McCabe's Baby Bargain

by Cathy Gillen Thacker

  Barely able to contain her hurt and confusion, Sara followed. She’d expected him to accept her comfort as readily as Charley had. Instead, he seemed to wish they were a thousand miles apart.

  She understood he was embarrassed.

  He had no reason to be.

  Determined to make him understand and accept that, she intercepted him at the door. “You don’t have to leave, Matt,” she told him quietly. “In fact, I’d prefer you didn’t. Not until we’ve at least had a chance to talk.”

  He shoved a hand through his hair and let out a long breath. Looking frustrated that she needed him to spell it out for her. Even though that was apparently the last thing he wanted to do.

  More determined than ever not to part like this again, with both of them locked in their own private version of hell, she moved into the doorway, further blocking his exit. Ignoring the tight lines around his mouth and the shadows in his eyes, she asked, “Is this why you’ve never wanted to stay the night with me? Have you been having nightmares all along?”

  * * *

  Matt wasn’t sure how to answer that, because first, he didn’t want her to know how long and how often this had been going on. He didn’t want anyone to know. And second, he wasn’t exactly sure what had happened tonight.

  Only that their lovemaking had been more incredible than ever. He hadn’t intended to fall asleep and tempt fate. But she’d wanted him to stay a little longer and he’d been too damn weak and greedy to say no. So he’d cuddled her close, savoring the delicious feel of her soft body pressed up against his. The next thing he knew, he was waking up, sweating and alone, to the sounds of Sara running down the hall, baby Charley crying his heart out. The state of the bedcovers, his own pounding pulse, echoing shouts and aching throat had him surmising the rest...

  He’d been dreaming about the compound again.

  The suicide bombers.

  The explosions...

  And the sheer hell and heartbreak that had followed.

  “Was your bad dream about Mutt?” she persisted, her soft hand curling around the taut muscles of his bicep.

  Why deny it? Suddenly too weary to stand, he sat down on the stairs to pull on his boots. He had to get out of here, if he wanted even a prayer of shaking off the residual terror and grief. He also knew, after what she’d just witnessed, she wasn’t going to let it go. So it was either talk it out now, or face it later.

  “Have you been having nightmares?” she asked again, sitting next to him on the tread.

  He grimaced. “Sometimes.” But they had faded when he had started spending time with her and Charley and Champ. Not gone away entirely. But lessened, just the same.

  Until tonight, anyway.

  Tonight it had been as bad as it had ever been.

  He blew out a breath.

  She wound her hand through his. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

  He looked down at their entwined fingers, wishing they could forget all this and just go back to making love. “I did.”

  She studied him a long, heartrending moment. Compressed her soft lips together, but still left her hand in his. “Ah no, cowboy, you did not...”

  Okay, so I didn’t exactly confess to chronic night terrors. Tightly, he reminded her, “When I said you’d sleep better without me here...that I wasn’t marriage material...that’s what I meant.”

  She swiveled to face him, her bent knee bumping into his thigh. She looked incredibly vulnerable, even as naïve hope shone on her pretty face. “You can get help for this at the WTWA. They have support groups...”

  He laughed harshly at even the suggestion of such a miracle. If miracles existed, Mutt would not be dead. Restless, he let go of her, stood. “Like you said, dwelling on the grief of what happened would only set me back. I want to move forward.”

  She rose with elegant grace. Her lower lip trembling, she pointed out, “Except you’re not okay, Matt.”

  Wasn’t that a little like the pot calling the kettle black? He lifted a censuring brow. “Projecting a little, are you?”

  Sara flushed, indignant. “I’m trying to move on,” she said, mimicking his coolly deliberate tone. “Build a new life for myself and Charley.”

  He tamped down his anger and resentment with effort. Shrugged. “Well, so am I.”

  His words hit their target.

  Her face turned a blotchy pink. “I can’t go back to living the way I did when Anthony was alive.”

  “I’m not asking you to.”

  She slammed her hands on her waist, and tilted her head up to his. “Aren’t you?”

  “First of all, I don’t inflict my bad moods on you, which is why I’m trying to leave here tonight. Second, I’m not reckless.”

  “But,” she interrupted, eyes glittering emotionally, “you are clearly suffering from post-traumatic stress.”

  He scoffed and leaned back against her front door, arms folded in front of him. “What makes you think that?”

  She went utterly still for one long moment. “Besides the nightmares? The fact that you’re not taking care of yourself as well as you should...a fact that was demonstrated when you let that splinter in your hand go untreated, even though it was clearly painful and you knew you were risking infection.”

  “I told you I would have gotten around to that. I delayed because I wanted to be with you.”

  Sara looked like the last thing she wanted was to be anyone’s excuse.

  Valiantly, she forged on, “You also avoid anything that reminds you of your loss. Like dogs.”

  “Hey,” he said, smiling thinly, not about to criticized for that, “I managed to be around Champ.”

  She paced the foyer like a prosecuting district attorney before the jury. “But you weren’t exactly comfortable at the WTWA reunion picnic, were you? All those servicemen and women. The dogs they loved...”

