by Amber Lynn
Wanting to make things easier on her, he didn’t hesitate to reach forward and gently place his hands on her hips. If he thought she would’ve stood for it, he would’ve wrapped his arms around her and danced as close as her stomach allowed.
“I get the feeling that you hate living here, and yet you stay,” Toby said as he started shifting his weight from side to side.
They were far enough apart that Meredith didn’t have any problem looking up at his face. She was almost a foot shorter than him, something he hadn’t really picked up since she generally kept him at a safe distance.
“Funny you should say that. I was just thinking yesterday about how it might be time to move on. When I first came here, I didn’t expect to put down roots.”
“I think I picked up somewhere that you aren’t from these parts originally, but if that’s the case, I really don’t understand you staying. Do you have some family around here I haven’t met yet?”
The accent clearly gave her away as being from somewhere else, but it was deluded like she’d changed it over the years. That made it impossible to figure out where she originally called home.
A not-so-happy smile appeared on her face before she shook her head. She sighed deeply as she looked around the room.
“My family is why I came here, but they aren’t here. That’s a topic we won’t be discussing tonight, or ever. I stopped here because I met Lawrence and fell in love with a man who I thought was the answer to my problems, at least temporarily.”
“And from what Caleb said earlier, I’m guessing it wasn’t as rosy a married life as you thought.”
The smile was still on her face as her eyes moved back to meet his. Her blue eyes were filled with hurt, but Toby wasn’t sure the cause. It could’ve been bringing up her family or the husband Toby was already on the way to deciding wasn’t good enough for her.
Before she could say anything in reply, a voice boomed from the other side of the room. Toby couldn’t help rolling his eyes and looking around him for a door to run out of.
“Toby Matthews, where the hell are you?”
Chapter Twelve
The man yelling at Toby sounded pissed. Meredith saw Toby looking for a way out and wished she could help. She had no idea who was yelling at him, but it made her want to find Caleb and make sure he was okay.
“That’s the first time I’ve seen pure fear in your eyes, Meredith. You didn’t even look that worried when you found a crazy guy honing in on your swim time two weeks ago,” Toby whispered, while every other sound in the room seemed to disappear. “Don’t worry, it’s just my best friend, who apparently made good on his threat to find me if I didn’t call him back yesterday.”
Meredith wasn’t sure about his words. The look of annoyance didn’t exactly indicate a buddy of his had just shown up. Leaning in, Toby quickly kissed Meredith’s forehead before turning around. Her fingers reached up to touch the spot his lips caressed as she wondered why in the world he’d kissed her.
She couldn’t see around his broad back to figure out what was going on in the rest of the room. He reached back, not having any trouble finding her hand and pulled her forward. Meredith thought for a brief second about dragging her feet, but she was a little curious about who Toby considered a friend. Toby had proven he wasn’t there to turn her over to her parents, but his buddy might recognize her and have different ideas.
“I told him where you were. I don’t know why he’s yelling like that.”
Caleb’s voice sounded close by, but Meredith didn’t seem him at first. She shifted her body to look towards Toby’s left side and saw her son walking a little ways in front of him.
“It’s okay, Caleb. Jimmy has a big mouth and loves to prove it.”
If that was true, it was no wonder Toby had run away for a little quiet time in the woods. Meredith could hear his friend still talking as people tried to help him find whoever he was looking for. Toby had been in town for a couple weeks, but most people probably didn’t know him as Toby Matthews. They probably just called him “the new guy.”
“I thought we had an agreement that you were going to keep him locked in the basement this summer, Jen.”
Toby kept a firm grip on Meredith’s hand as he leaned forward and wrapped his free arm around a woman with curly red hair. Meredith couldn’t get a great look at her before Toby straightened up. From what she saw, the woman was gorgeous, supermodel level gorgeous.
“You can’t blame me for this, Mattie. I’m not the one who called him up after not talking to him for weeks, claiming you were going to a hoedown.”
Mattie? Meredith didn’t say the word out loud, but she mouthed it. She supposed it had to do with his last name, but he hadn’t mentioned a nickname. She hadn’t really given him a chance, but if most people called him that, she thought he’d mention it.
“Maybe we should take this conversation outside.”
Meredith’s words were quiet but important. She hated being the center of attention and if Toby’s friends were anything like him, people weren’t going to be able to look away.
“That’s a great idea. Caleb, why don’t you lead the way out.”
“Wait just a second. Are you hiding someone behind you?”
It was the man who had yelled across the room asking the question. His voice thankfully was quieter. They would have all been deaf if he’d let his pipes rip again.
Toby looked over his shoulder at her and shook his head. It made her think he regretted dragging her across the room.
“I’m not hiding anyone. I’m protecting her from you. Follow my friend Caleb and you might get lucky enough that I’ll introduce you.”
Caleb had already followed Toby’s direction and was walking towards the door. Meredith loved the fact that he could still act like there wasn’t a single thing wrong in the world. The stares of the seventy or so people jammed into the barn didn’t bother him one bit.
Meredith wished she could see the newcomers’ faces. She wanted to know if Toby’s actions were typical for the man leading her around. The woman had already hinted that coming to the dance may have been out of character.
