The Sweetest September (Home in Magnolia Bend) (24 page)

“I was drunk and it just happened, Dad.”

“Sex doesn’t just happen, son.”

Silence sat for a moment. Finally, John said, “That night I felt so alone, almost not human. All I could see was Rebecca on the steps, her eyes open and that goddamn gun lying there, blood like a lake beneath her. I sat in that house alone and at some point I felt like I might go crazy. I just wanted the pain to go away so I went to Boots. I went somewhere where people wouldn’t know me and wouldn’t feel sorry for me.”

“You could have come to us. We could have helped you get through that day and night, but you never asked.”

John didn’t say anything for a few seconds. “I couldn’t change the past and neither could you. There’s no changing the fact Rebecca picked up my gun, the fact the gunsmith didn’t check the chamber and the fact I got drunk the anniversary of her death and had sex with Shelby.”

“No, you can’t change all that, but you can make wise decisions regarding the mistake you made with Shelby. You could have come to me before now. Why didn’t you?”

“Because...because I don’t know why.”

“You do.”

“I didn’t want you to be ashamed of me, and I wanted Shelby to stay here in Magnolia Bend because we needed time to get to know one another and figure out what to do. If everyone knew about the baby, well, you know this town...”

“So why did you want her to stay? You said she wanted to go home.”

“Because it’s my baby, Dad.” A long pause. “I wanted her to stay because it’s my baby. It was a stupid mistake, but I still want my child.”

Silence again. Shelby heard a burst of laughter from the living room. Fancy. The woman loved to laugh, and the sound of it pricked at Shelby like laughter at a funeral because John’s words weren’t about professing, but rather confessing something he wished he’d never done.

“I asked her to marry me,” John said.

No words from his father.

“She said no.”

“Why?” Reverend Beauchamp asked.

“I don’t know. Probably because she thinks having a baby isn’t a good enough reason to marry. Or maybe she doesn’t want to be tied down to me.”

“What about love?”

Shelby felt her heart rise in her throat. Reverend Beauchamp asked what she had been unable to bring herself to ask John earlier.

“I don’t know, Dad. I can’t seem to stop comparing what I have with Shelby to what I had with Rebecca. Shelby’s different.”

“Different isn’t bad.”

“No.” Another long pause. “I want to do the right thing. Not bring shame on the family or embarrass you and Mom because I had one bad night. That’s not fair to you. Marrying Shelby would rectify that and she could take the job at the school. We could raise the baby together. Here in Magnolia Bend. Love doesn’t figure into doing the right thing.”

Bring shame on the family? Keep her in Magnolia Bend?

Shelby covered her mouth with her hand, not sure whether she wanted to scream or march in there and punch John Beauchamp in the chops.

The tenderness they’d shared, the hope she’d nurtured shriveled up like a paper in a fire.

Love doesn’t figure into doing the right thing.

Shelby had hoped they could move toward love. Like some blooming idiot, she’d convinced herself she could make John love her, that she’d helped him heal. She’d envisioned them starting a life together. But John wanted, to quote the Southern phrase she’d heard last week at the post office, to make a silk purse out of a sow’s ear. Martha Boudreaux had explained the expression meant to try to trick someone into thinking something not so great was mighty fine. Yeah. Shelby was a freaking pig’s ear.

And it hurt.

Searing pain shot across her stomach. Or was it her heart? She’d been so, so stupid in agreeing to stay here in Magnolia Bend. She’d been chasing a pipe dream created by an eleven-year-old little girl alone in her room after her brother got married, hearing the words her mother had said to a friend.
Yes, I don’t know where Shelby came from. She’s not like any of us.

In Magnolia Bend, she’d thought she found a place she could belong. Most of the people in town had been so nice. Oh, sure they may have been titillated she lived with John, and some of the old biddies who were Carla’s friends had tried to stir up stuff, but Fancy had quickly quelled their attempt at running the whore outta town. Shelby had also grown to love Breezy Hill. Through Rebecca’s journal she’d seen the old house in a new light—she knew the waffling the woman had done over the right paint color for the kitchen, the struggle to get John to put in the flower beds, and how Rebecca had secretly brought Freddy home, but told John he just wandered up. And after last night, she felt the final piece of the puzzle had snapped into place.

