Between the Sheets

by Molly O'Keefe

  But they would get there. In time. They would get there.

  Chapter 25

  One year later

  The third Saturday of every month was theirs. And theirs alone.

  It started at Cora’s with fritters. And then they went out to Glen Home to see Mom. Shelby, with Ty’s unwavering help, had kept Evie at home after she got out of the hospital for as long as she could. There were round-the-clock nurses that Evie had grown used to, but the stairs got too difficult. Ty modified the bathroom as best he could, but the shower was still too dangerous, and Shelby knew that before something awful happened, she had to make a decision. And the decision was Glen Home.

  Shelby went there every day for lunch when Mom was at her best. Shelby, Ty, and Casey came every Sunday after church, and Casey would drop by a few other times after school when he could between piano lessons and his class at the Art Barn.

  It wasn’t great. The only one Mom always recognized was Casey, which was such a strange but beautiful turn in the disease. There were days Shelby felt destroyed by guilt that her mother was not living the end of her life in her home as she would have wanted, but Ty just pulled her into his lap and held her until she could bear it again.

  But the third Saturday of every month, after taking Mom some fritters, they drove up to West Memphis to Tilden Rodgers Park.

  Shelby pulled into the parking area across from the pavilion and turned off the car. They could see her through the windshield, sitting at one of the picnic tables, her back in the pink jacket hunched against the cold wind. Her unbound red hair blowing in the sharp January wind.

  On the table in front of her there was a wrapped package.

  A birthday present.

  Shelby nearly rolled her eyes at the gift. If that woman thought she could buy her way back into her son’s affections, she didn’t know her son.

  “I’ll be right here,” Shelby said.

  Casey, still staring at his mother, nodded. “I know.”

  “We can leave anytime,” she said. “You don’t have to stay the full half hour.”

  “You say that every time.” He flashed her a quick grin and she took a breath. The first in what felt like fifteen miles. This was the fourth monthly visit between Casey and Vanessa. Ty took him to the first one, but that had been such a disaster that Shelby and Casey had decided it would be best if she went.

  Casey had asked, actually. And Shelby had quickly agreed, her heart expanding with love.

  “I mean it every time.”

  “She doesn’t, you know, say anything mean. She mostly asks about school.”

  “Good,” was all Shelby said, but she was thinking she’d better not or I will be a million times worse than Ty would ever dream of being.

  Casey still didn’t open the car door.

  “Are you stalling because you don’t want to see her?” she asked. “Because you don’t have to—”

  “No. No. It’s fine. I better go.” Casey popped open the door.

  She wanted to pull him back, cover him with kisses, but he only allowed that when he was sick or about to go to bed, so instead she grabbed his hand and wrapped her fingers around his. “I love you.”

  “Shel-by,” he groaned, but he was grinning, and she grinned back at him.

  “Nothing you can do about it, Case. You just have to deal. Now go.”

  Casey got out of the car and she watched, holding her breath again. God, she really had to stop doing that; she was going to pass out one of these Saturdays.

  Vanessa, when she saw him, stood up, and Shelby watched the woman’s face through the windshield. She could not hide her pain, her regret, or her pleasure.

  Shelby pulled some papers to grade out of her bag but barely glanced at the fifth-grade identity projects. Instead she watched Casey and marveled at the effect one kid’s piece of art had had on all of their lives.

  When the half hour was up, she put the papers away and honked the horn.

  Casey waved at her and stood at the same time Vanessa did. Vanessa usually tried to hug Casey and he always stepped back out of her way, but this time she didn’t even try. Maybe she was learning.

  Casey got back into the car, smelling of cold and winter and the cigarettes Vanessa chain-smoked. He put the wrapped present in the backseat.

  “You okay?” Shelby asked.

  Casey nodded and she drove away from the park. Casey was customarily silent and she didn’t push, but when they pulled out of the city and into the dark, empty fields of the country she put her hand on his head, her thumb feathering the hair over his ear, and he leaned into the touch.

  Just a little.

