Lone Star Valentine

“I won’t need you,” Lily repeated, stubborn as ever.

Gannon sincerely hoped that was indeed the case.

* * *

“COMPANY, MOMMA!” LUCAS shouted when the doorbell rang, several hours later. “My cousins and the ants are here!”

“Aunts,” Lily corrected. Grinning, she followed her son into the foyer.

“That’s what I said,” Lucas insisted importantly, standing legs braced apart, hands on his hips. “Ant Rose and Ant Violet.”

With a grin and a shake of her head, Lily opened the door and ushered their company inside. Unlike the twins in the family—Maggie and Callie—who were identical, Lily and her two closest sisters were fraternal triplets, and hence nothing alike.

Whereas she was tall and blond, Rose was of medium height, with light ash-brown hair. Violet was tall, too, but had very dark brown hair, like their dad’s side of the family.

“And Ant Rose brought her baby triplets, too!” Lucas continued as his cousins—two girls and a boy—toddled in with both aunts.

Chaos erupted as greetings were exchanged all around.

When Lucas had finally hugged everyone, he gestured to the play area in the family room adjacent to the kitchen and breakfast nook. “I’m building a barn!” he declared. “And a ranch. And a fence where I can put my cows and horses.”

“Let’s go see.” Violet herded all her nieces and nephews into the family room. Together, they admired what Lucas had done with his vast trove of wooden architecture-style building blocks and toy farm animals.

Meanwhile Rose—a produce wholesaler and proponent of the Buy Local movement—carried the box of veggies she’d brought for their weekly get-together into the kitchen. “So what’s up?” she asked with concern.

“With what?” Lily asked.

“Come on, sis. Don’t play dumb.” Rose set a dark green head of crisp romaine lettuce, juicy heirloom tomatoes, cucumbers, carrots and radishes on the table. “I heard Bode was in town, along with an entourage. In a stretch limo, no less.”

“Oh...that.” While she rinsed the lettuce and put it in the salad spinner, Lily explained what had happened.

Rose’s expression turned to one of disgust. Having suffered her own quick and ugly divorce, she was not sympathetic to irresponsible, uncaring men. “That man’s ego knows no bounds,” she said, upset. “Hasn’t Bode thought at all about what this would do to his son?”

“Obviously not,” Lily murmured. Not that this was a surprise. Her ex never had cared about Lucas—and probably never really would, either, as sad as that was. All that mattered was raising Bode’s popularity with the fans in time for a new contract.

“No peeking, Aunt Violet!” Lucas shouted from the other room, while his younger cousins settled down to watch. “I’ll call you when I’m done!”

“I’ll be waiting,” Violet promised. She joined her sisters at the kitchen island. “What’s going on?”

Briefly, Rose brought her up to date.

Violet hugged Lily in commiseration. “Too bad you didn’t know your ex was coming with his entourage,” she said quietly. “You could have had your lawyer there, too.”

“Oh, I had one,” Lily admitted with mixed feelings. “Although he was uninvited.”

Rose’s and Violet’s brows rose in wordless inquiry.

“Gannon Montgomery was in my office when Bode and the others arrived,” Lily explained, doing her best to curtail her emotions. “I sent him on his way, but he crashed the meeting in the conference room anyway.”

Another wide-eyed reaction. “And?” her sisters prodded, in unison.

Lily went back to quartering tomatoes. She arranged them around the rim of the salad bowl. “Gannon didn’t say much. But clearly his presence put the other attorneys off their game. I think they expected to roll right over me.”

“No surprise there,” Rose said heatedly. She stepped in to peel and slice the carrots. “Given the way Bode dissed you in the press at the end... If I had been you, I would have thrown him to the wolves from the get-go.”

“Instead,” Violet recollected, grabbing a cutting board and knife, too, “you made everything a lot easier on Bode than he deserved.”

Lily got the makings for a balsamic vinaigrette out of the cupboard, along with a bowl and whisk. “I got what I wanted out of the deal.” She dropped her voice to a whisper. “The truth about Lucas’s parentage corroborated, full custody and the right to make all the decisions about his care and upbringing on my own.”

Rose checked to make sure all four children were still safely out of earshot, then returned to the kitchen island. “What did Lucas think when he saw his dad was in town?” she asked.

Lily whisked the salad dressing together with more than necessary force. “He doesn’t know.”

Again, her sisters exchanged looks. “You didn’t let Bode see him?” Violet inquired in surprise.

Lily looked at her resident-physician sister. “He never asked. He came in with his team of experts for backup, then left when he didn’t get what he wanted.”

“So what next?” Rose asked as she began setting the table.

Lily shrugged, refusing to borrow trouble. “Nothing that concerns me. Or Lucas.”

Violet paused. “You don’t think Bode will pursue this?”

When there were other, much easier ways to improve his public image? Lily shook her head. “Nope.” Instead, she expected to see Bode visiting sick kids in the children’s hospitals, working with the underprivileged or creating a foundation in his name. All with a photographer present.

“What about Gannon Montgomery?” Rose teased, taking a lighter tact. “Are you going to pursue him?”

Flushing guiltily despite herself, Lily took the lasagna from the oven and set it on the stove to cool. “Definitely not!”

Evidently more curious about the lack of love in Lily’s life than her own, Violet asked, “Is he going to pursue you?”

Trying not to think about how much the deeply romantic part of her still wanted that to happen, Lily inched off her oven mitts. “Gannon and I put that notion to bed a long time ago.” She pushed the image of his handsome face out of her mind. As well as the one of him naked between the sheets that followed. “We found out the hard way that we’re too different to even be friends.” Never mind lovers!

Rose frowned. “He’s still not inclined to compromise?”

“In his case,” Lily replied stubbornly, “I’m not, either.” Not when she knew how deep the attraction between them still was.

Gannon had devastated her once.

She wasn’t going to let him do it again.

* * *

TO LILY’S RELIEF, there was no further communication from Bode or any member of his team either that evening or the following day.

So it was with a much lighter heart that she went to the unveiling ceremony for the statue by Harriett Montgomery on Friday morning.

The artwork was already on the cement platform that had been built just for it on the town square. Nearly six feet tall, the statue was draped with heavy canvas cloth, secured by ropes.