She’d wanted to stay, but the whole marriage to fix this thing had zinged in from right field and smacked her in the head. Because at that moment when John proposed marriage, she knew she couldn’t make herself fit into his life if he didn’t love her.

See? This was what eavesdropping and sneaking and reading journals got her—the truth. And sometimes the truth wasn’t much fun.

“Shelby, where’s the tape?” Fancy called.

Shelby jumped, swallowed down the emotion threatening to spill down her cheeks and scampered toward the other kitchen door. Pushing through, she donned a smile. “Sorry, I sneaked some pie.”

And overheard the way your son really feels about me.

Both Fancy and Abigail sat on the coffee table with their feet holding the box flaps down. Fancy’s hands rubbed Abigail’s shoulders, massaging them from an awkward angle. The intimate scene hit Shelby just as hard.

This. This is what she’d never had.

“There you are,” Fancy said, her green eyes smiling as she withdrew her hands, eliciting a groan from Abigail. “Eating pie, huh?”

“Yeah, here’s the tape.”

Fancy took it and handed it to Abigail. “Are you okay, Shelby? You look pale, sweetheart.”

“Just tired. I need a nap.”

Abigail snorted and gave her the “I know what you did last night” look.

“Well, go on up to the guest bedroom and take a nap,” Fancy said.

“Actually I’ll see if John can run me out to Breezy Hill instead. I’d like a shower, too,” Shelby said, wanting to get away from all the touchy-feely family stuff, wanting to get away from John, but not seeing a way that could happen.

“I can give you a lift,” Abigail said, and taped the box, glancing up, her dark eyes probing Shelby, seeing beneath the surface. Maybe she knew Shelby’s earlier confidence lay in pieces. That’s exactly how Shelby felt. Shattered.

“Perfect,” Shelby said, helping Fancy with her box. “John can finish watching football with his dad and brothers.”

Five minutes later, Shelby rode beside an oddly silent Abigail. She’d told Fancy to tell John she went back to Breezy Hill. She hadn’t the fortitude to face him without betraying her emotions.

They’d just turned out on the highway, when Shelby’s phone buzzed. She glanced at it thinking it was John, but it was a text from her mother.

Texting, again?

But there was also a picture.

Shelby clicked on the small bubble and it enlarged, showing a beautiful christening gown of antique white lace. Underneath the pic her mother had written:

Found your christening gown when the decorators went up to the attic. I’ll keep it out for the baby.

And that’s when Shelby lost it.

“Shelby?” Abigail said, swerving the car over the line as she reached over to cup Shelby’s shoulder as she launched herself forward, deep sobs welling up within her.

But Shelby couldn’t talk, the hurt and pain and something she couldn’t name about her mother had erupted inside her and there was no way to stop the meltdown.

“Shelby, what is it?” Abigail persisted. “Bad news? Do I need to stop?”

Shelby shook her head, holding a hand over her mouth, wanting to stop the deluge, but unable. Rocking slightly, she managed to choke out “Just drive”. Finally after several minutes, Shelby leaned her head back on the headrest and swiped at her face.

Abigail darted a worried glance at her.

“Sorry,” Shelby managed, between sniffs. “I’ve been needing to do that for a while.”

Abigail nodded as if she understood that sometimes the only thing that helped was a good cry. “Bad news?”

“No, just an unexpected note from my mother. We don’t have a great relationship and she just—” Shelby’s voice trembled “—extended an olive branch of sorts.”

“Oh,” Abigail said. “I was worried I had upset you earlier by saying John still loved Rebecca. I shouldn’t have said that. I don’t know why I try to control every situation. I overstepped.”

Abigail made the turn into Breezy Hill and bumped up the road, slowing when she saw another car parked beside Shelby’s leased car.

“Oh, it’s Carla,” Abigail said, pulling in behind the Lexus. “Wonder what she’s doing here on New Year’s Day?”

Shelby didn’t think she could handle dealing with Carla today, but the sight of the woman nailing something on the frame of the door gave her pause. “Who does she think she is? Martin Luther?”

