The Time in Between

by Kristen Ashley

  Stone apparently had no response to that so he just stood there seething.

  So Coert gave me a jostle before he let me go and prompted, “Cuffs, Cady.”

  “You’re not arresting me,” Stone snapped.

  “I am if you don’t get your ass out of my house,” Coert replied.

  Stone stared at Coert then glared at me before he turned and walked out the front door.

  He slammed it, making the glass rattle.

  “What an ass,” Coert muttered.

  I turned to him. “Coert—”

  He looked at me and didn’t allow me to say another word.

  “Don’t think about it for a second.”

  “But he—”

  “Listen to me,” Coert demanded.

  And the way he did, I shut my mouth and listened.

  “If you think that guy can do me dirty, you should know Jake was a professional boxer who built a junior boxing league and has been running it for years. Parents love him. And not just parents right now. Parents and the kids he taught how to box for the last however-many years he’s been running the thing and kept them fit, helped them learn how to defend themselves and gave them a good male role model to use when it was their time to start to become good men. And Josie’s family has been living in Lavender House for over a century and her grandmother wasn’t beloved, she was practically worshipped in this town. And Josie adopting Ethan after his mother all but forgot him elevated her to that status in about a second.”

  Ethan’s mother all but forgot him?

  Josie hadn’t shared that with me. Although considering she had adopted him, I assumed something like that had to happen, unless the woman had sadly passed. But I hadn’t yet asked mostly because whatever had to happen would have to be sensitive and there hadn’t been an appropriate time.

  Still, how awful.

  Coert kept talking through my musings.

  “And Mick’s a volunteer firefighter who’s put his ass on the line repeatedly to keep people safe and save property, and his family owns Maine Fresh Maritime frozen seafood and not only is he loaded, his family helped settle Magdalene. Not to mention Amy is Amelia Hathaway, of the Hathaways, the oil gazillionaires. She’s got more money than you and me will see in five lifetimes or Boston Stone could ever dream of conniving a way to get in his bank account.”

  I knew Amy was a Hathaway.

  She’d seemed embarrassed when she’d shared for some odd reason, but she told me.

  Coert kept at it.

  “And you’re loaded and not only used your money to restore what the townspeople consider their pride and joy, you opened it to the public which is something they’ve never had. So they’re not gonna give a shit you married Moreland. You’re you and one look at you tells anyone you’re no gold digger. But you stayed married to the guy for seventeen years and anyone who meets you will know in about two seconds that was about love and loyalty.”

  Wow, that was sweet.

  Coert continued, “But even if I didn’t have all that firepower behind me, Alyssa’s just gotta open her mouth at the salon and drop the right thing in a few ears and he’s toast.”

  This was absolutely true. Everyone knew in a small town it wasn’t the town paper, it was the town’s beauty salon where everyone got their news.

  Coert wasn’t finished.

  “That man doesn’t scare me, Cady. And that man shouldn’t scare you. He’s a megalomaniac who thinks money means everything and the fact he has a lot of it gives him delusions of grandeur. I said he’s a joke because he’s a joke. If she had a mind to do it, Amelia alone could crush him. This project is not going forward. He’s not going to get me impeached. And you’re waking up in my bed every day, and hope to God for the next however many months, doing it pregnant with my child. I got that, nothing can touch me, Cady. Not a fucking thing.”

  He put his hands to my jaw and dipped his face close to mine.

  “Now let’s go check on our dog, and just in case all the energy we’ve been putting into it hasn’t actually taken root, we should see about keepin’ that effort going. And just to say, my call is to find out the sex. My boy is gonna be bedding down in a room that’s blue. It’s a girl, I’ve learned the drill, and when we do up the baby room, it’s gonna be all about pink. None of that neutral yellow shit, lying in wait to see what we get. When they come home, we’re gonna be ready for them.”

  When they come home, we’re gonna be ready for them.

  I stood in the foyer of an old, renovated farmhouse on the coast of Maine and felt the phantom wet of beer gliding over my fingers as I stared up into hazel eyes that I saw right there, I’d seen across a pillow from me, across a room from me, across a great emotional divide, and for almost two decades, in my dreams.

  It had taken years and we’d lived through everything, even murder.

  And we were right there.

  Nothing can touch me, Cady. Not a fucking thing.

  “Cady?” he called, the pads of his fingers digging into my flesh.

  “I’ve made a lot of mistakes in my life—”

  Coert dipped his face closer and it came in a whisper when repeated, “Cady.”

  “But I was spot on when I made the decision to believe in you.”

  His forehead came to rest on mine and he got so close, our noses rested alongside each other’s.

  And we stood in the foyer of an old, renovated farmhouse on the coast of Maine, so close, when Coert’s eyes closed, his lashes swept through mine.

  Then he kissed me.

  He tasted of chill nights and wool sweaters and sea breezes and holding hands and playful teases and crooked grins and warm eyes and man and musk and sex and a million, billion other things that made Coert that I’d discovered, and a million, billion more I hadn’t yet, and I couldn’t have stopped my tongue from touching his in my need, my hunger, my yearning to have more.

  He slanted his head and gave me more, wrapping his arms around me and pulling me deep into his body.