  Just enough.

  “Sean!” Ty yelled, walking out of the back door of Shelby’s house, carrying on his shoulder part of the kitchen cabinets. Inside, everyone was demolishing as fast as they could in the few hours that Shelby and Casey were gone.

  But not Sean.

  Sean was watching the twins, bundled up in their stroller, sleeping. He had wanted to take them out of the stroller, claiming it was too cold to leave them sleeping there, but Ashley had threatened to gut him—not joking, actually gut him—if he woke up Abby and Cole.

  “Someone has to watch these guys!” Sean said. He pulled the stroller closer to the lawn chair he was sitting in. He tucked and retucked the blankets higher around their sleeping faces.

  “Sean,” Ashley said as she came out carrying part of the kitchen counter. “They’re sleeping. When they wake up, trust me, we’ll know about it. And if you wake them—”

  “You’ll gut me.” Sean stood, but he couldn’t look away from them. “But God, Ashley. They’re so beautiful.”

  Ty threw his counter on the heap of scrap and then took Ashley’s stuff. Cora and Brody came out, too, all carrying loads.

  Shelby had been talking about remodeling the farmhouse for three months, she’d bought some kitchen magazines and the two of them had drawn up plans, but life was just so busy and things were pretty comfortable over at his place.

  But it was something she wanted. Really wanted.

  And so he was going to make it happen for her.

  It would take a while—he was pretty busy, between working with Brody and the part-time garage he seemed to be running from his place—but he would see this done for her.

  The phone in his pocket buzzed and he fished it out.

  It was a text from Shelby: On our way. Stopped for gas.

  Everyone okay?

  Quiet but good.

  The band that tightened around his chest every third Saturday of the month loosened and he took a deep breath. Come to your house, don’t go to mine.

  Why?

  Surprise.

  He grinned and put the phone back in his pocket.

  “You should have some babies of your own,” Brody said, slapping his brother’s shoulder as he walked by.

  “Hey now.” Cora dropped smashed cabinetry on the junk pile. “Don’t go putting ideas in his head.”

  “I’ve already got ideas.” Sean grabbed Cora as she walked by and put a kiss on her lips.

  A black SUV pulled into the driveway and before it had fully come to a stop, Gwen was out of the backseat.

  “Hey!” she cried. “Are the twins here?”

  “Do I ever go anywhere without the twins?” Ashley, who had survived a terrible pregnancy, asked her husband, and Brody pulled her in for a hug.

  “Go out tonight,” he said. “You and Monica and Cora. See if you can get Shelby to go, too. I’ve got the twins.”

  Ashley broke into tears. “Don’t laugh,” she said, her voice muffled in Brody’s chest. “It’s the hormones.”

  “It’s you, babe,” he breathed, walking her backward for some privacy.

  Wonder Woman Monica came around from the passenger side just as Jackson Davies stepped out of the driver’s side. She had a giant sparkling diamond on her left finger that Jackson had put there over Christmas, and there were plans in the works for a summer wedding at The Big House.
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  Which, to be honest, was giving Ty some similar ideas.

  Ty liked Jackson. A lot. He seemed a little slick at first, but the guy was seriously devoted to Monica and to his sister. He was finishing up his law degree with plans to move back to Bishop. Monica’s young adult book had come out last year to great reviews and success.

  “Thanks for coming, guys!” Ty said, giving Monica a hug and shaking Jackson’s hand.

  “Sorry we’re late. Gwen had a test in her last class.” Jackson pulled a tool belt and some gloves out of the back of the truck. “Where do you need me?”

  Another great thing about Jackson—the guy knew how to pitch in.

  “We’re taking down the kitchen,” he said, and Jackson was gone.

  “Where’s Shelby?” Monica asked.

  “She’s still on her way back with Casey.”

  They started walking back to the house and Monica stopped him with a hand on his arm. “I don’t know if anyone has said this to you, or if it can be said enough, but you are the best thing that’s ever happened to her.”