Abigail shifted into Park and killed the engine. They both climbed out, and Carla, holding a hammer, turned to face them.

“Hey, Carla,” Abigail said with caution in her voice. “What’s going on?”

“Nothing you need to worry over, Abigail,” Carla said in a no-nonsense voice, climbing carefully down the porch steps, a little winded. “Just business with John.”

Abigail brushed past Carla and jogged up the steps. “Wait a sec, an eviction order? Are you insane?”

Carla didn’t stop walking. She passed Shelby without looking at her.

“Carla,” Abigail called, parking her hands on her hips. “What is this all about?”

“Dissolving the trust and putting Breezy Hill on the market as soon as possible. I gave him two weeks’ notice. I won’t need him after the harvest.”

“What?” Abigail looked back at the paper fluttering in the breeze and then at Carla. “Why would you do this to him?”

Shelby watched Carla carefully as she turned around. The older woman’s face was ravaged with guilt and grief. “He knows the reason, Abi.”

Carla glanced over to Shelby and then got into her car. Abigail looked at Shelby, her normally calm, placid features twisted into disbelief, anger and a sort of understanding of what Carla’s words meant.

“Stop,” Abigail called out as Carla started her car. “Don’t you dare do this.” She ran back down the steps, heading for Carla’s car.

Shelby climbed the steps, her eyes on the paper. Eviction notice set for January 20. She pulled it down, her heart breaking all over again, and wadded it into a ball.

Carla had taken John’s dream and crumpled it like the notice in her hand...all because of Shelby.

Anger flooded her, along with a deep-seated sadness for the grief poisoning Rebecca’s mother.

Shelby stood in a no-win situation.

Abigail, having no success in stopping John’s former mother-in-law, tripped back up to the porch, looking incredulous. “I can’t believe she’s doing this.”

“I can. She hates me.”

“That’s crazy. John has been nothing but good to Carla. He’s taken Breezy Hill in a profitable direction, and he’s family, for goodness sake. What does she expect? For him to stay here alone for the rest of his life, clinging to a dead woman?”

“Yeah, that’s about right,” Shelby said, pulling out the key John had given her over a month ago.

“This is nuts.”

“Yeah. Nuts,” Shelby agreed, wanting Abigail to leave. The woman must have sensed it because she didn’t cross the threshold.

“I need to call John and then I have to go back to Laurel Woods. We have a full house. I hate to leave you here after a tough afternoon. Will you be okay?”

“Of course,” Shelby said, lying through her teeth. Nothing was okay about today. Like a house of cards in the wind, her life had toppled. No more hoping for the best.

“What about John and this whole eviction thing?”

“Nothing you or I can do. John will have to handle it.”

Abigail nodded. “Well, he can call our family attorney and see what might be done legally. I don’t know anything about trusts, but it doesn’t seem fair she can do this.”

Shelby shrugged, and with a final wave, shut the front door, sinking immediately against it, closing her eyes.

The solution sat in front of her, fat and full of tears.

John didn’t love her, and even though they were amazing in bed, liked vanilla ice cream and would become parents in June, it wasn’t enough for her to stay and destroy his life. He deserved to keep what he loved, not sacrifice it to “do the right thing.”

Shelby sighed, looking around at the house she’d grown to love. Beautifully simplistic, wholly warm, worn by time and care, Breezy Hill was not where she belonged no matter how much she wanted to believe it. No matter how much she convinced herself Rebecca’s spirit had intended it.

Bunch of hogwash and wishful thinking.

And now her mother’s text had given her hope for a new start with her parents.

A baby changes everything. That’s what the commercial said. Maybe the thought of a new sweet life had moved her parents’ hearts. That could be amazing. But also a baby shouldn’t change everything about John’s life. He didn’t have to give up the land to be a good father. The child didn’t have to live here to know his or her father’s love. She could make the separation work. Somehow.

It’s not like she hadn’t given staying in Magnolia Bend a try. She had. But things were too hard, and she wanted more than John could give her. She didn’t want him to give up his dreams. She wanted his heart.

And that might never happen.

