When Clyde Parker, the wayward son and the rotten-apple of the Parker family-tree, storms his way back into Avery Fields, he sets out a flurry of butterfly effect in Dawn Marshal's life.
...
Oops! This image does not follow our content guidelines. To continue publishing, please remove it or upload a different image.
IT DIDN'T BOTHER HER when the ringtone of her beat up Blackberry rang through the night disrupting the rhythm of her fingers tapping on the bedside table.
In fact, she had welcomed it.
Her mind had been wandering off to Clyde, he didn't get home that night and as much as she hated admitting it, it did bother her. She hadn't heard from him since that earlier incident. She gazed up at the white washed ceiling and her eyes focused on a tiny speckle in a corner. She wondered where he was sleeping that night. Was it as soft as her bed, or was it a sleeping bag in his tent.
Or did he pass out in someone else's couch, a girl perhaps? The thought made her burn with an inexplicable feeling. For some weird reason, she didn't want him staying the night at some random chick's house. This agreement they had, it was too classified and intimate and she didn't want to have to share it anyone.
The weather is unpredictable. What if there was a storm again and it blew his tent away like last time? What if his gigantic man-ego wouldn't let him crawl back to her place this time? What if he was lying on a meadow on such a cold night, the grass tickling his skin? What if he was eating off too much of canned food and drowning in cheep beer beside a dwindling fire? Was he playing his guitar this time?
If he looked up, would he see the same white-washed ceiling as hers or was it a sky split with the radiance of a thousand stars? If she was beside him, would they look at the same sky and see the same things? No, he wouldn't, she thought. He had beautiful blue eyes, the world must look more better in his eyes.
But then again she saw him with her dull brown eyes and he was still beautiful. She wondered if he thought the same about her? She wondered if she slipped her hands into his, their fingers interlacing, would he feel the tug in his heart as she did?
Such thoughts were as dangerous as running into a forest fire. And the phone call had been her rescue. "Hello?" she pressed her phone to her ear.
"Did I wake you?" It was two in the fucking morning of course he would've woken her if she was actually sleeping. But she bit back a curt reply. He wasn't guilty, neither did he deserve to be her punching-bag to release her pent up frustration over his brother.
"I was barely even sleeping." Loud music blared on the other side, and there were muffled voices around him. "Where are you, Caleb?"
"At some bar downtown. The boys and I—"
"Are you in trouble?" She groped her side table for a pen and paper to scribble down the address, "Do you need me to come get you?"
"Dawn Marshal, always to the rescue, isn't it?" There was a rumble of his chuckle on the other end. "Don't worry, I've got that covered. I just needed to hear your voice."
Then she was met with silence. She parted her lips but she couldn't come up with anything to kill this silence. She wasn't expecting him to call, she thought it would be Mia looking for another designated driver after being stranded in the middle of the road. But when she heard his voice, her first thought was that he had butt-dialed her.
