My Texas Sweetheart (book one) (9 page)

Chapter 14
(Maggie)

It’s a month later, and I’m back in school. The police still haven’t found Christian, and my family and friends still act like I am going to break. I know they are just concerned, but it’s driving me nuts. I wish everything could go back to being the way it was before. After the day we got back from the hospital and I remembered everything, I fell apart so Dad and Mom took me back to the hospital. We got meds for panic attacks, and I do therapy twice a week now. I still have nightmares every night so Mom either sleeps with me after my nightmare, or we sit downstairs and drink hot chocolate and talk about it. Chase, Todd, and Nate have gone back to work, but they all call me daily, and they are supposed to be visiting soon. Nate and Todd have become like brothers to me. I am so glad to have them in my life.

I’m
at school right now, sitting in the lunch room, watching all the people I love…Adam, Jase, Amy, Jeff, Pete, and Jake. They are all goofing around, which is really nice to see after everything that has happened. There’s times when I still have issues with people touching me, but not as much as before. Kelly and Sarah come over and give me a hug. I stiffen up for a second, then hug them back. Jenny walks by our table and I get up to talk to her. “Hey, Jenny. Can we go outside and talk?” She looks taken aback, but then nods.

When we get outside
, we find a tree to sit under. Then I see Adam, Jase, and the others sit down on the school steps. I roll my eyes and turn back to Jenny.
“Jenny, you do know that I don’t blame you for what happened, right? You never sit with us at lunch anymore, and I really want you to.”

She looks
at them, then back at me. “I know that, Maggie. I do. I don’t feel comfortable sitting with you and them after everything.” I understand, I guess, but it sucks that a friendship is ending because of it.

“Well, maybe someday you can try, or maybe we can hang out after school or something.” I need to keep my friendship with Jenny and, hopefully, we can help each other through this.

She looks down, then back at me and whispers, “I would really like to hang out after school.” I nod and smile.
We say goodbye and hug, and I return to the others just as the bell rings.

All of
us head towards the gym. Adam has his arm thrown around my shoulders, and Jase has a hold of my right hand since my left arm is still in a cast. Adam smiles at me. “So, baby girl, did you have a good talk with Jenny?”

I smile. “Yes, I did.” He already knows what we talked about so he doesn’t have to ask.

We make it to gym class and found out that we are playing dodge ball. Before I get a chance to say anything, Mr. Wade says, “Okay, class. You all know the rules, but I want to emphasize one important rule…NO HEAD SHOTS!!” He looks at me and smiles. Adam and Jase both have panicked looks on their faces. I smile, trying to reassure them that it will be fine.

Once
we start the game, I can tell that people are avoiding me on purpose. Any time a ball came near me, someone else took the hit or the ball was thrown so weak that it hit the floor. Seriously, this is getting annoying. I am about ready to tell them all off when a ball hits my leg. I smile. It’s about time. I look up and realize that it was Mr. Wade who hit me. I laughed. “Thank-you, Mr. Wade!”

He smiled “You’re more than welcome, Maggie.”

****

After school
, I jump into my jeep and head for home, and Amy isn’t too far behind me. The good thing is that the boys have football practice so I don’t have to deal with them right now. As soon as I am home, Mom asks how school was. “It was good. How was your day?”

She smiles
at me. “It was good, baby girl.”

Ever since I woke up in the hospital, I get sudden headaches.
I put my head on the table, feeling one of them coming on. It starts getting really bad. “Headache, baby girl?”
Mom says. I nod, weakly. “Here are some pain pills. Take them and go lay down.”

I take them and go to get up
, but I almost fall. My dad catches me.
“Whoa, baby girl. Let me help.” He leads me to the sofa and helps me to lay down. He grabs a pillow and blanket for me.

“Daddy, can I please have some water?” He smiles and nods, walking into the kitchen. I think this headache is the worst one I’ve had. Dad walks back in with a bottle of water and a washcloth. He puts the washcloth on my forehead and hands me the water. I take a drink. “Thank-you for everything, Daddy.”

He gives me a kiss on my forehead, whispering, “You’re welcome, baby girl.”

****

When I wake up, I’m feeling better. I decide that taking a ride on Storm will be good to get my mind off things so I head out to the barn. Just as I am saddling up Storm, I see movement out of the corner of my eye. I look that way and see nothing. I must be seeing things. After all, I did have a really bad headache this afternoon. Then I see it again. Now I feel uneasy. What if there is someone out here with me? There’s no way it’s any of my brothers or Jase, and my dad wouldn’t do that so who is it? I put Storm back into his stall and start looking around to see if I can see anyone, but there is nothing. “I must be losing my mind,” I whisper.

