Beauty and the Mustache

Beauty
and the
Mustache

A Philosophical Romance

By Penny Reid

http://reidromance.blogspot.com/

Smashwords Edition

All rights reserved, 2004

Caped Publishing

This book is a work of fiction. Names,
characters, places, rants, facts, contrivances, and incidents are
either the product of the author’s questionable imagination or are
used factitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or
dead or undead, events, locales is entirely coincidental if not
somewhat disturbing/concerning.

Copyright © 2014 by Penny Reid; All rights
reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced,
scanned, photographed, instagrammed, tweeted, twittered, twatted,
tumbled, or distributed in any printed or electronic form without
explicit written permission from the author.

Caped Publishing

Made in the United States of America

Final Edition: August 2014

ISBN-
978-0-9892810-6-9

EBOOK EDITION

DEDICATION

For Carl and Winnie

I love you in death as I
loved you in life; to the stars and beyond, just like
always.

“
There is no comfort anywhere for anyone who dreads to go
home
.”

―
Laura
Ingalls Wilder,
Little Town on the
Prairie

It was 6:14 a.m.
and I was awake.

The engine revved for a third time—louder,
longer, angrier.

I know an engine can’t be
angry, but this engine
sounded
angry. Specifically, it sounded angry with me. The
engine must’ve been feeling pretty pissed in my general direction,
because why else would it be waking me up after less than three
hours of sleep?

But what the engine didn’t
know was that I was not afraid of its anger. I took crap from no
engine, not anymore and especially not when the engine was under
the control of one of my six brothers. Because now, I was a
badass.

The only way one of them
would be awake at 6:14 in the morning was if they’d never gone to
sleep the night before.

Likely, they were either drunk or stoned or
both.

Lovely. Just…lovely.

Good old boys revving
their loud engines early in the morning was reason number
thirty-three for why I never came home. I’d started making the list
two days ago, when I’d decided that I had no choice but to fly to
Tennessee.

Though I hadn’t been home
in eight years, my momma had visited me at college many times.
Every year since I’d graduated four years ago with my BSN—a
bachelor’s degree in nursing—I’d taken her on a vacation with me,
just the two of us.

But three days ago, she
hadn’t returned my call, nor had she picked up the phone when I’d
called the next day. This was remarkable because she and I had
spoken on the phone at the same time every day for the last eight
years except for when we were together, of course. Our
conversations didn’t typically last very long, just a quick
check-in to see if she needed anything, see how life was treating
her. Sometimes she’d share gossip about people I’d grown up with,
and sometimes I’d tell her about a new book I was
reading.

Mostly, I think we just took comfort in the
sound of each other’s voices.

So after two days with no
contact, I was worried. Finally, I resorted to calling Jethro, my
oldest brother. He told me that Momma was in the hospital, and she
was refusing to see or talk to anyone.

Therefore, I hopped a
plane, intent on discovering the truth behind her mystery hospital
visit. I was determined to take care of the woman who’d never
failed to take care of me.

The car engine revved
again. I growled, threw my covers off, and marched out my bedroom
door. In my rush to rain a world of hurt on whoever was responsible
for the early morning wakeup call, I slipped on the last three
stairs leading to the first floor of my momma’s house and cursed,
almost falling flat on my ass. The resulting spike in adrenaline
was rocket fuel to my irritation.

Gone was the girl from
small-town Tennessee, mild mannered, sensitive, and ignorant youth
that my brothers once knew. Before I left I’d just begun to fight
back against their antics. Now I was a ninja of mind over matter.
Whichever of my brothers was responsible for waking me up revving
his hopped-up engine after I had endured a delayed,
three-connection flight from Chicago to Tennessee was going to
suffer.

Retribution. Revenge.
Perhaps death. At the very least, someone was going to be the
recipient of an epic titty-twister.

I flew out the front door
and let the screen door slam behind me. I wasn’t worried about
waking anyone. If the inhabitants of the house could sleep through
the ruckus coming from the garage then they could sleep through the
banging of a porch door. Besides, the roosters were already holding
a crowing contest.

Another thing I wasn’t
worried about was my state of undress. My family’s property was
situated on fifteen acres in the middle of Green Valley, otherwise
known as podunk nowhere. It backed up to the Smoky Mountains
National Park on the Tennessee side. If you didn’t count all the
cars on blocks, defunct trailers, old tires, rusted machine parts,
and general trashy appearance of the grand old house and yard, it
was actually a lovely spot.

Usually, my idiot brothers
ran around half-dressed, so I paid no mind to the fact that I was
in my pink tank top pajamas with matching sleep shorts. I was
likely overdressed.

I avoided a pile of broken beer bottles on
the path leading to the detached garage; really, it was more like a
giant hanger. My mind told me that the structure was called a
quonset hut and I told my mind to hush. I didn’t care what it was
called. I only cared that all of its inhabitants were soon going to
be murdered by my hands. Then I would go back to sleep.

The sun was already up,
which made the inside of the metal structure dark in contrast.
Regardless, I could see the machine of my angst as I approached; it
would have been impossible to miss.

Two male bodies leaned
inside the open hood of an orange and white Charger. A third
numbskull, currently hidden, was in the driver’s seat revving the
engine.

