A Date With the Other Side (21 page)

“Sean Connery?” Brady made gagging sounds.

Shelby left them to battle it out, Brady’s outraged voice floating behind her.

Brady’s older sister, Heather, was standing in a circle of women, absorbing the admiration of all for her newborn baby girl.

“Two weeks old and sleeping through the night,” she proclaimed proudly.

All the women oohed and aahed and told Heather how fabulous she looked. Which she did, despite the slight dark circles under her eyes. She had that almost palpable glow of a new mother, and Shelby couldn’t help but smile at her.

“Want to hold Rose, Shelby?” Heather held out the infant in offering.

“Sure.” It would insult Heather if she said no, and she did have an itch to get her hands on that downy blond hair.

After a tricky pass-off, where multiple hands shifted closer to them if needed for a fast catch, Shelby settled Rose into the cradle of her arms, her compact baby body resting with a firm warm weight. Wearing a little pink short-sleeve onesie, Rose was sleeping blissfully, her long pale eyelashes twitching over her red eyelids. Her mouth mimicked sucking in her sleep, and her little fingers shuddered occasionally.

She was just a baby. Just like any other of a thousand born every day.

But staring at her tiny beauty, smelling her soft formula-and-powder scent, Shelby felt everything inside her shift and rise up in a suffocating cloud of longing.

She wanted one of these. One of her own.

For the first time since that long-ago miscarriage, she could admit to herself that she wanted to be a mother now. Not later, not never. But now, in the next couple of years, and that which had seemed impossible a month before suddenly seemed possible.

Passion was fine and dandy, but at the end of the day, a girl had to have something to come home to.

And just in case part of her was thinking that, it sure couldn’t be Boston Macnamara.

Boston rang the doorbell to Shelby’s grandmother’s house and shuffled his feet a little on the porch, not sure if Shelby would actually come out with him or not. She was clearly having reservations about continuing anything between them, but Boston wasn’t going to take no for an answer.

If Brett Delmar was about to yank him right back out of Cuttersville, Boston didn’t have a lot of time. And he didn’t think he could leave this town until he’d held Shelby in his arms, skin on skin, her warm legs tossed around him, his body deep inside hers.

When Jessie Stritmeyer answered the door a split second later, he had a boner.

And the old lady knew.

As if guided there by familial protectiveness, she glanced right down at the front of his jeans and raised a whisker-thin eyebrow. Without even giving a greeting, she said, “You been to the drugstore?”

He didn’t even pretend to misunderstand. “Yes.” Three condoms he’d pulled out of a new box accounted for the other bulge in his pants.

“Alright then.” She held the door open. “Come on in while I round Shelby up. I think she’s shaving her legs.”

Boston didn’t need to know these things. The complexities of female hygiene had always mortified him, having grown up in such a formal household with no sisters. But for some reason, the image of Shelby damp from the shower, bent over, leg high on the bathroom counter, with her towel slipping, slipping, left him as hot as that imagined shower.

Stepping into the tiny front hallway, Boston prepared to wait uncomfortably with his landlord, but when he looked up the twisting spindled staircase, he saw that Shelby wasn’t shaving her legs. She was standing there watching him, hair piled on her head in its usual disarray, rich brown eyes wide.

There was something about Shelby that was timeless, that with just a quick change of her clothes, she could have been a farmers daughter in the Depression, or a young immigrant bride in the nineteenth century. She had a strength about her, and she was utterly no-nonsense.

Which was what he wanted between them.

No games, no flirtations, no selfish maneuvering, just a humid country night and desire etched plainly across her face.

“Hey there, Boston.”

“Hi, Shelby. Want to come and watch the fireworks with me?” And make some of their own?

The picnic had been abuzz with the pending Cuttersville fire-works extravaganza set for 10 p.m., and Boston was hoping he and Shelby could find a quiet corner on Main Street to watch them together. As luck would have it, he’d been freed from the pleasure of Amanda’s cynical presence by the arrival of Howie the fireman, who with more earnestness than charm had wooed her away.

Boston had considered slipping the guy a twenty to keep her occupied all week, knowing full well Howie was open to bribes, but he had resisted the urge.

