Palmetto Passion: A Sweet Small Town Family Romance (The Bradford Brothers Book 1) Read online

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  Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Epilogue

  Epilogue

  Also by Christina Benjamin

  About the Author

  Note from the Author

  This book is a work of fiction. Any references to historical events, real people, or real locales are used fictitiously. Other names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination, and any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without written permission of the publisher.

  Copyright © 2021 by Christina Benjamin

  All rights reserved.

  Published in the United States by Crown Atlantic Publishing

  Version 1.1

  Jan 2021

  Chapter 1

  Rowan

  Smoke billowed in thick gray plumes around me as the remaining concrete blocks of the ramshackle buildings fell, brick by crumbled brick. The ringing in my ears was so intense I couldn’t see straight and the only thing I could hear was one single word repeated on a screaming loop.

  Rachel! Rachel! Rachel!

  I wasn’t sure if her name was tearing through my mind or my throat. Both ached as I tried to get to her, but my legs wouldn’t move and my arms refused to swing. It was like I was glued to the ground, gravity suddenly too strong to allow me to break free.

  My throat clenched as I tried to breathe through the smoldering ash. I had to move. I had to find her.

  I tried to get up again, the throbbing in my ears so painful my head swam. I wiped the stickiness from my forehead and instantly knew it was blood. That didn’t matter right now. The only thing that mattered was Rachel.

  Her name replaced the rhythmic beat of my heart pounding frantically in my chest. It was enough to get me moving. Somehow, mustering all of my strength, I hurled myself forward through the smoke. I couldn’t see a thing but I reached out for her anyway, yelling her name. She had to be here. I was just with her. I was just . . . falling . . .

  The world dropped out from under me and nothingness swallowed me whole before my body jerked awake, my back colliding with something solid as the churning shadows faded into the recesses of my haunted mind.

  My eyes burst open, heart thrumming against my chest hard enough to bruise a rib. Dragging in shallow breaths, I looked wildly around only to find the moon mocking me as it glowed peacefully through sheer linen drapes. I tore off the sheets wrapped around my body like a cocoon, reality finally finding me.

  I was home. It was just a dream. Though that thought offered little comfort and did nothing to stop the shuddering breaths rocking my body. I glanced up at the bed I’d fallen off of, taking in the familiarity of my childhood bedroom. I was safe, I reminded myself.

  But she was not.

  I collapsed on the rug beneath me and caught my breath while I waited for my heart rate to slow. With a grunt, I rolled over and shoved away the blankets wrapped around me so that I could sprawl on the safety of my bedroom floor. I closed my eyes one more time and counted to ten, forcing my tense muscles to relax. I dug my fingertips into the lush rug to root myself safely in South Carolina rather than the foreign country where my life—and my heart—was shattered.

  The racing of my pulse finally eased and I pressed one hand over my bare chest, almost surprised to feel my heart still there. It’s been through so much, I wonder how the resilient muscle found the will to keep pumping when some days I wasn’t sure I should bother pressing on.

  Had it really been a year since I moved back into my parents’ house in Bradford Cove?

  It felt like days and decades all at once. Sometimes, it was like I’d never left on my Doctors Without Borders assignment, but most of the time, it was impossible to imagine the nightmares weren’t real. The invisible scars left on my soul reminded me daily that I had left South Carolina, and that not all of me had returned.

  I’d been so bright-eyed and optimistic back then. Funny how things changed. Going to Venezuela was both the best and worst decision I’d ever made.

  Things might’ve been different if I’d gone to another country instead. I might still be employed as a successful doctor traveling around the world saving lives instead of who I was now—a jobless and lost thirty-two-year-old living with his parents.

  I’d never intended on moving back here for many reasons. But the one that plagued me currently was that it was impossible to be surreptitious in Bradford Cove. I didn’t know what I’d expected. After all, the place was named after my family. Not to mention that the town was so small and tight knit that everyone knew everything about each other.

  There was no way I should’ve expected to return here undetected. But I had nowhere else to go.

  Truly, all I wanted was to find some peace. But even that seemed too much to ask for.

  I didn’t love the idea of my heartbreak fueling town gossip, but I was also too broken to do anything to stop it. Let everyone talk. I’d been through worse. Growing up here had given me thick skin. It was the pity I couldn’t stand.

  When people looked at me now, their eyes full of sympathy, it made my stomach churn. The pity was unbearable. Mostly because I didn’t deserve it. I hadn’t asked to be spared and the pitiful looks of everyone in town only made my shame that much more agonizing.

  I was already hurting enough, I didn’t need the disappointment of strangers on top of everything else.

