West of Nowhere Read online

  Table of Contents

  Other Bella Books by KG MacGregor

  About the Author

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Liberty Call

  Copyright © 2013 by KG MacGregor

  Bella Books, Inc.

  P.O. 10543

  Tallahassee, FL 32302

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, without permission in writing from the publisher.

  First published 2013

  eBook released 2013

  Editor: Katherine V. Forrest

  Cover Designer: Kiaro Creative

  ISBN 13: 978-1-59493-345-5

  PUBLISHER’S NOTE

  The scanning, uploading, and distribution of this book via the Internet or via any other means without the permission of the publisher is illegal and punishable by law. Please purchase only authorized electronic editions, and do not participate in or encourage electronic piracy of copyrighted materials. Your support of the author’s rights is appreciated.

  Other Bella Books by KG MacGregor

  Malicious Pursuit

  House on Sandstone

  Mulligan

  Just This Once

  Sumter Point

  Out of Love

  Secrets So Deep

  Worth Every Step

  Sea Legs

  Photographs of Claudia

  Rhapsody

  Playing with Fuego

  Shaken Series:

  Without Warning

  Aftershock

  Small Packages

  Mother Load

  Acknowledgment

  For those who’ve been asking: no, the books don’t get easier to write. This page in particular always proves a challenge because the people who have a hand in making my work the best it can be deserve special recognition, and it grows harder and harder to come up with words of gratitude that don’t sound rote. Their jobs don’t get easier either. I still forget the visuals, stilt the dialogue and flat-line the tension when I’m supposed to be building to a climax. I also drop, add, confuse, misspell and repeat words. It is my great fortune to be surrounded by people who know better and save me from myself. Heartfelt thanks to my editor Katherine V. Forrest, my partner Jenny, my friend Karen Appleby, and all the professionals at Bella Books.

  Thanks also to Commander Chris May, US Navy, Retired, for sharing her expertise on some of the technical aspects of Navy careers and advancement. And thank you also for your service. Though I was raised in a US Marine Corps household, I discovered in my research for this book a fascination for the navy. If I were thirty years younger…okay, forty.

  Please know that, despite all the assistance I receive in my writing and research, the editorial decisions are mine alone, along with each and every error you might find.

  About the Author

  A former teacher and market research consultant, KG MacGregor holds a PhD in journalism from UNC-Chapel Hill. Infatuation with Xena: Warrior Princess fan fiction prompted her to try her own hand at storytelling in 2002. In 2005, she signed with Bella Books, which published the Golden Crown finalist Just This Once. Her sixth Bella novel, Out of Love, won the Lambda Literary Award for Women’s Romance and the Golden Crown Award in Lesbian Romance. She picked up Goldies also for Without Warning, Worth Every Step and Photographs of Claudia (Contemporary Romance), and Secrets So Deep (Romantic Suspense).

  Other honors include the Lifetime Achievement Award from the Royal Academy of Bards, the Alice B. Readers Appreciation Medal, and several Readers Choice Awards.

  An avid supporter of queer literature, KG currently serves on the Board of Trustees for the Lambda Literary Foundation. She divides her time between Palm Springs and her native North Carolina mountains.

  Contact KG through her website at www.kgmacgregor.com.

  Chapter One

  Amber Halliday scooted her chair back from the long, boisterous table as the harried waitress cleared their breakfast dishes. Holding her cell phone high above her head, she twisted back and forth. “This is so weird. I can’t get a signal at all. Is anybody else having trouble?”

  She’d noticed the No Service message last night but didn’t have time to worry about it, since all anyone had cared about for the past three days was packing up and loading the bus for their five a.m. departure this morning. Gus Holley and his band were kicking off a thirty-four-city tour in the US and Canada, and for the first time ever, she was going along to help sell merchandise. Most of the band had slept the first three hours from Nashville to Louisville, but they were gearing up now to make some music tonight at the Ohio State Fair in Columbus.

  Her boyfriend of the past three years, Corey Dobbins, played bass for Gus, and had used his influence to have her join the tour. He even talked Gus into letting her bring along Skippy, her one-year-old Chihuahua-spaniel mix, so she wouldn’t have to turn him in to the animal shelter. Since the tour was scheduled to last five months, they’d whittled down their possessions and given up their apartment lease, hoping to find a nicer place when they returned to Nashville.

  Amber and Corey were part of the second bus, mostly musicians and instrument techs. The other roadies—the stage, sound and lighting crew—traveled a day ahead and were already setting up at the fair.

  “Don’t worry about your phone,” Corey said. “Mine’s working. Who would you call anyway? Practically everybody you know is right here at this table.”

  “That’s not true. I text with Harmony all the time,” she answered, looking over at the band’s drummer, Wayne. His wife ran the daycare where Amber had worked off and on for the past couple of years.

  Wayne turned his phone toward her. “I just got a text from her a few minutes ago. She’s bitching about some woman that always drops her kid off with a loaded diaper.”

