The Time in Between by Kristen Ashley
Boy, did I know how that felt.
But that I didn’t share.
I said, “And he’s putting effort into moving beyond that. Join him on that journey, Kim. Don’t stay in the past when he’s not there anymore. As the texting situation proved, it’ll only serve to drag him back there and remind him of the reasons he had to remain angry, you’ll react to that, and then where will we all be?”
“When you walked in, and I hoped to God you weren’t Coert’s Cady, then I found out you were, I thought it was because you’re so incredibly pretty that he was hung up on you for so long. But it’s not. It’s because you’re perfect for him. Honest and smart and sweet. And you don’t play games. You lay it out there. That’s pure Coert. Perfect for him.”
I sat back and it was my turn to stare.
The waitress came and served our lunches.
I turned flustered eyes to my plate.
“Janie’s falling in love with you,” she said softly.
I lifted my gaze to her.
“I’m so glad because I’m gone for your beautiful girl,” I said softly back.
“I know it’s not my right to say this, but I’m gonna say it anyway. I’m really glad he got you back so he can be happy. Giving you more honesty, it hurt a lot, being with him and feeling the sadness in him and knowing it wasn’t going to be me that would take that away. But I care about him enough that I’m glad he found what he needed to get rid of that. So thank you.”
“That’s very nice, Kim, and I hope you continue to feel that way,” I replied.
“Why would I not?” she asked, picking up her Reuben.
“To be totally honest, we’re aware this is going fast but we’re even more aware of the time we lost so even if Coert’s doing all he can to take care of Janie along the way, I think it’s only fair to warn you that it feels like we’re running to catch up and I’m not sure when that’s going to end.”
She chewed and swallowed the bite she took while I was speaking and then immediately grinned at me.
“Girl, if I was Coert Yeager’s one and only and he looked like he looks when he gets a text from you, I’d break world records running to catch up.”
I smiled back, feeling relief sweep through me, and feeling a lot more wondering what Coert looked like when he got a text from me.
“I’ll add my gratitude for you being so lovely through this,” I told her, going for one half of my patty melt.
“Beware our descent into the mutual admiration society because I can’t tell you how relieved I am that you didn’t come here thinking I was a total bitch after what I did to Coert, intent on hating me, and instead you’re being so cool.”
I chewed, swallowed and replied, “I don’t mind being a member of that society.”
“Good,” she said with mouth full. But she swallowed before she inquired, “Can I ask you for something?”
I tried not to get visibly tense while I nodded.
“I absolutely have to see this lighthouse. Just because I always wanted to see the lighthouse. But Janie talks about it all the time. She says the ‘window room,’ her words, is the ‘awesomest,’ her word as well. So now I need to see this lighthouse. And meet your dog. Janie is drawing black dogs over all her coloring books and she says it’s so she can have Midnight with her until she gets her back.”
Oh my God.
I loved that child.
“Any time you like. I always have wine,” I invited.
“That’d be amazing.”
“You can’t even imagine,” I replied. “We’ll set that up. I volunteer a couple of days a week at the Historical Society but other than that, I’m usually free.”
“Awesome.”
“Perfect.”
We both took bites.
And then two new friends had lunch.
I hustled on my boots down the sidewalk toward the station but had to slow when my phone in my hand binged again with a text.
I looked at it.
Cady, text me.
I could actually feel the bold and underline under “text me.”
This was because, close to the end of our lunch the text came in from Coert that ordered, Text me the minute you’re done.
Which was after the text that came in before we had lunch that said, Thinking of you. Hope it goes okay. Text me when it’s over.
I hit the microphone so it would type out my verbal reply without me having to stop and do it, saying, “Keep your pants on. I’m ten feet from the steps of the station. I’ll be in your office soon.”
I hit send.
Then I hit the steps to the station, trotted up them, pushed through the door, waved at one of Coert’s deputies and called, “Hi, Matt.”
“Hey there, Cady,” he called back.
I ran up the steps and smiled at Monica who was in her small office next to Coert’s.
“Hey, Cady,” she said.
“Hiya, Monica,” I replied.
I hurried down the hall, hit Coert’s door that was open and saw him at his desk.
His head came up.
I smiled, walked in and closed the door behind me.
“Future,” he growled. “I’m worried about you, don’t tell me to keep my pants on.”
I ignored his grouchiness and cried, “Kim knows a reporter at the Bangor Daily News!”
“Uh . . . what?” Coert asked.
I rushed to stand opposite him at his desk. “I told her about Boston Stone and the whole rezoning conspiracy and she got angry and told me she knows someone at the Bangor Daily News and she was calling her when she got back to work, and she hopes this reporter person will blow the story wide open!”
“You wanna share with me how your lunch went with my ex?” he demanded through a request, completely ignoring my fabulous news.
“Totally fine,” I verbally waved it away. “She’s lovely. It’s all good. She’s coming to the lighthouse for wine this weekend. Bringing Janie.”
Coert blinked.
I kept talking.
