“We’re in the sitting room,” Sister Theresa replied. “Are you getting tired?”
“Yes.”
Sister Theresa glanced at Tuck. “We’d better take her back to her room.”
“Sister, please, just a few more minutes,” Tuck pleaded. This was his only chance to hear about his mother.
Sister Theresa nodded. Tuck scooted close to Sister Frances. “Sister, please tell me how Bernadette became pregnant.”
“My son, some things are best unknown.” She leaned forward and whispered, “We shouldn’t be talking about this.”
“Please, Sister, whatever you tell me stays here in this room. I just have to know.”
“Well.” She kept her voice low. “We had a man who helped out with the maintenance of the orphanage. He was a nice fellow and did things for free. Sometimes Bernie would help him when he needed someone to hold a ladder or hand him something. She was very friendly and he mistook her friendship for something more.”
“He fell in love with her?”
“Yes.”
“But she didn’t love him?”
“No. She had given her heart to God.”
That queasy feeling became intense and he shoved it down, taking several deep breaths. He’d wanted the truth so now he had to face it. “What happened?” he asked in a voice that came from deep within him.
Sister Frances took another sip of water. “My son, I can’t tell you these things.”
Tuck swallowed hard and forced out the words. “He raped her?”
“Don’t use that word,” she ordered in a loud voice, her body shaking.
“Please don’t get upset.” Tuck tried to calm her, but inside he was shaking like a leaf in a windstorm. He couldn’t allow himself to think. Not now. He rubbed his hands together, preparing himself for the next question. “Was this man arrested?”
“No. The next day he came and asked for her forgiveness and Bernadette forgave him.”
“Why?”
“In some way she felt she had tempted him and it wasn’t in her nature to be vindictive or to judge him. The man was truly sorry for his sin and we are taught to forgive, my son.”
“But…” Tuck stopped, swallowing the bile in his throat. “What happened to him?”
“He was very distraught afterward and at work he wasn’t paying attention and slipped and fell from a scaffold on a construction job. They say he died instantly.”
Tuck linked his fingers together, feeling his sweaty palms. But he had to keep going. “Where is my mother now?”
“Don’t you know?”
“No, Sister. I don’t.”
“She died a month or so after you were born. I can’t remember exactly. The guilt, the shame and the dishonor got to her spirit. She died quietly in her sleep.”
His mother was dead. Tuck was trying to assimilate everything, but he just had a huge burning knot in his gut. He had to keep going, though.
“Why did she want me named Jeremiah?”
“It was her father’s name.”
He’d had a grandfather. The word sounded surreal in the extreme in connection to him. He’d never had grandparents. He was just Jess Tucker’s son and in that instant he knew that’s the way he wanted it to stay. Forever. Exposed secrets were tearing him apart and accepting them would take time.
“What is that?” Sister Frances spoke sharply to Grace, who held the yellowing letter.
“It’s the letter you wrote to Jess Tucker,” Tuck explained.
“Jess was supposed to destroy that. He promised before God—no evidence.” She grew agitated.
“It’s all right, Sister. No one ever knew. Jess Tucker kept his word.”
“Good.” Sister Frances seemed to relax. “Jess Tucker was an honorable man.”
“Yes, he was,” Tuck agreed. His father had kept the secret he’d sworn to keep. Even though he’d probably wanted to tell Tuck, he would never break his word. So he hid the letter away in a place Tuck would only look after his death. That’s why he was adamant that Tuck and Eli never touch the box. Tuck could only know after his death. Suddenly things were beginning to become clearer, but something still bothered him.
“Did Amalie know who my mother was?”
“That was the one thing Jess was insistent about. He had to tell Amalie. Bernadette agreed.”
They both knew. That’s why they’d told him repeatedly that he was a gift from God.
“Thank you, Sister. I appreciate your talking to me.”
Sister Frances frowned. “Who are you?”
“Jeremiah Tucker—Bernadette’s son.” This time he said it without pausing.
