Bed of Lies

by Teresa Hill

  "Me, too. I love your family. Cincinnati sounds good to me."

  "Good. I think I might still have a job there. I've been talking to some people, thinking about some things, and... I love what I do. I mean, it's hard, and I don't always love it. But I feel like it's important, and it's what I need to do. Still, it's one kid at a time, and there are just so many of them."

  "And you probably get so tangled up in every one of them, and I just don't see how you keep doing that day after day. Important as it is, as strongly as you feel about it," she said.

  He nodded. "There's another way to fight. State by state. State law by state law, I mean. Not as personal, not as immediate, but it has the power to make a huge difference in time. I talked to my boss at the foundation about it the other day."

  "Oh, that sounds promising. What did he say?"

  "He thinks it's smart in the long-run, if we can find some money for the fight. So do I. And I don't think it would take the emotional toll on me that individual clients and trials do. What else? I'm on a roll here."

  "I... I don't know that I have anything else. Not at the moment," she admitted. "I just... I'm starting to see it. You and me together. To trust in us, what we want, what we feel."

  He looked absolutely amazing in that moment. Happier and more handsome than she'd ever seen him.

  She leaned in and kissed him softly, then asked, "So, do you want to make out on the back porch for a while? Or take me off to bed right now?

  "Wow, that's a tough choice," he said.

  She nodded, thinking in that moment, life was very, very good.

  * * *

  Two months went by so fast, it practically made Julie's head spin. The Christmas festival organizers did indeed need her in the worst way. They'd been right—no one could have come into the job cold, not knowing the town or the people or the festival, and gotten it done.

  But she knew how the whole thing worked. When she was growing up, she'd alternately thought it was the most sickeningly sweet, fake thing in the world—a storybook, small-town Christmas—or looked at it with a sick kind of longing that can come only from a child who will never have a holiday like that.

  This year, despite all the work she had to do, Zach made sure it was a Christmas to remember. She had to be at nearly all the events, and he insisted on coming with her, acting like they were visitors enjoying the festival. He claimed it would make her so much better at her job—seeing it all from that perspective—and he wanted her to be great at her job. Because he wanted her to keep it, so he could keep her here.

  She knew he was worried about that—her being willing to stay—and it didn't seem so bad now.

  Peter was doing okay. He went to school without grumbling most days, did most of his homework, hadn't gotten into any fights. They'd had tough days, like the one when their parents pleaded guilty to taking the money from the bank and were sentenced to two years in jail. But they'd gotten through it.

  Zach's father and brother-in-law were working on the house, and most days Zach was there with them. He liked keeping busy, and when he was growing up he'd helped them a lot on job sites. So he knew what he was doing. The house looked like a different place. She couldn't imagine how good it would look when they were done.

  Zach was feeling much better, like the man she'd always remembered, and yet different, in a good way. She'd never forget the vulnerability she'd seen in him, never forget the fact that he'd needed her. She thought he still did, and she knew she needed him.

  He'd given her the time she'd asked for.

  And now, somehow, it was a mere four days before Christmas. They were going to his parents' house for a party. Peter hadn't grumbled once about it. He was still smitten with Emma's oldest daughter. It was the funniest thing to watch. Awkward and sweet—and scary, thinking about the difficult years to come.

  Julie had promised him she wouldn't leave him again, and she thought Peter was starting to believe it.

  Zach called her every morning before she climbed out of bed to tell her that he was still there, right down the street, and that he still loved her. Nothing had changed there. She was starting to believe that nothing ever would.

  As they stood on the doorstep that day so close to Christmas, she found it hard to believe how much her life had changed in just a few short months, how full it was, how happy. She wasn't scared anymore, wasn't waiting for the rug to be snatched out from under her. It had been so odd at first when the fear slowly fell away, and once it was gone, she wondered how in the world she'd managed to live that way for so long.

  "Is Dana here yet?" Peter asked impatiently, as they waited at the door. He'd bought her a present and hidden it under his coat. He planned to slip it under the tree for her to find when she came here Christmas morning.

  "I think so," Julie said. Cars were parked up and down the block. It seemed like half the town was here.

  Sam opened the door himself and welcomed them inside. The house sparkled with candlelight and Christmas lights. It smelled heavenly. Rachel had been baking. And people were everywhere.

  Peter went off to find Dana. Julie left her coat in the foyer and went off to say hello to Grace, who was looking puzzled by something.

  "Why is the tree in the wrong place?" she asked Emma as Julie joined them.

  Julie looked at it and thought it wasn't, that it had always been on that side of the fireplace, but Emma said, "I don't know. I asked Mom, and she got the funniest look on her face."

  "I thought it had always been there," Julie said.

  "Not for years," Grace said. "Like... I don't know. Ever since Mom and Dad replaced that old sofa with the sectional. When was that? Six years ago?"

  "At least," Emma said.

  "And that was such a change, it took us years to get used to it," Grace said. "Mom just doesn't change things like that. You know how she is about traditions."

  Julie nodded, still thinking it looked to her like the tree was in the right place. One of Emma's daughters joined them and started complaining about the tree, too, and they all laughed.

