by Ava Miles
“You own your own business, I hear,” Mama said, fingering a few white rose petals she was holding in her hand. “And Gail uses you still, I understand.”
“I don’t advertise my client list,” Vander said, “but I don’t think Gail would mind me saying I’ve done work for her. She’s a heck of a businesswoman.”
“Indeed,” Mama said, nodding. “She hired my daughter.”
“Gail might be a little eccentric,” Shelby’s stepfather, Dale, added, smiling at her, “but you can’t pull the wool over her head.”
Shelby refrained from mentioning her boss’ two ex-husbands. “Gail has taught me so much.” Oh, how much small talk were they going to suffer through before Mama relaxed her eager-beaver interest?
“Gail’s been good to you,” Mama said, nodding. “Are your people from here, Vander? Shelby didn’t say.”
That wasn’t entirely true. Mama wanted to see how Vander answered. “My mother moved out here from back east to go to Vanderbilt. It’s where she and my father met. He was from Nashville.”
“Was?” her mama asked. Susannah shot Shelby a compassionate glance. Yeah, she’d been through this too.
“Mama, I mentioned Vander had lost his daddy as a boy,” she said, reaching for his hand, peeved beyond belief.
“It’s okay, Shelby,” Vander said. “He was a local police detective, Louisa.”
“I see,” Mama said, gazing at him in that unflinching way she had. Growing up, they used to call it her way of playing chicken with folks. “I’m sorry for your loss.”
Well, at least she’d said something nice. For a moment there, Shelby had worried Mama was growing horns.
“Dinner should be ready soon,” Susannah said, reaching for Jake’s hand. “We should head back to the house and finish up.”
Vander held her mama’s stare as the others started walking back to the house.
“Come on, Louisa,” Dale said, clearing his throat to get her attention. “Vander and Shelby don’t have a drink yet, and it’s hot out here.”
Shelby wished she could give Dale a kiss. Mama had met Dale Adams when he’d joined her church after moving to town. He’d just gotten divorced and had no children. A few years later, not long after Shelby turned twelve, he and Mama had gotten hitched.
He’d never stepped into the role of father, not wanting to step on J.P.’s toes. But he was a good man, and Mama was happy with him. He let her do all the talking and run the church, preferring to be the quiet one in the corner who set up chairs or broke down tables, whatever was required.
“I’ll look forward to hearing more about you, Vander,” Mama said, finally breaking their staring match.
“I’m going to show Vander the garden,” Shelby called out. “We’ll be right in.”
Her mama cast one narrowed look over her shoulder before increasing her speed to the house.
“Ready to run yet, honey?” she asked Vander.
“That wasn’t bad,” he responded.
“I’m not sure she’s done with you yet.”
Bless the man. All he did was shrug and give her a crooked smile.
Chapter 26
Vander was at ease in groups. Always had been. After his dad had been murdered, he’d felt more comfortable talking to adults than kids his own age. What normal child knew what it was like to experience that kind of tragedy? But most adults had lost someone, whether or not it was from violence. They were willing to listen to him when his mother posted her No Talking sign up on her heart.
Catching up with Rye and Clayton was fun, and it felt good to shoot the shit with J.P. and Jake. They were all the kind of men he gravitated toward: strong and comfortable in their own skin. Vander dealt with enough assholes in his profession. He didn’t put up with them in his personal life.
Rory and Annabelle were entertaining. Only a girl with a delightful sense of humor could name her dog Barbie.
Then there was Shelby. She was never too far away from him. He sensed she felt protective of him here among her family, and for a man who never felt the need to be protected, it gave him a warm feeling. He couldn’t wait to get her home.
Louisa watched him all through a dinner fit for any five-star restaurant in Nashville. He was stuffed by the time he pushed back from the table with the rest of the family.
“Vander?” Louisa called. “I’d like to walk you down to the river.”
Shelby put her hand on him, going on full alert. He leaned in and kissed her cheek.
“It will be fine,” he whispered in her ear. “Save a piece of pie for me.”
She nodded, and he set off to join her mother. They walked out back and headed through the gardens until they reached an open field, which led to Dare River. She kept quiet, walking with her hands folded behind her back. Vander kept his own counsel, knowing she would speak as soon as she was ready.
When they reached the river’s edge, she gestured to the bench situated there, one that held a magnificent view. Water rushed over moss-covered rocks as dragonflies raced across the surface. A trio of turtles sunned themselves on an exposed log under a blue sky filled with puffy clouds resembling cotton balls.
He sat down, and she sat beside him, pushing her gray hair behind her ear. Shelby had her hair, the kind that curled of its own volition. Louisa’s was shorter though, barely cresting past her jawline.
“Out of all my daughters, Shelby has always been in the greatest hurry,” Louisa began.
Vander smiled, and their eyes met for a moment. He realized hers were green.
“Perhaps it’s a mother’s intuition, but she seems to be in a hurry with you,” Louisa said. “It’s got me worrying some.”