“Yes, yes.” She nodded. “Go in peace, my son.”
Sister Theresa motioned to the other nun and she wheeled Frances away. Sister Theresa slipped her hands into the pockets of her habit. “She fades in and out, but I believe it’s close to the truth.”
“I do, too,” Tuck replied, feeling numb.
Sister Theresa looked him straight in the eye. “Remember your promise to never use this information.”
“I would never do anything to tarnish my mother’s memory. Her secret will always be safe.”
“Bless you, Mr. Tucker, and may you find some peace.”
“Thank you, Sister.”
A nun guided Tuck, Grace and Eli down the long corridor, their footsteps echoing on the cold, hard stone. The gates of hell. The wages of sin drummed through his mind, mimicking the echoes. They stepped out into the warm April sunshine, but Tuck didn’t feel it. All he could feel was the pain. He blinked, his eyes adjusting after the dimness of the orphanage.
“Are you okay?” Eli asked.
Tuck placed his hat on his head. “I’ll be fine. I just need some time alone.”
“Tuck.”
“Eli, please. Just give me some time.”
“Okay.” Eli nodded. “If you want to talk, you know where to find me.”
“Thanks.”
Eli strolled away and Tuck walked briskly to his car. Grace broke into a run to catch up. Tuck didn’t speak on the drive home. He couldn’t and he could feel himself shutting down and shutting everyone out—even Grace. He needed time. Time to understand what he’d just heard. Time to learn to live with one of life’s hard truths.
He was the son of a rapist.
LIKE ELI, GRACE WANTED Tuck to talk, but she knew Tuck wasn’t ready. He’d heard so many truths today and she wondered how long it would be before he fully accepted them—both the circumstances of his birth and his adoption.
When they reached the house, Tuck hurried inside and studied the names on the table.
She picked up Sam. “What are you doing?”
“Her name should be here.”
“You mean your mother’s name?”
“Yes.” He jabbed at the table. “There it is. Bernadette.”
Grace glanced down. To the right of Bernadette was Tuck.
Tuck noticed it, too. “We’re together. I wonder if Ma and Pa planned it that way.”
“They…” But Tuck wasn’t listening to her. He tore toward the hall. She placed Sam on the floor and quickly followed.
She found him in the spare bedroom, going through the photos they’d stored in the plastic container. Kneeling, he hurriedly removed the frames, exposing the back of the photos.
“Tuck…”
“Ma wrote names on the back of all the photos. Her photo is here. I know it.”
Grace didn’t try to stop him. He somehow had to do this—to keep searching until he had all the pieces to the puzzle of the past. Of his life. Suddenly he sank to the floor, leaning against the wall, holding a photo.
Easing down by him, she read the names on the back: Carol, Bernadette and Nancy. “All dressed up for Easter services” the caption read.
Tuck turned the photo over, staring at the girls. “The middle girl is my mother.” The words came out in a hoarse whisper.
Grace looked at the smiling young girl. “She has dark hair and eyes.”
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“Like me.”
Grace touched his face. “Yes, like you.”
He pulled away and her heart sank. “Tuck.”
“Go home, Grace. I need time—alone.”
“I’m not leaving you like this.”
“Will you for once not argue with me and respect my wishes?”
He sounded like the old Tuck who was always snapping at her. She waited for an apology, but she didn’t get one. Instead, he said, “We made a mistake. We should never have gotten involved.”
She bit down on her tongue to keep from crying out. “You don’t mean that,” was all she could manage.
“I do. I’m sorry if that hurts you.”
“Yes. It hurts me, but it hurts me more to see you like this.” She took a deep breath. “None of what we found out today matters to me. You’re still the man I’ve fallen in love with. I don’t care who your parents are. They’re not who you are.”
“Save your love for a man who deserves it and who can give you all you need. I’m not that man.”
“Why not?”
“Leave it alone.”
