by Nora Roberts
“I think I’m safe there.”
And safe, Shelby thought, was where she needed to be.
At noon when Griff pulled up in his rental truck, she had the hamper loaded and ready, and Callie in her yellow dress with a ribbon in her hair. She’d opted for jeans and her old hiking boots.
Callie rushed out before Griff got to the door, and launched herself at him.
“You look like a picnic, Little Red.”
“I got a bow.” Callie reached back to where the yellow ribbon trailed.
“I see that. Pretty as they come, and so’s your mom. Here, let me take that.”
“You’ve already got her. We’ll take my van since I know where we’re going. I’ve got the blankets in there already.”
“I’ve just got to get a couple things out of the truck.”
He strapped Callie in her car seat—expertly, Shelby noted. You didn’t have to show the man something twice. He walked to his rental truck, came back with a tote bag. “Contributions,” he said, and put them in the van with the hamper.
“I’m hoping this spot is as pretty as I remember. It’s been a while.”
She drove toward town, then veered off on a back road, just skimming by the holler while Callie chattered like a magpie. As she took the rise, navigated the switchbacks, it all came back to her. The sights, the smells.
The color.
Winding through the greens, the browns, yellow trillium and crested iris splashed, while the delicate trumpets of columbine played in dappled sunlight. There, or there, mountain laurel brightened the shadows, and lady’s slippers danced.
“Pretty. It’s pretty country,” Griff said when Callie shifted to conversation with the ever-present Fifi.
“It won’t be long till the wild rhododendrons pop out. I just love the green of it. The endless, rising green of it, and how the color from wildflowers comes and goes.”
She passed a little farmhouse where a boy about Callie’s age rolled on the scrubby grass with a yellow dog.
“See the puppy! Mama, when can I have a puppy?”
“Her newest obsession,” Shelby said under her breath. “Once we get our own house, we’ll think about that. We’re almost to our picnic spot,” she added, hoping to block the litany of follow-up questions.
She turned onto a narrow dirt road, bumped carefully along it. “This belongs to that little farm we just passed. Daddy’s delivered three babies in that house—might be more now since I’ve been gone—and made house calls for the grandmother until she passed. The family lets us use this road, and have picnics or hike back here. They set great store by my daddy.”
“So do I, since he cleared me to work.”
“Your eye’s looking some better.”
“I kissed it better, Mama, when I had my pizza date with Griff. Are we there yet?”
“We’re as far as we can drive.” She angled into the pull-off. “It’s not very far to walk. About a quarter-mile. It’s a little steep, though, and likely a little rough.”
“We’re up for it.”
He settled the logistics by hauling Callie up on his shoulders, taking the hamper. “Bag and blankets for you,” he told Shelby. “It’s so quiet here.”
He spotted a bold red cardinal watching them from a perch on a hawthorn tree.
“That’s not even the best part.”
“Nobody’s going to come out with a shotgun?”
“I asked Daddy to check if it was okay, and the family’s fine about it. We leave the land as we found it, that’s all. Though they might have discouraged revenuers that way, back in the Prohibition days. Plenty ran whiskey out of the hills and the hollers. My people among them—both sides.”
“Bootleggers.” It made him grin.
“It’d be hard to find a handful of people with native roots who didn’t have bootleggers on the family tree.”
“It was a dumbass law.”
“Dumbass,” Callie repeated, predictably.
“Sorry.”
“It’s not the first time. That’s a grown-up word, Callie.”
“I like grown-up words.” When she screamed, Griff shoved the hamper at Shelby, started to whip Callie down.
“A bunny! I saw a bunny rabbit!”
“Jesus—jeez,” Griff corrected. “You scared the . . . heck out of me, Little Red.”
“Catch the bunny rabbit, Griff! Catch it.”
“I didn’t bring my bunny rabbit catching tools.” With his heart still hammering, he took the hamper back, continued the climb.
When he topped the rise, he saw every step of the climb had been worth it.
“Okay, wow.”
“It’s just like I remembered. The stream, the trees, especially that big old black walnut. And just enough opening up so you can see some of the hills and valleys.”
