by Rebecca Deel
“You have a family closet full of murderers and human traffickers?” Bitterness echoed in his tone. “A career teetering on the edge of nonexistence?”
“I’m not talking about your family. This is about you and the choices you face. Do you still want to be known as the guy whose adoptive family made some big mistakes, the one whose wife was raped and murdered?”
“No, of course not.”
“Then quit wallowing in the past, in other people’s mistakes, in your own mistakes.”
On the rolling table, Rod’s cell phone rang, breaking the silence. Nick reached over and handed him the phone. “Kelter.”
“Detective Kelter, this is Julie Simms. You said I could call if I needed anything.”
His hand tightened on the phone. “Are you all right? Your family’s okay?”
“We’re fine, detective, thank you. I told my husband and daughters about the baby.”
Rod’s gaze shot to the “baby’s” face. “Okay.”
“We’ve all prayed about it and we feel it would be better to meet him in person before the trial begins.”
“There may not be one.” Not if the Senator’s lawyer stalled long enough. He’d most likely die before a trial could begin.
“But we won’t escape the media coverage, regardless. Isn’t that right?”
Even though Meg had worked hard to avoid revealing Julie’s identity, the chance of the other media extending the same courtesy was next to nil. “Yes, ma’am.”
“I want to meet my son without the media as witnesses. Can you arrange that?”
“If he’s willing. Let me see what I can work out. Call me back in a few minutes.”
“Thank you, Detective Kelter. Please tell him how much we’d love to meet him.”
Kelter ended the call, his gaze still on Ty’s face. Would he be willing to meet his birth mother after all the disappointment with his adoptive family? “Ethan told you about the circumstances of your adoption?”
Ty’s face twisted. “Yeah. My birth mother thought she gave me up for adoption and knew nothing about the money.”
“She knows now. She’s asking to meet you. Are you willing?”
Ty leaned forward, his gaze intent. “You’re serious? She wants to meet me?”
Rod indicated his phone. “She’s the one who called me to set this up.”
“How do you know about my birth mother?”
“I interviewed her a few days ago, tracking down some leads on your, uh, the Senator.”
“Why didn’t she try to find me before now?”
“It’s better if you ask her. But I will tell you that her husband only found out about you in the last few days. She had you when she was very young, before she met her husband.”
“And he’s okay with this?” Ty looked skeptical.
“The whole family wants to meet you.”
“Family?” He sat up. “I have brothers or sisters?”
Rod grinned. “Sisters, one with a child on the way. You’re going to be an uncle soon.”
A small smile appeared on Ty’s lips as he rose from the chair. “An uncle.”
“Are you willing to meet with them?”
“Yeah. Why not? I think Sherri would have liked me to meet them. How will you arrange the meeting?”
Rod considered the options and settled for the most logical choice. “Your birth mother is supposed to call in a few minutes. Would you like to talk to her and arrange the details yourself?”
He shrugged, but Rod noted the interest growing in his friend’s eyes.
Rod’s cell phone rang again. He glanced at the caller ID, smiled and pressed the talk button. “Hello, Mrs. Simms. Your son, Ty, is standing about two feet away from me. Would you like to talk to him?” He pulled the phone away from his ear and extended his hand to his friend. “Your mother, Julie Simms, is very anxious to talk to you.”
A short time later, Ty left Rod’s room, a smile on his face and a spring in his step for the first time since Sherri’s murder.
“Are they good people?” Nick asked.
“The stepfather pastors a church in Knoxville, but I didn’t get a chance to meet him. Julie’s a fine woman, strong, compassionate. After her initial concern about her husband and church, she focused on Ty and what he’d been through.”
“I think Sherri would have been pleased to know that.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
The End. Meg stared at the final words of Sherri’s story, a wealth of emotion roiling through her. She saved the document, an overwhelming sense of relief flooding her, followed by sadness and loss. In a sense, she had delayed grieving too much over Sherri’s death by plunging into the manuscript. In the pages of typed text, Sherri still lived. After many days spent reminiscing and making sense of Sherri’s tragic loss, reality loomed. A reality of missed holidays, birthdays and phone calls because of the death of her friend.
Meg closed the word processing program and shut down her computer with a sense of finality. Oh, she still needed to edit the 80,000-word document, but that skill required a different part of her brain. The creative side, the side where she spent so much of her time in the two weeks since her abduction and rescue, was no longer needed. Now the analytical part of her brain would rake through every word, discarding passive verbs, infusing life with active verbs.
Car doors slammed outside. Meg glanced at the clock on her kitchen wall. 6:30. She smiled. She had to hand it to the handsome detective. He was always prompt, now that he was on medical leave from the police department.
She opened the door before the Big Ben chimes finished ringing. Meg stared at the bookcase sitting on her front porch. Ethan and Josh climbed the stairs with another bookcase balanced between them. “What’s this?”
“We’re just the delivery men. Where do you want them?” Ethan asked.
“Uh, I guess the living room.”