  It was a good party. Relaxed. Happy. Normal, Julie realized. This was how they did holidays in this house. This was why she used to sneak down here every chance she got and stay for as long as they'd let her.

  She was feeling particularly nostalgic as the evening wore on. People started drifting off to go home. Peter went with Emma and her group for a sleigh ride afterward at the Christmas-tree farm Rachel's cousin owned.

  Zach asked Julie to stay, and she found herself easing into what she'd always thought of as her corner of his house. When the tree had been up, she had been nearly under it, beside the fireplace, where it was warm.

  She was thinking of those days, hiding here, soaking up the serenity, the laughter, the joy. At one time this place had been all she'd known that was good in the world, and Zach had always been here, always been a part of that. He came into the room and sat down on the floor beside her, putting his arm around her, kissing the side of her face. "Have a good time?"

  "Yes. It was great. I can't believe it's almost Christmas."

  It seemed like the time had flown by, and then at times, it seemed like she'd always been here. In her new life. With him. Already, she couldn't imagine living without him.

  He picked up a little package from under the tree and handed it to her. "I have special permission for you to open this one thing early."

  "Special permission?" She laughed, because it was too big to be a ring box and it weighed too much. It was maybe four inches square all around, so she figured she was safe.

  "Yes. My mother has strict rules about these things."

  "I remember." They were a Christmas-morning family. None of that opening things on Christmas Eve or earlier for the McRaes. "Sure I need to open it now?"

  Zach nodded, looking at her intently, making her nervous with the look.

  She got a little uneasy and started babbling instead of tearing at the paper. "We were talking about that earlier. How seldom your m
other changes anything. Grace and Emma and about fifty other people commented on the tree being on this side of the room instead of the other."

  "Uh-huh," he said.

  And all of a sudden that made her nervous, too.

  "I asked her to put it over here," he said.

  That was... odd. Julie had a little trouble breathing all of a sudden. She managed to get out, "Why?"

  "Why would I want the tree here, Julie?"

  "I don't—"

  "Yes, you do."

  "Well... Why would this matter to him? Unless, he really had noticed everything, forever. Unless he would take note of the smallest things that had ever meant something to her. Even something like how she was most comfortable here in his house. "This is my corner," she said.

  He nodded, a hint of a grin playing at the corners of his mouth.

  She loved to kiss that spot on his cheeks, where the dimples were. She loved to kiss any little part of him at all, and she liked sitting in this corner of his house, by the fireplace. At Christmas it put her right beside the tree. She could nearly disappear here, and it was familiar and comforting, and he'd noticed.

  And made his mother move the tree for her, so it would be the same way it had been all those years ago, when she was a lost little girl and he was watching out for her, trying to make things easier for her. Just being there when she needed him.

  "Open the box, Julie."

  Her hands started to tremble. Tears filled her eyes. Still, she kept telling herself it wasn't a ring. It was too heavy. "You're sure... It's not even Christmas...."

  "You'll need it for Christmas," he said.

  For Christmas? What did she need for Christmas that came in a box this size?

  "Go ahead," he told her.

  She took a breath and unwrapped it, finding a little cube-shaped white box. Puzzled, she opened the lid. He took it from her, then tipped the box upside-down so that a bundle of something wrapped in white tissue paper fell into her cupped hands. She peeled back layer after layer. Whatever was inside must be fragile. Someone had gone to great lengths to protect it. Finally, she undid the last layer.

  It was a star-shaped ornament. A beautiful star made of beveled glass. Zach's mother made them. It was one of their most sacred traditions.

  "You know what this means," Zach said.

  Julie nodded, crying now. "I thought it was going to be something else, but this? This is even better."

  Because she knew exactly what this meant to him, to his family. The little glass star had her name etched into it and a date, from the year she was seven.

  "You've always been a part of us," he said.

  Julie nodded, simply unable to say a word.

  Zach turned the ornament around in her hand, and on the other side was a different date, a different name.

  Julie McRae.

  The date was next year's.

  In Zach's family, everyone had an ornament. Handmade, just like this one, with their names on it and the dates they'd become a part of the family. They gathered together on Christmas Day and one by one hung their ornaments and those of family members long passed away.

  She'd seen them do it so many times, and it never failed to evoke a longing that sometimes felt like it might choke her, right there on the spot. "I've always wanted one of these," she whispered.

  She'd always wanted to belong. Right here.

  "There's another one. For Peter. He'll be a part of this, too."

  Julie nodded, still crying. Zach would do it this way.

  "I want them hanging on the tree with all the others on Christmas Day," he said.

  Julie nodded. "I'd... I'd... Oh, Zach."

  "I have the other little box, too," he said, pulling out one that surely had a ring in it. "Did I give you enough time?"

  "Yes." She cried again, throwing her arms around him, as he did the same, holding on so tight.

  "You believe me now? Finally? You believe in us? Forever?"

  "Yes."

  She believed in every good thing in the world, all coming to her, with a man so strong and sure, absolutely unwavering in his faith in them and his determination.

  Being in his arms was the best place on earth.

