He was losing her.
He was losing the love of his life.
“I don’t know who you are anymore. We lost you. It’s only a matter of time before our marriage breaks apart. You lied to Ethan about Chris, and we almost lost our unit. Now you’re lying to us each and every day. You either want out, or you don’t love us anymore, and it doesn’t matter.”
She hated that she was ruining his night. Elizabeth hated that her mess was falling into his lap.
Again.
“Callen, I’m sorry. I’m…”
What?
Broken?
Angry?
On a path of self-destruction?
Yeah, or all three and so much more. She wished she knew how to fix her. Elizabeth didn’t like the dark hole she was sinking in, and she didn’t know how to dig herself out.
Each day seemed more hopeless.
She wanted him to pull her out, but how?
Why?
She didn’t deserve it. What lived in her was proof of that.
“Please forgive me. Tonight is your night. I don’t want you to be upset. You’ve been waiting for weeks for this night, so can we please just let it go? Let’s go dance, and you’ll feel better.”
Would he?
Did she know him at all?
He tossed back the rest of his drink.
Nothing short of getting his wife back was going to make him feel better.
No, he was taking a hard stance on this one.
Something had to give, and it was going to have to be her. She was going to have to come clean.
Into the com in his ear, he called for her security. While he was done, he wouldn’t leave her alone.
“Ivan, I’m going back to the bed and breakfast. I want to ride alone. Make sure Mrs. Blackhawk gets there safely—whenever she wants. I’m done tonight. Apparently, she wants to dance and pretend she’s fine.”
The com in his ear came to life.
Elizabeth stared at him.
“Callen.”
He stopped her, not caring that they were making one hell of a scene. If he didn’t get through to her, he was going to be the one leaving, and he was going to take his kids.
Callen had learned a lot about his life, and his past. He wasn’t going to be someone’s mistake.
If that’s what this was, he was going to give her what she wanted.
His heart was broken, but he couldn’t do this anymore.
He couldn’t hurt.
There was only one thing left to say to her.
“I’ve stood by you through everything. When I was damaged by my mother’s boyfriend, you told me that talking about it would set me free. You told me that being honest would help, and it did. You were full of shit. You don’t take your own advice, and I’m out of here.”
“Callen.”
Tears filled her eyes.
“You have two choices. You stop lying or you walk away. I don’t love this woman. She’s not who I fell in love with, and I’m done. I won’t stay with someone I can’t trust and love. You’re not the woman I fell in love with or married. You’re empty, and I can’t get through to you.”
GOD!
She wanted him to break through. She wanted him to swoop in, hold her in his arms, and tell her to let it go. Elizabeth wanted Callen to save her.
Only, he didn’t give her a chance to talk.
Callen James Whitefox had enough. This was his breaking point.
She watched him leave, his security moving through the crowd to his side. They pushed through the crowd of onlookers and fans.
Her heart broke even more.
When she thought it wasn’t possible, here it was.
It sucked.
“Hey,” Ivan said. He appeared at her side, hoping to get some of the gawkers to move along. The last thing she needed was this in the media.
The last thing they needed was gossip that ‘Husband Number Two’ was about to bail.
“So, you want to dance?” he asked, wishing she’d get mad and punch him. Then he’d know she was still in that shell.
She glanced over at him. “No. I want to die.”
Yeah, and that’s how he knew it was time.
It looked like his decision was the right one, despite whatever the possible outcome could be.
“Okay. I’ll take you back to the bed and breakfast, so…” So she could what? Die?
“Okay,” she whispered, trying not to cry. “Thank you. Just get me out of here. Please.”
She was emotionally bankrupt.
Elizabeth had hit rock bottom.
There went Callen, and she’d never felt so damn alone in all of her life.
Oh, yeah. When Ethan kicked her out. She’d felt the same damn way.
“Sure thing, Elizabeth. I’ve got you.”
And he did.
He took her arm, making sure she wouldn’t trip in her pretty dress. As Ivan led her through the people, he hated all of this. The Blackhawks were special, and Bonnie…
She’d made one hell of a mess.
“If it matters,” he said, tucking her into the car, “my money is on you, Tex. Do the right thing. They love you so much. You have to meet them halfway.”
She stared straight ahead.
Yeah, that was easier said than done.
And that was the problem.
She didn’t know how to do that. She was smart, a damn good investigator, but she couldn’t figure out how to get back to where she was.
Bonnie had broken her.
And she was lost.
* * * B l a c k h a w k - W h i t e f o x * * *
Bed and Breakfast
When Callen got back, he had barely had his suit jacket off when his phone and tablet had begun going off. He was pissed at Elizabeth, himself, and Bonnie.
For that brief moment, he thought it might be his wife, and he didn’t want to talk to her.
He wanted to do what he had said.
AVOID.
HIDE.
PRAY.
“Hey,” he said, when his brother’s face was on his tablet and phone, trying to video call him.
“Where is she?” he asked when he opted to use the tablet to talk to him.
