Shelly
“How was your weekend at Mikey’s? I feel like I hardly saw you.”
“He wants me to move in with him,” I whisper to my sister, who’s leaning against the door frame to the kitchen with a huge grin on her face.
“That’s awesome.”
“I don’t know, is it? I mean, I feel like we’re finally starting to get our lives back and I’m almost at a point where I can care for him myself. How do I just put all of that aside for another man?” I place some grapes and cheese on a plate for Ryker.
“Who says you have to put that all aside? Why can’t you have both?” She looks at me with confusion.
I stop to think for a minute. I knew this would happen someday. I would meet a man and all my fears and insecurities would surface. “I don’t know, Brea. There are so many what ifs, and I know there’s nothing that can take those away, but I’m not sure I can simply move in with him and give up all the freedom I’ve worked so hard for. Eli stole so much from me.”
She steps closer. “He’s not Eli and you know it.” She takes his plate and walks out to the table with it. “Ryker, come get your snack,” she calls.
“Thanks, Auntie Brea.” He takes a seat at the table as I’m placing his glass of juice down. On Monday nights we go to Sky’s for dinner, but we don’t eat until pretty late, so I like to give him a snack before we go. Then he’s not overly hungry and cranky by the time we sit down.
“Thank your mom, she made it.” He smiles up at me and does as he’s told. I’m so lucky to have such a well behaved, sweet little boy. I ruffle his hair and tell him he’s welcome.
“I need to finish getting ready.” I spent the entire afternoon in clinicals working with doctors and I want to freshen up before Mikey gets here to pick us up. Tonight we’re a lighter crew. Katie is due to have her baby anytime now, so Shane and Katie are staying home. She’s been battling swollen feet something fierce and is extremely uncomfortable. I quickly change into a pair of jeggings with a tank top and a lightweight sweater in case it gets chilly later. Once I’m ready, I grab Ryker an outfit to change him into. By the time I’m done, Mikey is knocking on the door.
“Hi, Brea.” I hear him greet her as I walk into the living room. He gives my sister a kiss on the cheek and fist bumps Ryker. A smile spreads across his face when he sees me. “Hey beautiful.” It amazes me how happy he gets when he sees me. It makes me think about what my sister said about him not being Eli. Eli was mean and liked to disappear the second I got home, and Mikey just wants to spend more time with me. Part of me feels like I’m not being fair to him, but my gut tells me he’s keeping something from me and I don’t know what to do.
“Long time no see,” I say jokingly, since he only dropped us back off at home yesterday evening after dinner.
“Are you two ready to go?” he asks, slipping his fingers into my hair and pulling me in for a chaste kiss.
“I think we are,” I tell him when he breaks the kiss.
We pull up to Sky and Logan’s house about forty-five minutes later, and for once we’re the first ones here. That doesn’t happen too often because we’re one of the furthest away from his house. We’re instantly greeted by Sky, who is carrying Kent in her arms and feeding him a bottle. “He’s getting so big,” I say as I give her a quick one arm hug.
“Tell me about it. He’s eating me out of house and home.” She chuckles.
“That’s what you said about Stephan and you survived just fine,” Mikey says with laughter.
Ryker says a quick hello and asks to go play with Stephan. Sky tells him that Stephan is in the playroom and my son runs off to join him. “I’m so glad they get along so well. Stephan looks forward to family dinner night, knowing he’ll have Ryker to play with.”
“Ryker looks forward to it too. I can’t wait for him to start school in the fall. It will really be the best thing for him.” As Sky and I are sitting around talking, the guys do as usual and move to the other side of the room to talk about work or whatever else they typically talk about. Before long, Miranda, Stone, Slade, and Kara are all standing around the kitchen as well. Sadie called to say that they weren’t going to make it because Laney was still not feeling better. The girls are all discussing baby talk when I decide to check on Ryker, but on my way to the playroom, I realize that Mikey and Logan are missing. It’s only Slade and Stone left in the kitchen and they’re discussing the club and security stuff.
Once I see the two boys are playing nicely, I decide to make a trip to the bathroom before they call us to sit down for dinner, but as I’m stepping inside, I hear whispering coming from around the corner and I realize it’s Logan and Mikey.
“Did you tell her?” Logan asks him.
“No, I asked her to move in with me and told her it was because I didn’t like the neighborhood she was living in,” Mikey whispers back to him.
“Damn it, Mikey. She has a right to know.”
“I know she does, but she’s just gotten comfortable, I don’t want to scare her.”
“Are you out of your mind? If she finds out that Eli is out of jail and stalking her from someone else, you’re going to lose her.”
My eyes go wide with fear. Did I just hear him right? Eli is out of jail? I slowly step around the corner, my body is trembling, and at this point I’m not even sure I realize what I’m doing. “Tell me it isn’t so.” My eyes are blurred with tears and my voice is barely a whisper.
Mikey’s eyes go wide with panic when he realizes that I’ve heard their conversation. “Come here, baby. Let me explain.”
