by Rachel Hauck
“Here’s my den and a powder room. Upstairs we have three bedrooms with a hall bath. But here is our domain, sweetheart.” He waved the pencil over a large square at the end of the second floor. “This is a bay window overlooking the pond and the north meadow.”
“Rhett, darling, it’s huge. Can we afford such a place?”
“With a small mortgage, yes. We’ve earned this, Ev. Besides,” he said, kissing her temple with tenderness and adoration, “nothing is too good for you. Look at this attached bath with a tub and a shower. No sharing with any of our dastardly brats when they come along.” His laughed. His easy glee tickled Everleigh.
Tell him! The timing was perfect.
“Rhett, sweetheart—”
He jerked his wrist up, checking his watch. “Oh, Ev, sorry, sweetheart, but I promised Dad I’d pick him up from the hardware store thirty minutes ago.” He gave her a quick, passing kiss. “I’d planned to show you these tonight, but I just couldn’t wait.” He rolled up the drawings and tucked them into the canister. “What is it you wanted to say?” On reflex, he checked his watch again.
“Nothing,” she said, smiling. “I’ll see you later. We can talk then. I have work to do anyway.”
“You sure?”
Everleigh fell into him and pressed her cheek against his chest. “You make my dreams come true, Rhett Applegate.”
He kissed her one more time, then held her at arm’s length. “Distraction, girl, you are one beautiful distraction.”
“Go, your dad’s waiting.” She watched him go, then in a flash of love and excitement, ran after him, her low heels echoing down the hall and down the stairs until she caught him in the street, standing under the slanting light of the Texas afternoon.
“Rhett!”
He turned and caught her in his big embrace. “What is it, darling?”
“I can’t wait. I just can’t.” Her heart thumped in her ears as she drew a deep breath. “I’m going to have a baby, Rhett. Come November, you’re going to be a daddy.”
He whooped as he scooped her up in his arms and twirled her around. “I’m going to be a daddy.” When he set her down, he hollered at the shoppers hurrying past the storefronts. “I’m going to be a daddy. This here’s my wife, Everleigh. She’s going to have a baby.”
The passersby laughed, offering congratulations.
Everleigh kissed Rhett good-bye one last time and hurried back to work. See, her life was perfect. Just as she dreamed it would be.
chapter five
Beck
“Holiday!” Lieutenant Ingram stood in his office door, arms akimbo, his expression drawn and tight.
Leaving her desk, Beck braced for the chewing-out of the decade. Then she’d drop her bomb and duck away from the shrapnel.
She’d debated telling him. After all, he didn’t need to be involved, but her condition would affect her future with the department. And maybe, if she was lucky, gain her some sympathy after punching a cuffed offender and leaving.
“Close the door,” he said, using his desk as a barrier between them. “Want to tell me what’s going on? You hit a perp, then walked off the job. The captain was all over me about this. Misconduct, dereliction of duty—”
“It was a rough night.” She kept her eyes low and averted, her dropping adrenaline giving her small tremors.
“Rough night? Beck, I’ve seen you hold a dying man in your arms as he bled all over you. The next hour you chased a known drug dealer down a dark alley. Two years ago you broke your wrist wrestling that woman who was beating her man with a bat. You went to the hospital and came right back to work.” He bent to see her face. “You have to give me more than ‘rough night.’” Besides being her boss, Hunter Ingram was her friend. More than a friend by some estimations. They’d . . . tangoed . . . one night. In a closet. At Rosie’s Bar.
“I wasn’t feeling good and Boudreaux had this dog—”
“So you punched him?”
She raised her chin and propped her hands on her belt. “Yeah, I punched him. He deserved it, and I’m not sorry. He fed the dog crack. How many times do we have to arrest him only to see him out on the streets within twenty-four hours? It makes our job worthless, Hunter.”
“You can’t whale on a cuffed offender, Beck.” Hunter came around to the front of the desk. “You of all people should know that. You’re by the book, Beck.”
