by Shirley Jump
“Where’s the money going then?”
“To pay salary and insurance for my COO, who had a damned-near-fatal heart attack after this happened.” Grady let out a long breath. “So you talk about guilt and regret, Beth? I have a few pages of that myself.”
She sat back in her seat. “Wow. I’m so sorry.”
He drove for a while, not saying anything. In his mind, he saw Dan in that hospital bed, pale and shaky, the machines keeping up a steady beat like a pounding hammer, driving home the blame. Grady had vowed then and there to fix this all, somehow.
Beth’s hand covered his, and something in Grady’s tough exterior cracked a little. “Thanks.” It was the only word he could manage.
As they turned toward the ocean, a spectacular sunset appeared between the buildings and smattering of trees. Deep orange, mauve and blue painted the sky with an undulating brush. The water glistened with those last rays of sunshine that were disappearing in the west, and the briny scent of the ocean filled the car. “It’s gorgeous,” Beth said.
Grady glanced over at her. The spectacular masterpiece of sky faded from his attention. “Yes, it is.”
She caught him looking at her and smiled. He loved her smile, loved the way it lit up every space she was in, better than any sunset he’d ever seen.
He pulled into the restaurant parking lot, but instead of going in, Grady parked the car and shut it off. He hesitated to remove the key from the ignition. “I had this great romantic night planned. Candlelit dinner on the water, dancing at a club I found online. But right now, all I want to do is keep on talking to you out here, with this gorgeous view.”
Her features brightened and another smile curved her lips. “I’d like that, Grady.”
“We can always get dinner later, and skip the dancing, if you want. Let’s take a walk for now.” He pocketed his key, came around the car and opened her door. She had her heels in one hand and put the other into his.
A simple touch. Something other couples did several times a day. Grady loved the softness of her hand, the closeness of her body. So he didn’t let go.
The restaurant faced a long boardwalk jutting out into the water, dotted by moored boats. Two smaller piers flanked it, peppered with late-night fishermen and a dinghy here and there. Another wooden walkway curved along the shore, lit with Victorian-style lampposts. Grady and Beth ambled along the deserted path. A jazz band played outside one of the bars, while lights from the shops and restaurants cast a glow on the water.
“What happened senior year?” The question popped out of him, an intrusion, and he almost took it back. But then Beth answered, as if she, too, needed to unburden.
“My mother got sick and died. Even before that—for years before that—my life revolved around taking care of her. But that was when it got really bad.” Beth scoffed. “I always say she got sick, but the truth is, she drank herself to death. She wasn’t always that way, and there are times when my heart aches for how things used to be.” They stopped and looked out at the waves softly lapping the shore. “I should have tried harder to get her to stop.”
“You can’t force someone to listen. I know that too well. I’m sure you did more than most people would, Beth.” A car passed on the road behind them, the tires hitting the pavement with a soft pat-pat-pat sound. He listened to it fade into the distance before Beth spoke again.
“Maybe,” she said, as she started walking once more, turning to head down one of the piers. She took her phone out of her purse and checked it for the tenth time since they’d left Stone Gap. Even though they were almost an hour away, her thoughts stayed with Reggie. “My father was never home when I was a kid. My mom had a lot of trouble with that. I think she just hated to be alone and got easily overwhelmed, especially with being a single mother. She struggled without my dad there, and started drinking at night. To sleep, she said. One drink led to two, led to three, led to a lifelong habit she didn’t want to break. I think she was actually relieved when her liver began to fail because it was...a way out.”
“That’s so sad.” Grady put his arm around her and drew her to him. His Beth—no, not his, not truly, but his for the night—was a caring, sweet person who had put her life on hold for a mother who hadn’t been there for her, and was doing that again for her father, with zero resentment.
“It’s life, Grady.” She turned to him. “Sometimes it’s great, sometimes it’s bad. But you keep moving forward and doing the best you can.”
Such a simple philosophy, but so hard to put into play. “Why?”
“Because the great parts are worth it.” She smiled again, and he realized that right now, right this second, was one of the great parts. If he could have taken a photo, he would have, but nothing, Grady knew, could completely capture this moment.
“Look, we’re so close we can touch the sea.” Beth dropped down to the edge of the dock and let her feet dangle in the dark water. “Join me.”
“I’ve got dress shoes on.”
She arched a brow. “And they don’t come off?”
He laughed. “Okay, you’re right.” Grady bent down, untied his shoes and took off his socks. He set them to the side, rolled up his pant legs, then slipped into place beside her. The water was cool on his feet. It could have been a summer night at his grandmother’s house. “I haven’t been in a lake in a decade. My grandmother’s place was where I learned to swim, to ride a bike and to really live. My parents’ house was so quiet, I could hear the grandfather clock in the foyer ticking at night, even when I was lying in my second-floor bedroom. There were no arguments or deep discussions. Family dinners, when they happened at all, were lessons in etiquette, and our small talk centered around briefs and judicial decisions. The only time I was a kid was at my grandma’s house. Me and my brothers...”