As was my custom, I was
yelling before I’d made it to the garage. “I don’t care which of
you hillbilly, disease-infested, flea-bitten, catawampus-heads are
in here making this ruckus, you better stop right this
minute!”

Jethro turned as I
approached and tugged his pants upward. As I suspected, I was
overdressed. He wore nothing but his beard and a pair of stained
jeans. Jethro’s longish brown hair was askew and unkempt, like he’d
just rolled out of bed, and his beard could do with a trim. But his
brown eyes were warm and sharp as they surveyed me.

Billy, the second in our
family, kept his back to me. I knew it was Billy because he had a
tattoo on his left shoulder of a goat with the word
Billy
beneath it. He was
likewise attired, which meant that his ass-crack was on full
display for the sun in the sky and the small woodland animals in
the forest.

Of my brothers, Billy and
I look the most alike; we are almost replicas of my father. We both
have dark brown hair that’s almost black, blue eyes, and the same
wide mouth with pillow lips, as my brother Duane used to
say.

But where I was pale
skinned and curvy, he was suntanned, muscled—presumably from manual
labor—and tattooed.

“
Well, hello gorgeous.
When’d you get in? It must’ve been late.” Jethro waved with grease
stained hands, his white teeth a glaring contrast to his dark brown
beard.

Billy called over his
shoulder, “Why are you even up?” He sounded exasperated.

“
Because you geniuses are
out here testing decibel limits. I can’t sleep through all
the-”

Just then the engine revved again. The sound
spiked, absorbing my words, and caused a new wave of
aggravation.

“
Argh! Which of you ugly
idiots keeps doing that?” I guessed it was Cletus, the third
oldest, behind the wheel. He was the sweetest, but also the least
likely to comprehend the obvious.

I charged into the garage, nearly kicking
over a quart of oil in my haste. I didn’t care. I needed my sleep.
I did not need an early morning of boys and their toys.

I began bellowing as soon as I crossed the
threshold. “I swear to the god of moonshine, I am going to pinch
your nipples straight off your chest!”

Without a second thought,
I reached my hand in the open driver’s side door of the charger and
twisted the nipple within reach. I did this with relish, the
gleefully vindictive kind, not the pickle kind. I also gripped the
roof of the car with my other hand for leverage in case Cletus
tried to push me away.

“
Ow! What
the…?”

A string of impressive
expletives arose from the car. A large and powerful hand gripped
mine and ripped it away from the male chest.

I gasped. This was for
several reasons, not the least of which was that Cletus didn’t know
the equivalent word for
fuck
in Latin, nor did any of my brothers.

Therefore, this person
whose nipple I’d just assaulted was most definitely not my brother
Cletus.

A shot of adrenaline
coursed down my spine, my eyes widened with shock, and I tried to
unsuccessfully wrench my hand away. The fingers that held me were
punishing; with one fluid motion the occupant stood from the
driver’s seat, twisted my arm behind my back, and brought my body
flush against his.

He was breathing hard.

I was breathing harder.

I stared at him.

The occupant stared back.

Gray-blue eyes, almost
silver, held mine in a vice grip of anger and surprise. I felt an
electric bolt, like I’d been tazered in the stomach. Other than a
very slight shadow of wonder, he wore an expression that would have
made a thunderstorm proud.

As well, he was so
ruggedly sexy I’m sure my mouth fell open to protest the unfairness
of his existence. Luckily, no sound emerged. I was too busy
oscillating between stunned, mortified, and turned on.

This man was definitely not one of my
brothers.

First of all, this guy had
a blond beard and a smattering of blond chest hair. All the Winston
boys had dark brown beards except Duane and Beauford, who were
twins. They were numbers five and six in the family and had ginger
beards.

Also, this guy had a
bronze tan. He was tan all over, like a grease stained surfer or a
Viking marauder who spent all his time at sea shirtless.

And… what number was I on?

Oh yes. Third, he was the
kind of expertly disheveled, ruggedly handsome that made me forget
what number I was on.

He was massive. Like,
six-foot-four huge. His chest and arms and stomach and shoulders
were cut like a boulder; he felt stone hard.

The staring continued. I
watched confusion war with fury as his glare devoured my face,
lingered on my lips, and darted back to my eyes.

Unable to handle the intensity of his stare
a moment longer, I blurted, “I’m so sorry!”

He blinked at me and shook
his head once, quickly, as if I’d just appeared. He released my
hand and stepped away as though touching me might burn him. “What
the hell was that?”

I ripped my gaze from his
and looked at his chest. It was a nice chest—a
very, very
nice chest—but his left
nipple was red and angry. My nipple-wist marred the otherwise
physical perfection of his chiseled torso. A small sound of dismay
tumbled from my lips.

“
Oh my God, I’m so sorry,”
I stammered, and I reached forward and petted the offended skin. “I
never would have purpled your nurple if I’d know you weren’t
related to me. It’s just that I was trying to sleep. Really, I
should have known you weren’t Cletus; he would have guessed my
intentions a mile away and taken evasive maneuvers.”

“
Evasive
maneuvers?”

I glanced up from where my
fingers continued to caress his wounded nipple to his silver eyes,
now a tad less thunderstormy, but a tad more cautiousy.