I shake my head. “Your time to explain was yesterday. You had the chance. We sat down and I explained my concerns and why I was nervous about moving in with you. All you had to do was tell me the truth, and yet you lied and withheld information.” I shake my head. “How can I trust you?”
“Please, baby. Let’s talk about this.”
“Take me home.” Mikey looks down in defeat. His devastation is blatant, but I don’t care. I just want to go. I want to curl up on my bed and cry.
Logan walks over. “I’m sorry. This isn’t how you were supposed to find out. Please stay safe and let me know how I can help.” I nod my head, but say nothing as I walk out of the room to get my child.
“Ryker, we need to go. There’s been a change of plans.” I take him by the hand and lead him out the door to Mikey’s SUV. It takes him a second, but he’s right behind me unlocking the vehicle to let us in. The entire car ride home is a quiet one. I knew in my gut he was keeping something from me and now I know I was right. I’m angry but scared at the same time, and I don’t know what to do. I want to run, but I’m tired of running. I need to get home and talk to Brea.
When we pull back up to the house, Mikey climbs out of the car. “Let me walk you up.”
“No.” I try to stop him, but he’s not hearing it.
“Shelly, this is no joke. He’s out, and we have no idea what his intentions are. He has people watching you—that’s all I have so far. There’s no way in hell I’m letting you go up by yourself.”
“Fine, but once you see we’re inside safely, you leave,” I demand. He’s not only hurt me but he’s pissed me off. I can’t believe he thought it was okay to keep something like this from me.
He looks disappointed, but doesn’t argue further. He walks us up to my apartment, and when we discover it’s empty, he demands that he checks it out before he goes. Once he’s deemed it safe, he turns to me and says, “When can we talk about this?”
“Ryker, go to your room.” I don’t need my son hearing this conversation.
“But Mommy, I’m hungry.”
“I’ll make you something in a minute, now go.” Ryker storms off, unhappy that he hasn’t been fed, and I can’t say I blame him, but first I need to finish my conversation with Mikey. “I don’t know. I have to think. I’m not just mad, I’m hurt. This is a serious matter and you kept it from me.”
“I didn’t want to scare you. I needed to confirm that it was him before I said anything.” He looks so upset but I can’t cave on this. It’s not okay for him to keep things from me. “I get it, I screwed up. You need to understand, all I wanted was to keep you and Ryker safe. I wanted you to have the happy, safe life you deserve,” he pleads.
“Do I deserve to be lied to or to have information kept from me? Because I’m pretty sure I don’t. I’m a grown woman who has busted my ass to get to where I am, and I’m damn proud. Don’t come up in here acting like I’m some damsel in distress.” I cross my arms over my chest and turn my back to him. “Just go, Mikey.” Tears are streaming down my face, but I won’t let him see it. He says nothing more, I wasn’t even sure he was gone until I heard the door shut behind me. I instantly ran over and locked every lock and then sent a text to my sister.
Shelly: He’s out! Be careful.
Brea: Holy shit! How do you know that?
Shelly: I’ll explain when you get home.
Brea: We’re on our way.
While I wait for Brea and Eric to get here I quickly whip up something for us to have for dinner. My poor kid needs to eat and get off to bed. While he’s eating, I get busy grabbing my clothes for tomorrow so I’ll be ready for another day in the office learning all I can. I’m too close to graduating to let him get in the way.
Brea comes running through the door as I’m shutting the door to Ryker’s room. He’s settled with a movie for the night and I’m glad because I really need to talk with my sister and Eric. I don’t know what to do. “What happened? And where is Mikey?”
I instantly break down into tears. “I overheard Logan and Mikey talking. He’s known Eli was out and kept it from me. I demanded that he bring me home and then I sent him away.” I wipe away my tears. “How could he keep this from me and what do we do?”
“Is he sure it’s Eli?” Eric asks.
“He said he hadn’t told me right away because he wanted to confirm it before he got me all worried. I don’t know how long he’s known, but I heard Logan ask him specifically if he had told me that Eli was out. That means he had his confirmation.” I shake my head. “I think what upsets me the most is we spoke yesterday about the whole moving in thing and he just kept saying he didn’t like our neighborhood. That would have been the perfect opportunity for him to tell me and he chose not to.”
“Okay, well, we have to figure out what we want to do,” Brea says, panicking.
“I agree. If he knows you two are here, then this place is not safe.” Eric takes a seat on the couch next to Brea. “Maybe I should call Mikey and find out what he knows.”
I shake my head. “I think we all just need to watch our backs and make sure when we’re here all the locks are locked. I put extra locks on this door for a reason.” I suddenly feel extremely tired from taking this all in. I want nothing more than to lay down on my bed and think about what to do next. “I’m going to bed. Hopefully I can process all of this and make a clearer decision in the morning. Good night.”
“That’s it?” Brea asks with concern.
“For now.” I walk out of the living room, tired and scared. I hear Eric tell Brea that he’s spending the night and he’ll be here for us.