Suddenly,
all the hair stands up on the back of my neck, and I know who’s in here.   How did he get in here without anyone noticing him? I try and figure out a way to get back to the house without letting him know that I know he’s here. As I’m thinking about what to do, Christian steps out of his hiding spot. I freeze. He just stands there, staring at me for the longest time. Then he starts to move toward me. I move backwards. He stops and frowns at me. “Why are you backing away, Maggie? I won’t hurt you.”

I don’t reply
, just keep moving away. He gets a dark look in his eyes and, before I can take another step, he is on me, pulling my hair. He starts trying to kiss me, but I knee him in the balls. As I try to run, he grabs my leg and pulls me down. I start kicking and screaming for him to let me go…

“Maggie! Maggie, wake up!” My eyes pop open and I am staring at Dad, Mom, Jase, and Adam. It was just a nightmare. I get up and throw my arms around Dad. “It’s okay, baby girl. Just a nightmare,” he says.

Looking around at all of them
, I see how concerned they are. I give them a small smile. “I’m okay.”

“What was your dream about, baby girl?”
Dad asks.

I di
dn’t really want to tell them so I just say, “Same as always.”

“Well, you know that we’re here if you want to talk about it. How about we watch a movie and make some pizza?” Mom
says. I smile and nod.

Jase grab
s my hand and pulls me into a hug. “You can always talk to me about anything, Maggie. There’s something I want to talk to you about later on, okay?” he says, raising his eyebrows at me.

I smile.
“Sure.”

About
a half-hour later, we finish putting the toppings on the pizzas and put them into the oven. I go to grab juice and ginger ale, chips and fruit. Creed and Jade walk into the house. “Hey, guys. How was the event?” Dad asks.

“It was good. Jade beat my score this time.” Creed laughed.

“Congrats Jade” I say smiling at him. He walks over and gives me a big bear hug,

“How are you feeling baby girl” he whispers in my ear. Before I get a chance to answer Creed pulls me into him for a hug too. Smiling at my big brother I tell them I’m feeling fine, they nod but don’t looked convinced.

I know there all concerned and that they blame themselves, and some days I want to slap the shit outta them. No matter what I know they love me and are just looking out for me in their own ways. Thinking back to what Jase said before has me wondering what he wants to talk about. I hope it has nothing to do with my freaking nightmare, I can’t tell them.

Jase and I have grown a lot in the last month, he’s always around helping me or we just talk about anything. Yeah I’m falling more for him every single day and I am pretty sure he feels the same way about me. He just hasn’t said anything yet, if I had to guess why. It would be because of what happened to me.

I
hear my phone beep and go to see who was texting me. It was Amy saying that she was on her way over. “Amy is on her way, Mom.”

She
smiles. “Okay, baby girl.”

Just as Amy
gets there, my mom’s pulling the pizzas out of the oven. We all sat down to eat.

Chapter 15
(Jase)

Tonight is going to be the night that I tell Maggie how I feel about her. I just hope she knows I’ll wait for her, and we can take our time with the relationship.  I know her brothers are all fine with it because I already talked to them and told them that I’m in love with her. They all got big grins on their faces and said that it’s about time. I even called Chase and told him. He said that it was awesome news “This pizza is great,” Adam says.

Maggie’s phone beeped with a text
. That’s weird because most of the people that she texted were all here. I hear her phone hit the floor and I look at her, seeing that she was pale. “Mags, what is it?” Brad asks, getting up.

She
looks about ready to have a panic attack. Creed grabs her phone and looks at it. When he looks up, we could tell who it was from just by the look on his face. “Son of a bitch. He’s going to pay for this shit,” he growls.  He showed us the text:

Christian:
Maggie, did you enjoy yourself that night on the path? I know I did because it was the best sex of my life. Seeing your brothers’ and Jase’s face was even better. I’ll be seeing you again real soon!!
)

FUCK
, this isn’t happening! Maggie was just starting to feel better about things, and her panic attacks weren’t so bad anymore. “He comes anywhere near her and he’s a dead man,” Jade growls.

Lily and Amy
take Maggie upstairs for a bath so she can relax. “I was going to tell her how I feel tonight. Probably should wait to do that now,” I say, hanging my head. Adam, Creed, and Jade just stare at me.

Creed takes a deep breath.
“Wait a second. No, you should still tell her. It’ll give her something else to think about.” He has a point.