“Did you hear what he did to the dog? His drug mule? The poor thing was in so much pain I could barely pick him up. He was half dead, smelling of feces and vomit.” She turned away from him, arms folded, facing the door. “It was too much. Just too much. Then Boudreaux said he was going to eat him for barbecue and well, I snapped.”
“I hope it was worth it.” Beck glanced back at him. “You’re suspended. Four weeks without pay.”
“Four weeks?” She whirled around to meet him face-to-face. “What the—” Choice blue words flowed over her lips. “Without pay? Tuttle was arrested for public intoxication and only got two weeks with pay.”
“Different time, Beck. This is coming down from 1 PP. Zero tolerance for anything smacking of police brutality.”
“Hunter, look, I knew something was coming. After all, I do know the book.” She air quoted the book. “But Parker Boudreaux is a known drug runner in this precinct. He’s hurt a lot of people. Way more than the punch—”
“Or two.” Clearly the lieutenant had all the details.
“Or two I gave him.”
“And you walked off the job.”
“To save a living being. A sweet, innocent dog. I don’t see how any of this merits me four weeks without pay. I want my union rep in here.”
“He’s already signed off on your suspension. Hogan confirmed the events after the kid’s parents lawyered up and filed charges for police brutality. We have his body cam footage, and yours as well.”
“Hunter, this is crazy. You know it is. Boudreaux is a scumbag. Who knows what homeless, innocent animal he’ll lure into his lair next? If this is some PR stunt, then why don’t we tell New York about the dealings of this Upper West Side rich brat who’s squandering his life and harming dogs, huh? How many families are destroyed by the product he sells? How many lives lost? Everyone in the city would be on my side.”
Hunter reached back for a copy of the New York Post. “If you’d answer your phone, you’d know the Boudreauxes already went to the papers.”
Front page above the fold was a picture of Beck and the headline police brutality: attack on son of prominent manhattan businessman.
“You’ve got to be kidding me.” She tossed the paper back at Hunter. “I thought his parents were good people.”
“I thought you were a good cop. Smashing Boudreaux, no matter what he did—”
“A defenseless animal, Hunter.” Against her will, hot tears surfaced. “I thought we were supposed to protect and defend. You should’ve seen him. All matted and in pain.” Beck held up her hand. “His . . . his tears dripped right here.”
“Dogs don’t cry like people, Beck.”
She lunged at him. “I’m telling you he was crying.”
Hunter stepped back, hands raised. “Okay, okay. Sheesh, I never knew you to be so emotional over a dog. Or anything else for that matter.”
Beck turned away. It was the baby hormones. Had to be. “So, four weeks without pay?”
“Yes. We dropped the charges against Boudreaux with the condition he goes to rehab. That should keep him away from Vinny for a while. But to make the lawsuit go away, we had to suspend you.”
“Rehab? Oh joy. A holiday in a luxury resort where he’ll blame his parents for everything. In six weeks they’ll give him a gold star and put him right back out on the streets.” Beck swore and kicked Hunter’s ficus, knocking the tree into the wall. “Who’s running this city? Rich businessmen? We’ve been trying to collar Vinny for years. Boudreaux was our best bet. We had him. Why didn’t the DA dangle that in front of him? Talk or prosecution?”
“Becaus
e he had police brutality as his trump card.” Hunter filled a small paper cup with water from the cooler in the corner and offered it to Beck. “This incident goes into your record too, Beck. When you get back, you’ll be on probation for a year.”
“This is such bull.” She drained water from the cup.
“Any repeat offenses could result in termination.”
She crunched the paper cup into a wad and slammed it into the trash can. “So I’m the whipping girl?”
“They’re holding you up as an example. I probably, unofficially, agree with everything you did, but you picked the wrong time to swing. The commissioner’s office is eager to advance our good reputation in the city and really, the world.”
Beck reached for her service weapon and shield and tossed them onto Hunter’s desk. If she waited to be asked, she’d crumble with humiliation. He may as well strip her naked and parade her round the squad.