  The End

  Read more about the McRae's

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  Five Days Grace

  Twelve Days

  Edge of Heaven

  Excerpt from

  Five Days Grace

  The McRae’s Series

  Book Four

  by

  Teresa Hill

  USA Today Bestselling Author

  The dog cried the whole way, sticking so close he nearly tripped Aidan three times, the last in the cabin doorway. They came inside as a single muddle of man, dog and a giant bag of dog food, which Aidan gingerly lowered to the floor by the door.

  Tink whined and danced around on wet, muddy feet, while Aidan toed off his heavy boots, shrugged out of his wet jacket and hung it on a hook on the back of the door.

  Outside, the storm was even louder, cracks of lightning, the rolling boom of thunder, pounding rain sounding like hell itself on the cabin's tin roof.

  And then, just before he was about to flick on the light, out of the corner of his eye, Aidan saw something out of place.

  No, he realized, a lot of things out of place.

  He slowly panned right until he could see the whole room, a small, rustic, combination living room/kitchen.

  Someone had ransacked the place, quickly, sloppily.

  Aidan reached above the kitchen cabinet to his right, where he'd stashed a loaded Sig Sauer, telling himself to breathe, to remember both that he was still a little revved up by the accident and that he wasn't in a war zone anymore. Moving silently, he clicked off the safety, taking aim on the doorway that led to two bedrooms and a small bathroom at the back of the cabin.

  There was a lock on the cabin door, a totally ineffective one, but Aidan used it anyway, every time he left. He'd put the key in the lock when he returned a moment ago, had turned the key, but had the lock already been disengaged? He honestly couldn't remember. He'd been juggling dog food and dog, and there'd been lightning, rain and incessant dog noises.

  So he wasn't really sure if the door had been unlocked or not, but there was a little, niggling feeling in the back of his head that someone else was here, and no one else was supposed to be.

  Only four other people even knew where he was, his shrink, his commanding officer, his brother and the guy who'd loaned him the cabin. None of them would just drop by or let themselves in, except for Zach, but surely the man wouldn't tear his own cabin apart.

  Burglar? Aiden had a hard time thinking so. The place looked like a wreck from the outside. It was okay on the inside, but certainly nothing fancy. Surely there were more promising places to rob.

  More likely, someone who was hungry and just looking to get out of the rain, maybe stay a while, probably not cause any trouble. So it was highly unlikely he'd need the Sig, but he'd been shot before. He wasn't going to take chances on being gunned down in a tiny town in southwestern Ohio.

  Of course, it was possible that someone had come looking for him, someone who wanted to hurt him, but he really didn't think so. There'd been vague threats, but he'd been sure his CO had made more of them than was warranted to get Aidan out of the hospital before he really went nuts.

  Still, he'd nearly died three and a half months ago, still wasn't a hundred percent recovered, so he wasn't interested in a fight of any kind, not when he could simply pull out the Sig and knew well how to use it.

  He eased around the corner to press his back against the wall that led to the bedrooms and bathroom. As small as the place was, it couldn't take that long for even the sloppiest, most amateur thief to toss it, and there was only one exit. When the guy walked back into this room, Aidan would have a gun pressed against the guy's back before he knew what was happening.

  Minutes ticked by, the dog whining and dancing around, making the
biggest damned mess on the floor, and sometimes over the noise of the storm, Aidan thought he might have heard someone else crying, too.

  Finally, he heard footsteps.

  A shadow appeared, halting a step inside the room and staring at the dog. For once, the damned thing proved useful.

  Aidan stepped to the left, pressed the gun to the shadow's back and hooked an elbow across the guy's throat. "Don't move."

  He barely got the words out before he heard a scream, a distinctly feminine scream, and if that weren't enough to convince him that his would-be thief was female, her height and small frame would have.

  He planned to wait out the screaming, so she could hear him when he spoke, so he could back this down, slow and easy. He really didn't want to hurt her. But the dog either took exception to the whole thing or got scared and wanted to huddle against their legs. The girl elbowed Aidan hard in his gut, managing to catch a still-healing incision from his surgery.

  Fuck, that hurt.

  She lunged away from him, tripping over the dog, and he went right after her, not willing to let her go while also trying to protect her as they fell. The dog howled in outrage or maybe fear, and scampered out of the way. Aidan and the girl landed hard on the floor, although he managed to twist sideways with her and take most of the blow on his right side, the rebuilt hip hurting like a son of a bitch. She landed half on top of him and half on the floor, struggling like mad.

  Did she not realize that if he wanted to, he could have killed her three times over already?

  Rolling her over, he pinned her facedown on the floor, straddling her hips as he sat, purposely putting all his weight on top of her. He pulled one of her arms behind her back, hard enough that if she tried to move too much, it was going to hurt, but if she just relaxed and stayed there, it wouldn't.

  Took her a minute to figure that out, screaming the whole time, the dog dancing around the two of them, seemingly unable to figure out if this was some kind of game or if Aidan was trying to hurt her. He whined, barked, cried and then finally licked the girl's face, bringing forth a howl of outrage from her, and then, finally blessed silence.