“I ditched her. She was making me insane. I’m sick of the pod person. She lied right to my goddamn face, Ethan! How much more are we supposed to take?”
Ethan got it.
Now he understood why his wife was a mess. Now he understood that she wasn’t trying to hide inside herself. He’d been there.
She was trying to survive.
Elizabeth had survivor’s guilt. Despite how angry she was, he got why she was slipping away. They were losing her because she was suffering in silence.
“Well, before you say anything else to her…”
He cut him off.
“Too late. I told her I want off this ride.”
Ethan sighed.
“What?” Callen asked, seeing it in his face. “What do you know that I don’t? What the hell is going on in our fucking relationship?” he asked in frustration.
“Ivan called me.”
“About?”
“He told me that something happened when she was facing down Bonnie.”
“What?”
What could have happened?
“He wouldn’t elaborate, but that she was feeling guilty. He simply said she’d sworn him to secrecy, but it was bad. We have to find out what it is.”
Callen agreed.
“What could it be?”
Ethan didn’t know, but he knew survivor’s guilt when he saw it. He knew PTSD, and he was worried about his wife. Whatever had happened had locked her in some invisible box, and they had to find the key.
They had to find her.
“I’m scared,” Callen admitted. “I don’t like this version of her. She’s cold, Ethan. She’s empty.”
He was aware.
As Ethan sat at home with their kids, he understood that this was going to be ugly. “We have to push until we
figure out what she’s carrying. Elizabeth reminds me of a soldier who’s broken.”
What?
Did she?
“What do you mean?” he asked.
“Remember Tori Littlemoon when she had that case where Elizabeth teamed up with her?”
“Yes, of course. We found out we were having EJ. Why? What does that have to do with it?”
“Remember how she put up all those walls to hide something bad?”
“Yeah, is that what she’s doing?”
“I think she’s doing just that. We haven’t been doing what we’re supposed to, Cal. We’ve been letting her wallow, and it’s all coming to a head. We have to get through to her. She’s holding something back, and it’s killing her.”
“Our wife has PTSD?”
“Wouldn’t you if you just carved a baby out of a woman’s body to save him? Wouldn’t you if that woman was someone you genuinely loved?”
Yeah, he had a point.
“Well, I just left her, so there’s your catalyst to get her to talk. She’s going to either shut down or open up.”
“Well, I’ve dealt with agents who have that same exact reaction after a job goes south. We can do this.”
He hoped so.
There was so much on the line.
“If you can’t?” he asked.
“Then she’s going to be doing therapy. I can force her. Gabe will take my side. She’ll have to saddle up and do some time with Doctor Gaines.”
Yeah, she was supposed to anyway, but she dodged it because she took time off to take care of TJ.
“I hear her.”
“Put me down so she sees that we are a unified front in this.”
Callen sat on the couch, and he placed his brother beside him on the back of it, so it was as if they were sitting side by side.
And they waited.
It was time to get to the bottom of this mess, once and for all.
When she came in, she stopped the second she saw them both. It was Ethan’s face on a tablet, and Callen sitting on the couch with his arms crossed.
They both looked pissed.
Well, shit.
“Hey.”
“Hello, Elizabeth,” Ethan said.
“I wasn’t expecting to see you. How are the kids?” she asked, trying to calm her nerves.
He wasn’t having it.
“Nice try. Here’s how this is going to play out. You’re going to come clean, and tell us what it is that you’re hiding, or we’re going to have issues. You are not yourself, and we deserve to know what’s going on.”
She didn’t speak.
What was she going to say?
“I see.”
Ethan had been a Fed longer. He knew how to work an interrogation, and he could profile with the best of them. He was willing to bet his career on the whole survivor’s guilt and PTSD thing.
He knew his wife.
If she wanted him to be tough, so be it. He and Callen were fighting for their marriage, their family, and their wife. While he’d told her to go once before, he wouldn’t again.
If they were going to fight, then they were going to have a knockdown, drag out, bloody brawl—but it would be for their marriage. That was worth fighting for in life.
He’d learned that.
“You went after Bonnie into those woods, and you came out changed. Something happened in there, and we deserve to know why our wife is different. We deserve to know why you’re sullen, hurting, and struggling. We aren’t asking you for much, but not to lie, and to be honest.”
God!
How did she do this?
How did she ask for them to save her? She wanted to drop to her knees and beg for one of them to set her free from this guilt, the hate, and everything brewing in her.
Only she didn’t know how.
“Elizabeth?” Callen asked.
“Well, I had to cut Timothy out of his mother…so yeah, that was tough.”
They stared at her.
For the last month, that’s what they believed. Only, that excuse wasn’t jiving for any of them.
Not anymore.
“Try again,” he ordered. He knew when his wife was not right, and he could see it now. She was running.
How had he missed this?
Oh, yeah.
They’d been cleaning up after Hurricane Bonnie and the aftermath.
“Ethan.”
He held up his hand. “Okay, so, let’s do it the hard way. What happened with you and Ivan as you went after Bonnie? I know it was then, because you’re not our wife anymore.”