  We consumed each other’s mouths in the foyer until I broke the kiss, broke from his hold but grabbed urgently at his hand and tugged him toward the stairs. I was at the foot of them when he tugged me back around and his mouth slammed down on mine again.

  His hands were everywhere, but his tongue was my entire universe, until I felt him yanking up my sweater.

  I lifted my arms and took a step back to draw him closer to where I wanted us to go.

  He pulled my sweater free just as the heel of my boot caught on the first riser.

  I started going down but Coert caught me around the waist and he didn’t stop my descent, he just controlled it, following me to the stairs.

  We kissed and touched and tore at each other’s clothes as we made our way up the stairs, and it wasn’t until we were at the top that Coert came up to his feet with arms around me pulling me up with him.

  I was in my bra and undies and his diamond, he was in his boxer briefs, our sweaters, jeans, socks and boots strewn along the stairs when we turned and kissed and turned and kissed as we made our short way down the hall, banging into walls, hitting the doorframe to his bedroom, each of us half groping, half struggling to get the upper hand.

  Coert got impatient then and caught me just below my bottom and around my upper back.

  He picked me up and strolled to the bed where he put me down.

  “Don’t move,” he growled, towering over me.

  I only let my eyes move to follow him to the closet.

  He disappeared in it for moments but came out naked and hard, his thick cock rising proud from the spring of dark curls between his legs. That lumbering gait of his I loved so much and was such a part of him, his utter confidence in himself and his physique, his burning eyes intent on me, I felt a rush of wet hit between my legs and a whimper escape my lips.

  He got to where I was lying horizontal across the bed, my calves over the side, and he bent to me.

  He put a hand in the bed beside me and I watched the back of his
strong neck, the muscles moving in his shoulders and back, as he put his lips to the skin just under my bra between my breasts and he trailed them down to my belly.

  I held my breath as he stayed there, just his lips brushing my skin before he turned his head, and I felt the gentle abrasion of his evening whiskers grazing my skin. Claiming me. Staking his territory. Declaring me and what might lie beneath what he was doing and where he was doing it as all his.

  My God, Coert Yeager was just . . .

  Everything.

  I slid my fingers in his hair and whispered, “Baby.”

  He lifted his head, his chin scraping my skin, his beautiful eyes hitting mine, as his fingers curled into the sides of my panties.

  More wet saturated my sex as he slid them down my thighs and they fell down my calves and only then did Coert join me in bed.

  Gathering me to him, his fingers flicked the hooks on the back of my bra. It came undone, he pulled it off my arms and tossed it aside as he hit a hip in the bed and rolled to his back, turning me, pulling me over, positioning me so I had his rock-hard cock in my face.

  Before I could do a thing about it, his hands pressing in at my bottom, my knees slid down the comforter on either side of his head and his mouth was on me.

  I pulsed into him, my neck arching back, then I rocked against him, reached to his iron shaft, curled my fingers around tight and sucked it deep.

  He growled into my wet, instantly moving from lapping to hungry, insatiable eating.

  Like we’d consumed each other’s mouths, we consumed each other’s bodies, Coert’s fingers gripping the cheeks of my behind, biting into me, driving me against his tongue. I cupped his balls in one hand, stroked his cock with the other one as I bobbed and sucked.

  And I sucked hard.

  I didn’t lick. This wasn’t playing around. This wasn’t going slow.

  This was us, taking all we could get of everything we had as fast as we could.

  I tasted salt on my tongue, knew he was ready and it was an enormous relief because I was so close to ready too, I was about to stop and beg him to take me.

  I wanted to climax with him inside me, connected, looking into my hazel.

  I was on my back before I could consciously slip him out of my mouth and Coert was dragging me up his thighs, looming over me, wrapping my legs around his hips. His eyes roaming, starving, all over me, one of his hands left my leg and went between us.

  I felt him coating the head of his cock with my wet before his gaze locked on mine and he drove inside.

  My back arched again, my hands went over my head, clutching the edge of the bed, using it as leverage to push down into his strokes.

  He held my hips steady and slammed into me. I could hear his heavy breathing rasp in the room, grating against the sound of mine, when I felt him drift a hand over my hipbone, in, and his thumb hit my clit.

  Oh yes.

  “Coert.”

  “Yes.”

  “Coert.”

  “Yeah, Cady.”

  He pounded into me and I watched his face, flushed and hard, staring at mine like it was the only thing in the room, the only thing on earth, the only thing in the universe, and I understood that, because he was the only thing in mine.

  His thumb pressed harder and circled.

  “Coert,” I whimpered, starting to lose our rhythm, needing to let go.

  “Cady,” he grunted, the muscles in his neck standing out.

  He circled my clit hard, slammed into me, I let go and went flying.

  I heard his growls turn to groans as he bucked between my legs and pushed my orgasm higher manipulating my clit, but it just added to the glory of floating on nothing but his cock buried deep inside, his cum flooding me, connected to Coert.

  I was gasping and falling, again feeling the bed under me, when Coert’s thumb left me and he fell forward into a hand on the bed, arm straight, his other hand still steady on my hip.

