by Liz Talley
The cell phone sitting in the cup holder buzzed. He lifted it, expecting it to be Abigail, but it was his younger brother, Jake. News traveled fast in the Beauchamp family.
“Yeah,” he said into the phone.
“Who’s Shelby?”
“Shelby is none of your business.”
“So you’re out in the dating world again. Here I was thinking you were holding fast to the role of grieving widower.”
“It’s not a role.”
“Yeah,” Jake said, his voice softening from smart-ass to the hushed tone he’d used after the accident...after the funeral. John would rather have Jake stick with smart-ass. “You show up with a good-looking woman at our sister’s bed-and-breakfast, asking favors, lip buttoned, and you think you can escape the inquisition?”
“Just leave it alone.”
“Was it eHarmony or something? Lot of guys do computer dating. Even thought about it myself.”
Bullshit. Jake Beauchamp didn’t need a computer. Women fell in his lap. “No. It’s not like that.”
“Christian Mingle? The old man would approve.”
“I’m not using a dating website.”
“So how did you meet her? The Rev and Fancy will know by tomorrow morning. Rochelle Braud already told me she saw a strange woman in your truck, and Shannon Smith said you were at Jamison’s office with a blonde. Jig is up, my brother.”
John released a frustrated breath. This was the huge downside of living in Magnolia Bend. Nosy folk didn’t have enough to occupy them. “She’s just a girl I met.”
“Why was she at Jamison’s? Birth control?”
John smothered a bitter bark of laughter. Too damn late for that. “How about you back the hell off, Jake? Unless you want the same meddling in your life?”
Silence reigned on the line before his younger brother sighed. “Good point. I’m not prying. Just being there for you, bro.”
John already knew this. His family had always been there for him...almost nauseatingly so, and Jake was a good sounding board even if he ran as wild as the kudzu growing along the Mississippi River. “I appreciate that, but at present I don’t need help.”
Liar.
“If you change your mind, I’ll be at Ray-Ray’s later. A cold beer always makes things clearer...but maybe you’re getting a little something-something later? Am I right? Huh? Huh?” Jake cackled like an old woman.
“Goodbye, Jake,” John drawled.
His brother sobered. “I’m just raggin’ you. Besides if you’re getting some, good for you. You’ve been wearing black for a long time, brother.”
“I’m not wearing black.”
“Figuratively speaking, of course. Later, bro.”
John clicked off the phone and focused on the road in front of him. Part of him wanted to tell Jake about Shelby and the baby. The other part of him wanted to do what he’d been doing for the past year—withdraw and hide in the cave he’d made comfortable for himself.
Disappearing was easy to do when the light in your world was extinguished.
But he didn’t want to think about Rebecca, grieving or even the cane still standing in the fields. He had to decide what to do about Shelby.
He wanted to hate her for riding into his world looking like a sex kitten, making him remember he was a man...not a robot. He wanted to hate her for making him want her. But most of all he wanted to hate her for dropping the bombshell she’d dropped hours ago. His child, the one Rebecca had wanted so badly was housed inside a woman he barely knew. The thought squeezed all the air out of his lungs.
Shortly after Shelby uttered those words, John had felt resentment so intense it had stunned him in its ferocity. But when he’d entered the bathroom and saw the sheer desolation on Shelby’s face, that kernel of hate dissipated. He hadn’t a clue why. If she’d lost the child, everything would be easier. No one would have to know John’s shame. Everything could go on as normal. But one look at the terror in her eyes—at the desire to keep their child in her body—and he’d changed. Hate turned to an odd desire for that child...for the hope he or she represented.
Maybe hate was too strong a word.
He’d never hated Shelby.
Only himself for being so weak.
John turned into the drive he’d turned into every day of the past decade, bumping up to the silent house illuminated by moon glow. Like a ghost, Breezy Hill sat, a relic of happiness. As he stopped and shifted the gear to Park, the old ginger tabby crept out of the small barn located out back.
Damn cat.