  “I know exactly who she’s talking about. I told her to save it and put it back on him just before his mother came to pick him up, but Harmony’s like ‘I can’t do that,’ and I’m like, ‘Well, you’re going to get a shitty diaper every day.’ You can’t let people get away with that kind of shit.”

  Corey snorted. “Pun intended. Hey, Amber, aren’t we pretty close to where you grew up?”

  Amber made a face and shuddered. She’d seen the sign for Shelbyville when they pulled off the interstate to the truck stop. “I guess that explains why the hair’s standing up on the back of my neck. Gives me the creeps just to think about it.”

  Several of the guys in their party suddenly stood, dropped a few dollars on the table for the waitress and made their way back out to the bus, but Corey held out his coffee cup for a refill, in no apparent hurry. “Don’t you ever wonder what your folks are up to these days? I get that you had it rough growing up but you don’t even know if they’re still alive.”

  “I know all I want to know.”

  He handed her his phone. “Seriously, you ought to call since you’re so close.”

  She batted his hand away.

 
; “You’re too stubborn for your own good sometimes, Amber.”

  “What, you think I should just run over there all smiles with Skippy and say it’s all okay now? I’m sure Mama would just break down and cry, and Daddy would fall all over himself to say how sorry he was.”

  “How do you know what they’ll do if you never give them a chance? You haven’t even called home a single time since you left. Not once, Amber. They could be worried sick for all you know.”

  “Trust me, they aren’t.”

  Corey sighed and pulled his wallet from his hip pocket, drawing a five-dollar bill out for the waitress. He then handed Amber five twenties. “Here, take some of this money. It’s not a good idea for me to carry all of it in one place.”

  Her boyfriend had a lot of faults—drinking to excess and a wandering eye chief among them—but he was generous, paying all the rent and household bills, and even giving her a little spending money whenever she was out of work. His propensity to sleep with other women from time to time was something she’d learned to accept, because he always came home to her. Theirs wasn’t the greatest love story of all time—it was probably more habit than love for both of them—but it was dependable.

  Through the restaurant’s broad window she saw Wayne tipping his head toward the bus to signal it was time to head out.

  “Looks like everybody’s ready to go,” she said.

  Corey held his cup as if warming his hands. “I’m going to finish this last cup of coffee. You should go to the bathroom here before we get back on the road because we probably won’t stop between here and Columbus. I’ll meet you back on the bus.”

  A full-sized ladies’ room was definitely preferable to the tiny compartment that passed as a lavatory on the bus, especially since she couldn’t put her makeup on while the bus was jiggling down the road.

  Amber leaned over the sink to the mirror, careful not to soak up the water she had splashed all over the counter when washing her hands. With a stiff brush, she untangled the wiry blond curls that cascaded almost to her shoulders and pulled them tight into a bushy ponytail. Her practiced hand then methodically lined her eyes with a slate-gray pencil, giving life to her face for the first time since she’d rolled out of bed at four a.m. Blue eye shadow, creamy blush and red lipstick finished the look and she stepped back to take in her overall appearance.

  Her denim miniskirt, stretched out from three days since its last laundering, sagged from her hips. A pair of ribbed tank tops—one red, one black—hugged her slender frame snugly, not quite hiding the outline of her breasts and stiff nipples. Corey teased her about having a chest like a teenage boy, but she always thought a B-cup was plenty. She appreciated the trade-off of not usually having to wear a bra.

  Corey made no secret of his preference for voluptuous women. Three or four times a month he slept with Rachelle, who was closer to his age at thirty-two and full-figured. Amber had never really been jealous, but she was relieved when Corey had chosen her and not Rachelle to join the tour.

  A woman entered the restroom and, before going into the stall, stopped to pick up several stray paper towels off the floor and stuff them into the wastebasket. By her dress—dark green cargo shorts, a bright yellow T-shirt and sturdy hiking shoes—she wasn’t a truck stop employee straightening up, just a neat freak.

  Feeling guilty over the fact that a couple of those errant towels had been hers, Amber took a moment to wipe the excess water off the counter and carefully dispose of the waste. Then she stashed her makeup in her purse and fished out a pack of Marlboro Lights, knowing she’d have time for only a couple of quick puffs before getting back on the bus. It was a nasty habit, one she could barely afford even when she was working, but she’d found it impossible to quit when surrounded by so many others in the band who smoked.

  When she exited the ladies’ room, the first thing she noticed was a busboy separating the tables they had pushed together. Corey was already gone and the bus had moved to the front of the restaurant, which meant her cigarette would have to wait because these guys were obviously itching to get back on the road. As she stepped outside, the bus pulled into traffic and made an immediate right turn down the interstate ramp.

  “Oh, very funny!” she yelled. All the guys were probably howling over the sight of her standing in the parking lot. Their trip down to the next exit to turnaround would probably take ten minutes or more, and they’d all have another laugh at her expense when they came back to pick her up.