  When I’d left Bradford Cove, I was sure I’d make a change in the world, but it was the world that had changed me.

  It’d shown me a cruel ruthlessness that I’d been ignorant to. Growing up in a peaceful, little southern town outside of Charleston, South Carolina, had left me sheltered to the punishing truths of the real world. The fact that I was back here . . . well, that said it all.

  I wasn’t the man I thought I was. Maybe my father had been right all along. I should’ve stayed here and filled the shoes I’d been born into.

  Shaking my head to clear my thoughts, I pushed myself to my feet and wandered out of my room, making my way down the long second-story halls lined with photos of the Bradford Clan. The framed pictures on the wall progressed from faded black-and-white shots to modern colored ones as our family’s heritage traveled across ivory damask wallpaper.

  My brothers and I beamed out from one particular frame toward the end of the hall, our little sister nestled between us. I paused at the photo, inspecting each of the faces.

  It’d been so lon
g since we were all together under one roof. Not since I left just after high school.

  Someone sighed wistfully from behind me. “Isn’t that a beautiful photo? It’s one of my favorites.”

  I didn’t have to turn around to know who approached me. My mother’s warm hand took mine as she moved to stand next to me. Eleanor Bradford was always an intuitive woman. I watched a smile bloom across my nurturing mother’s face as she gazed at the photo of her children. I knew how much she loved having me home, even though I was sure she wished it was under better circumstances.

  “What are you doing awake?” she asked.

  I avoided her gaze, knowing the truth would only upset her, because it meant I wasn’t getting better. “Sorry,” I muttered. “Did I wake you?”

  The clock had flashed three-thirty when I’d stumbled out of my room. My mother was a morning person, but this was early, even for her.

  She paused, biting her lip before attempting to cover a worried frown. “I heard you shouting her name in your sleep again.”

  I shoved my hands in my pockets and looked back at the old family photo. Somehow it was easier for me to look at the past than the future. Probably because I worried I didn’t have one anymore.

  Being a Bradford afforded me a lot of things in life, but dealing with my emotions wasn’t one of them. All the wealth I’d been born into made me feel guilty for expressing any form of discontent, warranted or not.

  I didn’t want to talk about what happened, about what had brought me home suddenly after all these years. When I walked back into my family home that first day, my mother wrapped me in her arms and held me tight. The only thing she said was that she was glad I’d made it back home to her. After that, we’d all just pretended that I’d never left in the first place, like the last decade could be erased like errant pencil marks on paper.

  If only that were true.

  Still next to me, my mother edged closer and wrapped a thin arm around my muscled shoulders, giving me a tight squeeze as she gazed at the photo with me. I closed my eyes, feeling the walls closing in on me again. I didn’t even know why I’d come home. I didn’t remember making the decision. But somehow, I’d ended up back here, a place I’d been so desperate to leave. But that was then. Things were different now.

  Not better, just different.

  I still felt like I couldn’t breathe here, but it wasn’t the small town that suffocated me now. It was my heartache and my failures.

  Despite my unease I let my mother squeeze me tight, wondering what it said about me that her touch only made me ache more. I knew she was only trying to help, but maybe I was beyond help. I knew better than most that some things couldn’t be repaired.

  My mother sighed again as she nodded at the photograph. “You were all so cute when you were young.”

  “Are you saying we aren’t anymore?” I teased, happy for an excuse to talk about anything other than what had brought me out here at three in the morning.

  My mother laughed harder at my joke than it deserved. “Never! I just miss my babies.” Her eyes shifted to a more recent photo. “You’re all so grown up now.”

  My gaze followed hers, inspecting the most recent family portrait. In it, I stood in the middle behind Ivy, grinning slightly away from the camera. I remembered posing for that photo. We’d taken it right before I’d left to pursue a medical degree. There was an excitement in my grin that I hadn’t seen in months. I’d been thrilled to set off on my own path.

  I studied the photo, realizing it might have been the beginning of the end.

  If I’d known this was how my story would go, would I have taken another path?

  If I’d stayed and done as my father asked none of this would’ve happened. All he ever wanted was for one of his sons to stay in Bradford Cove and take over the family business, but I’d been so sure I was meant for more than what small town life in South Carolina could offer.

  I guess all of us had.

  Not one of my siblings had stayed in the town our ancestors had founded.

  I looked at our smiling faces in the photograph, wondering what it was that made each of us leave. Asher stood on my left—the middle son, a smirk curving beneath cunning blue eyes. On my other side, Colton looked wistful, probably daydreaming and paying no attention to the camera. Only Ivy looked directly at the lens with joy lighting her delicate features. She looked tiny compared to the rest of us, but her smile was the biggest.