“I know Bangor isn’t close but Kim thinks like us, that this is corruption and Boston Stone has dealings all through Maine so she thinks it’ll be so meaty, her friend will be dying to sink her teeth into it.”
“Kim’s coming to the lighthouse for wine?” Coert asked.
“Yes,” I answered impatiently. “But Coert, did you hear me about Kim’s friend?”
“I did. And it’s a good idea that Amy already ran with. She did some huge house sale a while back and contacted all the local papers, so Mick phoned me this morning to say that she contacted them as a concerned citizen and shared this with them, and this morning a reporter at the Derby Forecaster called her back to tell her the paper is running a story next week. Now, let’s talk about you having wine with my ex at your house.”
“Do you think that’s a bad idea?” I asked.
“Do you think it’s a good one?” he returned.
“I can’t imagine why not,” I replied.
“Cady, she’s my ex,” he told me something I knew.
“Yes,” I confirmed I knew it.
“And that road has been rocky.”
“So has ours,” I shared.
“Uh, yeah, I know. But just to let you in on something, a guy isn’t real comfortable with two women he’s taken to bed having wine at one of their houses.”
I fell silent because I found this very interesting.
“The goal of this lunch was for you to get Kim’s head out of her ass, not become best friends with her,” he informed me.
“I doubt we’ll ever be best friends, Coert, but I’m uncertain it’s a bad thing that we become friend friends.”
“I’ve slept with both of you,” he retorted.
“Although I’ll admit that when wine flows, tongues can loosen, but I do think it’s doubtful we’ll compare our Top Ten Favorite Intimate Times with Sheriff Coert Yeager.”
His mouth got hard.
I tried not to laugh.
Instead, I went so
“You can trust me.”
“I know that,” he bit out.
My next was going to be harder.
“You can trust Kim.”
“You’ve had one lunch with her and you feel you can say that?” he asked.
Yes, it was harder.
“She cares about you,” I shared.
“Think I got that with how hard she found it, letting me go.”
“Do you know her mother nearly disowned her after she tried to take Janie away from you?” I asked.
Coert sat back and he didn’t hide this news stunned him.
“She says her relationship with her brother took such a hit, it hasn’t yet recovered.”
“Jesus,” he whispered.
“She was terrified of meeting me, the reason she acted out in the texts, because she thought I’d hate her.”
“Shit,” he murmured.
I lifted my chin. “I like her. I’m going to be her friend. She’s coming over for wine. And I promise I won’t share my favorite time is a tie between bar bathroom sex, kitchen floor sex way back when, and the first time you tied me up.”
“Don’t try to distract me by making me hard reminding me of that first time I tied you up,” he warned.
So his favorite time was that time.
Noted.
“It’s over, honey,” I reminded him.
“It’s—”
“Over,” I whispered. “Boston Stone could build a mall right next to the lighthouse. And Janie’s no doubt someday going to have a bad flu. And I’m going to probably completely fail at being Switzerland with Elijah and Verity and not just in hopes of getting him to try things with my niece. But because I really do not like his new girlfriend because I heard her shouting at him when I pulled in last night before you came over that he never listens to her, and Elijah is an excellent listener. But that’s it. That’s all. Just life. We’re through the tough stuff. Let’s let go and be happy.”
His expression was another mix of beautiful and awful when he whispered in return, “I’m not used to that.”
“Then we’ll get there together.”
He stared in my eyes before he turned his head away and I saw a muscle jump up his cheek.
“Is it terribly inappropriate if I sit in the sheriff’s lap at his desk?” I asked quietly.
He turned his head right back. “No.”
I rounded his desk and Coert swiveled in his chair for me to have a clear shot at sitting in his lap.
So I did.
I also put my arms around his shoulders while he curled his around me.
“We’re going to beat Boston Stone. And Janie will get over that future flu. And Elijah is going to break up with that awful girl. And we’re going to move in together and get married and get pregnant and have a beautiful baby boy with your eyes,” I told him.
“Yeah, except it’ll be a girl with yours,” he replied.
I smiled and snuggled closer, advising, “So, to end, we have to learn to get used to happy, Coert.”
His arms separated, one coming up so he could pull me to him in a tight hold.
I rested my cheek at the base of his throat and felt him rest his chin on top of my head.
“I’ll do my best,” he murmured.
“Good,” I murmured back.
“Sucks but it’s probably ‘terribly inappropriate’ I make out with my woman at my desk,” he kept murmuring.
“Yes, that sucks. Because that means sex is entirely out.”
His arms gave me a squeeze and I felt his body shake with his laughter.
I cuddled even closer.
“Probably won’t be too hard,” he noted.
“Getting used to happy?” I asked.
He kissed the top of my hair and said there, “Yeah.”
“Yeah,” I agreed.
We stayed where we were for a while before Coert said, “Sucks again but I gotta get to work, because I got shit to do and I want to do it so I can come home to you and then watch Jon Snow probably meet an ugly, bloody death at the hands of some White Walkers or something.”