“Sure,” she said in a breathless little voice that wrapped around his groin and squeezed.

If it wasn’t for her grandmother standing there looking amused, he might have bounded up those steps and pressed her against the nearest wall for a deep kiss.

Struggling to divert himself, he turned to Mrs. Stritmeyer. “So who haunts this house?”

Jessie gave him an incredulous look. “No one. You think I’d share a house with a bunch of dead people? No thanks.”

Shelby came down the stairs and waved to her grandmother. “Good night, Gran. Don’t wait up.”

“I wasn’t planning on it.” Jessie headed toward the kitchen. “Not that I’ll get much sleep tonight with all those fools shooting off fireworks in their backyards.”

Shelby laughed, and leaned in to whisper to Boston. “She’s one of those very people, you know. She’s got a box of Roman candles and bottle rockets set out in the garage just ready to go.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” Jessie was all old-lady innocence.

“Uh-huh. Just don’t let Fran set the roof on fire this year.” Shelby leaned over and gave her a kiss.

She turned to Boston. “Bingo ladies. They’re wild, I’m telling you.”

He could only imagine. “Good night, Mrs. Stritmeyer.”

“Night, Boston.”

They walked outside, the porch steps creaking under their weight, and Shelby took a deep breath. “I love that smell. Summer.”

He loved her smell. Fresh and sweet, like soap and honey, which no perfume or shower gel could ever replicate.

Boston put his hand on the small of her back as they headed toward his car, just to touch her. Just to feel her warm firm skin under her T-shirt, and to tease himself with how close his fingers were to the top of her panties.

“I know a place where we can watch the fireworks,” Shelby said. “Alone.”

Nothing in his entire thirty-two years had ever sounded better.

“Lead the way.”

Shelby had to get a handle on her heart racing, or it was likely to leap out of her chest and run on down the road. Which would earn her notoriety she didn’t crave.

“We should probably drive there.”

Boston stopped in front of his fancy deep blue car, and the corner of his thin mouth lifted. “Are you taking me to Lovers’ Lane, Shelby?”

“Of course not.” She grinned, nervousness evaporating. “I would never do anything so tacky. I’m taking you to a cornfield.”

He opened the door for her and leaned over, his lips brushing across her jaw. Shelby shivered.

“At least I know you can’t take advantage of me in a cornfield.”

She snorted.

Boston wasn’t touching her anywhere, except for that little dusting with his lips across her chin and around the corners of her mouth. It felt as intimate as sex, that soft coaxing kiss.

“And there won’t be any voyeuristic ghosts to interrupt whatever might happen.”

“That’s true.” Shelby shifted away from him and slid into the car. “Let’s go.”

Before she started making out with him in her gran’s driveway.

Boston came around and got into the car. She pointed him in the right direction to drive and he did, but as he turned left, he glanced at her. “So why did you and Danny really get divorced?”

Shelby was startled out of her impure thoughts. “I told you, we just decided we were better off as friends.”

“He still cares about you.” It wasn’t a question.

“Yes.” Shelby studied Boston’s profile, the firm jaw, the long aristocratic nose, the smooth stubble-free complexion that seemed so unusual for a man with black hair.

It occurred to her that maybe a tiny piece of Boston was just a wee bit jealous of her relationship with Danny. The thought thrilled her more than it should if she were a decent sort.

“Then there had to be something,” he insisted. “Did he leave his dirty underwear lying around? Hang out drinking with his buddies too often?”

“No.” Shelby ran her fingers over the fringe of her denim cutoff shorts. She’d put these on hoping they’d get dirty. “Love between eighteen-years-olds isn’t always enough five years later. That’s all. Nothing mysterious or complicated or worth writing home about.”

She wanted to be swept away, not tussled back into her past.

Boston didn’t say anything, just took a left turn when she pointed in that direction, but she could just about feel him thinking. He wanted a
real
reason, like infidelity or screaming arguments, or irresponsible spending habits.

Sometimes it was both simpler than that and much more complicated.

She hit the button to send her window purring down, the thick night air rushing in. “So did you and Amanda ever date?” The question had been on her lips all day and she couldn’t contain it any longer.