She stared at him.
Tears filled her eyes and her bottom lip quivered.
Ethan hated doing this to her. He loathed it. Their relationship was balanced on the blade of a knife, and he feared losing her, but he’d already lost her.
She’d gone in their woman and come out a shell. Someone had to fight for her.
She clearly wasn’t anymore.
“What happened?” Callen asked. “Did you fall out of love? Did we let you down because you had to save that baby alone? Do you hate us? This feels like hate to me. You’re cold, uncaring, and not Elizabeth.”
She was aware.
She was filled with hate. Only, it was self-loathing.
Still, she didn’t budge.
“Okay, then we’re done. If this secret matters more than our hearts,” Ethan said, praying he wasn’t doing the stupidest thing in the world—again.
Callen agreed. “I’m going home to my children. I’m done with this. You’ve already left us. I’m getting my kids before they are treated like this next.”
That was the straw that broke her.
Her babies.
“Stop,” she said. Both men did exactly that. Ethan on the tablet, and Callen in the room with her.
“Then make us stop,” Callen stated. “I want my fucking wife back. If I wanted to be married to some cold, empty woman, I could find one. I want Elizabeth. I want EJ, Cat, and Christopher Anthony’s mother back.”
Ethan agreed. “We need you. We can’t be us, Elizabeth, without you. You’re the glue that holds us together.”
And there it was.
That was the damn problem. She couldn’t be weak. She couldn’t struggle.
She was the glue.
And she was falling.
“I’m so damn angry! I’m so lost. I don’t know how to do this,” she said. “I went in whole, and I came out broken!”
They listened.
This was the most she’d said.
“Help us understand,” Ethan stated.
“What happened in there?” Callen asked. “What is so scary that you can’t tell us? We were a team.”
“Maeve betrayed me.”
Neither man spoke.
Finally, Ethan found words. “What? How?”
The truth came gushing out. Elizabeth couldn’t lose them. She just got Ethan back. She’d spent seven weeks without him, and they barely survived.
“Bonnie gave her a choice. Me for her life. She chose her life. Then Bonnie killed her. I couldn’t save her. I’m so angry at her, and I’m angry at me.”
Neither man spoke.
Jesus.
They couldn’t imagine.
“She betrayed me. The woman I would have died for was more worried about herself. I would have jumped in front of her to save her, and here, she offered me up to Bonnie. Then she was killed. I survived, and I’m angry.”
And here it was.
Ethan had been right.
This was survivor’s guilt at its worst. While his wife was angry, she was angrier that she’d lived, and she’d failed.
“Elizabeth,” Callen said, his heart breaking for her.
She wiped her eyes.
“That’s not all, is it?” Ethan stated.
“I didn’t feel bad for her when she died. That’s on me. I’m a horrible human being. As I stood over her, making the choice to save Timothy Jackson or chase Bonnie, I didn’t give a shit if sh
e died. I was angry. I was pissed. I crossed a line in me that makes me afraid.”
The men listened.
“I saved that baby for Wyler. Then he betrayed me too. My life, it’s going down in a spiral. I was betrayed by Ethan, when you told me to leave. All the people I trusted…”
He got it.
Callen got it.
He moved toward her. “Angel, I’m sorry.”
He didn’t tell her she was wrong. He didn’t tell her to stop, he simply said he was sorry.
Elizabeth stepped back.
“I don’t know how to save me. I don’t know if I can be saved at this point. I’m always the one doing battle, and I can’t this time. I have nightmares, I’m scared, and now Callen wants to leave me too. Everyone leaves. Why fight anymore?”
Callen realized how ill-timed his tirade had been.
“Why didn’t you just come to us and ask for help?” he asked, trying not to be hurt with how she’d isolated herself.
“I know why,” Ethan said. “You’re punishing yourself, aren’t you?”
She closed her eyes and the tears were there. They were about to fall.
“I went into that case broken. I came out the other end worse. I let the kids down, I let Wyler down, and I let that baby down. I’m Elizabeth fucking Blackhawk, and I lost the fight with Bonnie. Look what it’s done!”
“This is not your fault, Elizabeth.”
“It feels like it is.”
“That’s on us.”
Callen looked over at him.
Was it?
“We let you drift in this mire. We didn’t make you deal. We figured you’d be okay because…”
“Because I’m Elizabeth Blackhawk. See? I wanted help. I needed you both, but I don’t know how to get through. I’m trapped in this.”
Ethan felt horrible.
“Callen, I’m sorry I let you down tonight. I was trying to be that wife for you—one you’d be proud of.”
He stared at her. “I am proud of you.”
Her lip quivered.
“Oh, Elizabeth, because you want to hunt down Bonnie and end her does not make you a bad person.”
“Yes, it does. My father always told me vengeance…it is bad. Here I am, eating, drinking, and sleeping it. I see TJ, and I can’t help but see that moment when I had to stick my hands in Maeve’s body to save him.”
Discarded by Fate Page 4