The Time in Between by Kristen Ashley

But with Lonnie and Maria all about each other, I figured it would seem to Tony when he came back that I was waiting for him to reappear.

  So I took off.

  And I did it repeating my prayer.

  Even if I worried doing it actually made me the bad girl I promised I wasn’t going to be.

  Former Glory

  Present day . . .

  I SAT ON MY BED at the Chickadee Inn in Magdalene with the lovely, elegant, large red wineglass the folks at the inn gave me to pour in the fabulous Malbec that I’d found at Wayfarer’s Market in town.

  I stared at the fire the young man had come up, laid and lit.

  I was assured by their website that this wasn’t preferential treatment considering I was in the White Pine Suite, the only suite in this small, spectacularly charming, ten-room inn. As the website proclaimed, most of the rooms had fireplaces, and if you put in the order in the morning that you’d be staying put in the evening to relax, they sent the young man up to lay and light your fire.

  I’d been in Magdalene now for fourteen days, and I’d had a good many fires and a goodly amount of (exceptionally delicious) room service because I was laying low.

  It wouldn’t do for a certain someone to see me around while I was writing the outline to what would be the last chapter of my life.

  I had taken a necessary trip up north, but just to get the lay of the land. I hadn’t made contact.

  That would come later.

  It would all come later.

  My eyes shifted to the papers strewn on the bed.

  Now I was outlining.

  The inspection on the lighthouse had been done.

  It was, as suspected, a complete disaster. Every building (except the lighthouse itself) needed a roof-to-roots facelift—new shingles to re-stabilizing foundations. The lighthouse itself needed a new furnace, new plumbing, new electric, cable laid for TV and Internet, all new bathrooms and a new kitchen.

  It was going to be a project of epic proportions, which was further fettered due to the fact the seemingly only local contractor had Yelp reviews that were so abysmal, I wondered why he was still in business. Even Rob (the real estate agent and my new friend) said he wouldn’t recommend the guy.

  So I had to go farther afield, find someone outside the county, and the three I’d contacted to look over the inspection report and property told me flat out they’d have to charge a travel fee.

  That was not optimal.

  But I wanted it perfect.

  It would need to be.

  It was where I was going to spend the rest of my life. It was where the family was going to stay when they visited me (or the studio and loft were).

  It was going to be mine and Patrick had taught me not to accept anything but the best.

  The family who owned the lighthouse had not been best pleased I’d deducted ten percent off the asking price when I’d made my initial offer, because even with that inspection the land alone was worth double what I’d offered.

  But I felt they shouldn’t get any hint of a reward for what they’d done. None of them had taken care of their father’s legacy, shown it (or him) the least amount of respect, never mind love. They’d just left it to rot like it meant nothing when it was a beacon of safety (primarily) but mostly it was a memory of the man who had a hand in making them.

  I’d learned in beautiful and hideous ways how important it was to respect someone who carries your blood, and do that no matter what.

  No matter what stupid things they did, what toxic people they spent their time with, what drastic decisions they made.

  We’d settled on five percent below the asking price and I was signing the papers in four days.

  Then it would be done.

  No going back.

  No matter what, I was not going back.

  I sipped my wine with one hand, gathered the house papers with the other, shoving them into a manila folder (except the inspection report, which was a whole binder worth of grim information).

  I got up, set the folder and binder on the dresser and moved back to the bed, turning to the nightstand and setting down my wineglass in order to pick up a cheese knife (kindly provided by the inn) in order to slice into an extraordinary camembert (not provided by the inn, which made the knife another kind gesture) and slathering it on a hunk of fresh French bread (all this also from Wayfarer’s).

  I shoved it into my mouth and chewed, barely able to stop myself from closing my eyes to better enjoy its scrumptiousness.

  It was all coming together.

  I loved Wayfarer’s.

  I was being cautious about being seen, so I was careful how much time I spent in it, but regardless, I’d fallen in love with the town of Magdalene and couldn’t wait to spend more time in the shops, not to mention experience the restaurants.

  The contractors would be meeting me to go over the property and then they’d be getting back to me with their plans and bids very soon, so I’d need to make a decision and start that long process moving.

  Now it was necessary I find an interior decorator. I was hopeless at that kind of thing.

  What I wasn’t hopeless at was knowing what I liked. I wasn’t the kind of person who vacillated about making a decision.

  Patrick had always loved that about me.

  “You’re a joy to go to dinner with, darling girl,” he’d say at many a restaurant table after I’d open my menu, skim and make a decision within a minute.

  Yes, I knew just scanning if I wanted seared tuna or steak Diane.

  So I’d be able to pick between different comforter covers and wall hangings without taking six weeks to do it.

  The outline was coming together. The framework was getting set.

  It was going to be other things that would be difficult.

  And as if the cosmos wished to remind me of what one of those things were (as if I’d forget), my cell on the nightstand rang.

  When I saw who was calling, I not only grabbed the phone, I grabbed my wine because I figured I’d need it.

  I took the call and put the phone to my ear.

  “Hey, Pat.”

  “Hey, honey. How’s things?”