  She’d always shined the brightest. And she’d been my father’s last hope for passing down the family business. He’d come to realize that none of his sons wanted to be tied to Bradford Cove, managing the properties that kept the town thriving. But Ivy was always the apple of his eye. If she’d wanted to step into his shoes he would’ve rejoiced.

  When Ivy left home, it must’ve devastated him.

  “Can you believe Ivy is getting married?” my mother asked. “My little girl. I can hardly believe she’s twenty-four already. Why did all my babies have to move so far away? Ivy and Ash in New York, Cole in Connecticut.” She conveniently skipped over my own travels before adding, “I'm glad you’re back, Rowan.”

  If only it’d been more pleasant circumstances that had brought me home.

  “Oh! Did I tell you that Ivy settled on a venue for her wedding?” she asked after a few ticks of the nearby grandfather clock drifted through the hall, marking our awkward silence.

  Her eyes suddenly shined brightly and she clasped her hands together in front of her chest before bobbing up and down on her toes, reminding me very much of my little sister.

  When I shook my head my mother sucked in an excited breath. “Here! Ivy is coming back here to have her wedding, Row! Your brothers are too!”

  “Everyone?” I asked uncertainly, blinking dazed eyes.

  Am I still dreaming?

  When was the last time we were all together? Surely, it’d been years by now. We probably hadn’t been under the same roof since high school. One by one we’d left the safety of our parents’ luxurious nest to explore the world on our own.

  “All of my babies are coming back,” she exclaimed. “I have the wedding announcement set to run in the paper tomorrow. I can’t believe I forgot to tell you. Ivy is flying in tomorrow. The rest will join shortly. It’s all fairly last minute but it’s going to be the talk of the town by tomorrow.”

  “That’s great news,” I answered, meaning it.

  My siblings and I were all so different, but I missed each of them deeply. Plus, it would give me something to look forward to. Not to mention that the distraction from the trials and tribulations of my life would be quite comforting.

  My mother stepped closer and took my elbow, turning me back toward my room. “Now, you head on back to bed and try to get some rest, Row. Tomorrow the excitement starts.”

  “Excitement?” I huffed, dryly. Nothing exciting ever happened in Bradford Cove. That, along with the need to escape my father’s desire to shackle me to the family business, was why I’d left Bradford Cove.

  It was a quaint little town, with quaint little people, living quaint little lives. It might be the perfect backdrop to host a wedding, but that wasn’t exactly something I would label as exciting.

  Then again, maybe I’d already had enough excitement in my life. It was time to find peace and to try to mend my invisible wounds.

  That’s why I came here, isn’t it?

  “Goodnight, Mom.” I kissed my mother’s cheek and started to head back toward my bedroom, unsure if I’d actually be able to fall asleep or if I’d lay in my bed trying to forget everything that drove me back into my parents’ home. Sleep had been hard to come by lately. My dreams were rarely pleasant. Being awake and exhausted was preferable to reliving the past that continued to haunt me.

  As if she could sense my fears, my mother abruptly reached a hand out to stop me, her eyes still glowing happily. She pulled me in for a hug and kissed my cheek. “Mark my words, Row. This wedding is going to do marvelous things for all of us!�
� she mused, winking once before heading down the hall, her voice drifting behind her. “I have a good feeling about this!”

  Chapter 2

  Tess

  “A card laid is a card played, darlin’,” Hal announced batting my hand away so he could snag the card I’d missed in the pile.

  “Now hold on just a minute, sugar,” Mabel argued. “The girl’s green. Give her a chance.”

  “Ya burn, ya learn,” Hal replied, already onto playing his hand.

  I grinned. The man was full of idioms today. But Mabel had just as many to dish back.

  “Surely we can cut her some slack, Hal.”

  “I’m not throwing the baby out with the bathwater here, Mabel, but rules are rules.”

  I shook my head with amusement, wondering how long a conversation between the sweet couple could last if they were only to converse in this strange language of colloquialisms. Luckily the phone rang before I could find out.

  “I’ve got it!” I said, leaping up from the little table we were gathered around. “Mabel’s Flowers, this is Tess speaking. How can I help you?”

  I breathed a sigh of relief when I hung up. Finally, something to do. “Just got a delivery order. A dozen roses out to Juniper Farm.”

  “Oh how lovely!” Mabel exclaimed, starting to push back her chair. “Let me help you package them.”

  “I’m on it!” I said already moving toward the cold case where we stored the roses. “I’ll be back in a few.”

  Mabel and Hal exchanged a look, smirking at each other. “Take your time, darlin’.”