Heartbreak, Tennessee (2 page)

Of course, none of his
friends had ever been with Amber. And Mac would have been willing to bet that
if they had, they wouldn’t have found it so easy to move on with their lives,
either.

The beer tasted bitter
as Mac felt that old familiar tug at his heart. He cursed her for ever coming
into his life. During the two years they’d had together, his nineteenth and
twentieth, he was barely a man. But he had been old enough to make a man’s
pledge and to feel a man’s pain.

If only they’d never
met.

But it was pointless
to dwell on it. A man who didn’t know peace could waste an entire life envying
those who did.

Amber pushed open the
door and welcomed the warm, moist June air on her face. It brought back a
thousand nights just like this one, nights when her hair stuck to the back of
her neck and a thin dew of moisture was ever present on her face and long limbs
as she pedaled her bike home, from sleepovers, Girl Scout meetings,
after-school jobs.

And later, evenings
spent with Mac.

Her mother had put fans
in the bedroom windows of their little house, blowing the batiste curtains and
circulating the air in the comfortable familiar rooms. The drone of the fans
through the summer nights had been as much a part of life as breathing.

She hadn’t realized
how much she missed the sultry, humid evenings of her childhood. Her apartment
in Nashville was sleek and modern, and climate-controlled. Winter or summer,
the sophisticated system kept the place at a constant, comfortable temperature.
The windows opened only an inch or two, the noise from the street below
drifting up as though it were miles away.

Amber was still
shaking a bit from the shock of seeing Mac, but she chose to ignore it. She
stood on the sidewalk a moment, trying to decide if she should head back to the
hotel or continue her walk to clear her mind and settle her stomach.

As she deliberated,
she heard the door of the bar open behind her, the old hinges creaking. She
stepped quickly out of the way and turned her back squarely to the door. She
didn’t feel like being recognized again right now. Tomorrow would be plenty
early to revive old acquaintances, painful as it might be. At least Sheryn
would be there, and the attention would all go to her, allowing Amber to stay
on the sidelines, minimally involved.

If only her emotions
would follow suit.

“Amber.”

She froze. His voice. Mac’s
voice. A little deeper, a little rougher, as though it had rusted over the
years.

A warm, rough hand
circled her arm and drew her, gently but firmly, around. She stared resolutely
forward, her gaze resting on the hollow beneath his chin.

Mac was a tall man,
and he seemed somehow even taller now, though she was sure it was an illusion. Long
ago, she’d loved how his arms had encircled her, holding her to him easily, as
though she were at once weightless and delicate, making her feel like a
precious thing, a treasure.

Mac lifted the wrist
he held and examined it, turning it over. The gesture was neither rough nor
tender. Immediately Amber understood what he was looking for: something to
prove it
was
really her. The
crescent-shaped scar, a burn from hot grease when she was waiting tables at the
truck stop. It had been painful, but Mac had bandaged it so carefully, so
tenderly that night.

Finding it, Mac let
her arm fall.

“So it
is
you after all. What are you doing
back here?”

Amber lifted her chin,
forcing herself to look into his eyes. They were as blue as ever, steel blue
like the sky over Boone Lake on the rare long summer afternoons years ago when
they both had a day off, sunbathing and floating, the old wooden boat rocking
gently, lulling them alternately to sleep and to passion.

“Business,” she said,
forcing her voice to be even and cool. “It’s good to see you, Mac. I wish I had
time to stop and catch up on things. It’s been a lot of years.” With effort,
Amber forced a smile. She was practiced at that; her features were elastic,
betraying nothing more than she was willing to reveal.

She looked down at her
watch. The gesture was just for show. She couldn’t even see the numbers on the
dial, her vision clouded by the tumult of thoughts and emotions. She was aware
of Mac’s eyes on her; they never left her face.

“But our schedule’s
jammed,” she added. “I’m sorry.”

“
Our
schedule,” Mac said, realization dawning in his voice. “You’re
here with Sheryn Sawyer.”

“Yes,” Amber said,
surprised. She scanned his face. “How did you know?”

“Oh, come on, Amber. The
minute a country music star and a beautiful companion checked in over at the
Two Pines Motel, you can bet phones were ringing all over the place. Wasn’t
half an hour ago Pat Thoroughgood stopped by our table and filled us all in. We
don’t get a lot of news here—as you might recall,” he added, his voice
faintly tinged with sarcasm.

“I see.” Amber
swallowed. On top of the shock of seeing Mac, she now felt unsettled, out of
her element. She’d forgotten so much—
chosen
to forget, she mentally corrected herself.

Of course, news
traveled in Heartbreak at speeds unmatched in any bigger city. She of all
people should have known that.

The door opened again,
and a couple of men emerged from the bar, laughing at some shared joke. Their
voices were cut short when they noticed Mac and Amber.

“Evenin’, Mac,” one of
them said. “Ma’am,” he added, lifting his hat a fraction of an inch. The two of
them lingered, making no bones about appraising Amber. Obviously they were
waiting to be introduced. She stepped back, putting some distance between
herself and Mac.

“Gentlemen,” Mac said,
his tone clipped. His meaning was clear, and they glanced once more from one to
the other, then made their way down the street, resuming their boisterous
conversation.

Mac gazed at Amber,
his features easing. “Look,” he said, stepping forward so they were once again
separated only by inches. “It doesn’t make much sense for us to stand out here
talking. Come sit in my truck a minute.”

Amber didn’t miss his
meaning. He must have picked up on her reluctance to be recognized. She
softened a little, and hesitated. “I’ve got a big day tomorrow—”

“Just for a minute.”

Before she could protest
further, he took her arm, gently this time, and steered her a few yards down
the street.

