“I think she was embarrassed that I knew Knox had just left. From there, it went downhill. I never meant to shove her back and kill her, nor that I didn’t go to the police immediately.”
“Dustin, it wasn’t your fault. The papers said you weren’t responsible; it was her kidneys. She was getting ready to leave town with Holly and Logan. Logan could have died because of her irresponsibility. And she had been lying to Holly about taking Logan to the doctor to see why he was so sick. If Holly and her ex-boyfriend hadn’t broken into Diamond’s office, you would have never found Logan before it was too late. I remember how weak and fragile he was before the doctor gave the approval for him to go to daycare.”
“I’ve made too many mistakes in my life, but Logan will never be one of them. I would die for him.”
“I know. He’s kind of hard not to love. And I’m going to be honest, too. I was jealous of her every time I saw her with you. I felt like I was being stabbed in the gut when I found out she was pregnant. But from the very freaking moment Holly brought Logan into the daycare, I fell in love with him. How could I not? He’s your son.”
Dustin stopped moving his hand on the back of her neck, gliding it over to cup her cheek. “So, where do we go from here?”
“We go to sleep. Right now, that’s all I can manage.”
Jessie felt the lightest touch of his lips brushing her forehead before he returned his hand to stroking her back.
“Sweet dreams. Don’t let the bed bugs bite.”
“You’re not helping me go to sleep by reminding me of bugs that are probably trying to slip into the sleeping bag.”
He tightened his arms around her. “Do you want to go back into the tent, where they can’t get to you?”
“No, I want to stay here.” Confessing the truth wasn’t easy, but she did it anyway.
“Good. This is where I want you.”
“Jess ….”
Jessie opened her eyes, seeing the sun shining off a barrel of a rifle pressed into the side of Dustin’s temple.
“Jess … tell Bubba that I’m going to kick his ass when he moves that gun.”
“Tell Dustin”—her cousin mockingly rose his one shaggy eyebrow—“that unless he’s a cat, I don’t have a damn thing to worry about because I’m going to splatter what brains he has over this mountainside.”
“Tell him that—”
Jessie giggled. “Tell him yourself. He’s standing right there.”
“If I don’t talk to him when I see him in town, why would I talk to him when he’s sharing a sleeping bag with you?”
Jessie rose into a sitting position to glare at Bubba. “Because it’s the polite thing to do when you barge into our campsite and put a gun to someone’s head? You know nothing happened. You and Bud sat in the bushes watching us after we went to bed.”
“That damn bush was too little to sit under, so we had to lay under it. My back is itching. And I told Holt I’d watch you. There is only so much a man can stomach, and having to watch pretty boy here all comfortable and snuggled against you for five fucking hours is more than I can stomach.”
“Then go home, you old wart hog.”
Jessie put her hand over Dustin’s mouth so he wouldn’t insult her younger cousin again.
He stared up at her balefully as she tried to talk Bubba out of pulling the trigger.
“He doesn’t mean it. Dustin’s always grouchy when he wakes up.”
“How do you know what he’s like in the morning?”
“We used to play together when we were younger.”
“You aren’t young’uns anymore. You two need to keep to your own beds.”
“We do. I had a nightmare last night. He was comforting me, and I fell asleep.”
“I bet he did,” Bubba said sarcastically, pressing the barrel down harder.
“Stop it. You know nothing happened.” Trying to drill anything into a male Hayes’s thick head had always been a source of frustration for her, especially this one. He was twenty-six and looked like a man in his thirties because of his god-awful bushy beard that grew to his chest. “You’re just being ornery.”
“I passed ornery two hours ago. Now I’m just pissed and wanting a cup of coffee.”
“If I make you one, will you quit threatening to shoot Dustin?”
“Yep.” Raising his rifle to his shoulder, Bubba gave the bushes behind him a chin nod. “Make enough for Bud and BoDean.”
Jessie removed her hand from Dustin’s mouth to climb out of the sleeping bag.
“I’m not making them coffee,” Dustin snapped as he sat up to tug his boots on.
“Good.” Bubba snorted, restarting the fire with the sticks that Dustin had stockpiled last night as her cousins crawled out from underneath the bushes. “What’d you bring us for breakfast?”