“Have you culled through your book collection since last week?” Josh scowled. “You’ll need to clear a path if you haven’t. I’m not about to spend my first Christmas at home in years laid up in a hospital with a broken bone.”
Heat flamed in Meg’s cheeks. “Give me a minute.” She hurried into the living room, grabbed stacks of books and carried them to the kitchen table. She cleared enough room for the men to maneuver and waved them inside.
By the time they finished, four floor-to-ceiling bookcases stood tall as sentinels against her walls. “Wow.” Meg fought to keep her mouth from hanging open. “Who bought these for me? They’re a perfect fit. They even match the furniture.”
“You’ll have to ask our third man.” Ethan nodded toward the open door.
Rod leaned against the doorjamb, arms crossed over his chest. “Do you like them?”
“On that note, I’m out of here. Come on, Ethan.” Both men eased past Rod into the cold night.
He shut the door and turned to face her. “Do you like them, Meg?”
Something in his voice told Meg the answer meant a lot to him. “They’re beautiful, perfect. Where did you get them?”
“Rod’s workshop.”
“You made them? For me?” Her eyes narrowed. “When? You were supposed to be resting.”
“I started on the bookcases after I came to your house the first time.” He held his hand up. “And before you decide I’m criticizing your housekeeping skills, I realize someone with your job needs a lot of research material. I thought you could locate information easier with a place to organize the resources.” He grinned. “Besides, I was climbing the walls with so much silence and enforced rest. I worked on all the pieces separately, then asked Ethan to help me put them together in the final form.”
Meg crossed the room and stepped into his open arms. “Thank you, Rod. I appreciate the practicality of your gift, but the fact that you made those bookcases means even more. So, is this my Christmas gift?” She pulled back to smile up at him.
“Part of it.” He shifted his weight off his injured leg, as if uncomfortable.
&n
bsp; Meg flushed. “I’m sorry, Rod. I wasn’t thinking. Please, come sit down.”
He sank onto the denim-colored couch beside her and enfolded her hand between his. “I’m not very good at expressing myself sometimes, Meg. Not like you are. So I probably won’t do this right.”
Meg pushed a stray lock of red hair from his forehead. He’d allowed it to grow longer than his usual military cut while off duty. She liked the extra length and her fingers itched to run through the red strands. “Just talk to me, Kelter.”
“After I lost Erin and Kayla, I didn’t think I would ever be interested in another woman. I guess my heart has been frozen.”
A cold knot formed in the pit of Meg’s stomach. Was he going to end their relationship? Did he not care enough about her to try?
He cast a sidelong glance at her, his lips twitching. “At least, it was frozen until a smart-mouthed editor became a key witness in my case and torched all the barriers I built.”
“Hey!” Meg scowled. “Smart-mouthed?” She wrinkled her nose and the scowl morphed into a grin. “All right. You got me. I resemble that characterization.”
“I’ve gotten very attached to that editor.” His blue eyes focused on her. “Somehow, she burrowed inside my heart so deep, I’ll never get her out. I don’t want to let her go because I’ve discovered in the last two weeks that I’m in love with her.”
A broad smile blossomed across Meg’s mouth. “I’m glad to hear you say that because the editor is madly in love with the detective who nearly died protecting her.”
Rod reached into his pocket and pulled out a velvet-covered box. “I wasn’t sure if you would toss me out on my ear because of the bookcases, so I spent the afternoon scouring the jewelry store for the perfect ring, something unique.”
He slipped a gold ring out of the box and slid the ring on Meg’s finger. Breath caught in her throat. Reflected firelight danced on the surface of the emerald solitaire.
“Marry me, Meg.”
She threw her arms around his neck and hugged him close. “Yes. The sooner, the better.”
He pulled back, a stunned expression on his face. “Are you serious?”
“About accepting your proposal or the timing?”
“The timing.”
She traced his lips with her fingertip. “Dead serious. You don’t exactly have the safest job in the world.”
“But don’t you want a big church wedding with all the trappings and publicity?”
Meg shuddered. What a nightmarish thought. “I had enough of the society wedding glitz with Serena and Ethan’s extravaganza last month. I have no desire to replicate that hoopla. I want something simple, private. Definitely no media blitz.”
His dark gaze searched hers. “What about my job? Can you live with my career?”
Meg held up her hand with his engagement ring. “I wouldn’t have accepted this if I couldn’t deal with your job. No one has a guarantee of tomorrow.”
He dropped a brief kiss on her lips. “And I don’t want to come home to an empty house anymore.”
Meg tilted her head. “So what are we going to do about it?”
Twenty-four hours later, sweat dotted Rod’s forehead despite the thirty-degree temperature at Aaron and Liz Cahill’s back door. The small hand clasped in his gripped harder.
He turned to Meg, gaze slicing through the darkness, thoughts of escape foremost in his mind.
“Are you regretting what we did?”
“No, not for one minute.”
“Then why do you look like you want to cut and run?”