As his friends walked away, Toby moved to keep her behind his back and hidden. It only solidified the idea that he didn’t need her for whatever conversation he and his friends were going to have. That idea changed once Jimmy and Jen started following Caleb. With them in front of Toby, he pulled her up to his side and squeezed her hand.
“I know I’m acting crazy, but bear with me a few more minutes.”
Toby’s voice was for her ears only. Meredith hadn’t thought for a second he was acting crazy. Protective maybe, but not crazy.
Away from staring at Toby’s backside, Meredith got a better picture of his friends, at least their backs. Seeing that side of the woman’s figure did nothing to change the idea she was a supermodel. The black dress she wore hit her well above her knees and showed off her toned calves. Meredith couldn’t figure out why anyone would torture themselves with the five-inch heels paired with the dress.
The man looked about the same size as Toby, but after following Toby around, his friend definitely had an inferior rear. Meredith didn’t want to admit, even to herself, that she’d been checking Toby’s out, but it was hard not to when she was being dragged behind him. In his tight jeans, it was easy to see how firm everything about him was.
She’d seen him in shorts, so it wasn’t a surprise. There was just something about his muscles being hidden under the surface that made things more intriguing. Not that she was checking him out. Like any warm-blooded heterosexual woman in the world, she just appreciated fine quality.
Meredith kept an eye on the man and woman in front of her, waiting for one of them to turn around and take a peek at her. They held hands, much like the pair behind them and whispered words Meredith could only pick up every third of. As their hands swung together, it was hard to miss the large diamond ring weighing down the all-important finger on her left hand.
They wer
e either hopelessly, and maybe foolishly, in love, or they were still in the honeymoon of their marriage. In Meredith’s experience, that didn’t last long, and love was something that didn’t exist in the way they cooed at each other. She almost felt sorry for them, knowing from personal experience that those smiles on their faces would fade.
As they made it outside, Meredith lifted her free hand up to her forehead to try to block out the sun setting directly in front of them. The sky was brilliant, with shades of red and purple making shelves as far as she could see. A part of her wished she was at the lake, sitting on the dock, taking in the wonder of nature all around her with the beautiful backdrop.
They walked across the gravel driveway leading up to the barn. The location of the dance was on the edge of town. The barn didn’t really belong to anyone. Lawrence had told her it was built almost a hundred years ago for the very purpose of having an annual dance.
“So, you left us all behind to come up here and play house or something?”
As Jimmy said the words, he spun around and got his first real look at Meredith. The words didn’t sound harsh, in fact they were playful, but the way his eyes widened when he got a look at Meredith told her he didn’t have the whole story. To help him see he wasn’t imagining things, she let the hand on her forehead fall to her stomach and rubbed it.
The look on Jen’s face wasn’t as shocked, but there was a momentary head shake in disbelief. The woman’s eyes were quick to not focus on the stomach and move over to the attached hands. Meredith agreed that they were probably the more outrageous part of the picture, and yet she did nothing to extract her hand.
“Meredith, this is my best friend, Jimmy, and his wife, Jen. Guys, this is Meredith and her son, Caleb, who I’ve heard you’ve already met.”
Caleb stood to the left of the pairs and plastered a ridiculous grin on his face. There were times the kid was pretty lucky he was adorable.
“Yup, he came right up to where I was playing with some of my friends and asked which one of us was Caleb. I wasn’t so sure about telling him it was me on account of him being a stranger and all, but then he said he was your friend Jimmy and I thought since you told me about him that it’d be okay.”
“I’m not sure what your mom thinks, but my rule of thumb is to always question a man wearing a nice pair of pants and tennis shoes.”
“Don’t you start. Thanks to you, my favorite pair of shoes is covered in mud and are probably ruined. Six-hundred dollar shoes, Toby. You could’ve told me that your new homestead was basically surrounded by quicksand.”
Attention was at least momentarily drawn away from Meredith as Jimmy went on his little rant. If the guy was serious about how much his shoes cost, he didn’t belong within a hundred miles of town. Even a hundred dollar pair of shoes would’ve been completely outrageous.
“There isn’t quicksand around my cabin. It rained a couple days ago and things don’t dry out here as quickly as back in New York. Look, you really didn’t need to drop everything and come up here. I told you I’m going to give it a little more time, but we both know I’m not coming back to the team.”
Jimmy raised an eyebrow and glanced over at Meredith. She hoped he wasn’t thinking she was the reason Toby was sticking around. It’d be cute in a bad romance novel kind of way if that was true, but whether they were holding hands or not, she’d made her stance clear.
“She knows who I am and why I’m here. And she’s my neighbor, if you don’t remember me mentioning that about Caleb yesterday.” Toby squeezed her hand briefly before he continued. “As I also said yesterday, I owed someone a favor, which is why we’re here. Meredith helped out during my second blackout and the town psycho has a thing for her, so I couldn’t let her come alone.”
Meredith watched as Jimmy’s mouth moved, but the words coming out didn’t make it to her ears as a sharp pain radiated through her. She might have gasped at it, though, it was hard to say as she reached her hand to the left side of her stomach where the pain started.