Jade
looks at us, then at Maggie’s phone, picking it up:

Maggie:
Text her again and you’ll lose something you value. We will be showing your text to the police, but if you want to come visit me and the rest of the boys, we’ll be more than happy to clear our schedules.

“What are you up to?
” I asked. He grins and shows me the text. I just grin back. I should have known that he would do something like that.

The girls all
come back into the kitchen, laughing. Wow, that’s not what I expected. “Well, this is nice to see,” Brad says, walking over to her. He wraps Maggie in his arms and kissed her forehead.

“I don’t care what he texts, Daddy. I’m not gonna let him hurt me more than he already has.”

Brad
gets a huge smile on his face. “That’s my girl.” Wow, I’m in love with a brave girl. 

We
all take turns hugging her. I pull her into my arms. “So, you ready for that talk?” I whisper.   She nods and starts to pull away, but I wasn‘t ready to let go just yet. I look at all the faces in the kitchen. “Um, why don’t we go outside so we can have some privacy?” As we get to the door, I turn around and can see the huge smiles on all of their faces. I roll my eyes at them, Geez it’s not that big of a deal.

We walk out the door and over to the swing
. “So, what did you want to talk about, Jase?”

How do
I say this? I guess I just do it. I just hope it doesn’t scare her. “I want you and me to be together. If you’re not ready, I’ll wait for you.”
She stares at me for a long time. Shit, am I pushing this? Maggie, please say something!

“You don’t have to wait, Jase.”

“Meaning?” I ask.

She smiles
at me and leans in, looking at my lips, then into my eyes. I close the distance between us and press my lips to hers, just a light kiss because I don’t want to scare her She smiles. “Meaning I want to be with you, too. I’m done putting my life on hold.”

Grinning,
I pull her into my arms and press my lips to hers. This time, she grabs my face to hold me there. I deepen the kiss and trace her bottom lip with my tongue. She opens her mouth and our tongues dance together. Her hands move into my hair, pulling me closer.

I hear somebody clear their throat. Reluctantly, we break the kiss.
“Well, it’s about time you two,” Amy says beaming. She wasn’t the only one out there, either.

“I’m so happy for you two,” Lily says, smiling. I smile at her and look at Maggie, who was blushing.

“Lily, let’s leave the kids alone now,” Brad laughs, shaking his head he pulls Lily inside.

Adam and Amy both
stay outside with us after everyone else went in. “Don’t move too fast, Maggie. You still need time,” Adam says.

She
rolls her pretty green eyes at him. “I know, Adam.” She gives him that look that he knew meant he should back off. Leaning over, I kiss her again. She wraps her arms around my neck.

“Okay, you two, come on. I don’t need to see this,” Adam grumbles. Amy and Maggie both laugh at him. God, I missed her laugh.

“You know, Adam, you’re going to see it a lot now,” I say with a smug smile, winking at him.

Adam almost
looks like he is ready to kill me, but then he smiles and shakes his head. “Yeah, I guess I’ll need to get used to it. For the record, I really am happy for you both.”

Maggie get
s up and hugs him. “Alright, get your hands off my girl. You’ve had her long enough,” I grumble and they laugh. Maggie walks back over to me, puts her arm across my back, and puts her head on my shoulder. I lean in and kiss her hair. I can’t believe that this girl is finally mine.

Adam and I
start talking about football and collage scouts coming out to watch our game next week, while the girls talk about going to the spa this weekend with Lily and Amy’s mom. I didn’t know they had that planned. Adam and I had plans this weekend with Jake and Pete anyways, playing some football with his brothers, Brad, and my dad. Lily pokes her head out the door. “Maggie, Chase is on the phone!” She gives me a kiss on the cheek, then ran into the house.

Adam
stares at the door for a few minutes, then back at me. “Dude, be good to my sister. Don’t hurt her.” He knows I’d never hurt her, but I guess he needs me to reassure him. She’s been through a lot in the last few months. If I can help it, Maggie will never be hurt again.

“You know I will, dude.” He nods.

Jade and Creed come out to join us
. “We still up for football this weekend, or has your woman told you that you can’t play anymore?” Creed asks.

I look at him and laugh
.
“Yeah, we’re still playing. Maggie has ‘girl’ plans this weekend and, even if she didn’t, I’d still be playing.”

He holds
his hands up. “Okay, just checking,” he says, with a smile.

Maggie comes walking back out
, smiling. “Chase, Nate, and Todd are coming for a visit in three weeks,” she tells us. That’s good news. I know how hard it was on the three of them when they had to leave. Even though we would have anyway, Chase made us promise to take care of Maggie. We told him not to worry and to take care of himself so he could come home safe and sound.