“Go home, get some rest, Beck. You don’t look well.” His sympathy was evident in his tone and expression. “I’m sorry about this.”
Beck dropped into the chair across from his desk, head in her hands. “Not your fault.”
Hunter was fifteen years her senior, handsome and confident, a poster boy for the NYPD. He ran marathons and volunteered at a local boys club. On his credenza was a row of pictures with his smiling, beautiful wife, Gaynor. By her expression she respected and adored her husband.
Guilt and shame welled up. She’d take a year’s suspension without pay to undo what she’d done. To undo the growing consequence.
“What are you going to do on your month off?”
Beck crossed her arms, feeling insecure without her NYPD credentials. Badge and gun. Who was she if not a cop?
“I just learned I inherited a house in Florida of all things.”
“A house?” Hunter said. “From who?”
“Some lady we knew back in the day.”
“The days you’ve forgotten?”
“Something like that.” She stood, fighting a wave of despair and nausea.
Hunter was one of the few in the Ninth who knew about her memory loss. She had to tell him when he tried to reminisce with her about her old man.
“He had this giant, drunk man down on the ground before I could say, ‘Stop. Police.’”
“Where in Florida? You know Vinny has connections in north Florida. You could go down, keep an eye out for any suspicious activity.” He chuckled and Beck snarled.
“I’m suspended, remember?”
“I think you should check it out. Forget this dingy place for a few weeks. Get out of winter.”
“Maybe. But in my mind the house is a broken-down hovel with nineteen cats roaming the rooms. I’m not even sure the will is legit.”
“Talk to legal. Have them snoop around.”
“Again, suspended.” Sarcasm eased some of the pain.
What was she going to do with herself for four weeks? With nothing consuming her days, she’d have to face the truth. She was almost five months—five months—pregnant.
Beck peered at Hunter. “Um, there is something I need to tell you. At least I think I should tell you.”
The door rattled with a heavy knock, and Sergeant Anstruther barged on in. “Holiday,” he said, tipping his head to one side, feigning some sort of sympathy. “I heard you popped Boudreaux.”
“Get out.” She jumped up and slammed the door in his face, almost catching his fingertips against the frame.
“Beck, what is the matter with you?” Hunter yanked open the door, advising Anstruther to come back in a few minutes.
“I’m pregnant.” She dropped back down in her chair.
“You’re—” His complexion washed white as he reached to steady himself. “Excuse me?”
“I’m pregnant.” This time her confession came soft and low.
“H-how . . . can you be . . . Wh-who’s the fath—?”
She shot him a wry expression, and he stumbled backward into his filing cabinet. He was the father.
They’d been teasing each other for a year, engaging in a bit of harmless flirting. Then last summer they met up at Rosie’s bar after the failed bust. They drank and complained, then danced and flirted, drank some more, and well—
She scrubbed the image of them entangled in the utility closet from her mind.
“That was five months ago.” He frowned as his eyes drifted to her middle. “Are you sure?”
Beck twisted her fingers together and nodded. “I’m sure.”
“Beck, my wife—” He yanked her to her feet. “How could you let this happen?”
“Me?” She jerked free. “I don’t recall being in that closet alone.”
“You said it was safe.”
“Did I? I don’t remember anyone pausing to ask birth-control questions. We were trashed, Hunter.”
Hunter ran his hands over his face. “W-what are we going to do? My wife, she’s . . . I can’t . . .” He sat hard in his chair. “She knows about the night at Rosie’s. I couldn’t keep it in any longer. We built our marriage on trust and—”
“You told her? Oh my gosh! It was one night. One stupid night.”
“Because one evening she looked at me with those big brown trusting eyes and asked what I wanted to do for our anniversary and all I heard was, ‘Cheater, cheater, cheater.’”
“So you broke her heart to clear your conscience?”
“After she punched me out of the bed—”
“I like this woman.”
“—we talked all night. We’d been ignoring some issues in our marriage and knew we had to get some help. Believe it or not, she’s forgiven me.”