She tried not to panic, calmly telling herself it was a momentary twist of something. One time pain didn’t mean anything was wrong. For a second, she believed that.
When a second pain hit, ten times worse than the first, her legs gave out and she felt herself falling. If she hit the ground, she had no clue because the world around her totally disappeared. She shut her eyes tight, trying to block out the pain that didn’t’ want to let up.
She didn’t know if words came from her lips, but her mind kept thinking “the baby” over and over, hoping at least one of the people around her would hear it and understand. She swore that even given childbirth without an epidural didn’t feel as bad as whatever was going on in her body. The worst part was that she knew she couldn’t do anything to stop it, except pray that everything would be okay. Something deep in her pessimistic gut told her prayer was useless.
Chapter Thirteen
The small-town doctor’s office wasn’t meant for a confused man who took up most of the waiting room. Toby had barely been able to catch Meredith before she dropped to the ground. He could still hear her scream echoing in his head.
Toby wanted to take Meredith to a hospital, but Caleb ran to find Meredith’s doctor, who like everyone else in town was in the barn. By the time he came out, blood had already started to soak Meredith’s dress. He knew there was something wrong with the baby, and if there was hope of helping both mom and baby, the closest doctor was the best chance.
Seeing the cramped space had him searching on his phone for the nearest hospital. Even breaking every speed limit there was, the forty minutes it would take to get there was way too long. If the doctor could stop the bleeding, maybe there’d be time to get her to a proper hospital.
Since Toby had been instructed to lay her down on a table, the doctor hadn’t been out to say a word. Two nurses had rushed in behind the doctor, one of which shooed Toby out into the waiting room.
“You’re scaring the kid, Mattie. Why don’t you sit down for a few minutes?”
It wasn’t the first time Jimmy made the suggestion. Toby heard him just fine, but he’d never been good about handling stressful situations. The fact that he hardly knew Meredith didn’t matter. Someone he was fond of could very well be dying twenty feet away from him and there was absolutely nothing he could do about it.
“I asked you guys to take him home.”
Caleb had to stay to find the right people to help, but once Meredith was in the doctor’s hands, Toby had tried to keep him away from the action. It would’ve been easier if Toby was willing to leave Meredith alone with the doctor. Since Jimmy and Jen were doing nothing more than bothering Toby, it seemed logical that they could babysit for a little while.
“Yeah, and the kid’s decided we’re strangers so he won’t get in the car with us. Where’s his dad?”
At least Caleb had wised up about trusting Jimmy. The timing of it sucked, especially with Jimmy bringing up his dad.
“My dad died five months ago.”
Toby focused on the boy sitting next to Jen. Even though Jimmy claimed he was scared, Caleb didn’t show any emotion. He relayed the information about his dad being dead like he was saying the sky was blue. The boy had showed plenty of emotion the times Toby had been around him, so he had to assume he was an expert at concealing things when he wanted.
Jimmy cleared his throat, causing Toby to turn to look at him. Since Caleb was staring down at his feet, the boy didn’t acknowledge anyone studying him. Toby saw Jimmy tilt his head in Caleb’s direction and tried to relay something with his eyes.
His eyes showed some worry about Caleb. Toby knew a little more about the situation, and remembered Caleb talking the same way when he mentioned his father hitting his mother. Toby could only guess at the kind of life he’d had to make him act like an adult more than a child at such a young age.
“Look, Caleb, I know your mom doesn’t get along with anyone in town, but is there a friend or someone you can go hang out with f
or a while?”
Toby had to ask, even though he knew the answer. He’d seen Caleb with the other kids. They were friendly enough, but definitely not close enough that Caleb would leave the building without knowing how his mom was doing. If Toby didn’t already know about the town’s general feelings toward Meredith, it was clear when not one person came to volunteer to help with her son.
There were no lines outside to check on Meredith’s condition. Paul hadn’t even shown himself in the twenty minutes or so since Meredith had gone down. The only reason Toby knew the time was the large clock hanging over the reception desk in the office.
As much as he hated the waiting room, it was like just about every other waiting room he’d been in, just smaller. There were only six chairs, and on most days Toby imagined only one or two were ever used. The walls around them were covered in a light wallpaper with tiny flowers on it and the floor had white tile that reflected the bright florescent lights above their heads. Toby hated hospitals and waiting rooms, but he couldn’t think of anywhere else he wanted to be in that moment.
“Mom said I get to be here when the baby’s born. We still have a lot of days on the calendar before she’s supposed to come, but Mom said she might come early. She was teaching me how to get her to town on the ATV in case she couldn’t drive.”
The monotone, almost robotic voice, was eerie. All Toby could think about was how he’d love to show the kid some fun. If anyone deserved a day that he didn’t have to act like a grown-up, it was Caleb.
“Jesus,” Jimmy whispered. “What have you gotten yourself in to, Toby?”
“Nothing I can’t handle. You guys don’t have to be here. Since Caleb’s decided he’ll scream ‘stranger danger’ if you take him home, you can just head up to my place, or even better yet, back home.”