eyes on him. “Now I don’t know how your mama raised you, but something tells me you know family is the most important thing you’ll ever have in your life, so you’d just better get it in your head right now that—”

He took my hand and tugged until I followed him, stumbling, out the closest exit. “
You’d
better get it in
your
head that we’re not doing this in public with all of those cameras on us. And that you don’t know everything there is to know about me and my family, let alone my asshole brother who’s already made his choices in life and proven he isn’t ever going to change. He doesn’t want anyone’s help, and even if he did, he doesn’t deserve it. Not yours, at least.”

He didn’t stop, despite the fact that I was practically running in my heavy, clunky, bedazzled high heels in order to keep up with his long stride, until we’d nearly reached the church’s nursery. He threw open the door, flipped on the light, checked to be sure we were alone, and shut it behind us.

His big body was too close to me, leaving me lightheaded with awareness, so I backed up a few steps. Then I bumped into the wall. Hunter followed me, bracing his arms on either side of me and leaning in so close I could feel the heat of his anger. But that heat mixed with something else between us, and it bounced around like hot, yearning, burning need. I couldn’t take a breath without my breasts brushing against the fine wool of his tux, couldn’t hold on to a thought because he was looking at me like he wanted to eat me alive, and Lord Jesus help me but I wanted to let him. I wanted to do more than let him devour me. I wanted to tear him apart a piece at a time and let him melt on my tongue, savoring every single tasty bite I could get. I wanted it so much I thought I might burst from the wanting if something didn’t happen to break this crazy, animalistic tension between us, and soon.