“You’re in charge of all the picnic spots, from this day forward.”
“Hard to top this one, unless it’s at your place.”
When he put Callie down, she bulleted straight for the stream.
“Callie, don’t go close to the edge,” Shelby began, but Griff grabbed her hand and pulled her to the stream.
“Cool.” He crouched down beside Callie. “Look at all the little waterfalls. The shiny rocks.”
“I wanna go swimming!”
“It’s not deep enough for swimming, baby, but you can take your shoes and socks off, put your feet in. You can go wading.”
“’Kay. I can go wading, Griff!”
Callie plopped down, attacked her shoes while Shelby spread blankets beside the stream with its tumbling water, mossy logs, thickening ferns.
“Not worried about her getting the dress wet?” Griff asked.
“I’ve got a change for her in the bag. I’d like to know a little girl who wouldn’t want to splash in this stream.”
“You’re a pretty cool mom.”
While Callie stepped in to splash and squeal, Griff pulled the bottle, wrapped in its frozen cozy, out of his bag.
“Champagne?” After a surprised laugh, Shelby shook her head. “That’s going to put my fried chicken to shame.”
“I’ll be the judge of that.”
She drank champagne, had the satisfaction of seeing Griff devour her chicken. She let Callie run off some energy chasing butterflies or going back for another splash.
And relaxed, as she realized she hadn’t, not really, since the morning she’d faced Arlo Kattery with bars between them.
And he’d have that view, she thought, through bars, for a long, long time.
But she had this—the green and the blue, the chirp and twitter of birds, the sun streaming through the trees to play shadows on the ground as her little girl played in the stream.
“You’re definitely hired,” Griff told her when he went back for another piece of chicken, another scoop of potato salad.
“Sitting here, it seems like nothing’s wrong in the world.”
“That’s why we need places like this.”
She reached out, trailed her fingers over the healing cut on his forehead. “Forrest said they still haven’t caught that Harlow person, and it makes me think he did what he came to do, and he’s long gone from here.”
“Makes the most sense.”
“Then why’d you follow me home at two in the morning on Friday night?”
“Because that makes sense to me, too. When are you going to let me follow you home again?”
Oh, she’d just been hoping he’d ask. “I guess I could see if Mama’s okay watching Callie one night this week.”
“Why don’t we go to the movies, then back to my place for a while?”
She smiled, thinking she had this, too. A movie date with a man who made her belly flutter. “Why don’t we? Callie, if you don’t eat your picnic lunch, there won’t be a cupcake in your future.”
Shelby marked it as a perfect Sunday afternoon, and driving back with Callie fighting sleep in the back, wondered how she could prolong it.
Maybe she’d s
ee if Griff wanted to sit out on the porch while Callie napped. Or she could see if Emma Kate and Matt wanted to come over, and they could do up some burgers on the grill for supper later.
“I guess you’ve got things to do at your house.”
“There’s never a lack of things to do at my place. Why? Do you have something else in mind?”
“I was thinking, if you wanted to stay awhile, I’d see if Emma Kate and Matt wanted to come by later on. Have some wine, and grill some burgers.”
“More food? How could I say no?”
“I’ll see if it’s all right with Mama and Daddy, then . . .”
She trailed off as she pulled up to the house, saw her mother already running out.
“Oh God, what could’ve happened now?” She shoved out of the van. “Mama.”
“I was just about to text you. Gilly went into labor.”
“Oh, just now?”
“It’s been a few hours, but they didn’t say until they were heading in to the hospital. Daddy—my daddy’s got Jackson already. Daddy—your daddy—and I are heading into Gatlinburg to the hospital right now, and Forrest is bringing your granny. Clay says she’s moving fast. Oh, I don’t know why babies always put me in a tailspin.”
“It’s exciting, and it’s happy.”
“You should go,” Griff said. “You should be there.”
“Oh, I don’t want to put two preschoolers on my grandfather on his own.”
“I’ll take her. I’ve got Callie.”