  The memory caused his gut to twist.

  He grimaced. “What’s your point?” he demanded gruffly.

  She stepped toward him, hands outstretched, like the relentless do-gooder she’d been when they’d met. “The point is I care about you, Matt, so much. Charley loves you. Champ adored you, despite the fact you avoided him as much as possible. And you cared about him. I saw it before we left for the picnic, when I realized—” her voice caught on a half sob, and it was a moment before she could go on “—we were going to have to say goodbye to him today.” Eyes brimming with tears, she continued, “I know you, Matt. Not just on the surface, but deep down. You’re meant to have a dog and a family of your own.”

  Matt only wished that were the case. He regarded her bleakly, his misery increasing by leaps and bounds. “Charley would probably tell you differently, given how I terrified him tonight.”

  She nodded then murmured softly, “Which is why I’m suggesting you get the help you need.”

  Except it wasn’t really a choice. Not in her view, anyway. And the last thing Matt wanted was a repeat of his previous failed relationship. Or a new onslaught of the kind of badgering he’d received from his family. “Suggesting,” he queried lightly in return. “Or commanding?”

  Her shoulders stiffened in defiance. “I am not trying to order you around.”

  “Sure sounds like it,” he scoffed.

  Another tense silence fell. “I want to know you’re taking care of yourself the way you should, Matt. I want you to be able to stay the night with me, to sleep here.”

  Matt wanted that, too. More than she knew. He also knew it wasn’t going to happen. Because as hard as he tried, he couldn’t just erase that part of his life. Couldn’t will the nightmares away.

  And he damn well wouldn’t risk hurting or frightening her—or, God forbid, Charley—again.

  Desperately trying to hang on to what they’d had, he countered just as persuasively, letting her know his own requirements for happiness. “And I want w
hat we’ve had up to now, Sara. To live each day to the fullest and hang out together and help each other...and when we’re both feeling it, make love with each other.”

  Her lips quivered as much as the rest of her. “I want that, too, Matt.” Her eyes glistened with worry and hurt. “I also want to know that you’re not going to go off the rails, the way my husband did.”

  Was she talking about the accident that had cost Anthony his life? “I don’t drive recklessly, or go into a curve traveling way too fast.”

  Sara swallowed, looking uncomfortable again. “I’m not talking about car wrecks, per se.”

  He studied her in confusion, sensing something new about to be revealed. “Then what are you talking about?”

  Her breath caught. “Suicide.”

  * * *

  Matt stared at Sara. “Anthony’s death was ruled an accident. I know, because my brother Dan was the first deputy on the scene and I talked to him about it at the time.”

  Sara paused.

  “You yourself told me tests showed there were no drugs or alcohol involved. He didn’t have his cell phone with him, so he wasn’t texting or looking at that. He was simply going too fast for the turn, and drove off the road. And that explanation makes sense. Given Anthony’s post-war inclination toward reckless driving.”

  Looking terrified and distraught, and uncertain, she lamented, “But what if it was more than that?”

  He shook his head at her. “Now you’re the one going over the edge...”

  She held up a hand, wordlessly asking him to hold on a minute. Then went to the computer set up on the desk in the living room. He’d never really seen her use it, he realized belatedly, as she turned it on and sat down in front of it. When the screen lit up, she motioned him over.

  There were two different log-in icons on the desktop computer. She pointed to Anthony’s, then typed in the password. His home screen came up. She clicked on the icon that held the Word documents and pulled up a list of files. They were arranged by date.

  She clicked on one that was titled Pros and Cons.

  When it came up, she sat back and motioned for him to read it over her shoulder. He moved in.

  Under pros, it said:

  1) Life insurance

  2) Military benefits for surviving spouse

  3) No more fights

  4) No more regrets

  5) No more worrying about not being the kind of dad our kid will need

  Under cons, it said:

  1) Will never know if it’s a girl or a boy

  2) Sara might never forgive me

  Matt turned back to Sara in shock. This was damning, but not entirely conclusive. Unless she knew something else. “You think Anthony was struggling with whether or not to commit suicide?”

  She got out of that document and opened up another file.

  It appeared to be a personal letter, written six months before his accident.

  Sara,

  I’m so sorry. So very sorry...

  Matt looked at her. “Did the two of you have a fight when he wrote that, an argument of some sort?”

  She threaded her hands through her hair, pushing the heavy length of it off her face. “I don’t know what happened on that date. I’ve also gone back in my work calendar and so far as I can tell, that day was like any other.”

  “But something is nagging at you,” Matt guessed, seeing her continued distress.

  Sara nodded. “It was around that time that he told me he wasn’t sure if we should keep trying to get pregnant. Maybe it wasn’t a good idea for me to have a baby.”

  She shook her head, her sorrow clear. Tears of regret misted her eyes. Knotting her hands in front of her, she continued explaining softly, “That’s all I’d been holding on to while he was overseas and I disagreed. He backed off and we kept trying but he became even moodier and more shut off, and... I don’t know. As I mentioned before, our relationship wasn’t good when he died. We’d become strangers, sharing the same house, sleeping in the same bed.”