  “It’s the same for me,” Ty said. Every once in a while, when he woke up in the middle of the night with his brain turned on and unable to turn back off, he wondered what would have happened to him and Casey if he hadn’t picked this place to live. If it hadn’t been Shelby teaching that art class.

  Part of him liked to think that they would have made it. Somehow. Someway he and Casey would have been okay.

  But the truth was probably very different.

  He owed his world to Shelby Monroe.

  Two hours later everyone heard the crunch of tires over gravel and they all stopped where they were in the living room, tearing up the pink-and-blue carpet.

  “That’s her?” Sean asked.

  “That’s her.”

  A ripple of excitement went through the room and Ty pulled off his gloves, shaking his head. “You guys are worse than Casey.”

  “Go get her!” Monica said. “I want to see her face when she sees what you’ve done.”

  Ty was walking down the back steps just as Casey and Shelby got out of the car.

  A new routine had started since Shelby started taking Casey to see Vanessa and Ty didn’t want to make too big a deal about it in case it stopped, but this new routine was everything to him. Everything he’d ever hoped he and Casey and Shelby would have.

  “Hey, Casey,” Ty said, searching his son’s face for any signs of distress or grief. He was usually very quiet after seeing his mother, but after a day he seemed to snap back.

  “Hey, Dad,” Casey said, and then he walked straight into Ty’s arms. Casey curled his arms around Ty’s waist and hugged him. Hard. As if making up for every hug they didn’t get in the eleven long years they didn’t know each other.

  Ty wrapped his arms around his boy and stared, his heart in his eyes, at the woman who made his family complete.

  “Is that Monica and Jackson’s car?” Shelby asked, pointing to the SUV.

  “I tried to stall as long as I could,” Casey said, stepping away, but the imprint of that hug lingered on Ty. His body, his heart, his soul—everything was made better by that hug.

  “Stall me?” Shelby asked. Her smile these days was something to behold. If there was any doubt, any question that he made Shelby happy, the answer was in that smile.

  She was easy, confident, loose. She was quick to hug and laugh and tease. With him and with Casey.

  And when Ty got her alone in bed, or in the truck or in the Art Barn for old time’s sake, there was no hesitation. No doubts. No anger. Nothing coming between them. She was as open a woman as ever lived and he’d never in his life felt so lucky or loved.

  And those times she was quiet, when she needed to be alone, he gave her that distance. Because she always let him back in.

  “What’s going on?” she asked.

  “Come on inside and see.”

  Casey ran on ahead and Ty could see him through the screen door making the rounds with their friends—high-fives and quick hugs, kisses for the twins, who were awake in their parents’ arms, a shy, awkward wave at Gwen.

  Ty held the door open for Shelby, who walked into her old kitchen and gasped. The purse over her arm fell to the floor.

  “Surprise!” Cora cried, but Shelby wasn’t smiling.

  “What …” Shelby spun in a slow circle, her face totally unreadable. “What have you done?”

  This was one of those times the self-contained universe of her had Ty fooled and his stomach fell to the wood floor they’d exposed when they pulled up the old linoleum. “We’re starting the renovation,” he said.

  Oh shit, had he read this wrong? Was this the sort of thing that she said she wanted, but in reality she didn’t really, and he’d totally screwed it up? “Are you mad?”

  “You all came here to do this?” Shelby asked their friends, who were all nodding and wincing at the same time.

  “And you—?” She turned to Casey, who held up his hands and pointed at Ty.

  “His idea. Be mad at him.”

  “Mad?” she breathed and put a hand back over her mouth. “I’m not—” She shook her head and launched herself into Ty’s waiting and pretty relieved arms.

  “I love you,” she said, over and over.

  “Oh honey,” he said, burying his face in her hair. “I love you, too.”

  “Oookay,” Sean said. “Maybe we should take this little party over to The Pour House.”

  “No!” Shelby stood back, wiping her eyes, her cheeks pink and wet. “No. I want … I want to help. I want to do this, too.”