  The August sun was already beating down on the asphalt and Amber turned to look for a shady place to wait. That’s when she spotted Skippy sitting patiently at the corner of the building, his leash tied to her suitcase.

  * * *

  “Here you go, sweetie. Two eggs over light, hash browns and sausage patties. There’s jelly on the table for your biscuits, and I’ll hit your coffee cup on my next trip.”

  “Thank you, ma’am,” Joy Shepard answered graciously, despite having ordered her eggs scrambled with bacon. That party of fourteen had run the poor waitress ragged, and Joy considered herself lucky she was served at all. Fortunately, she wasn’t picky.

  Apparently, the crowd at the long table was part of Gus Holley’s band—at least that’s what she’d gathered from the tour bus outside and the excited voices of those around her. Joy had never been much of a country music fan but she knew someone who was, and had sent a couple of photos of the bus via her smart phone. She wasn’t surprised when it chimed with a request for the video chat application she and her nine-year-old goddaughter used.

  “That’s Gus Holley!” Madison exclaimed. “Where are you?”

  “I’m in Louisville, Kentucky,” she answered, keeping her voice low so she wouldn’t bother those around her. “I don’t think Gus Holley was here. The waitress told me it was just his backup band.”

  After dropping Madison at her home in Newport News, Virginia, only a day earlier, Joy was already missing her like crazy. She stood her phone up next to the napkin holder so she could keep eating, and noticed Madison was calling from a kitchen that wasn’t her own.

  “Where are you so early in the morning? I thought you’d sleep late on the last day before school starts.”

  “Syd dropped me off at Tara’s. We’re supposed to go to the pool.” She made a face at the mention of the six-year-old who lived a couple of blocks down the street. “She wouldn’t let me stay at home by myself. You would have, wouldn’t you?”

  “I doubt it, kiddo. I think I’d rather you be with a sitter for a few more years.” Madison was growing up way too fast as it was. It hardly seemed nine years since Joy had held her good friend Carrie Larson’s hand in the delivery room as she gave birth to this beautiful child. When Carrie died two years later from a reaction to anesthesia during hernia surgery, the hospital forms she’d joked about having to sign kicked in, granting Joy and her partner Sydney Koehler the right and responsibility to raise Madison.

  It hadn’t worked out that way. Joy had been deployed at sea for much of the next four years, coming home to Norfolk to find Syd not just seeing someone else, but already married to him. While it hadn’t come as a total shock—Syd had long struggled with her sexuality and the challenges they faced as a lesbian couple—it certainly upended life as they knew it. Since the State of Virginia didn’t recognize parental rights for two women, Joy had bent over backward ever since to maintain a cordial relationship in order to keep her place in Madison’s life. That got a lot harder when Joy returned to Oakland, California, to help care for her mother in the last stages of COPD after a lifetime of work in a textile plant.

  “I wish I was still with you, Joy. I’m going to ask Syd if she’ll let me come for the whole summer next year.”

  It was curious that Syd had never insisted on Madison calling her Mom, not even after the formal adoption. Had it been Joy, it would have been music to her ears.

  “Fine by me if you want to come back for that long, but you’ll probably be stuck at home with Grandpa Shep while I’m at
work. Sure you wouldn’t rather be playing at the pool with Tara?” Actually, she could have enrolled Madison in a summer camp for outdoor activities and crafts if Syd had given her more notice that she was sending Madison for a whole month. Calling at the last minute left Joy scrambling to extend her vacation time so they could take a cross-country trip back to Newport News in the truck camper.

  The waitress refilled Joy’s coffee cup and smiled over her shoulder at the picture of Madison on the small screen. The child’s long hair was kinky brown with gold streaks, as though every other strand had come from each of her parents, her fair-skinned mom from Georgia and her African-American father. Creamy brown skin set off her wide blue eyes, causing everyone to look twice at her extraordinary beauty.

  “Syd has a new boyfriend…Mitch Hildebrand. She likes that he’s a lieutenant, so I guess that means he’s supposed to be better than Johnny.”

  “Have you met him?”

  “Yeah, he stays with us now. All of his stuff is here.”

  That probably explained Syd’s sudden change of heart about giving Madison up for four whole weeks instead of two. At least Johnny was out of the picture for good. That marriage had lasted only sixteen months, and he’d made no effort to adopt Madison.

  “Do you like him? Is he nice?”

  “He’s okay. I just wish Syd had gotten a girlfriend instead of a boyfriend.”

  “What difference does that make?”

  “Just that she gets all helpless and goofy whenever she’s around guys. You never do stuff like that.”

  Joy had to laugh at that. For a kid, Madison had an amazing understanding of what it meant to be gay or lesbian, but the concept of butch and femme was probably too much for her to grasp. “That doesn’t have anything to do with her having a boyfriend or girlfriend. She just likes to be a certain way and I like to be another way. That’s what makes us all so interesting. You wouldn’t want everyone to be the same, would you?”