“Sweet, did he say for how long?” Jade asks.

“He isn’t sure yet,” she says. Even a short visit would be awesome.

I wonder how long I’ll have to wait before I can tell Maggie that I’m in love with her
. I guess I’ll just have to play it by ear. Amy gets up and grabs Maggie’s hand. “Walk me to my car?” I look at her brothers and I can tell that we all have the same thought. We all get up. Amy looks at us, puzzled, but doesn’t say anything.

We are
making our way out to Amy’s car when we hear what sounds like a whine. I raise an eyebrow at Creed. He shrugs and starts walking towards the barn. The rest of us boys tell the girls to stay put and we follow him. As we get closer, the whining noise gets louder. What hell is that? Why can we smell smoke? Shit, that whining noise must be the cattle. Why aren’t the horses making noise? What the hell is going on? “Fuck me! Adam, run and get dad! Tell him to call the fire station!” Creed roars.

I look back to see Maggie and Amy huddled together
, scared. I’m about to run over to them when Creed yells that we need to get the cattle and horses out. The three of us rush into the barn. “We need to take the cattle one at a time or all hell will break lose!” Jade yells.

We
open the back doors to let the cattle and horses out into the fields. We get to work on opening the stalls for the horses and rush them out. Adam and Brad rush in to help us with the cattle and tell us that the fire department is on the way. Brad starts working on putting out the fire while we take care of the cattle. Just as the last of the cattle leave the barn, the firemen show up. Maybe we can still save what’s left of the barn. As they start battling the blaze, we go out to make sure the cattle and horses are far enough away.  

Suddenly,
we hear screaming. We all stop and look around. What the hell? Shit, that sounds like the girls! We take off for the driveway. When we get to the front of the barn, we see someone pushing Lily into a car, Maggie and Amy already inside. Fuck, this is not
happening! We take off running towards them. The guy looks over and see us. He pushes Lily to the ground and jumps into the car. Brad goes for Lily and the rest of us jump into Creed’s truck to go after him.

As we get to the end of the lane
, Creed slams on the breaks. “Dammit! We lost them! Which way should I go?!” he yells. We all tell him left, but we never find them.

When we pull back into the ranch, we can see
Brad pacing outside, waiting for us. When we climb out of the truck, he says, “You didn’t find them.” It wasn’t a question; it was a statement of defeat. “We need to call the police,” he says.

Adam slams his fist on the truck. “Like that’s helped so far, Dad! Christian hasn’t been found yet! Whoever took them could be working with him
!” Brad shakes his head and goes inside.

“What we should do is call Chase,” Adam mutters. We think about that for a second.

Jade shakes his head and growls, “Chase will kill whoever took them
, and then us for not protecting them.”

Creed says, “But we didn’t know the fire was set only to keep us busy.”

Brad comes back out to tell us he called the police…and Chase. We all nod and head back inside. Lily is sitting at the table crying. She looks at us when we came into house. “The guy said that he was taking Maggie to Christian. Amy and I were just in the wrong place at the wrong time.” I close my eyes, knowing what this means. Please, God, keep them safe.

“Chase and his crew are on their way to look for them,” Brad tells us. That makes us feel a little better. They’ll be able to find them faster than the police.

The fire
chief comes to the door and lets Brad know that the fire is out. Brad tells him that we know it was deliberately set, and what happened to the girls. The chief says how sorry he is and that an investigator will come out to officially look into how the fire was started.

Tara and Bill
, Amy’s parents, arrive at the ranch an hour later to sit and wait with us. Maggie must be having a panic attack right now. Hopefully, with Amy there, she’ll be able to deal with it.

Adam jumps up. “Hey, Maggie and Amy should have their cell phones. Will that help Chase
fined them?”

Brad runs to the phone
. “Chase, your sister might still have her phone on her. Will that help you fined them?” He smiles. “Okay, son.” Hanging up, he says, “He said that they can track them using their phones.” Lily gets up to make coffee and tea for everyone because all we can do is sit and wait.

We all start
pacing until Brad says he’s going to check out the barn. We all decide to go with him, at least it will feel like we’re doing something. From the outside, you could never tell that there even
was
a fire. However, once the doors are open, we can tell that it’s going to need a lot of work to restore. At least the cattle and horses are safe.

****

Four hours later and there’s still no news from Chase. Come on, dude. Give us some news. The phone rings and Brad runs to grab it, “Hello?...Chase, did you find them? Are they okay?...What do you mean you’re not sure?...Why haven’t any of you moved in yet?...Okay, call when you have more news…Stay safe.” Shit.