But his genuine laugh reassured her. “No. I don’t even really know her. She’s been at corporate functions and flits into the office looking for an advance on her allowance occasionally, but that’s the extent of our relationship. I have no idea why she showed up here.” He shrugged. “Just bored, I guess.”

“Turn here and park, and we’ll walk in.” Shelby rolled the window back up. “You know, there does have to be something boring about getting everything you want just handed to you. But I hope Amanda doesn’t mess around with Howie’s head. He’s just a simple kind of guy, you know, nicer than anything, and eager to please. I’d hate to see her take advantage of him.”

Boston opened his door. “She won’t be here long enough to mess around with anyone. I can almost guarantee she’ll be gone in a matter of days.”

She waited for him to come around and open her door, knowing that’s what he would do. When he opened it, she stared at the buttons on his black shirt and asked, “But Amanda is the type of woman you date, right? Has there been anyone serious?”

Strong hands tugged her out of the car and snug up against Boston’s sculpted chest. “I’m a workaholic. Didn’t I mention that?”

“That was sort of the impression I got myself,” she told his chest.

“I always dated casually. Not enough hours in the day to spend on both a serious relationship and my career.”

“Don’t you want to settle down someday, Boston?”

She felt a casual shrug, nothing more, then he moved away from her.

“Let me get something out of the car.”

Running her hands over the goose bumps that were on her arms for no apparent reason given the temperature, Shelby watched him emerge with a bottle of wine and two glasses. They were flutes from the china cabinet in the White House. He also had a big blanket that looked suspiciously like the bedspread from the yellow bedroom.

But she couldn’t find it in her to protest, not when the very thought of snuggling up on that with him was sending a nice warm sensation slithering throughout her body. “We’ll be able to see the fireworks just perfect from here,” she told him, heading to the edge of the cornfield.

Her uncle owned this farm, so she wasn’t worried about trespassing, and there was a little rise between two fields that afforded a perfect view of the night sky over Cuttersville. Dusk was rapidly falling, and the knee-high corn plants swayed in the soft sticky breeze.

“How’s this?” She gestured to the grassy slope, and Boston gave her such a hot look she glanced down to make sure her breasts hadn’t popped out of her T-shirt when she wasn’t looking.

“This is beautiful.” Though he wasn’t looking at the field, or the sky, but at her. Just her.

Shelby took the blanket that was draped over his arm and spread it down on the ground, then flopped on her stomach with a sigh. Boston dropped down beside her, the glasses in his hand clinking a little.

“Wine?”

“Sure.” She wasn’t much of a drinker, but it seemed to match the mood. Rich, robust, reckless.

Out of curiosity, she looked at the bottle in his hand, then got annoyed when the letters shifted and jumbled in her head, the French phrasing throwing her off. She concentrated a little harder, but still wasn’t quite sure what she was looking at.

“It’s just a Zinfandel,” he told her, and something about the tone of his voice had her looking up at him.

“I’m dyslexic,” she told him. “Did you know that?” She could tell he did—it was written all over his face—but she wanted to see if he would tell her the truth.

There was only a slight hesitation before he nodded. “Yes, Brady told me.”

Little pain-in-the-butt teenager. She felt the urge to snip Brady’s sapphire spikes off next time he was sleeping. “Nice to know my cousin goes around running at the mouth.”

“Does it matter that I know? That you are dyslexic?” he asked her earnestly.

“No, I guess not.” Except she’d never quite been able to shake her shame off, even though intellectually she knew it wasn’t a big deal, and it said nothing about her smarts. Part of her just couldn’t help thinking that she wasn’t quick enough, high-powered enough.

Boston popped the cork on the wine. “Sometimes, Shelby Tucker, I think you and I have more in common than we ever could have imagined.”

Lust maybe, but that’s as far as she saw the resemblance.

Still on her stomach, Shelby picked a milkweed and ran the tip back and forth over her fingers.

He poured the wine, not looking at her. “I never thought I would ever settle down as you called it. I didn’t exactly have good role models for raising a family.” His fingertips brushed hers as he handed her a glass. “Put me in a boardroom and I have unlimited confidence. The thought of anyone depending on me totally strips me of that.”