Vander studied the river and took a moment before replying. “We’ve both been surprised by the pace of our relationship, but we also know our own minds. If you’re wanting to know if this is normal for me, I can assure you it isn’t. Your daughter is one of the most amazing women I’ve ever met, and it’s because she’s so amazing that I want to spend every moment with her. Usually all I want to do is work. I love what I do, and it requires a lot of social time with clients and the community. Shelby makes me forget about all that in a good way.”
She nodded, folding her hands prayer style in her lap. “That eases my mind some.”
“Good,” Vander said, deciding to be plainspoken too. “What else will?”
Her chest rose, and he could tell she was having trouble getting a breath. “I don’t know what she’s told you about her daddy, but your profession is giving me some discomfort. Not that it’s not an honorable one. That’s not what I’m suggesting.”
He could see the writing on the wall and braced himself for what was to come. “Go on.”
“Shelby has never known anyone with the skills to find a person,” Louisa said. “Until now.”
“I’m listening,” he said.
“I don’t want you to encourage her to find her daddy,” Louisa said, giving him a sudden case of heartburn. “Even if she asks you straight out, which I fear she will.”
“Why are you afraid she’ll ask?” Vander asked, meeting her gaze. “Moreover, why are you afraid to have her find him if it’s what she wants?”
She flinched. “My reasons are my own—as I’ve always told the children when they ask me about him. Shelby is the most inquisitive of my bunch, although Sadie has asked questions too. I don’t want them to get hurt. Some things are best left in the past. I’ve learned that the hard way.”
“Louisa, I love your daughter,” Vander said. “That means I support her. I can’t promise you not to support her if she asks me to.”
She narrowed her eyes at him. “If you ‘help’ her in this matter, it could tear apart this family. That is not all right by me, and I’m the mama.”
A mama with claws, it was clear. “Forgive me, Louisa, but as a man who lost his father at a young age, I can tell you that sometimes the past doesn’t stay there. In a few weeks, it’s the twenty-fifth anniversary of my father’s unsolved murder.
There isn’t a day that goes by that I don’t think about him and wonder why it happened.”
“I read that about you online,” Louisa said, giving a deep sigh.
A few articles had been written about him opening up shop in Nashville, serving the same community his father had. He didn’t express any concern, which made her frown darken.
“I looked you up,” she said, continuing. “I’m sorry for your loss. Truly. I can’t begin to understand what it must have been like for you, but there’ll be no true peace in your life until you let the past go.”
Vander stood, his shadow covering her. Anger unfurled inside him, some of it not from her. His mother had said the same things to him.
“From my perspective, Louisa, you don’t seem to have let the past go. Not if you’re asking promises of me that could undermine your daughter’s wishes, notwithstanding her happiness.”
“Excuse me?”
“I love Shelby, and she loves me. Yes, we’ve moved fast, but as my best friend recently pointed out, I usually make my mind up about things straight away. Shelby and I are good together, and I want us to keep being good together. That means I support her and her needs—not yours. I hope you can understand that.”
She stood as well, coming only to the center of his chest. “I do understand that, and I respect it. I just don’t like it.”
He had to give her points for honesty.
She rubbed her forehead like she had a headache coming on. “I want to like you, Vander. You seem like a good man, and from everything I’ve read about you, you’ve done an incredible job becoming who you are. I also see the way you treat my daughter, the way you look at her—and how she’s been guarding you from me. She’s given her whole heart to you.”
Somehow hearing Louisa tell him how much Shelby had fallen for him cinched everything between them in a whole new way. They didn’t need to rush into marriage, but he could feel it there, waiting on the horizon. For a man who hadn’t thought of growing old, let alone getting married, it was quite a realization.
“I’m glad you see that,” he responded, coming back to the moment. “Given that, how could you expect me to say anything different?”
She raised a brow. “If you said anything different, you wouldn’t be the man for her.”
“So this was a test.”
“Perhaps,” she said, starting to walk back. “You’re right about Shelby always knowing her own mind. It’s how I raised my children.”
“You just don’t like it when their opinions conflict with yours,” he said, falling in step with her.
She stopped and turned to face him. “If and when you ever become a parent, you’ll find yourself struggling with the same thing. I try and be a good person every day. Live a good life. Treat people as I want to be treated. Just like the Good Book says. Vander, I can promise you I would never wish for my children to learn anything more about their daddy and why he left. If I could, I would erase it from my own mind. I hope you’ll remember that.”
When she took off again, he didn’t follow her immediately, sensing she needed time to compose herself before rejoining the others.
He turned around and looked back at the river, soaking in the perfect diorama of the natural order. The water knew which direction to take. The dragonflies knew how to take flight. Soon the turtles would breathe underwater when they took a swim off the log.
Vander didn’t believe things happened for a reason. He believed it was his job as an investigator to figure out why something had interrupted the natural order. A father who wanted to raise his son wasn’t supposed to be taken away from him.
Louisa was wrong.
Sometimes peace only came from finding out what had happened to make life deviate from the path it should have taken.
As he walked back to the house, he was filled with questions about what had broken the McGuiness home and why a woman as forthright as Louisa didn’t want anyone to find out.
Chapter 27
The minute Shelby and Vander closed the car doors, she pounced on him.