  It was not surprising to me that Patrick’s eldest son, in four words, could communicate the depth of concern he had for me at the same time sharing how he wanted me so far away from Maine, if he could, he’d put me in a rocket ship and launch me to the moon.

  I had not told Pat about the lighthouse.

  I would also not tell Pat about the lighthouse until I’d actually bought it.

  It was sneaky and thus wrong.

  But he was Pat. His wife, Kathy, was my best friend. And he was my dead husband’s oldest son, he was a lot like his father and he was definitely like my big brother.

  In other words, if I let him, he could get to me.

  “Things are great. Have you been to Maine?” I asked then went on immediately, “It’s beautiful. Totally amazing.”

  “Yeah. Kathy and I did a whale watching thing before the hellions were born.”

  I knew that.

  Kathy had told me.

  And the hellions, officially my step grandchildren, Verity and Dexter, were not hellions at all.

  They were now nineteen (nearly twenty) and seventeen, respectively. Verity was currently utilizing a full academic scholarship at Yale (which was close, another good thing about Maine, because Verity and I were super close—it was almost as traumatic for me when she went away to school as it was for her parents), and Dexter was considering Harvard, but only to annoy his big sister. He’d end up at Yale too.

  “I should do a whale watching tour,” I murmured, thinking that would be fabulous because it would just be fabulous but also because it was highly doubtful I’d run into a certain someone if I did it.

  “Yeah, you should,” Pat replied. “Listen, when are you coming home? The house is getting some interest and the realtor doesn’t think it’s going to stay on the market very long. We’ll need you here for the sale.”
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br />   I felt my back get straight as my eyes drifted to the fireplace because this shocked me.

  A fifteen-thousand-square-foot house that had been on the market for less than a month was getting interest?

  It was listed for six and a half million dollars.

  How could it be getting interest? Or, I should say, the kind of interest that would lead to a quick sale?

  “Cady, honey?” Pat called gently.

  “I didn’t . . .” I cleared my throat and looked at the lovely blue and white paisley of the comforter cover. “I didn’t think it would go that fast.”

  “There are rich people who need houses too, Cady,” Pat said on a careful tease.

  “Right,” I mumbled then spoke up. “Are you sure Kathy and you don’t want it?”

  “Soon-to-be empty-nesters bumbling around in fifteen-thousand square feet? I don’t think so.”

  “What about Mike and Pam?” I asked after Patrick’s second son and his wife (Pam being my other best friend). “Their kids are all home.”

  And they were, there were three of them and they were younger.

  “We already had the family discussion, sweetheart,” he said softly. “Mike and Pam and the kids hate to see it go but they don’t want it. And Daly and Shannon don’t want it either.” There was a brief pause before he said, “Are you sure you don’t want to stay there?”

  “Patrick didn’t give me that choice,” I reminded him and took a sip of wine.

  Not that I wanted to stay there. Me alone in that huge house with nothing but memories to keep me company?

  Absolutely not.

  “I know he put that in his will, Cady, but maybe we can talk to the attorneys. Find a way around that.”

  “Is it because you want the family home to stay in the family?” I asked carefully.

  “I grew up there. I fought like crazy with my brothers there, even though I loved them like crazy too. We lost our mom there. Dad found you and we had good times there. Holidays. Those birthday parties you’re so good at giving. Game nights. Your ridiculous slumber parties with our grown women that we guys definitely had to panty raid, so we did. But the family is the family. Dad and you, me and Kath and the kids, Mike and Pam and their kids, Daly and Shannon and their brood. That’s the family. The house is just a house. But if you wanted to keep it, we’d find a way.”

  And find a way to keep me close to home so I wouldn’t get my heart pulled out of my chest, twisted to mush and discarded like trash.

  I drew in breath before I said, “Your father wanted me to move on, I need to move on, Pat.”

  “Yes, but how?”

  I didn’t answer that. I took a sip of wine.

  “Cady.” His voice was sharper.

  Definitely like his father.

  Or my big brother.

  “That picture is coming clearer,” I told him vaguely.

  “You gonna show it to me?” he asked.

  “When the time is right.”

  “Dammit, Cady,” he bit off.

  “Pat, he’s been gone two months and six days. Give me time,” I whispered.

  Pat said nothing for a while.

  Then he said, “I don’t like this.”

  “You’ve made that clear, sweetheart,” I said quietly.

  He had. Kathy had. Mike. Pam. Daly. Shannon. Even Verity, Dexter, Riley, Ellie, Melanie, Corbin and Bea had, and Melanie was only seven years old.

  They wanted me home.

  In Denver.

  “If you need to find your way, you should do it with your family.”

  They weren’t my family.

  They were Patrick’s.

  “You know I love you,” I said softly.

  “Yes, I know. And Kath knows. Verity. Dex. I could go on but I won’t. What I’ll do is say we love you too. Dad’s gone and we all lost him. We all miss him. And trust me, because we’re all here and you’re there, I know it’s easier to grieve when you’re with family.”

  “To get back to our original discussion,” I changed the subject badly, “Kath has my power of attorney. If the house sells—”

  “If the house sells,” Pat interrupted me, “then the stuff in it needs to be auctioned off.”