Shelby climbed the stairs with no more tears left to cry.

Sometimes life just sucked. She’d learned that long ago, and so she knew how to put one foot in front of the other.

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

J
OHN
SAT
IN
his father’s study feeling much the way he had as a child, ready to explain his way out of trouble, hiding from the shame of his actions. Some things never changed.

His father sat in the cracked leather chair, Bible close at hand with volumes of discourse and stacks of legal pads holding down the desk corners. In the center was a framed picture of him and his siblings taken twenty years ago. This was the desk of a man who thought, worked and embraced his faith every day.

“The reasons you gave are not reason enough to wed. Marriage is a sacrament—a selfless pledge of love.”

“I know what marriage is. I’ve been married,” John said.

Dan Beauchamp leaned forward, the chair creaking as he propped his elbows on the desk. “So do you love Shelby?”

“I don’t know. Maybe. She’s funny and makes me happy. I want her.” He cleared his throat. “I mean to say the chemistry’s there.”

His father’s laugh made him straighten. “You act like your mother and I don’t have good sex. I’ll have you know—”

“Please,” John interrupted, focusing on a pewter candlestick beyond his father’s head. “That’s not something I want nor need to know.”

“Any more than I needed to know about your having drunken monkey sex in a bar.”

“Monkey sex?”

“A term I picked up from Jake.”

“Good Lord,” John said, sucking in a deep breath, shame spiraling inside him at the truth in his father’s words—not about monkey sex, but about the drunken in a bar part. “I’m not proud of myself.”

“Son, you’re a healthy, thirty-four-year-old man. You’re supposed to desire a woman.”

John nodded. “But it’s not just about sex.”

“Is it about not being alone?”

“No. I mean, it’s been good having Shelby beside me, but what we have between us isn’t the same as what I had with Rebecca, so I’m confused.”

“What if there were no baby?”

“That’s a moot point because there is.”

“What if she lost the baby? What if there were no other reason for Shelby to stay in Magnolia Bend?”

John glanced out the window, turning over the thought of how he would feel if something happened to the baby. From the beginning, the thought of losing his child had hurt, but Shelby hadn’t been as much a concern. But now the thought of losing Shelby...crippled him.

But how did he put a name to whatever it was that held them together? Was it companionship? Sex? Friendship?

Or something more?

“I would want her in my life regardless of a child.”

“But you didn’t want her at first,” his father said.

“I didn’t know her.”

“But now you do? So that means what?”

“I don’t know. You’re supposed to tell me. You’re my dad. That’s your job.”

“My job, huh?” His father gave a dry laugh. “Okay, so how is what you feel for Shelby different than what you felt for Rebecca?”

For the first time since her death, thinking about Rebecca didn’t hurt and didn’t flood him with guilt. Strange.

He’d always felt safe with Rebecca. She’d been part of him, soul mates from the beginning, fitting together like a zipper. Was that the way he was with Shelby?

No.

But a zipper wasn’t the only thing that held things together.

“Can a man truly love two women the same way, Dad?”

“Can a father truly love three sons the same way?” His father twisted his lips and lifted his dark eyes to the ceiling, carefully weighing his thoughts before he spoke. Finally, he nodded. “I don’t love you the same, but I love you as much. Love comes in many forms, a gift from our Heavenly Father. God doesn’t put Himself into a box, and so you shouldn’t put his gifts into a box. There are no rules when it comes to life or love.”

“I know I loved Rebecca, but I think I love Shelby, too. It’s different, but not less. If something happened to Shelby...” He trailed off, the thought of losing her latching onto his heart, making his insides tremble.

“I understand, son. Loving a woman is always complicated, and no love is the same, just as no two people are the same. It’s rather like a snowflake. You can’t prove a snowflake is a snowflake because everyone’s flake is different.”

“So as long as the makeup is love, I don’t have to worry about what it looks like?”

“Smart man. Just like your father.”

“If you think talking snowflake analogies is smart.” John finally smiled.

“Shelby suits you, son. She’ll be a good partner, making you laugh, helping you heal and teaching you patience. But of these, the most important is love.”

John laughed. “Always bringing the scripture.”

