Or had she been trying to do exactly that when this baby was born, and he had thwarted the effort by stepping into the breach in her memory, and instead pulled her back to him?
On that thought, the alarm ringing in
Cade’s head sounded its warning even more, a thousand ringing bells and noisy sirens reverberating in every corner of his soul, for this time its message was loud and clear.
With dread in his heart, Cade looked down at Sara. Her eyes were filled with that crushing aloneness, as devastating to his self-control as ever. Like always, he was as helpless not to respond to her—even if it meant losing a part of himself.
And acknowledging such a fate was the most devastating to Cade of all.
* * *
THE HALF-DOZEN HOURS until Loren and his wife arrived seemed like a century to Cade. The irony wasn’t lost on him, given how a day ago he’d almost been hoping for more time...time alone with Sara.
It helped to keep busy while he waited. He opened the furnace vents in the front bedroom, put clean sheets on one of the single beds there, then put clean sheets on his own. He’d already decided to give his bed to Loren and his wife—it seemed too bizarre yet even to think of her by her name—and to take a bed in the room that had been his and Loren’s when they were growing up. As a married couple, they’d want to sleep in the double bed. Had the most right to.
Taking a broom to some of the worst of the dust bunnies floating around the wood floor, Cade couldn’t help but remember how he and his brother had slept, dressed, talked and feuded away most of their boyhood in this tiny ten-by-twelve room.
He shook his head. How they’d managed not to kill each other was still a mystery to him. Of course, there was barely enough floor space to turn around, much less do any serious fighting. Not that they’d done a lot, he thought in retrospect, but as close as they’d been in age, in addition to close quarters they’d endured in this room, some amount of sibling rivalry had probably been inevitable.
But that had been Sara’s insightful observation, hadn’t it?
Sara. He could barely think about her. Couldn’t not think about her and what she must be dealing with. To his surprise, she’d been calm when he’d repeated his and Loren’s conversation to her, holding back only the part about the news not being good about her husband. But Cade had detected that fear in her, and it had taken everything in him not to override her wishes when she’d asked quietly to be left alone. As much as what she’d known before, believing she was Loren’s wife, hadn’t made sense, it still beat going back to square one, having to reorient herself to a whole new identity. And trying to figure out a whole new set of feelings—for a man she still didn’t know, or know what happened to him.
So what had happened to her husband? What kept him from being with her now, had kept him from being with her on that fateful New Year’s Eve? Guilt gnawed a plate-size hole in his gut as Cade went back and forth between hope and dread. And what would he hope for, if he did? He couldn’t seem to find an answer to that one. No logical scenario he came up with boded well for Sara, and in none of them did he come off looking too good, either.
Because the fact of the matter was, he’d already done enough damage by letting her fall in love with him. And if that meant she must now deal with even more turmoil in her life as she tried to come to terms with what she felt for the man who’d fathered her baby, he couldn’t help feeling that the blame for it rested smack-dab on him.
Cade attacked a cobwebby corner of the ceiling with particular vehemence. Oh, he knew he didn’t have the ability to change the course of events that were beyond his control. He knew also, though, that the human mind was a powerful thing to be reckoned with. The evidence of that was Sara herself and how she’d blocked from her brain whatever tragedy she literally couldn’t comprehend.
Or was that the doing of her heart, not being able to accept the loss of so great a love that life as it stood held little meaning without it?
Now there was a thought that had the ability to make him lose his mind with hopelessness.
And so he tried to avoid guessing games, to keep his mind both occupied and blank at the same time. He dared do nothing else, almost in self-defense, for if he’d learned anything in the past seven years, it was that fate had a way of putting a wicked twist on any wish, even passing, he might come up with.
Best just to play a waiting game, he thought, mentally adding, which has pretty much been par for the course for the past seven years.
At nine in the evening he made his way downstairs, after stocking the newly spick-and-span bathroom with clean towels, to find fresh coffee on the burner and a short note from Virgil saying he’d headed back to the bunkhouse to get a shower in before Loren and his wife arrived.