  Dazedly, I focused on the top of his head, which was bent, staring down our bodies to where he was gently stroking me with his cock.

  “Coert,” I whispered.

  Instantly, his head came up, his eyes sought mine, he buried himself inside and then he lowered himself to me, releasing my hip so he could brace some of his weight into a forearm.

  “Yeah?” he asked softly.

  “Yeah,” I replied.

  He brushed his mouth to mine and again and again, before he gave me a sweet, wet kiss. He broke the connection of our mouths to rest his forehead against mine.

  “That hit the top five,” I told him.

  I watched the light of humor hit his eyes. “Agreed.”

  I grinned at him even if he was so close, he couldn’t see my mouth.

  Then I asked, “Did you have dinner?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Was Midnight okay?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Do you want to do that again?”

  I felt his body shake with his amusement, a body still connected to mine.

  But he answered, “Yeah.”

  Then he kissed me.

  And we did it again.

  But we went slower that time.

  Impatient?

  Cady

  Present day . . .

  THE PHONE RANG AND I felt Midnight jerk, heard Coert growl, and I opened my eyes as he kept hold of me but twisted at the waist to reach toward his phone on the nightstand.

  This was not unusual. At least once a week Coert got late night calls. Bad things happened all the time, but they had a favorite time of day and that time was nighttime.

  It was the way of the world and it was the way of my life with Coert.

  I had to admit in the beginning it took some getting used to.

  But Coert was not one of those men who came home and complained about work. He did what he was meant to be doing. He was committed to it. And even if it didn’t cause euphoria, I knew it meant something to him to be the man he was to the people of this county.

  So I very quickly learned to get used to it.

  That said, that night after Midnight had her turn, after we’d shared what we’d shared in bed, when the next day we’d learn if we were pregnant, and when the weather was nasty outside and the roads were grim (and I knew this because this was not the first call Coert had received, rain had turned to sleet then to snow, there was ice everywhere, the salt trucks had rolled out hours before, but people still needed to go places, and on ice, that wasn’t easy), I didn’t want him going anywhere.

  “Yeager,” he said into his phone.

  I looked at the alarm clock.

  It was just after midnight.

  He listened then said, “Yeah. Right. How’re the roads?” More listening and then, “Okay. That means I’ll be there in half an hour, forty minutes.”

  Damn.

  “Later,” he finished, I heard a beep and Coert turned back to me. “Gotta go, Cady.”

  “What is it?” I asked.

  “Car accident,” he answered. “Alcohol is involved.”

  Alcohol?

  “In this weather?”

  “People drink all the time, even when it’s snowy, baby. And if they do enough of it, they do stupid stuff.”

  This was sadly true.

  “Go back to sleep,” he ordered.

  Normally, I did that.

  The first few times he was called away, that hadn’t come easy, but I got there. Then it just became par for the course.

  But bad roads, I wasn’t so sure.

  However, he didn’t need to know that.

  “Okay,” I replied.

  He found my lips in the dark and kissed me.

  Then he did what he always did when he left me in bed like this, sliding from under the covers so the cold didn’t hit me then being careful to arrange them around me even though he didn’t have to.

  Midnight, apparently fully recovered after her ordeal (Coert had brought her to bed with us after we got finished with our activities earlier, she’d been g
roggy but awake), jumped off the bed and did what she always did when this happened. She followed him around as he went behind closed doors in the closet and bathroom to get ready without bothering me with any lights (something else he always did).

  He came back to me when he was suited up, bent over me and gave my temple a kiss.

  “Be home as soon as I can,” he murmured.

  “Okay, honey. Be careful.”

  “Yeah,” he replied.

  I felt him leave me but knew he was giving Midnight a rubdown when he said, “Stay with your mom.”

  It wasn’t like she knew what he was saying. I heard him snap repeatedly and knew he was motioning to the bed when she jumped up.

  I watched his shadow move to the door and called, “Love you,” when he was almost out of it.

  “Love you back,” he replied.

  Then he was gone.

  Midnight and I tried to sleep.

  And when that didn’t work, we tried some more.

  And when that didn’t work, I turned on the light on the nightstand, got out of bed, put on some socks and Midnight and I went to find my book.

  I located it in the living room, assessed my alertness, then Midnight and I went to the kitchen and made some herbal tea.

  As the kettle boiled, I looked over my dog to assess her alertness and was pleased to see she seemed no worse for the wear. The sedative had worn off and she was just Midnight.

  My tea made, Midnight, my book, my mug and I went back to bed.

  I tried to read.

  I failed in trying to read.

  I kept going, sipping tea, stroking Midnight where she lay stretched down my side, but I eventually gave up, stared at the curtains over the window and wondered what it was like out there.

  Rain to snow, it was probably beautiful.

  Beautiful and treacherous.

  On this thought, Midnight’s head jerked up, she woofed then she got to her feet and trotted off the bed and out of the room.

  I looked to Coert’s alarm clock.

  It was now just before three.

  No barking commenced, so I got out of bed, went to the chair in the corner, grabbed my cardigan and I was shrugging it on as I walked out of the room and down the hall to the mouth of the stairs.