“Hey, it’s my thing.”

Looking at the man who always seemed to know the answers, John’s heart filled with gratitude. Family could be a pain in the ass...or a shot in the arm. Either way, he was happy to be a Beauchamp. “Thanks, Dad.”

“Sure, and you will soon discover being a father doesn’t end when your child grows up.”

John walked around the desk, embracing his father as he rose to his feet. Feeling the strength of his old man, internalizing the wisdom, renewing the intent to create something beautiful and real from the mess he’d started that night in September.

* * *

J
OHN
SAT
IN
the living room reading the letter Shelby had left him on the kitchen table, along with a notice of eviction from the Stanton trust and the journal Rebecca had kept.

He’d returned home from his parents ready to share with Shelby the conversation he’d had with his father.

Ready to tell her exactly what she meant to him.

Ready to embrace a new love.

But Shelby’s car had been gone and the house empty.

At first he’d wondered if she’d gone out to the store, but then remembered it was New Year’s Day and outside of a couple of gas stations, the town was shut down for the holiday. So he’d gone up to her bedroom and found the bed made, everything tidy, which was totally unlike Shelby.

He came back down the steps, noting Bart’s full food bowl, and found the letter.

He’d picked it up, shocked at what she’d written.

Dear John,

I know this will surprise you after the wonderful night we shared, but I have decided to go back home to Seattle. I know I should have had this conversation with you rather than being a coward like this, but I couldn’t face you and not be swayed. You’re my personal crack, remember? I’ve spent the afternoon thinking about our situation and contemplating your proposal of marriage. After reflection, I realized that as much as I want to I just don’t belong at Breezy Hill. You, however, do. When I saw the eviction notice, I understood that in trying to do the right thing by me, you sacrificed your livelihood and all that you are, which is not fair.

I don’t want you to worry about the baby. He or she is your child, and I think you know me well enough now to know I would never shut you out of our child’s life. I will send you updates and we can later discuss the specifics. My attorney will be in touch with yours. Tell Carla I’m no longer in the picture. Tell her you belong there.

And I don’t.

Shelby

Holy shit.

A real-life Dear John letter.

He crumpled it up and hurled it across the room, desolation consuming him...along with anger and fear.

God damn Carla Stanton.

And God damn Shelby, too.

The woman didn’t even have the guts to tell him to his face that she didn’t want him or this life. She didn’t have the guts to stand and fight with him for happiness. John kicked the chair across the room and it clattered to the floor, making Bart yelp and run toward the living room. John slammed his fist on the table, knocking over the salt and pepper shakers, not caring he made a mess. His heart throbbed and tears clogged his throat.

Looking down, he caught hold of Carla’s notice and ripped it into small pieces. He’d always loved the warmhearted woman who’d made fantastic lasagna and could beat him at dominos, but she’d lost her ever-lovin’ mind in evicting him from his home...the place he belonged.

Carla wanted to erase his life here like it had never happened, like he hadn’t poured his blood, sweat and every nickel he’d ever made into Breezy Hill.

“Goddamn it,” he hollered at the top of his lungs, rattling the glass in the low-hanging light fixture centered over the breakfast table, and then he bowed, defeated, his head lowering to rest on the bound journal sitting on the table. He sucked in several deep breaths, inhaling the leather of the cover. Loss was an old friend—didn’t take long for the pain to latch on.

A knock sounded on the front door and he lifted his head.

Maybe Shelby had changed her mind. Maybe she realized she did belong, not at Breezy Hill, not in Magnolia Bend, but with him.

Didn’t she know she was his damn snowflake, different and wonderful?

More insistent knocking.

He rose and went to the door, throwing it open, half of him annoyed, half of him hopeful.

His sister, Abigail, stood there.

“Where’s Shelby?” she said.

“Gone.”

“Gone where?” Abigail made a face.

“Seattle. She left me a note so she’s that kind of gone.”

“I knew it,” Abigail said, bulldozing her way inside like only she could do. She never asked. She just pushed and finagled her way into whatever she wished.

John closed the door, hoping like hell he didn’t look like he’d been crying. He hadn’t, of course. His eyes just felt raw and achy. “Knew what?”

