Page 21 of Mustang Summer

“It’s not like that.”Brock wanted to make her feel better.Her tears had bothered him.

A sandy blond brow arched.“Since she showed up, you’ve been plastered to her fine ass.Pick another woman, Brock.That one spells trouble.”

He didn’t want another woman.

Oh shit.It wasn’t that he wasn’t interested in women right now, but he wasn’t interested in any other woman period.Maybe Cash was right and he was wanting to hang around Josie for more than car chats.

Aaron laughed.“Brock’s luck with the ladies sucks balls, and not his.”

True, but women liked the idea of him.They just never took the time to get to know him, assumed he was another charming Walker.Admittedly, it was hard for them when he couldn’t share as much as they wanted him to.At some point, they announced he was an insensitive bastard who loved his cars more than them.

And they weren’t wrong.

Chapter5

When Josie woke the next day, her eyes felt like she’d used sandpaper instead of Kleenex.

Crying herself to sleep—not a feeling she missed.After the trial, she’d hidden in her plain motel room and wished she could gorge on her mom’s homemade brownies—with extra fudge.

Then thoughts of her mother and how heartbroken she’d be caused another cascade of tears.

Jesse was going to jail.Josie doubted a town as close-knit as Moore would take it easy on a city boy with a grudge.The Walkers were too highly regarded.

Josie sighed wistfully.She could see why.Aside from their good looks, they oozed small-town wholesomeness.

The way Brock had tried to make her feel better…

Geez, she’d was fast becoming a Walker groupie.

No, not all Walkers.Just Brock.

They had all stood together, just the five of them.They probably kept the rest of the family out of the loop to protect them.She doubted their parents hadn’t been there because they’d been too busy and the trial was too inconvenient.

She and her mother had always championed Jesse.Bill just slammed him about how he had no legacy because it had died with his birth dad.

She fisted her hands over her eyes.Poor Jesse.No wonder the stories of his great uncle’s land and how it should’ve been his had burrowed into Jesse’s mind and festered.

With resignation, she checked the time.Time to go and see if she could visit him.

Her phone pinged.She wasn’t ready to face the world, but she checked the message.Her heart stuttered as she did.

It was from Brock.All it said was“This is my number.”

Well, good morning to you, too, farm boy.

Her day just brightened, if only a little.She rolled out of bed.In the bathroom that only took two steps to cross into, she had to shake her head at theNo Cleaning Fowl in the Showersign.

“We just keep it up year ’round,” the clerk had explained.“Some hunters think it’s no big deal to strip their kills in the shower even when we provide an outdoor station at the end of the building.Duck feathers clogging the drain has flooded many a room.”

Dead birds in the shower—was that the worst thing the shower had seen?

Josie arrived at the jail on time and they brought her into the little room where she could speak to her brother.

After a few minutes he was led in by a petite deputy.The deputy passed on a few instructions and left.Jesse plopped down in the chair across from her.His face hung like a pound puppy and Josie wished she could give him a big hug.Lord knew, she could use one.

“How are things?”he asked.

“Shitty.You?”

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