Rebecca had loved Freddy even when John threatened to use him as gator bait for sharpening his claws on the seat of the new lawn mower.
“You touch that cat and you better sleep with one eye open, John Miller,” she’d said, brown eyes glittering as she propped her hands on slim hips. Rebecca’s brown hair had always been cut chin-length in something she called a bob. Her mouth was wide and a few freckles scattered across her nose. She’d been cute, but not pretty. But beauty had never mattered to John. He’d loved everything about his wife—the long fingernails she used to scratch his back, the messy office full of travel books on places she’d never go and the way she cried over every present he gave her...even the blender. Beauty hadn’t been a factor.
But Shelby was beautiful.
The first time he’d seen Shelby, he’d liked her because she was so different from Rebecca. Almost as if it was okay to hold her in his arms while they danced because she wasn’t even close to being the woman he’d loved.
Still, like Rebecca, Shelby had made him smile. She was funny, and when she laughed, her blue eyes sparkled. He’d heard that term before—sparkling eyes—but had never seen it until he’d met Shelby. Even now, in the face of this difficult situation, she cracked jokes.
It occurred to him perhaps that was her coping mechanism. Maybe Shelby laughed so she didn’t cry.
The cat wound around his ankles, its meows plaintive in the stillness. John walked to the porch steps and sank onto them, stroking the cat despite his profession of disliking the old thing. He’d fed it every morning, and some nights he sat outside and petted it, as if taking care of Freddy would make up for the fact he’d killed his wife.
Okay, so technically he hadn’t killed his wife—Rebecca had died from an accidental gunshot wound. He hadn’t been home when it happened, hadn’t been the one to leave the round in the chamber. But he’d been the one to accuse her of wanting to leave him. He’d been the one to make her feel guilty, guilty enough to want to please him by stopping by the gunsmith and picking up his repaired shotgun.
He shook his head. No time to think about guilt. No time to dwell on what might have been. He had to decide what to do about Shelby and the baby.
Telling his folks would be hard. The Reverend Beauchamp was a principled man, and also a good man. He’d never turn away one of his flock during times of trouble, including his own son.
But John wasn’t ready to bring any of his family, other than Abigail, into this mess...yet.
First he had to get to know the mother of his child...and convince her he belonged in the child’s life—as more than a check and weekly phone call. Maybe introducing his family to her wasn’t the best way to do that. The Beauchamps were like a straitjacket—the more you fought against them, the tighter the binds got. But there was no way of getting around his family, especially if he took Shelby to dinner on Thursday.
“I’ll think about this later, Freddy,” John said to the cat.
Freddy meowed and rubbed against him insistently.
“Yeah, I’ll do that, too,” John said, and looked at the moon.
* * *
SHELBY WAS BORED to tears. Okay, not real tears, but that didn’t matter. Lying in bed was only wonderful when one had a seven o’clock meeting and had to get up. When
given permission to wallow via doctor’s orders, it pretty much sucked.
For one thing, John’s sister had obviously tried to create Old South ambience, and, alas, there was no television hidden in the ornately carved wardrobe.
To which Shelby said a modern version of “I do declare” that would have shocked Aunt Pittypat outta her hoop skirt.
And though cold air piped though vents somewhere in the room, there wasn’t a ceiling fan. And Shelby always slept under a ceiling fan, except for that one time in Girl Scouts when she’d gone camping. Emphasis on the one time.
Fiddle dee damn.
So Shelby stopped counting the folds in the canopy, rose out of bed and ambled around, finding a copy of The Sound and the Fury in the drawer of the secretary. Of course, she’d rather bite her toenails than read Faulkner. She’d never cared for “the classics”—dusty books recommended by English teachers made her break out in hives. Those, along with snotty historical biographies, were what her sister, Sela, read. When Shelby had professed to loving Christian Grey and being tied up, her sister had literally lifted her nose and given her that look.
Made Shelby want to take a paddle to her sister...and not in a kinky way.