Grady shook his head. Even now, more than a decade since those times at Ida Mae’s, when he looked back on the summers, everything seemed infused with this golden glow. Maybe it hadn’t been as good as he remembered, but it had always been better than being home. “We had a great time with our grandparents. My grandpa died when I was nine, and then it was just my grandma. My brothers and I spent most of our summers with her, when we weren’t in summer school or taking piano lessons or learning French.”
“French? Ugh. I hated foreign language in school.”
He laughed. “Me, too. I know I should keep up with it—the business world is more and more global every day. But I’ve never really had a knack for remembering the words or how to conjugate the verbs.”
“Good thing I work with dogs.” She grinned and paddled her feet, sending up a little splash of cool water. “I haven’t gone swimming in a really long time. I sort of missed that entire part of childhood, you know?”
“On the next warm, sunny day, come over to my grandmother’s house. It leads down to Stone Gap Lake, and the pier is still there, perfect for jumping off of into the water.”
“I’ll have to take you up on that someday.” Beth leaned her head on his shoulder. Grady’s arm stole around her, and a part of him wanted to hold on to this moment as much as he wanted to hold on to her.
Then her phone rang, and everything changed.
Chapter Seven
“What were you thinking, Dad? You could have killed yourself.” Beth stood in the hospital room beside her father, who seemed to grow paler and thinner by the minute. After the doctor called, Grady had broken all speed limits rushing her back to the hospital outside Stone Gap. He’d dropped her off, then gone to park the car while she’d beelined for the emergency room and found her father, who looked far frailer than before. He had a bandage on his left arm from trying to put out the fire he’d accidentally started when he’d knocked a newspaper into the stove, trying to reach one of the upper cabinets for the good wineglasses he’d wanted to clean.
“I was just working on the house a little. Trying to stay useful.” The car
diac monitor above his head displayed a steady stream of heartbeats, and a constant check of oxygen levels, blood pressure and resting heart rate. The nurse had just come in to draw more blood and run enzyme tests to see if her father’s chest pains had been a heart attack.
Lord, please, no. His heart was already weakened from the first two heart attacks. How much could one man take? She dropped onto his bed and took one of his hands in hers, then leaned over and pressed a kiss to his temple. “You need to take it easy.”
“I’m tired of taking it easy,” Reggie said. “We have a big event coming up, and I want to be ready.”
“Dad, it doesn’t have to be a big event. Grady and I haven’t even set a date yet—and neither of us want anything splashy.” The lies slid off her tongue far too easily, leaving a trail of guilt running into her gut, piling onto the regret she felt about leaving him home alone tonight. She never should have agreed to the date. This was why she had no time for a relationship.
Her father leaned back and held her hand up. “That’s one hell of a beautiful ring,” he said. “Grady did good.”
Beth had forgotten about the fake engagement ring. The moment when he’d given it to her seemed ten years in the past, not a few hours. This charade was spiraling out of her control. Somehow, she had to end this entire thing. But...
Telling the truth was out as an option. The last thing Dad needed right now was another shock.
Her father’s cardiologist came into the room, a young man with dark hair and dark glasses, and a serious expression that sent icy dread through Beth’s veins. “You gave us quite a scare there, Mr. Cooper,” Dr. McCall said.
Reggie waved that off. “Just doing some housework. I’m sure it was nothing.”
“That’s not what the EKG is saying.” The doctor sighed. “We’re running blood tests to be doubly sure, but you almost caused yourself another heart attack. When I say take it easy, I don’t mean move a recliner or redecorate the kitchen.”
“You tried to move your chair, too?” Beth let out a gusty sigh. “Dad! Why didn’t you wait for me to get home?”
“Because I have put too much on your shoulders for way too long, Bethie. I was just trying to clean up the house, get things ready. So I can give my little girl the wedding she deserves.”
Before it’s too late. The words he didn’t say, the words that everyone in the room was thinking. Her father was dying, and there was nothing she could do about it, no way to reverse the inevitable.
The doctor touched her shoulder. “Can we talk out in the hall?”
“Of course.” She gave her father’s hand a squeeze and put a hopeful smile on her face that belied the worry churning inside her. “Promise me you’ll lie here and rest?”
“Do I have a choice?” Her father returned a weak smile. “I promise. Stop worrying.”
Beth headed out of the room with the doctor, and shut the heavy door behind her. Grady came down the hall just then and stopped beside her. A little ripple of relief filled her, simply from his presence.
“Everything okay?” he asked.
“Not really.” She quickly explained what had happened, introduced Grady to the doctor and then braced herself for what was coming next. She’d had enough conversations with the cardiologist to know by the look on his face that he was about to deliver news she didn’t want to hear.
“Miss Cooper, you know your father is living on borrowed time. His heart was already getting weaker by the day, and this incident didn’t make things any better. He truly needs to rest, and build his strength up gradually. I’m going to start the physical therapy again, but it would be nice if he got some walks in around the neighborhood. Get him outside, let him enjoy some fresh air.”
The words were ones she’d heard before, but this time the inflection in the doctor’s voice had shifted. There was an urgency to his advice, and a hesitation in his sentences. “What aren’t you saying, Dr. McCall?”