  “And I went through everything with Kath, Pam and Shannon before I left, so they know everything that I haven’t put aside is good to go.”

  “I think with this break, you should come home and have another look. Kath tells me you barely put anything aside.”

  “None of it, as you know, is Patrick.”

  Again he said nothing but this time he stuck with that.

  “I’m doing what your father wanted, Pat,” I reminded him.

  “I’m not sure he was in his right mind when he shared what he wanted, Cady,” Pat returned.

  “You know that isn’t true,” I chided gently. “You know he’d been planning this for years.”

  And again, Pat was silent.

  “I need to do this, Pat. For your dad.”

  “If the place sells, you need to come home.”

  “Kath has my power—”

  “When we say goodbye to that house, Cady, we’ll want you home.”

  It was my turn to be silent.

  “Are we agreed on that?” he asked.

  “Yes,” I whispered.

  “Good,” he said and it sounded almost like a grunt.

  I nearly grinned.

  Instead I took another sip of wine.

  “I’ll keep you informed with how the sale is going,” he promised.

  “Thanks, sweetheart,” I replied.

  “And Kath wouldn’t mind hearing from you,” he shared with me.

  That surprised me.

  “I called her just yesterday.”

  “She’s used to talking to you every day, and seeing you nearly every day. So maybe think on that.”

  I closed my eyes.

  We were thick as thieves, Kath and me. Pam and me. Heck, Shannon was my third best friend.

  The rest of the family would miss me. But it would hit Kath, Pam and Shannon hard, and I knew this because if any of them went away, I’d be devastated.

  And I was because I was going away.

  I just couldn’t think about that.

  “I’ll give her a call a bit later,” I told him.

  “Appreciated.”

  “Okay, then, I have a camembert bleeding here and—”

  “I know you’re going to see him.”

  I shut my mouth.

  Pat didn’t.

  “I know you’re going to try to see them and I’ll just put my two cents in here to say neither of them is worth it, Cady. They both turned their backs on you. That one, that cop, what he did to you—”

  I closed my eyes again and whispered, “Please.”

  “They don’t deserve to know you, honey. They don’t deserve to have your light in their lives. I don’t know what Dad was thinking and I loved my father. The whole world feels strange without him in it because he was such a big part of mine. But he’s wrong about this. I feel it in my bones.”

  “It’s beautiful here,” I said quietly, opening my eyes and staring into the fire.

  “I know.”

  “Peaceful,” I told him.

  “I know that too.”

  “I need to do what he wanted me to do, Pat.”

  “And it annoys me, but I know that too. So now I’ll say, we’re here. We’re always here. I don’t care if we’re most a continent away, we can be there or we can get you back here if you need us. All you need to do is call.”

  My heart was in my throat when I said, “Thank you, sweetheart.”

  I heard him clear his own throat when he replied, “Call Kath later. But don’t tell her I browbeat you because she’ll make me sleep on the couch.”

  Kath was a woman and a mother. Kath didn’t browbeat and Kath wasn’t a big fan of when Pat did (he still did it and thus sometimes found himself on the couch).

  She had other weapons in her arsenal to get what she wante
d.

  And she was using them.

  I had just so far been immune.

  “I’ll call her. And I’ll also say thank you for being all you are and caring so much. But I’ll be fine.”

  “We’ll see.”

  We would.

  We said our goodbyes and rang off.

  I put the phone down, the glass beside it, prepared more cheese and bread and poured more wine while I chewed it.

  I did this thinking about doing what I should absolutely not do.

  But the conversation brought it all steaming full force into the present, into that lovely room in a lovely inn in New England.

  So I went to the closet and opened the empty suitcase I’d stowed there after I’d unpacked (this something Patrick found amusing, if we were to stay somewhere for two days or more, I always unpacked).

  The big envelope was in there.

  I shouldn’t have brought it. In my more fanciful imaginings, I considered a certain someone finding I was there, ordering a police raid and discovering it.

  Of course, that wouldn’t happen.

  At least the last part of it.

  I went back to the bed, pulled the two manila folders in the envelope out, and I set them on the bed.

  I nabbed my wine and turned back to them.

  I opened the thinner one.

  There was an eight by ten picture paper-clipped to the inside, front left, of my brother leaving a lovely, shingle-sided home and walking to a blue Subaru parked in his drive.

  The last time I’d seen him was at my mother’s funeral. The last time I’d spoken to him was at my mother’s funeral. Or, I said very little to him. What he’d said to me was that I wasn’t welcome at the gathering at Mom and Dad’s house, and I should feel my due respects were paid by attending her service graveside.

  Patrick, who had been standing at my side, had been livid.

  We did not go to the gathering.

  Dad had died nearly two years before Mom did. Regardless of the fact he was a fitness fanatic, ran nearly daily and watched everything he ate, he’d had a bad heart that had led to a succession of strokes, the last one killing him.

  Mom’s death had been uglier.

  She’d slipped, fallen and hurt herself badly in her greenhouse, cutting her arm on a pair of shears, nicking an artery and bleeding heavily. She’d dragged herself to the door and nearly through it before she’d passed out with the pain and blood loss. It was winter and it was during a cold snap.