Beck regarded him for a long moment. “But she won’t if you tell her about the baby?”
“I don’t know. I assured her you were not—” Another deep sigh echoed in the room. “This will crush her. You don’t know . . . You don’t know.”
“Then don’t tell her. I’ve got this.”
“Do you? Really? You’ve just been suspended for four weeks. You’re on the edge, Beck. You still live with your parents. Are you sure—”
She shot to her feet, knocking over her chair. “I don’t need a lecture on my life from you.” She gave him a mock salute and turned for the door.
“Wait.” Hunter stepped to the door, blocking her exit. “How? How are you going to go this alone?”
“I don’t know. Guess I have something to think about on my suspension.”
“This baby is not just your problem. It’s mine too. You know it or you wouldn’t have told me.”
“I don’t know why I told you.”
“Because I’m going to be a father.” He swore, shrugging out of his suit coat, loosening his tie. “So what’s the plan?”
“Well, since rolling back time isn’t an option—”
“I’ve never done this before. Cheated.” He pressed his hand to his chest, drawing in short, quick breaths. “The captain will have me—”
“Hunter, there’s no need for anyone to know. I plan to say it was an old boyfriend.”
“You don’t need to cover for me.”
“It’s not for you. It’s for me. You think I want a rep of sleeping with my superiors? I’ve never done this either.”
“What about the baby? Doesn’t he deserve to know his father?”
“In a perfect world, yes. But this is far from perfect. Hunter, I’ll take care of this.” She tried for the door again, but he refused to move.
“Let me know what you need, Beck. I’ll try to be there for you. Have you seen a doctor?”
“I have an appointment on the third.”
“Will you keep me posted?”
Their eyes met and she saw his guilt, his apology, and the layers of pain they’d inflicted on his wife. On the baby.
“I think you should just let me take care of this myself. I’m not even sure I want to raise it. I’ve been considering adoption.”
“Adoption? Are you sure?”
“No, but not
hing about this feels sure or right.”
Hunter stepped aside and Beck left without another word, making her way through the squad room, past the desks loaded with papers and dirty coffee cups, past the detectives and sergeants to the civilian employees answering phones.
In the locker room she changed her clothes and exited the precinct into the dark, busy streets of the city. Descending into the subway, she felt one with the black shadows, with the nearly empty cars as they raced underground through the city that never sleeps.
chapter six
Everleigh
May 1953
She awoke late and stretched in the midmorning sunlight streaming through the bedroom windows.
Rhett’s side of the bed was empty, the sheets cool under her palm. He rose before dawn to start work. The life of a rancher was not one of ease.
Pushing back the mass of curls falling over her eyes, she glanced across the small room to the bouquet of flowers he’d handed her yesterday before they left for church.
“For your first Mother’s Day.”
Mama Applegate scoffed at Rhett’s extravagance. “She’s not even showing yet.”
Rhett defended his actions with vigor. “If being pregnant doesn’t make you a mother, I don’t know what does.”
The woman softened afterward. After all, Everleigh was carrying her first grandchild. Kind of gave her a bit more leverage in this strong Texas family.
She slipped from the blanket to peer out over the endless Applegate ranch. He was out there somewhere. Her man.
Since she’d told him she was pregnant, Rhett worked the ranch during the day and their house plans at night.
Next week the contractor would break ground. Everleigh pressed her fingers to her smiling lips.
It was happening. Her own home. Any more happiness and she might burst. Was it right for one woman to feel so much love and joy?
The soft knock at her door had her reaching for her robe. Mama Applegate stepped through without waiting for a response, tugging on her white lace gloves.
“How are you feeling, my dear?”
“Well, thank you. Still no morning sickness.” Everleigh cinched the belt of her robe and looked around for her slippers. Monday was her day off from Kestner’s. Rhett insisted she rest, but as the wife of a rancher and the daughter-in-law of Heidi Applegate, lying about was no such luxury. There were chores to be done.