The man took a moment before he spoke. Beth reached over and slipped her hand into Grady’s, needing someone there, someone to lean on, for just a moment. His larger fingers closed over hers, strong, sure, secure.
“Your father doesn’t have a lot of time,” the doctor said. “His heart is operating at about a tenth of normal strength. So get outside. Make some memories. Enjoy the days. And pay someone to move the furniture.” His brown eyes softened. “I’m so sorry, Miss Cooper. I wish I had a different prognosis. I’ve always admired your father. Used to watch his fights with my dad on Friday nights.”
“Isn’t there anything else we can do?”
The doctor shoved his hands into his pockets and rocked back on his heels. “One thing your dad has going for him is that he is a fighter. I’ve never known someone as stubborn as he is. There are times when that’s hurt him—”
“Because he doesn’t listen and tries to move a recliner.” She still couldn’t believe her father had done that. He knew better.
“Yes...but there are also times when that can be a good thing. If I was a betting man, I’d say you have a few weeks, maybe a month.” He paused and Beth choked back a sob. “But...the reason I’m not a betting man is because I have seen the human spirit give some people months, sometimes years, more than anyone with a medical degree predicted they would have. Your dad has a strong spirit, and from what he told me, something big to look forward to with you getting married. Sometimes that hope and anticipation can do more than all the treatments in the world.”
Beth thanked the doctor, and he headed down the hall to his next patient, promising to come back and check on her father again later. The hospital went on about its controlled chaos, nurses rushing from place to place, machines beeping, orderlies hurrying to deliver equipment and meds.
Beth leaned against the pale green concrete wall and sighed. “I knew this was coming, but hearing the doctor say it...”
“He didn’t say your dad is going to die tomorrow, Beth. You still have time,” Grady said.
“Yeah, but how much?” Her eyes filled and her heart squeezed. For months, she’d been avoiding the full extent of the truth, trying her best to pretend it didn’t exist. “I don’t know what to do.”
Grady glanced down the hall at the retreating figure of the doctor, then back at her father’s name scrawled on the paper plaque outside his room. “Marry me, Beth.”
It took her a second to process the words in her head. “Grady, you don’t have to pretend,” she said. “My dad’s inside and probably asleep. He can’t hear you.”
“I mean it. Marry me, this coming weekend.” Grady’s brown eyes met hers. “We’ll do it up right and let your father see that you’re happy and taken care of. And maybe, like the doctor said, that will give him something wonderful to focus on, and that will change the tide.”
Marry Grady? Now? That was the most insane idea she’d ever heard. The haste made it sound like a shotgun wedding, but this wasn’t the Wild West, and she wasn’t some teenage girl with a baby in her belly. “Why are you doing this? It’s above and beyond what we agreed to.”
“Because I wish like hell I had a father who loved me half as much as your father loves you.” His voice was thick, but he cleared his throat and went on. “I like your dad. I like you. And it’s a small thing I can do before I leave town, and not feel like a jerk for not having some medical miracle to give you.”
She smiled, but couldn’t work up a laugh at his joke. The offer was huge—too huge—and she couldn’t possibly say yes, even to make her father happy. “Marriage means living together, Grady. We can’t do that. And then you’re going to leave and—”
“And I’ll take a business trip. We’ll tell everyone we had a fight and are separating for a bit, but let your father think we’re still trying to work it out. As for living together, we don’t have to do that. Your dad could stay at his house, you stay at yours and I stay at Ida Mae’s. When I sell the house, we�
��ll have that fight.” He grinned. “In the meantime, your dad will think we’re working on some grandkids. Long-term anticipation.”
She shook her head. “We can’t do that. Quite honestly, I don’t know where my dad and I are going to stay. My dad set off a small fire accidentally. Now the stove is useless, plus there’s smoke damage on one wall of the kitchen. He can’t stay in his house, and my cottage is only a one bedroom.”
“Then come to my grandmother’s house and stay until it sells. There’s plenty of room.” Grady took her hand. “And a lake you can swim in.”
The reference to their date made her warm inside. For a moment, she imagined swimming in that lake with Grady. Splashing him, dunking him, kissing him... Damn. Still, the crazy spiral she was trying to contain was expanding and moving faster by the second. Get married, now? “Grady—”
“We’ll have a small wedding. Nothing formal or...”
“Binding,” she supplied. Because this wasn’t anything other than a way to give her dying father some peace, and maybe a reason to hang on.
He nodded. “That way we have nothing to undo legally later.”
That was practical. Clinical. Not at all emotional or romantic. Which was exactly what Beth wanted. “So we just keep on lying,” she said. “To my father. My friends. The preacher. The whole damned town.”
“Or we don’t lie. We get a real preacher, and have a real wedding. And get a real annulment later. People do it all the time, for much weaker reasons than ours.”
Her heart had skipped a beat when he said real preacher and real wedding. For a second, she’d thought Grady was genuinely proposing to her. Then he’d added get a real annulment, and that little lilt had disappeared. But this was what she wanted, wasn’t it? If that was so, then why did she feel like she was losing more than she was gaining?