The tone of his voice should have deterred her, but it didn’t. “Why not?” she persisted, fighting for their relationship. Fighting for their love.
He scrambled to his feet in an angry movement. “Because I’ve always had control of that empty place inside me, a place that belonged to the unknown—my mother. It was protected, secure, but now it’s wide-open and the pain and the heartache is pouring in. I can’t stop it. I can’t do anything but feel that pain. The pain of knowing that I’m the son of a rapist. I’m no good to you or myself or to anyone. I’m completely spent, completely empty.” He turned toward his bedroom.
“You don’t need control. All you need is love.”
He didn’t respond. His back was rigid, straight and unyielding, telling her more than she wanted to accept.
“You’re an incredibly good man. I know that. Everyone knows that. What happened between your biological parents doesn’t change that. It doesn’t change you. You’ve spent your life giving to others. It’s all right to take some of that back. It’s all right to have a life. It’s all right to fall in love.”
“I don’t love you, Grace,” he said clearly and effectively. It crushed whatever hope she had and the fight left her. She knew when to give up.
But she would never give up on their love.
She ran from the room, tears streaming down her face. She made it to her car and called Eli. Tuck was hurting and alone and she couldn’t stand that. Eli said that Tuck needed time and they should respect his wishes, but he would check on him first thing in the morning.
She drove home feeling as if her world had suddenly come to end.
WHEN TUCK HEARD the door close, he made his way into the den. He laid his mother’s photo on the table and picked up the humidor from the floor. Pulling the letter from his pocket, he placed it on the bottom as it had lain for so many years. After putting the box back together, he sat in his recliner letting his mind take him places he didn’t want to go.
He’d had horrible feelings when he’d learned Pa had lied to him, but now he knew he had his reasons. Pa would never break his word. He was that type of man.
Thoughts followed about his biological father. What type of man forces himself on a nun? The lowest kind. But this man had also given Tuck life. That was harder to accept. He honestly didn’t know if he ever would.
Unable to stop them, tears rolled from his eyes. He hadn’t cried since Ma had died, but now he cried for a mother and the pain she must have endured. He cried for his adoptive parents and the torment they must have suffered at keeping their secret from him. And he cried for himself and the agony he couldn’t get through.
Lastly, he cried for Grace and all that could have been. He prayed one day she would forgive him.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
THE RINGING OF THE PHONE woke Tuck. It took a moment for him to realize what it was. The sound stopped and he instinctively reached for Grace, then everything came flooding back with painful clarity.
Grace wasn’t here. She wasn’t ever going to be here again.
He sat up, realizing he was still in the recliner. He ran his hands over his face, feeling as if he’d been slam-dunked through a net of barbed wire. Each scar ran deep and wide inside him and he couldn’t get past the truth.
His father…
He swallowed hard, unable to complete the thought. Did the truth somehow change him?
Tuck didn’t have any answers. All he knew was that he had started to believe that he could have a life, a family—with Grace. But now…
Feeling the weight of despair, he slowly stood and a deep, tortured sigh escaped him. He had hurt her in a way no man should hurt a woman, but he was powerless to change that. She deserved someone better than him. She deserved love, happiness and everything that entailed.
He couldn’t give her that.
Not now.
TUCK’S CELL RANG and he reached for the phone on his waist.
“Tuck, this is Sheriff Wheeler.”
“Morning, Sheriff.”
“Remember that hit-and-run case you investigated about a year ago?”
Tuck headed for his bedroom as he talked, Sam trailing behind him. “Sure. Luis Rodriquez is well hidden in Mexico.”
“The Mexican authorities just called. Luis is tired of running and he’s ready to turn himself in and face charges here in Texas. They’ll bring him to the bridge in Laredo. Since the Rangers have jurisdiction, I thought you might like to be the one to walk across the bridge and arrest him.”