“All right, what did Mama say to you? She was pale as a church mouse when she came back from your walk. It took everything in me not to march across the room and ask her.”
Part of the reason she hadn’t was fear. She wasn’t sure she wanted to know what Mama had said.
“So it’s okay to ask me?” he asked, driving them to the main highway.
She worried her lip. “Vander, let’s be real. Of course I’m going to ask you. I’m upset.”
“I know you are,” he said, “and I’m sorry for it. Heck, poor Sadie looked like she was… What do you call it? Fixing to come undone when I came inside too. And Susannah…”
“Everyone was on pins and needles while you were gone,” Shelby said, digging her fingernails into her palms. “We don’t like lying to Mama or causing strife.”
“Well, your Mama is equally concerned,” Vander said, putting his hand on her knee. “Shelby, she’s worried you’re going to ask me to look into your daddy’s whereabouts. She asked me not to.”
“She did not!” Shelby said, shocked Mama would interfere like that. “My goodness, that’s a horrible thing to do to you.”
“And to you,” he added, caressing her knee. “But she means well. Whatever she’s trying to keep a lid on, she’s gripping it with all her might.”
“You didn’t promise her, did you?” she asked.
“Of course not. I told her I loved you and that meant supporting you. I also said it wasn’t good of her to ask that of me, especially since she admitted to knowing how much you love me too.”
Her heart welled, hearing him talk like that. She wanted to take her seatbelt off and snuggle up against his side.
“She also thinks we’re moving too fast,” he said, patting her knee again. “I told her we’d talked about that, but we both know our minds pretty well.”
“What else?”
“That’s about it,” he said with a shrug. “She said she wanted to like me, that she even respected me. But I worried her. You did too. She said you’ve always been inquisitive.”
True that, she thought. “So Mama didn’t seem to know we’ve already looked?”
“No,” he told her, removing his hand from her knee to take a sharp turn. “I suppose that’s the silver lining in all this. But she thinks you’re going to want to. She’s a little behind the curve, but she’s got your number, all right.”
“Lovely!” Shelby said, falling back against her seat. “Oh, this just makes me all the more curious. By all that’s holy, why won’t she tell us her side of things? Dammit, now that Daddy turned coward for the second time and up and ran, Mama is the only one who knows anything.” When Vander didn’t respond, she turned her head. “I wish…”
She trailed off, feeling the deep sadness she’d been fighting so hard descend upon her. Suddenly she felt exhausted and weepy—and cold.
“Can you turn down the air conditioner, please?” she asked, looking out the window.
“Sure,” he said, putting his hand back on her knee and stroking it. “Shelby, I’m sorry.”
“I am too,” she said, turning sideways in the seat and bringing her legs up as far underneath her as possible.
When they reached her home, Vander came around and opened her door. He helped her out and pulled her against him. She let him hold her until better sense prevailed.
“We shouldn’t be making a spectacle by the street,” she said, untangling herself and walking to the door, which she then opened with her key.
He closed the door behind her, and she rubbed the back of her neck. Hours ago, she’d told him she wanted to make love with him. Right now, that was the furthest thing from her mind.
“If you’ll give me a little time, I promise to rally,” she said, putting her purse on the table in the entryway.
He turned her and raised her face to his by tipping her jaw up. “Shelby, when we make love for the first time, we should both be thinking of nothing else. You ha
d a tough day. There’s nothing you need to rally for.”
She wanted to give in to a good cry right then and there.
He reached up and caressed her cheek. “But I’d like to hold you if that’s okay. Maybe stay a while. You don’t need to be alone. Earlier when I was upset, talking about my dad, you supported me. I want to do that for you.”
Leaning her head against his chest, she wrapped her arms around him. “Don’t misunderstand what I’m saying, but having you hold me… Right now, it would be better than making love.”
“I know,” he said, and she could hear the smile in his voice. “But that will be good too.”
She already knew that.
Chapter 28
Sadie started Monday breathing easier. She’d gotten through another Sunday family dinner with Mama and held it together.
Then her phone rang, and she felt her lungs shrivel up in her chest. Mama! She thought about letting it go to voicemail, but this couldn’t continue. She didn’t want it to, and Mama wouldn’t allow it.
“Hi, Mama,” she answered brightly, clutching her coffee mug.
“Hi, honey,” Mama said. “I thought I’d see what you were up to. I didn’t get to talk to you much yesterday, what with all the excitement about Shelby’s new beau.”
Sadie’s hand jerked at the mention of Vander, and coffee sloshed over the rim of her mug, spilling onto the counter. “Oh, shoot! Wait a sec, Mama. I just spilled something.”
Hold it together, girl. She mopped the mess up, wishing she hadn’t taken the call. Clearly she wasn’t in her right mind.
“Okay, I’m back,” Sadie said, deciding the best tack was to get Mama talking. “How’s your day going?”
Monday was usually a lighter day for Mama after all the Sunday services. She was fond of calling it cleanup day.
“Have you started next Sunday’s sermon yet?” she asked.
“Yes,” Mama responded. “It’s going to be about letting go of the past and living in the present.”