So she stared out the window. The Laurel Woods Bed-and-Breakfast was aptly named. Just outside the window, trees knitted together, holding mysterious woodsy secrets. Shelby had stared out, determined to enjoy the rustic peace. So far she’d spied a couple of bright red birds, one frisky squirrel and an ugly buzzard roosting in a huge tree.
Boring.
But then Birdie showed up.
The child wore skinny jeans and a hoodie. Huge binoculars dangled from around her neck. Her brown hair had been scraped back into a messy ponytail, as if she could care less, and on her back swayed a large backpack. Walking intently toward the big tree in which the buzzard sat, she immediately swung up on a lower branch and started climbing. The buzzard took flight, which Birdie didn’t seem to notice. After scampering up half the tree, Birdie plopped down on a thick joint just as casual as she pleased.
Good gracious. If the child fell, she’d break her neck.
Surely, Abigail didn’t allow her daughter to sit in trees without...did they make tree seat belts?
Birdie was partly visible through the half-bare branches. Shelby watched with bated breath as the child pulled off the backpack, sat a sketch pad on her lap and lifted her binoculars, training them on something to Shelby’s right. Adjusting the knob thing on top, the girl grew still and focused.
Shelby sighed and wondered if she should say something to Abigail about the child being so high in the tree. Then again, Abigail seemed to know about her daughter’s daredevil antics.
Turning away, Shelby looked around the room for something to do. Her phone had only 5 percent battery life remaining, and she’d left the charger in the rental car, which was parked at John’s house. No playing on her phone. She glanced at Birdie one last time. The kid still perched, binoculars focused on the distance behind the house. Shelby pressed her face against the window and tried to see what the girl watched, but she couldn’t see beyond the edge of the woods.
Something in the girl’s demeanor nagged at Shelby so she glanced back at Birdie, waiting for the girl to pick up her sketch pad and start working, but she never did. Instead the girl’s mouth fell open in that age-old expression of “I can’t believe what I’m seeing.”
Shelby wrinkled her nose.
What the devil was Birdie watching that would render her so engrossed?
Any other time and Shelby wouldn’t care. But she was bored out of her gourd. Not to mention, some inner teacher Spidey sense told her this was not about birds.
So she pulled the oversize T-shirt serving as her nightgown over her head and scooped up the dress she’d worn yesterday. Thankfully, the dress was a rayon blend and didn’t wrinkle, but the stained tights were hopeless. She netted three points tossing her balled-up tights into the metal trash bin. The new cotton undies were a bit blousy, but the hot-pink socks featuring a popular boy band logo, which she’d grabbed at the Dollar Store, would work fine for stealth. She left her knee-high boots beside her purse and sneaked out the door.
No one was in the hall. Abigail had said she wasn’t full until next week so no surprise there. A soft runner ran the length of the shiny floor. Shelby padded to the end of the hall where an antique rocker and a bookshelf nestled near a wavy-paned window. She peered out, cursing the authentic glass. Despite this, she could still make out the large privacy fence and the houses backing up to it. There appeared to be a small subdivision with cookie-cutter houses and requisite postage-stamp backyards directly behind Laurel Woods.
So Birdie wasn’t bird-watching. She was people watching.
The little spy.
Shelby chuckled and craned her neck to see if she could make out who the child watched with such fascination. Out of the corner of her eye she saw someone plunge into a lap pool. Someone naked. Not just naked...but tight male ass naked.
Whoa. Birdie wasn’t just spying—she was a peeping, uh, Birdie. So what to do about that?
This was a child and a naked dude. A responsible adult would find Abigail and squeal. But maybe not yet. Maybe she needed to know more. Something about the girl’s pluck and natural curiosity carved a tender place in Shelby’s heart. Had to be hard having a mother like Abigail. Again, teacher Spidey sense blipped and she decided to track down Birdie later to suggest she not spy on naked dudes in their lap pool no matter how nice the view was.
“Shelby?”