“Oh, well, I—”
“I wanna go with Griff! Please, Mama, please. Griff, I wanna go to your house. Can I go to your house and play?”
“That would be the nicest thing,” Ada Mae said. “Shelby couldn’t be here when Jackson was born. It would sure mean a lot to us, Griff.”
“Done.”
“Yay! Yay!”
Shelby looked at her daughter’s shining face. “But it could be hours.”
“Not if Clay’s any judge. Clayton, you come on now!” Ada Mae shouted. “I’m not going to miss my grandbaby’s birth because you’re dawdling. Griff, thank you so much. Callie, you be good for Griff now, or I’ll know the reason why. Clayton Zachariah Pomeroy!” Ada Mae marched back toward the house.
“Are you sure? Because—”
“We’re sure, right, Callie?”
“Right! Let’s go, Griff.” Thrilled, she rubbed both her hands over his cheeks. “Let’s go to your house now.”
“Let me just . . .” Think what to do, Shelby mused. “I’ll just run in, get some things for her to play with.”
“I’ve got scissors and sticks for her to run with, and all those matches.”
“Aren’t you the funny one? Give me two minutes. And, well, you’d best just take my van in case you have to go somewhere with her. If I can borrow this truck.”
“It’s a rental. What do I care?”
“All right, then, all right. Two minutes. No, it’ll take me five. Five minutes.”
She raced toward the house as her mother came out dragging her father.
“Ada Mae, I’m a doctor, and I’m telling you, there’s plenty of time.”
“Oh, don’t doctor me. You tell me about plenty of time when you’ve given birth. We’re going, Shelby!”
“I’ll be behind you in five minutes. I know how to get there.”
Griff leaned back against the van beside Callie’s window. “We’re going to have some fun, Little Red.”
20
They did have fun.
Griff fashioned a monster face out of cardboard and, donning it, chased a thrilled Callie around the front yard. She brought him down with the magic wand he cobbled together from some tubing and more cardboard.
As the restored prince, he answered the first text from Shelby.
At the hospital now—everything’s going well. Okay there?
He considered for a moment.
We’re great. We’re heading out now to find some traffic to play in.
He took Callie in for a Coke, and judged by her wide, shiny eyes Coke wasn’t something on her usual beverage menu. It took a solid half hour to run off her Coke high. Breathless and wiser, he loaded the kid back in the van and took her for a quick drive for a pack of juice boxes.
That had to be a better option.
He spotted the sign Pups For Sale, decided a stop there would entertain her for a while, and pulled up in front of the compact rancher next to the little market.
Following the arrow on the sign, he took the gravel path around the back.
In a kennel, clean and dry, three cream-colored pups and one brown pup came instantly to life, yipping, racing toward the fencing, wagging chubby bodies.
Callie didn’t squeal and rush toward them as he’d expected.
She gasped, then pressed both hands to her mouth.
Then she turned her head, tipped her face up to Griff’s. And her eyes were full of wonder and love and immeasurable joy.
He thought, Oh shit, what have I done?
Then she threw her arms around his legs, squeezed. “Puppies! I love you, Griff. Thank you, thank you.”
“Well, ah, listen . . . I thought we’d just—”
While he fumbled, she tipped her face up again, all but blinded him with her shining joy before she broke off to, at last, rush the fence.
A woman, a baby on her hip, a red kerchief tied around her hair, stepped out of the back door of the rancher.
“Afternoon,” she said while the baby eyed him suspiciously.
“Hey. We were just at the market, and I thought she’d get a kick out of seeing the pups.”
“Why, sure. You want to go in, honey? They’re as friendly as they can be. Three months old now,” she continued as she opened the gate for Callie. “Had a litter of eight. Mama’s our Lab-retriever mix Georgie, and the daddy’s my cousin’s chocolate Lab.”
Callie ran in, dropped, and was immediately buried in puppies.
“That’s a happy sound, isn’t it?” the woman said as Callie’s giggles mixed with the yips and fake growls.
“Yeah . . . but—”
“They’re a good mix with kids, Daddy,” she said with a smile as she juggled the baby. “Gentle and loyal and playful.”