“Oh,” Mason said. He buried his head in his hands. He got to his feet unsteadily. “Excuse me,” he said, ever the southern gentleman. He hurried into the powder room and closed the door firmly.

“We have to talk,” Mason said, when he finally emerged from the powder room, pale and grim-faced. While he’d been retching, she’d moved into the kitchen, washed her face, and combed her hair. She looked radiant, if that was possible.

“Yes,” Celia said, nodding eagerly. “I agree.”

He went to the liquor cupboard, pulled out a bottle of bourbon, poured three fingers into a water glass, and downed it in one swallow.

Celia had never seen Mason drink this early in the day. She slid onto one of the leather barstools at the kitchen counter. But Mason remained standing, his backbone ramrod straight.

“There’s no easy way to say this,” Mason started. “The thing is, even before, well, the thing with Annajane, I guess I’d started to realize maybe we should rethink getting married.”

One large tear rolled down Celia’s cheek. She turned her head and brushed it away with the back of her hand.

“I’m sorry,” Mason said. His shoulders slumped. “I just don’t love you. I thought I did, but I don’t. You deserve better than that. Marrying me would be the biggest mistake of your life, Celia.”

“But, the baby,” she whispered, fighting back the tears. “Our family…”

He sighed. “I can’t lie. The baby complicates things. You said December?”

Celia nodded.

He looked out the kitchen window. A baby. His own flesh and blood. How could he have been so careless? And not just about that. How could he have let his marriage to Annajane dissolve, without a fight? How could he have let the business deteriorate to the point that it was at risk? How could he get himself engaged to a woman he didn’t really want to marry? Had he been asleep for the past five years? What would his old man think of the way he’d screwed things up?

“I will, of course, take care of you and the baby,” he started to say. “Financially, emotionally, whatever. You’ll never want for anything.”

Celia was uncharacteristically quiet.

“You don’t still want to get married, do you?” he heard himself ask.

She shrugged. “I don’t want to force you to marry me.” She sniffled a little. “But I never thought I’d be an unwed mother!” And then she was crying again. Loud, gasping sobs. He put a hand on her arm, and she shook it off angrily, refusing to be comforted. “Just leave me alone,” she said.

22

Annajane couldn’t sleep. She was haunted by the consequences of her actions. By six that morning, she’d decided on a course of action. She had to go to Shane, tell him what she’d done, and ask for his forgiveness.

She threw some clothes into an overnight bag and text-messaged Davis.

“Won’t be coming in today. Maybe not tomorrow either. Sorry.”

Celia, she thought wryly, would be delighted.

It was a six-hour drive to Atlanta. She welcomed the quiet, the chance to think, the absence of distraction. She watched the sun come up over an emerald-green pasture dotted with horses and an old sway-backed mule and, finally, at eight, gave herself permission to stop at a Bojangles’ north of Greenville, South Carolina, for coffee, a biscuit, and a bathroom break.

The restaurant was busy, with construction workers picking up bags of chicken biscuits, office workers lined up in their cars at the drive-through, and two long tables of elderly men who were obviously members of an unofficial coffee klatch.

Her cell phone rang as she was getting back into her car. She glanced at it warily, praying it wasn’t Mason, grateful it was only his sister, Pokey.

“Hey,” she said.

“Oh my God!” Pokey breathed. “OhmyGodOhmyGod. I can’t believe you did not call me.”

“I was going to,” Annajane said. “But I left at six. I figured you’d probably still be asleep.”

“Left where?” Pokey asked, her voice rising with excitement. “Are you telling me you actually spent the night with him? That is the best news I’ve had in months. Years maybe.”

“Spent the night with who? What are you talking about?” But Annajane had a sinking feeling she knew exactly what her best friend was talking about.

“You. And Mason. Last night. Doing the wild thing out at the farm. In the Chevelle.”

“Oh, no,” Annajane moaned. “This cannot be happening.”

“Oh, yes,” Pokey crowed. “Believe it.”

“Where did you hear it?”

“What’s important is who I didn’t hear it from,” Pokey said. “You! How could you?”

“This is not exactly my finest moment,” Annajane said dully. “How did you hear, anyway? Surely not Mason…”

“My brother? Be serious!” Pokey said, laughing. “Of course I didn’t hear it from him. I did call him right before I called you, but he’s not answering his phone, the jerk.”

“Then who?” Annajane asked, bewildered. Her face was in flames. “It’s only eight o’clock in the morning. How on earth…?”

“Oh, honey,” Pokey drawled dramatically. “It’s gone viral. You know I walk every morning on the high school track at seven with Vera Hardy, and she was just agog over the news. And then on my way home, I stopped to get milk and cereal and juice boxes at Harris Teeter, and Bonnie Kelsey, that bitch, stopped me by the Pop-Tarts and wanted to know what was going on with you two. Don’t worry, though, I played dumb…”

“I’m having a nightmare,” Annajane said.

They heard a faint beeping on the line.

“Oops,” Pokey said. “That’s Pete. I’ll call you back.”

Ten minutes later, she called back. “Pete wants to know if you two could reschedule the wedding before he has to return his tux to the rental place,” Pokey reported. “Save him a hundred bucks.”

“Not funny,” Annajane said. “Did you have to tell him?”

“I didn’t tell him,” Pokey said. “He already knew.”

“How?”

“Kiwanis breakfast meeting,” Pokey said succinctly. “You know those men gossip like a bunch of old biddies.”

“The whole Kiwanis Club knows?” Annajane felt fine beads of perspiration forming on her upper lip and forehead.

“Rotary, too, apparently,” Pokey added. “Pete said Davis called him this morning, about to split a gut over it. Davis told Pete he’s furious at Mason for disgracing the family, if you can believe it. Talk about the pot calling the kettle black.”

“Davis knows?” Annajane felt a stabbing pain in her abdomen.

More faint beeps.

“Oh, Lord, that’s Mama,” Pokey said. “I’ve gotta take this. You know if I don’t pick up on the second ring she’ll pout for days and days.”

Please, please, please, Annajane prayed. Please don’t let Sallie have heard. Anything but that. Please.

But apparently the gods were deaf to her pleas.

“Mama knows,” Pokey said, calling back ten minutes later.

“Davis told her?”

“Afraid not,” Pokey said. “She heard it at altar guild this morning.”

“What all did she say?” Annajane asked, dread in her heart.

“Don’t ask,” Pokey said darkly.

“I just don’t understand how this got out so fast, and so far,” Annajane cried. “Mason would never have said anything to anybody, and I for sure didn’t.”

“Well, that’s easy,” Pokey said. “Grady Witherspoon! If you wanted to keep your affair with your ex-husband secret, you should have picked a more private place than the farm.”

“We are not having an affair! It was a kiss. One stinking kiss.”

“That’s not how I heard it,” Pokey said. “Pete said Watson Bates saw Grady at the feed and seed this morning. Watson told Pete he heard the two of you were going at it buck nekkid in the backseat of the Chevelle.”

“It was the front seat!” Annajane objected. “And we were not naked.”

“Were you fully dressed?” Pokey asked.

“None of your business.”

“Half-dressed?”

“It doesn’t matter now,” Annajane said, biting her lip. “The truth doesn’t matter, because all of Passcoe is now firmly convinced I was having sex with Mason Bayless last night. So that’s it. I can never show my face there again. Thank God my loft is already sold. You’re gonna have to finish up my packing for me.”