He reached over and slapped a comforting hand on her knee, right below where the duct tape ended. “I’ve missed you.”
“Yes, I can tell. Clearly you’ve wasted away without me.”
“I didn’t say that. But I did think about you … sometimes.” And this was where she told him that she’d thought about him too.
He waited and waited and waited.
But instead of telling him that she’d missed him too, Lyric reached for the magazine she’d just handed to him and buried her face in what he was sure was a fascinating article about US tax law.
He counted to one hundred—twice—and had just about given up when she finally said, “Yeah, well, I didn’t think about you at all. At least, not unless a Wranglers game was on and I couldn’t find the remote control.”
Ouch. That stung a little bit—not the actual words, but the ring of honesty he heard behind them. She really had gone off to college and forgotten all about him.
Suddenly angry—and heartily sick of playing the role of persona non grata after close to thirteen long years—he demanded, “Can you explain to me what the hell I did that was so bad? Yes, I slept with your sister. But it wasn’t like I was just going for a notch on my bedpost. I really cared about her. Hell, I thought I was in love with her. And after the best night of my life, after I told her how I felt about her and the night we spent together, she sucker punched me in the stomach.” Absently, he rubbed the spot as he remembered how Harmony had slammed the door in his face after slugging him. How no amount of pleading had gotten her to open it again. “Your sister has a right hook that’s worthy of a heavyweight title.”
Lyric smiled to herself and murmured something under her breath that sounded like damn right.
Closing his eyes, he rubbed a hand over his face. He must be more tired than he thought if he’d willingly pulled out that memory, especially after he’d spent a good portion of his college years screwing it away.
“You didn’t do anything.” Her voice turned shrill and choppy with indignation. “That’s what you want to hear, right? That beautiful, perfect Heath Montgomery didn’t do a damn thing. So fine. I’ll play. Everything that happened was Harmony’s and my fault. It was all our—”
“Honey, I just heard about your father. I’m so sorry.” Tre bustled right up to her, a box of tissues in one hand and a glass of whiskey in the other. There were several small, round disks floating at the top of the whiskey, but Heath didn’t take time to investigate. Her father? Tre knew her father?
“The ground crew wanted to make sure that you’d gotten on board safely. Apparently there was a pool on whether you’d injured yourself or someone else, because Jack says he hasn’t seen a move like that since his cat accidently licked an electrical outlet.” Gingerly, Tre placed the tissues in her lap. “It’s important to stay positive. I’m sure your daddy’s going to be okay.”
“What happened to him?” A frisson of alarm worked its way down Heath’s spine at the thought of anything happening to Mayor Bowman Wright, or BB, as everyone in San Angelo called him. Lyric’s dad had always seemed so strong, so indomitable, so able to conquer anything and everything that came his way. It was hard to imagine something happening to him, harder still to imagine San Angelo without him.
“He had a heart attack a couple of hours ago. I was at a benefit dinner when I got the news. Hence the ridiculous outfit.” She gestured to the duct tape.
“How bad was it?”
“Bad. I don’t know much more than that. He’d just been admitted to ICU when Mother called, and now I’m stuck on this stupid plane imagining the worst.” She turned her head away, and if Heath didn’t know just how close Lyric’s apple fell to her father’s tree, he might have thought she was crying. As it was, he felt like a total heel for hassling her over something that happened a decade ago when her father’s life hung in the balance.
“I just want to get home,” she continued. “I need to get home.”
This time he could hear the tears in her voice, and when he placed a finger under her chin and tilted her face up to his, he could see them burning little trails down her cheeks.
“Excuse me, could I have some water?” Wranglers Jersey, oblivious as always, called from the seat in front of him.
“Here, take this.” Tre shoved the glass of whiskey into Wranglers Jersey’s hand. “In case you haven’t noticed, I’m a little busy right now comforting a passenger in her time of need.” He whipped a tissue out of the box and dabbed it across Lyric’s wet cheek.
“Oh, right. Sorry.” Wranglers Jersey slinked back down in his seat. He must have taken a drink, because Heath heard the sound of spewing liquid. “Jesus, is this whiskey peppermint flavored?”
“Oops. I forgot.” Tre shot Heath a look. “Peppermint Life Savers. They were as close as I could get to cherries and a paper umbrella.” He leaned over Wranglers Jersey’s seat. “Sorry about that, sir. The Deuce is a little kinky in his drink preferences, if you know what I mean. I’ll be right back with that water.” He patted Lyric’s head a couple of times before flouncing back up the aisle.
For the first time, Heath realized his hand was still on Lyric’s face. He dropped it reluctantly back into his lap, but when she sniffled, he couldn’t resist lacing his fingers through hers.
“He’ll be fine. Your dad’s a fighter. He’ll get through this.” He infused his voice with a certainty he was far from feeling. But what else could he do? When his father had died, Lyric had been there for him. She’d been the shoulder he cried on, the sounding board for his pain, and the hand holder when words couldn’t express the grief he’d felt. The dim memo
ry of the girl she’d been nodding attentively while he poured out his soul as they sat in the bed of his old pickup watching the sun go down drifted to the forefront of his mind, had him squeezing her hand just a little more tightly. He’d never felt closer to another living creature than he had that night—before or since. No matter how much sex he’d had in the intervening years, he’d never been able to re-create those moments of perfect intimacy.
“Mother says he’s in bad shape, Heath. What am I going to do if he doesn’t make it?”
She sounded so lost. Which was weird, because if there was anyone who knew who she was and where she was headed, it was Lyric Wright. From the time she could walk, she’d blazed a path brighter and straighter than any rocket ever could. And she’d done it all with a single-minded focus that hadn’t left room for anything else.
Even when she was little, she hadn’t cried much. If she got hurt, she’d picked herself up and moved on. If someone made fun of her, she’d tied them in knots with her crazy intellect until they were the ones everyone was laughing at. So when she did cry, when something hurt her enough to break through the layers of protection she had around herself, it had always turned him inside out.
Tonight was no different, even after all the years that yawned between them. Seeing her vulnerable, watching her cry, was ripping away at a part of himself he hadn’t thought about in years, a part he’d been certain had disappeared about the same time Lyric and Harmony had booted him out of their lives. Finding out that it was still there—that he still cared—wasn’t comfortable, but it was nothing compared to watching Lyric cry.