Page 2 of Back To Our Beginning

Graduation was in two weeks.

I sat down on the porch swing and slowly made my decision. Now I’d just have to tell Maddie. It was going to gut me. But she wouldn’t cry. She’d pretend to be happy for me. That was who Maddie Avery was.

She was a much better person than me.

And after I left, I could never look back. Because if I did, I might forget why I left in the first place—and ruin everything we’d ever been to one another.

Chapter One

Fifteen years of almost absolute silence, and now he was here.

Again.

It was twice now he had taken leave and come back to Jasper Creek in the last eight months. Just to visit his twin, and both times he hadn’t reached out to me.

I shoved open the door to Maverick’s Bar and Grill, my pulse hammering in my ears, my stomach tied up in knots. Laughter, the crack of pool balls, and the scent of fried food washed over me, but none of it mattered. Because I was here for one reason.

Beau.

“Damn, it’s crowded, Maddie. Good thing Michael said he saved a booth for us.”

I looked over at my friend and gave her a wan smile. “Yeah, that’s good,” I said, then I went back to scanning the room. I’d called ahead and Vic, the bartender, had told me Beau had arrived half an hour ago, so now it was just a matter of finding him.

“Are you even listening to me?”

I looked at Fallon again. “What?”

“Michael texted. He’s against the west wall. That means he’s near the jukebox. Come on.” Fallon grabbed my hand and started tugging me past the hostess stand and through the crowd.

“I see Michael,” Fallon cried.

And that’s when I saw him. And it was like the air got sucked straight out of my lungs.

It was Beau. Beau ‘Grady’ Beaumont. There, in the flesh. A man I hadn’t seen in fifteen years. Someone I’d considered my best friend since kindergarten, and here he was in Jasper Creek. Where he’d been for the last week and a half, and he hadn’t even reached out.

My stomach twisted.

Stop it! God knows this isn’t the worst thing that’s ever happened to me. Think of Mom and Dad.

I let out a harsh laugh.

Fallon grabbed my hand and pulled. “Come on, Michael’s waving at us.”

I stood my ground. “I see Beau. You go on ahead.”

Beau was sitting at a high table next to people playing pool. He turned his head and his gaze zeroed in on mine like a heat-seeking missile. How was that even possible? But it was. Another set of silver-blue eyes looked at me, but I ignored him. It was Beau’s identical twin brother, Brady. Everybody had thought he was dead, but here he was, alive.

Again, I didn’t give a shit. My focus was on Beau. My best friend who I’d known down to my soul, a friend I thought I would never lose. The same man who had sent me only one letter during basic training, then never contacted me again, no matter how many times I had tried to get a hold of him.

Beau had been as much of a ghost as Brady.

Now he was back in town for the second time this year. Sitting at Maverick’s, after being home for over a week. Eleven days he hadn’t reached out to me. It cut deep. Deeper still because this was the second time he’d done this to me. How could I matter so little to him? What had I done wrong?

I blinked back tears.

Dammit, I will not cry.

This Beau was a stranger. He looked different. Broader, harder, with stronger edges in his face, but I could recognize his silver-blue eyes anywhere, anytime. His were sharper than Brady’s. A little more silver. Yep, that was my man.