“This is your truck?” Amber
couldn’t keep the amusement out of her voice. The big, powerful-looking vehicle
parked at the curb was tomato red, its sleek lines emphasized by custom
striping and a generous amount of chrome. There wasn’t a spot on it.

Mac cut a glance her
way, but didn’t stop walking. “You remembered.”

It had always been his
dream. When Amber was dating Mac, he was driving a beat-up old Buick that was
held together with hard work and baling wire, but he used to talk about the
truck he’d have one day. Big, red. Expensive.

Just like the one they
stood admiring.

“I wouldn’t have
guessed you to be so sentimental,” Amber said.

“Then I suppose you
would have guessed wrong,” Mac said gruffly. He stepped ahead to open the door
for her. The truck’s cab was unlocked. Of course—nobody locked anything
in Heartbreak. Another reminder she’d been away a long time.

The interior of the
truck was just as clean and well-cared for as the exterior. It even smelled
good. Amber smiled when she noticed the expensive sound system. “You still love
music as much as ever?”

“Mmm,” Mac said,
noncommittally. He reached under the seat and pulled out an enormous case of
CDs, scanning the rows of titles. Looking over his shoulder, Amber felt a rush
of memories as she read the familiar titles. Alabama, The Judds, the Nitty
Gritty Dirt Band—all albums they’d once listened to together.

So he
was
sentimental.

About everything
?

She banished the
thought as soon as it appeared. No reason to think he had anything more on his
mind than a conversation with an old friend...just because her knees were
feeling a little unsteady, and her pulse was racing.

 
Mac made a selection—nothing old,
Amber noticed, to take them further into the past. The latest Martina McBride
tune filled the cab, and he turned in his seat to face her.

“So what do you do,
anyway? Are you her manager?”

“Hardly,” Amber
murmured, her eyes downcast. She felt her confidence erode, her defenses slip a
little. “Just a glorified secretary, actually. I’ve been with Sheryn five years
now. I guess—” She bit her lip and looked out her window at the empty
street, the lights coming on one by one as the dark descended. “I guess in some
ways I haven’t gone so far in the world.”

“On the contrary—it
looks to me like you got a world away.”

Amber blushed under
his intense scrutiny. “I’ve changed my look, I suppose, since I last saw you.”

“I’ll say.” His voice
was barely more than a murmur, and a shiver traveled through Amber’s nerves. How
she’d loved his voice. Late nights he’d sing along with the radio, the deep
bass voice practically resonating under her skin. Sometimes he would sing to
her while he held her close, his lips brushing her cheek softly. She used to
love to close her eyes and let the sound fill her senses, until everything else
slipped away, her cares and worries replaced by the words of a love song.

Those had been the
happiest moments of her life.

The thought came
unbidden, and Amber bit her lip fiercely to keep from reacting to it.

“Did you get married?”
Mac looked away as he asked, his voice now casual.

“No...you?”

Mac shook his head. “The
business has really kept me pretty tied up.”

“Your father’s
business?” Amber managed to get the words out with only the slightest edge to
her voice, though it cost her. Thankfully, Mac didn’t seem to notice.

“Yeah. Well, actually,
mine now. He’s been dead almost ten years, and my mother’s in Florida, so it’s
just me. And the guys, of course. We have a whole new crew, though a few of the
old ones are still around.”

“Dead ten years,”
Amber said softly. With a great deal of effort, she forced herself to look Mac
in the eye. “I’m...sorry.”

It wasn’t a total lie.
She
was
sorry, if only because she
knew it must have been a blow for Mac. His father’s presence had been the only
thing that had kept Mac going before she met him.

And, she had to
assume, after she left.

“Yeah, well.”

There was a silence,
awkward for Amber, though Mac seemed ill at ease as well, a deep crease
appearing between his eyebrows. A worry line, something she did not remember. She
found herself wondering what he was thinking.

They had once been
able to understand what was on each other’s mind without speaking. A word or
glance or touch spoke volumes; they knew the details of each other’s lives with
an intimacy rare among young lovers. Neither had had an easy existence; life
had already left scars by the time they found each other. Perhaps that
explained the intensity with which they had approached each other.

The past. It was all
in the past, not worth dwelling on now. This conversation was nothing more than
a footnote to their relationship, a chance encounter to be forgotten tomorrow. Still,
Amber found herself wishing she’d taken some time to fix up before she left the
hotel, to refresh her makeup and put on something other than her
strictly-business blouse. She hadn’t slept well the night before, and she knew
she had the dark circles under her eyes to prove it.

Mac, on the other
hand, looked great. His hair was tousled, a little long in the back, and one or
two glints of silver peppered the sun-lightened brown. He was wearing a work
shirt that had obviously seen a lot of hard miles, the fabric softened by
dozens of washings, the indigo color faded. The hair on his arms was bleached a
pale gold in contrast to the sun-burnished skin. Around his eyes there were a
few more crinkles than before. From smiling, she wondered, or from worry?

Not that it mattered.

Even if he hadn’t
volunteered the information, she would have guessed that he was still at his
father’s shop—
his
shop, she
corrected herself. His arms were every bit as well-muscled as they’d been over
a decade ago, shaped by hours of working on the boats. He’d been brought up in
the shop, learning at the knee of his father and the men who worked for him. When
Amber met him he could take on nearly any kind of task, everything from
finessing a motor to coax the best possible performance out of it, to scrubbing
down the sides of the boats at the end of the season before they went into
storage. She remembered the dozens of times he picked her up after her
waitressing job, still wearing the smells of hard work, the motor oil and heady
scent of a man’s honest labor.