“You bet.” Tuck had spent a lot of hours on the case, trying to find Rodriquez after he’d run from a car crash. The young girl he’d hit died instantly. Rodriquez was drunk and fled the scene before police had arrived. His family quickly got him to Mexico. The girl’s family had been waiting a long time for this day.
“How soon can you be in my office?”
“In about forty-five minutes.” This was what he needed—to throw himself into work. It would keep him busy and his mind on other things.
He hung up, took a shower and dressed. Carrying his boots and gun into the den, he sat down to put them on.
His back door opened and Eli walked in. “Morning,” he said, sinking into a chair.
“I’m not in a mood to talk, so go home.”
“I’m just checking to see if you’re okay.”
“I’m fine.” He slipped a foot into a boot. “I’m going to Mexico to pick up Luis Rodriquez. He’s turning himself in. I won’t be gone long, but would you check on Sam and Dee?”
“Sure. No problem.” Eli picked up the photo of Tuck’s biological mother from the coffee table. He flipped it over and read the back side. “You found a picture of your mother.”
“Yeah.”
“You have her coloring.”
“I know.” He slipped his other foot into a boot. “I wonder what I inherited from my father.”
Eli looked straight at him. “All his good qualities.”
He clenched his jaw. “I don’t feel like going over this.”
Eli fingered the photo. “You’ve been through a lot lately. Just take some time and think this through. You’re the most caring, giving man I know. There isn’t a part of you that’s bad.”
Tuck attached his gun to his belt, trying to block out Eli’s words, trying not to think, but somewhere in the corner of his soul he could feel that soiled part of him, like a scarlet letter. He would never be able to change that. He gulped in a breath.
He looked at his brother. “Then why do I feel so tainted?”
“Tuck, give this time. Whoever your biological father is doesn’t mean a thing. It’s the man you’ve become that matters. The man we all love. Ask any kid you’ve mentored. Ask Grace.”
“Leave Grace out of this.”
“Tuck, for heaven’s sake, don’t throw away what you have.”
Tuck sucked in a painful breath. “It’s ove
r. I know that.”
“Tuck—” Eli stopped for a second. “Okay, think about your biological father. He helped out at the orphanage for free. A bad person doesn’t do that. He’s human and fell in love with a nun. I’m not saying that what he did was right by any means, but your mother forgave him. And you have to, too.”
Without a word Tuck attached his badge to his shirt.
“You’re not the spawn of the devil,” Eli said firmly. “Even if you were I’ll still love you. Caroline and Jesse will, too, so will the McCains. Even Grace will. Do you know why?”
“No, but I’m sure you’re going to tell me.”
“Because we know you. And soon you’ll realize that, too. Just don’t throw away everything that’s good in your life.”
Tuck didn’t reply. He had nothing to say.
Eli stood with an aggravated sigh, glancing at the boxes. “What are you going to do with those?”
“Put them back in the attic for now.”
Eli settled his hat on his head. “Tuck.”
“Go home, Eli. And tell the McCains I don’t want to talk to anyone.”
Eli shrugged. “Sure. But you know Beau. He’s going to want to help, as all of us do.”
“Eli…” Tuck couldn’t take much more. He had to get away from everyone.
“I’ll get the point across,” Eli added quickly.
“Thanks.”
“Are you okay?”
Tuck saw the worry in his brother’s eyes. “No.” He didn’t lie. “But I will be.”
GRACE CURLED UP on her sofa, clutching the peignoir she planned to wear for Tuck, her tears soaking it. Everything had been so wonderful and now it just seemed lost. What hurt the most was that she couldn’t reach him. Her love wasn’t enough.
Her doorbell rang and she ignored it, then she heard the key in the lock. Caroline. Why did she ever give her sister a key?
“Grace, where are you?” Caroline called.
“Go home, Caroline.”
Caroline flopped down beside her and Grace rose to a sitting position. Caroline brushed away Grace’s tears. “Oh, Gracie, I’m so sorry.”
“I love him, Caro, but…” She hiccuped. “But he doesn’t love me.”
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