Page 69 of Tee’d Up For Trouble

Dee

It was bad enough that Jax Caldwell was still in Ballybeg, but now he was staying on the family farm with Ronan, who had apparently decided to become the President of the Jax Caldwell Fan Club.

I kicked him out of the pub, but of course, I did. The next thing I know, Ronan offers himmyroom in my childhood home. Jax is happy as a clam. When I told him the whole house had only one bathroom and it was old, he said he’d be fine.

Imagining this wealthy man living at the pub was already a stretch; now, he was staying in my rundown old farmhouse, and that was beyond my imagination.

“Fair play to him, Dee,” Ronan said over breakfast the day after Jax came back as if I’d asked for his opinion. “He’s not running away with his tail between his legs, and you’ve done your best to make it impossible for him.”

“Good,” I snapped, slamming the butter knife down onto the counter. “I want him gone. And I’m very angry with you for offering him a place to stay inmyhome.”

“It’s currentlymyhome. In any case, Paddy offered. Seamus offered, though I don’t know if Jax wanted to go there…you know, because of Fergus,” Ronan said thoughtfully. “Even Noreen said he could stay with her.”

My eyes widened. “Noreen has the one bedroom.”

Ronan smirked, the smug bastard. “I think she was offering him her bed as well.”

“That brazenhoor.”

“You dumped his arse, which means he’s a free agent. And Noreen is a nice-looking lass. Body made for sin and all that.”

Ronan was having way too much fun baiting me.

“He’s not interested in Noreen.”

“Oh, I know that, and so does she, but I don’t understand why it’s making you jealous. You don’t still want the man, do you?” He grinned widely.

Arsehole!

“No, I don’t want the man,” I lied. “I just don’t understand why he wants to stay. I thought he’d be running back to America or wherever.”

“He said something about helpingyousave Ballybeg.”

“The nerve that man has,” I growled and left the kitchen before I hurt myself with the effort it was taking for me not to scream.

As the days passed, things only got worse.

Ronan, it seemed, wasn’t the only one in Ballybeg who appeared to be on Jax’s side. In fact,everyonehad something positive to say.

“Jax Caldwell’s been out fixing the fences with Paddy,” Mrs. Nolan informed me—as if I needed to know. “He’s got a good head for work, that one. Not like some of those useless blow-ins.”

“Caught him buying paint at the hardware shop,” Liam Ryan said as I pulled him a pint. “Said he was sprucing up your old barn. It’s about time someone did.”

By the time I closed up the pub at night, I was ready to scream.

Who did Jax think he was, striding around Ballybeg like he belonged here, winning people over with that damn Southern charm of his? Didn’t anyone remember that he was a liar? That he was practically in bed with the developers who were trying to destroy everything we loved?

But deep down, I knew the real reason I was angry.

It wasn’t because Jax was staying. It wasn’t even because the whole village seemed to have taken his side.

It was because I couldn’t stop thinking about him—couldn’t stop loving him.

I knew in my heart that Jax had nothing to do with the developers. He wouldn’t. Why would he? As he’d told me before, he had a lot of money, and this was just peanuts. He was right when he said I saw an opportunity to push him away, and I took it. I missed him so much, and I wanted him back. I didn’t know how to apologize and ask him to come back. I felt like a fool.

On Monday, instead of going for a walk and visiting Maggie, I sat down at my desk in my room. The county vote was less than a month away. We were running out of time. Hell, we’d already done so. After the vote, we had to deal with the reality that Ballybeg would never be the same. The pub, the fields, the land my family had fought so hard to keep—it would all be gone.

I couldn’t save anything. It was those damn taxes.

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