A weak laugh escaped. “Maybe because that’s exactly how I feel.” He pulled her close, marveling at how right she felt in his arms, wondered if he would survive the next few minutes. “I’m counting the hours until we catch our flight.” Rod rested his chin on the top of her head. “You have to admit, though, we’re doing this backwards.”
“Everything will be fine. Trust me.”
He closed his eyes a moment. Meg didn’t understand. He faced interrogation by four men inside the Cahill home. No matter that he counted two of them close friends. Her father was inside, waiting beside her brother. None of them knew. Would they understand or approve? If not, he had fences to mend. Not a great position when facing four formidable men. He wasn’t sure whether to expect a blessing or a blasting.
A sense of doom forced words from his throat. “I love you, Megan.”
She laughed softly, her breath misting in the night air. “Sounds like you expect a firing squad.”
He hoped the next few minutes passed with a less painful end. “Might as well get this over with. My leg is stiffening up from the cold.” Rod reached around Meg and opened the door into the dimly lit kitchen.
Meg breezed past him. “Hey, where is everybody?”
“In the living room, sugar.” Liz Cahill’s voice sounded muffled. “We’re putting up the Christmas tree—an artificial one.”
“I’ve brought someone I want you to meet.” Meg threw him an impish grin.
He rolled his eyes, but remained silent. This was her show. Maybe, just maybe, if she did this right, he would get out of this house with his skin intact.
She threaded her fingers through his and drew him down the hallway to the living room. Seven pairs of eyes focused on him. Their expressions ranged from curious to puzzled. The only pair of eyes he focused on belonged to Aaron Cahill.
“What’s going on, Meg?” Josh turned from the tree, topper in hand.
Meg grinned, beaming at her family. “I’d like you to meet Rodney Kelter, my husband.”
Stunned silence greeted her announcement. Rod held his breath, waiting, sweating.
Serena broke the tension-filled quiet first. “Congratulations!” Smiling, she enveloped Meg in a hug, released her, and turned to Rod. “Welcome to the Cahill clan, Rod. We already felt like you were one of us. This makes it official.”
“Thanks.” Rod remained stiff in her embrace, eyeing the four men in turn as Madison kissed him on the cheek before enfolding Meg in a hug. Ethan looked stunned, but he detected no hostility. Nick’s grin and wink made him feel he had at least one advocate to plead his case.
His gaze settled on Josh. Though the former soldier’s lips were set, his thoughtful expression gave Rod some hope of eventual acceptance from that quarter as well. The knot in his stomach grew as he faced Meg’s father and mother. Liz’s silvery blond hair reflected the Christmas tree lights as she walked to him.
“This is quite a surprise.” Liz took both of his hands in hers. “We’ve gotten to know you well these last few months, Rod. You’re a man of integrity, one I respect.” She squeezed his hands briefly and released them.
“I appreciate that, Mrs. Cahill.”
“Please, it’s Liz.”
Aaron Cahill stepped up beside his wife and drew Meg into his arms. “You certainly caught us by surprise, sweetheart.”
“I know, Dad. You’re not mad?”
“No. I’m concerned, though.” He shifted his gaze to Rod. “We love this young woman. God gave her and her sisters to us and we consider all three of our girls a gift from Him. I expect you to value my daughter and treat her with the respect and honor she deserves.”
“I will, sir. You have my word on that.”
Aaron’s gaze grew intense. “Becoming a husband doesn’t automatically wipe out whatever problems and baggage we come into the marriage with.”
Rod’s cheeks heated. “I’m aware of that, sir.”
“Dad.” Meg pulled away from her father. “I walked into this marriage with my eyes open.” She slipped her hand into Rod’s.
“It’s okay, Meg. He has a right to ask.” Rod nodded at Aaron. “You’re right to be concerned, but I’ve been honest with Meg about the drinking. I haven’t touched any alcohol in months and I’ve been in counseling for the addiction. Ethan can vouch for me as well as Pastor Lang. I know I’m asking a lot, for you to trust me with your daughter. I can’t guarantee I won’t mess up. All I can pro
mise is I’ll do my best to be the husband Meg needs and deserves.”
A small smile appeared on his father-in-law’s face. “That’s all we can expect.” He held out his hand. “Welcome to the family, son.”
About the Author
Rebecca Deel is a preacher’s kid with a black belt in karate. She teaches business classes at a private four-year college in Nashville, Tennessee. She plays the piano at church, writes freelance articles, and runs interference for the family Westies. She’s been married to her amazing husband for more than 20 years and is the proud mom of two grown sons. She delivers monthly devotions to the women’s group at her church and conducts seminars in personal safety, money management, and writing. Her articles have been published in ONE Magazine, Contact, and Co-Laborer, and she was profiled in the June 2010 Williamson edition of Nashville Christian Family magazine. Rebecca completed her Doctor of Arts degree in Economics and wears her favorite Dallas Cowboys sweatshirt when life turns ugly.
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