  “Yes, I remember. I’m so sorry, Sara.”

  “So that letter he started and never finished, it could have been about whether or not we should have a baby...”

  Or, Matt knew, it could have been the beginning of a suicide note that was also never written.

  Sara reached for a tissue and blotted the dampness from beneath her eyes. “I don’t think Anthony ever had nightmares. Not that I knew, anyway. But maybe it would have been better if he had, instead of stuffing all his conflict down, deep inside.”

  “So he came back from his tour in the Middle East with issues about what he saw and experienced there.”

  Sara gave a stiff, jerky nod.

  “Did you ever tell anyone about this?”

  “No. Just you.”

  “Why not?” he asked.

  “Because he didn’t want me to and I didn’t have any proof of anything anyway, except he was closed off, moody, reckless. And none of that proved anything!”

  She gestured impotently at the computer. “Don’t you think if I thought there was even a chance he would do something crazy like take his own life that I would have found some way to intervene?”

  Matt knew she would have.

  “But I didn’t think whatever was going on with him was anything that couldn’t be fixed by opening up a new chapter in our lives.”

  “And starting a family,” Matt guessed.

  Wearily, she began to cry. “And I didn’t come across these two files until about four and a half months after he died, and by then I was nearly six months pregnant. I didn’t see any reason to speculate about what he had been thinking and feeling that day. I already felt guilty enough for sending him on the errand that led to the accident that caused his death.” She shook her head in quiet misery. “I didn’t want to burden anyone else with the question of what we will never know for sure.”

  Except, Matt thought, he was pretty sure Sara still had her suspicions. And those doubts were clearly tearing her apart. “I can see why you’d want to protect Charley,” he said carefully.

  She shoved her chair back, rose and gazed at him in a way that made his chest go tight. “Then you can also see why if you’re going to be around us, as much as you have been, Matt, you have to get help dealing with your grief and guilt over Mutt’s death.”

  A support group wasn’t going to fix that.

  Dwelling on it wasn’t going to help.

  He knew that. And somewhere, deep down, so did she.

  Calmly and patiently he pointed out, “I can see why you’re worried, but again, Sara, I’m not your late husband.”

  Her lips formed the stubborn line he knew so well. “I know that.” She stepped toward him beseechingly. “But I also know that I can’t take a chance that anything will ever happen to you.” Tears streamed down her face. “I didn’t do anything when it came to Anthony. I sensed he was in trouble. That he was shutting down. The same way your family and I have intuited you are privately struggling.”

  She shook her head, the mounting despair and fear emanating off her as she choked out, “I don’t want to look back on this night and wonder what might have happened if only I’d been able to convince you to do what Anthony never would.”

  So this was it, then? he wondered furiously.

  She told him how it was going to be and he was just supposed to forget what he wanted and needed—which was solitude and the time and space to heal on his own—and instead mindlessly cede to her demands?

  “Look, Sara, I’m sorry for all you’ve been through. If I could undo it for you...and for Charley,” he said, his voice catching, “I would.”

  She studied him, tears glistening in her eyes. Evidently sensing what he already knew—that they were at a crossroads. “But...?” she prodded shakily.

  Knowing he had to be honest, even i
f it hurt, he looked her in the eye and went on implacably, “I won’t be in a relationship where I’m told how, and where, to live my life. I did that and it didn’t work. I was never more miserable.” He shook his head, recalling, aware a line had been drawn, and she had drawn it. “I’m not doing it again,” he said flatly.

  Sara regarded him as if she could not believe he was countering her wishes. Even when she had given no notice to his. “So what are you saying, Matt?” she asked in shock, her eyes filling with tears.

  The truth, Matt thought.

  The sad, awful, heartbreaking truth.

  That, as much as they both might have once wished it, the two of them were never meant to be.

  And, given the fact they were oceans apart in what they each required to be happy, probably wouldn’t be able to go back to friends with benefits, or mere friends, either.

  Which left them with only one option.

  He exhaled roughly and shook his head. “That it’s over, Sara. You’ve made it clear. It has to be.”

  Bitterness and regret sweeping through him, he turned on his heel and left.

  Chapter Fifteen

  “Hey, stranger.” Bess Monroe grinned as Sara walked into the WTWA facility. “Did you plan to attend tonight’s support group for military widows?”

  Was that tonight? she thought uncomfortably. Apparently so.

  “Ah, no.” Although Sara had been wondering...hoping, actually, that Matt might have decided to partake in the support group for returning veterans, which she definitely knew was being held this evening.

  “I just came by to see if one of Charley’s moccasin-style booties is here. He didn’t have it on when we got home from the reunion picnic Saturday evening, and it wasn’t in the car, so I thought someone might have found it here.”

  Bess gestured at one of the elevators. “Let’s go to the Lost and Found and see.”

  Bess led her upstairs to the administrative offices. “So how’ve you been?” she asked, chatting amiably.

  Horrible. “Good,” Sara fibbed. She caught the rehab nurse assessing her with clinical expertise. “Why?”