She jerked around to find Abigail standing at the head of the stairs holding a tray. John’s sister wore her hair pulled back into a knot, a deep blue sweater and the same flats from the evening before. She looked like a librarian catching someone making out in the stacks.
“Oh, hey,” Shelby said, turning with hopefully a nonguilty smile. “Just checking out the, uh, view.”
Abigail snorted. “No view out that window. I fought like the devil trying to preserve this historical area, but I didn’t win. They built that subdivision last fall. I tried to fence them out and mask the sounds of a busy neighborhood with the water feature out back.”
Shelby moved toward her room, abandoning her own spying on the very interesting Birdie. “Well, my view’s lovely and I didn’t hear anything.”
“I’m lucky most of the rooms face the woods on either side of the house. I haven’t had trouble, but I would have preferred the solitude.” Abigail set the tray on the bedside table. “Nice socks.”
Shelby lifted her foot and wiggled the One Direction socks. “I feel cool, but maybe I’ll leave them for Birdie.”
“Don’t bother. She thinks boy bands are stupid...and boys are disgusting.”
Yeah. Right. “Well, she’s only...eight or nine?”
“Try twelve,” Abigail said with a smile. “A little small for her age.”
Twelve? Shelby thought she had stretched it by suggesting eight. Of course, Shelby didn’t know a lot about elementary-aged kids. Neither of her siblings had procreated, professing no urge to overpopulate the earth—something about the ozone layer and stretch marks. And by the time students hit high school and Shelby’s desks, most had gone through puberty.
“I brought you some oatmeal, a soft boiled egg and dry toast. John said you were sick or something and I didn’t know if you wanted anything rich. I have some Bananas Foster French toast if you’d rather that?”
Oh, yum. Shelby’s stomach growled...but then she thought about the diet guidelines in her healthy pregnancy books. Maybe something low fat and easy on her stomach would be a good idea. “This is fine. Thank you.”
“John called and said he would pick you up at noon.” Abigail’s remark was more a question than a statement, said the way a mother would say it...with that little unspoken “And?” at the end.
&
nbsp; “Great,” Shelby said.
Abigail stood there for a moment, looking indecisive. Shelby knew she wanted to ask about her and John, but was too polite to do so. And Shelby wasn’t going to help. That was John’s cross to bear.
“Okay, if you need anything else,” Abigail said, still not moving.
“Nope,” Shelby said with a smile, sinking onto the bed, wishing now she’d just left her T-shirt on. She’d forgotten about breakfast, which was crazy since suddenly she could eat a small horse.
Abigail walked toward the door, casting wistful glances back at her.
“Thanks, Abigail.”
John’s sister turned. “Oh, good gravy, just tell me. Are you seeing John?” So much for his sister not asking questions.
Shelby played dumb blonde. “Of course I’m seeing him. He’s picking me up at noon.”
Irritation flashed in Abigail’s eyes, reminding Shelby of her brother. “Oh, stop it. You know what I mean. Y’all say you’re just friends, but John has never had any female friends. He’s a farmer.”
“Farmers don’t have female friends?”
“You’re good at avoiding questions, but I’m the only girl in my family, so I’m good at getting around the bullshit,” Abigail said with a feral smile. “So are you dating? Because he’s never mentioned you. None of us even knew he—”
“Maybe he didn’t want his family to know his business. I don’t like my family sticking their noses into mine. I’m the baby of the family so I’m good at avoiding everything. I win,” Shelby said, trying for lightness, lifting the toast and taking a bite. It was good—a homemade multigrain. Good for Shelby and good for baby.
“We’re not like most families,” Abigail sniffed. “We’re very close and we’ve been very worried about John.”
“He doesn’t strike me as a man who needs his sister to manage his life or screen his dates.”
“That’s not what I’m doing,” Abigail said, propping her hands on her hips, looking even more like a librarian. This time Shelby had talked too loudly...or lost a book. Deadly librarian sin. “I suppose the only way he could have met you was online.”