I smiled into his chest at his GoT quip but said nothing about Jon Snow’s bloody end. He’d have to be surprised.
I just shifted to kiss the skin of his throat above his Henley and then moved away so he could look down at me.
“Love you,” I whispered.
“Love you most,” he returned.
“Not even close.”
We didn’t make out.
But he did kiss me.
He also put his coat on to walk me to my car.
Then I went home.
And a few hours later, Coert joined me there.
We had dinner.
We watched three episodes of GoT.
He made love to me before we went to sleep.
And we were happy.
In a Nightie, Cardigan and Socks
Coert
Present day . . .
“I’M NOT SURE PISSED IS the right word. The way Arnie describes it, after Stone stormed into his office yesterday afternoon, apoplectic is the right word,” Jake said in his ear.
Moving around Cady’s kitchen as she made him breakfast, something she made clear she was going to make a habit and did, even on a day like that day—a Saturday he had off—while he refilled their coffee, Coert didn’t bother to beat back his grin.
“So I take it Stone wasn’t a big fan of the injunction Weaver filed on behalf of the citizens in unincorporated Derby County to freeze proceedings on reclassifying Magdalene parkland for commercial builds until an assessment of conflict of interest for the board of governors can be made?” Coert asked, finding Cady’s eyes and watching hers taper in a smile.
“That and the Forecaster story followed up by the Daily News doing a three-part exposé on the shady machinations of Stone Incorporated to acquire land, some of it protected, and reclassify it for commercial or residential use across the state of Maine. Mick’s dad is still a member of the Magdalene Club and Mick got him to make a few touch-base calls with some of his old buds, and there’s some maneuvering going on with folks distancing themselves from Stone while this storm is hitting. So I’m thinkin’ that’s making Stone even testier.”
“It’s tough being a dick,” Coert muttered just as the buzzer went, telling them someone was at Cady’s gate.
He caught her eyes again and shook his head. So she stayed at the skillet frying bacon while Coert walked toward the console by her front door.
“Keep in touch, Jake,” he said into the phone. “Especially if you got news as good as this. But now I gotta go. Someone’s at Cady’s gate.”
“Right, let you go. But Amber and Ethan want you two over for dinner. Amber, because Josie digs your woman and has been talking about her so she wants to look Cady over. Ethan because he wants to impress you with some macaroni and cheese recipe he’s made up that Josie assures him is gonna be the bomb, and he’s decided you and Cady are gonna be his test subjects.”
“We’ll set that up when we got Janie back, sometime next week,” Coert told him as the buzzer right in front of his face went again.
He frowned at it.
He might not have raced to answer the damned thing but it was eight feet from the kitchen, so it hadn’t taken a year to get there.
“Next week,” Jake agreed. “Later.”
“Later,” Coert replied, took the phone from his ear and hit the button to open the line to the gate. “Yeah?”
There was nothing.
“Hit the button to reply,” Coert instructed.
“Who’s this?” a man’s voice asked.
Coert turned his head Cady’s way.
She was staring at the console.
“Cady?” he called.
Her eyes moved to him and she opened her mouth to speak but the voice came through before she got anything out.
“I need to speak to Cady Webster. Doesn’t she live here?”
Webster?
No one in Magdal
“You know who this is?” Coert asked his woman.
“I think . . . it sounds like . . .” She moved wide eyes from console to Coert. “Caylen.”
Coert’s neck instantly got tight.
Oh hell no.
He turned back to the console and hit the button. “Is this Caylen?”
“Again, who’s this?” Caylen demanded, like he was ascertaining who was at his own freaking door.
“Remove yourself from this property,” Coert ordered.
“Coert—” Cady started, and he knew she was coming his way so he twisted to her.
“Do not even say it,” he growled.
“But—”
“I need to speak with Cady Webster,” Caylen stated over the console.
Coert returned his attention to Caylen. “This is Sheriff Coert Yeager. And I’ll repeat, remove yourself from the property.”
He took his finger off the button and got nothing.
She didn’t have a fucking window to the front of the property on any floor but the observation deck, which would leave Cady with the console if Coert went up to check that her brother was complying and that wasn’t happening.
She’d talk to her brother if he left her with that console.
God damn it.
Fortunately and unfortunately, Caylen’s voice came back, letting Coert know he hadn’t left without Coert having to check, but also letting him know the asshole hadn’t actually left.
“Yeager, that’s the name of the undercover cop who—”
Coert cut him off by hitting the button. “You leave or I’ll call deputies to remove you.”
Cady’s hand fell on his arm so he knew she was right beside him.
He didn’t look at her because Caylen came back.
“I’m not on Cady’s property. I’m outside Cady’s property so unless you intend to abuse your authority, you can’t have me removed and I’m not leaving until I speak to my sister.”
“Right,” Coert muttered irately to the room, not through the speaker, and he turned to Cady. “Do not speak to him. I’m going out there.”
“Coert,” she whispered, her beautiful green eyes big, concerned, and already ready to forgive.