“Shelby started acting weird. She came back from the kitchen all pale and quiet and wanting to leave. Then when we were in the car, she burst into tears, saying it had something to do with her mother, but then when we got here and Carla—”

“Wait, when she came back from what kitchen?”

“Mom’s.”

“Wait, what?”

“We were taking down the tree and Mom sent her in the kitchen for tape. I think you were in Dad’s office.”

In Dad’s office.

Had Shelby overheard his conversation with his father? And if she did, why would she leave? Because she didn’t want him to love her? Because she didn’t like being compared to a snowflake? Or maybe she heard the first part of the conversation...the part where he doubted what he felt.

Abigail continued. “She got really quiet and sad on the way home. I could feel a change in her. Usually she’s so smart-mouthed and funny, but it was as if someone had taken the wind from her sails. Deflated.”

John shook his head, trying to remember what he’d said to his father at first. Crap. He’d said he didn’t want to bring shame on the family, that he was sorry he embarrassed his father. He’d said he wanted to do the right thing.

He’d never said anything about love until much, much later.

“Then when we got here and she saw the notice, she got even more subdued. I should have invited myself inside, but she seemed to want me gone.” Abigail lifted an apologetic gaze to his. “So she just left?”

“Yeah,” he said, turning toward the mantel, to where the painting she’d given him sat against the pale cream walls Rebecca had repainted the summer before last. “She said things weren’t working and that she wanted to go back home.”

“But she lied,” Abigail said.

John snapped his head up. “Why do you think she lied?”

“Because she loves you, idiot.”

He ignored the insult because he was likely worthy of it and concentrated on the important words. “Loves me? Then why did she leave?”

“Men,” Abigail said, crossing her arms. “You all are on some other plane of consciousness...the dumb-ass plane of consciousness.”

He stared at her blankly.

Giving a beleaguered sigh, Abigail continued. “She left because she didn’t want you to lose Breezy Hill. Because you’re moving slowly in your relationship with her, and she’s fallen head over heels for you. Obviously, you’ve given her the impression you’re not in love with her or still grieving or—”

“I never said anything to make her think that.”

Abigail looked momentarily guilty. “Yeah, but did you dispute it?”

No. He hadn’t. Until earlier that day, he hadn’t been sure what he felt was love. He’d had only one experience with it, and what he felt for Shelby was different than what he’d had with Rebecca. Not less. Just different. “I told her I couldn’t promise love. I wasn’t sure. But now I know.”

His sister hooked a brow. “And you’re sure? Because love is tricky. That flirty wonderfulness you feel at the outset won’t sustain.”

“Thanks, buzzkill,” he drawled, his heart lifting, his anger draining at the thought of Shelby trying to fade out of the picture. At Shelby trying to “do the right thing.” He left the room, heading for the kitchen.

“Hey, where’re you going? And I’m not being a buzzkill. I think you’re smart in being cautious with a new relationship.”

John picked up his cell phone and turned to Abigail. “Of course, that’s what you would think. You’re jaded when it comes to love. Totally shut off. But I’m not. I love Shelby and want to build a life with her. If that’s too fast, I don’t care. I’ve already missed a whole year of life.”

He’d dialed Shelby’s number, but she didn’t answer. He let it go to voice mail, deciding to hang up. What he had to say would be better done face-to-face. He clicked on the internet and began the search for airline tickets.

Abigail hadn’t responded. Instead she crossed her arms and leaned against the cabinet.

“Damn it,” he said, clicking off the phone.

“What are you doing?”

“Booking a flight to Seattle, but there aren’t any out of Baton Rouge until morning.”

“You’re going to Seattle?”

“I’m going to bring her home. Where she belongs.”

“What about the harvest? You’ve got cane—”

“I just got fired, remember?” He picked up the torn pieces of the eviction notice Carla had overdramatically nailed to his door. Probably wasn’t even legal to serve it without the bank or law present, but Carla wanted effect. A twist of the knife for good measure. “Homer can take over for a few days. If anything goes wrong, what do I care?”

“But this is Breezy Hill,” Abigail said, looking at him like his head had started spinning around.