  Monica handed Shelby her gloves and Sean gave his to Casey, and Brody showed her how to pull up the carpet and use the crowbar on the floorboards.

  She was relentless, systematic. Every once in a while her shoulders shook and Ty didn’t know if she was sobbing or laughing. Slowly their friends filed out of the room, taking Casey with them back to his house, where Ty had food and drink waiting.

  And then it was just the two of them, Ty and Shelby, tearing down the past, getting ready for the future.

  To Geoff and Regan Koski, the laid-back activists changing the world one craft beer festival at a time. Your partnership and outlook are an inspiration. Thank you for answering all my questions about politics and Atlanta (any errors are my own) and for being such a big part of so many of our favorite memories.

  BY MOLLY O’KEEFE

  Crooked Creek Novels

  Can’t Buy Me Love

  Can’t Hurry Love

  Crazy Thing Called Love

  The Boys of Bishop Novels

  Wild Child

  Never Been Kissed

  Between the Sheets

  A hot, addictive tale of passion and scandal

  takes center stage in the next installment

  of Molly O’Keefe’s Boys of Bishop series

  INDECENT PROPOSAL

  In which a driven man who refuses

  to be distracted

  meets his match in a beautiful bartender

  who just may change his life.

  Available from Bantam Books

  Read on for a sneak peek

  Chapter 1

  “Ken Doll is back.”

  Ryan Kaminski didn’t have to look to see who Lindsey was talking about.

  Ken Doll had been Lindsey’s obsession for the last three nights.

  “Yeah? What’s he doing?” Talking on his phone? Texting? Ignoring the rest of the world? She did not understand why people came to a bar to stare at their phones and ignore people. Ryan scooped ice into the martini shaker, she poured in vermouth, the high-end vodka that cost about a week’s worth of tips, and slid on the top before giving it all a good shake.

  “He’s not on his phone. Ken Doll looks sad,” Lindsey added.

  That made Ryan look over her shoulder at the handsome blond man at the far corner of the bar. For three nights he’d been coming in, working on two different phones. Making calls. Sending texts—never looking
up. Never acknowledging that he was actually in a room full of people.

  He ordered beer—Corona in a bottle. Tipped double the bill and usually left every night without saying anything more than; “Corona” and “thank you.”

  Ken Doll would be totally unremarkable—there were plenty of men at The Indigo Bar spending more time on their phones than actually talking to people and wearing beautiful tailor-made suits that clung just right to their bodies while they did it.

  But they were not nearly as interesting as Ken Doll.

  “God,” Ryan muttered. “He’s just so pretty.”

  “I know, right?”

  Blond hair with a slight curl to it. Piercing blue eyes. Like they’d been computer enhanced, that’s how blue they were. In the soft smooth plane of one cheek there was a dimple, she only saw it by accident when he smiled at a woman who asked to take the bar stool to his left the other day. But the real kicker, the show stopper—was how he moved, efficient and graceful, like there was simply no time to waste, because he was A Man Who Got Things Done.

  Watching him unbutton his jacket before sitting down was a mission statement. A planted flag.

  Gravitas.

  That’s what Ken Doll had that every other man in this bar was lacking.

  But tonight he didn’t have his phones out. He sat there, hands pressed down flat against the mahogany bar, raindrops caught in his blond hair. He was wearing a University of Georgia Bulldogs tee shirt under which his shoulders … oh, that slump, it told a very sad story indeed.

  Ryan poured the martini into the chilled glass, took a twist off the fresh lemon behind the bar, and put the glass on a napkin before sliding the drink over to the woman who’d ordered it and collecting the twenty the woman had left on the bar.

  “I want to ease Ken Doll’s pain.” Lindsey watched Ken Doll out of the corner of her eye while pulling a draft for one of the guys working the couches. “Like. Really.”

  Lindsey was well-suited to that task. The bar’s uniform, short leather shorts, the fishnets and tall boots, took on a whole new level of sexy with her. She was a twenty-one-year-old party girl from the Bronx who could take care of herself and anyone else who wanted to have a good time.