Forgiving Jackson Read Online Free PDF Page A

hire her back to cook for him. Catering for one would be a whole lot easier than what she had been doing.
    He pulled up to the gate and stopped. Within minutes he would be in his rooms in the family wing. Tomorrow, he’d walk through the main house and maybe the grounds, but for tonight he wanted a beer and bed.
    He hit the button for the power window, pulled his cap off, and stuck his head out. For once, he wanted to be recognized.
    He didn’t know the man in the guardhouse. He must be new.
    “What can I do for you?” the guy said. Then he got a good look. “Oh, Mr. Beauford. Welcome home, sir.”
    “Thank you,” Jackson said and the gates opened.
    He’d driven a few hundred yards through the quarter-mile oak canopy that led to the house before realizing something was wrong. Why were the white lights in the oak trees on? They’d been a fixture there all his life, and before, ever since his mother and Aunt Amelia had opened Around the Bend to help pay the upkeep of the ancestral property. Damn he hated those little bastards. How many hours of his youth had he spent climbing, taking down dead strings, and replacing them? But the lights were only turned on during a nighttime event and at Christmastime. Oh, well. Maybe Dirk had turned them on for some reason.
    Then he heard the music. Country swing. Second-rate. Good for dancing if you didn’t know better but not much else.
    But never mind the critique. What the hell? Maybe Dirk and Gwen were having a party. Big parties weren’t really their style but maybe they were hosting a family reunion. Or could be one of the kids was having a birthday, though it didn’t seem like it had been a year since the younger one had been born. He put the brakes on his irritation and reminded himself that Beauford Bend was Dirk and Gwen’s home, too, and he hadn’t told them he was coming.
    Then he came to the clearing. The main house was lit up like a homecoming bonfire. His stomach lunged. There was no reason for that. Dirk and Gwen had their own house on the property. Even if Gwen was using the commercial kitchen in the main house all the lights from ballroom to basement would not be on—unless …
    He let his eyes travel to the wedding grove. The scene was familiar—all too familiar. More fairy lights. Portable bar and dance floor. He knew all about setting that up. He knew about passing trays and cleaning up, too.
    This was no kid’s birthday party or family reunion. This was no shindig Dirk and Gwen would throw unless in the unlikely event they’d divorced and one of them was getting remarried—because there was a bride in a big puffy dress right in the middle of the whole business.
    But how? These people couldn’t have broken in.
    Then the truth settled on him. Emory had defied him! How was that possible? No one defied him!
    He sped up.
    • • •
    Emory walked through the crowd. They were still going strong but everything seemed to be fine. They’d either gotten used to the heat or decided to ignore it. She ducked behind the gazebo where the catering tent was set up.
    “How’s it going, Gwen?” she asked. Gwen was in charge of food for events, whether she prepared it herself or worked with the Eat Cake Pastry Shop and Beauford Catering from town. Tonight, Beauford Catering had provided the dinner but Gwen and her staff were handling the hors d’oeuvres the clients had insisted on having during the dancing. Gwen looked up from where she was arranging tomato tarts on a silver tray. “Going good! We’re out of bacon and grits fritters but everything else is holding out fine, even for this crowd. They can eat. We’ve never served this much food at one event before.”
    “They’re high maintenance all right but we only have a couple more hours. I’m going to check on the bar. Want me to hand that tray off to one of the servers?”
    “That’d be great. I need to slice this pork tenderloin.” As she held the tray out, Gwen’s eyes went to a place over Emory’s