Cade filed another regret behind the others. He could have counted on one hand the number of times in his life the old ranch hand had seen the necessity of putting pen to paper. But after Sara had gone off to her room, he’d given Virgil the rundown in the kitchen on his phone conversation. Arms crossed as he leaned back against the edge of the counter, the hand had listened to the whole story before asking what he could do to help get ready for Loren’s arrival. Cade had suggested a few of his own outdoors chores that would need doing since he had to get the house ready, and Virgil had headed outside to tend to them without a word of judgment nor condemnation regarding the scene in the ranch yard this afternoon. There wouldn’t be, Cade knew. And that was the biggest condemnation of all.
Suddenly restless as a dog with a fresh crop of flea bites, he took a wander around the house, trying to see the place from Loren’s perspective of a seven-year absence, and failing. He had grown too used to this house and ranch to be able to see it from an outsider’s eyes. Not that Loren was an outsider, only that what had once been more both of theirs together was now more Cade’s alone. And yet he’d never felt so dispossessed in his life.
Somehow, he ended up at the door to Sara’s room. Much as he should, he couldn’t stay away.
She certainly made a peaceful picture, sitting there in Granddad’s old rocker, the baby tucked into one arm, his head hidden beneath the nursing blanket. She’d put her hair back and changed into the blue corduroy jumper that she’d arrived in a few short days ago.
She seemed not to register his presence but continued staring sightlessly out the window, apparently deep in thought.
“Well, the house is as clean as it’s going to get, given we only had time enough to more or less rearrange the dust,” he commented. “They should be here anytime, I’m thinkin’.”
“Yes,” she said, rocking gently. She seemed far away, in her own world, and shutting out the one in which he stood.
Could he blame her? So much was still a mystery, and a frightening one, at that. It worried him, though, this daze she’d been in since Loren’s call. Along with her amnesia, it seemed a dangerous combination.
“I bet your cousin’ll be glad to see you,” he said in what seemed a hugely lame attempt to be helpful.
This time, she said nothing, her grasp on the here and now seeming as fragile as ever.
It scared the death out of him.
Forget asking to be invited in, even if she was nursing. Cade stepped into the room, taking a seat on the old cedar chest at the foot of the bed and directly in her line of vision. He wanted, badly, to pull her into his arms, reestablish the bond between them that had seen her through, seen them both through, time and again. But he dare not touch her. He just didn’t think it’d do either of them any good right now, and might in fact muddy the situation even more.
But he needed to hold her!
At least his action seemed to bring her out of her fog, for she gave a slow blink. “Oh. Cade. Did you want something?”
“No. No.” He swallowed and made himself go on. “Just to tell you that...well, I’m sorry for all the things I said. You know, about you not
bein’ a good wife to Loren. It’s pretty clear findin’ out you weren’t married to him was a big shock. I—I blame myself, for tryin’ to play Sherlock Holmes, putting clues together and obviously comin’ up with the wrong answer.”
“Cade.” She seemed to come out of her funk a little more as she extended her hand. Yet she let it drop before reaching him, evidently thinking better of such a gesture, too. “I don’t blame you.”
“But it must be difficult now to adjust to thinkin’ about what might have happened to your real husband—”
Cade clamped his jaw shut. Would somebody take him out and just shoot his sorry hide? He didn’t come in here to make things worse for her! It seemed, though, that filling that role was his lot for the moment.
Gritting his teeth against that sort of doomsday thinking, he set off on a more positive tack. “Still, no matter what news Loren and your cousin have, it already isn’t as bad as it could be, you know? I mean, they both obviously care about you a lot. From what I could tell, you were on your way to go make your life near them, and that’s somethin’ to feel hopeful about, don’t you think?”
“I—I suppose.” She dropped her chin, her brow furrowing as she idly caressed one of the baby’s tiny feet. “But these are still people I don’t know, Cade. They’re strangers to me.”
“Not completely. You said that you saw Loren in your dreams or whatever those were,” he persisted.
“Yes, but I also knew that what I felt for him wasn’t the kind of emotion that would have caused me to lose my memory—or would be enough to help me regain it.”
Dropping her head, she rubbed her forehead, and he realized it was the first time he’d seen her do that since right before the baby was born.
“I’m not trying to be perverse, Cade, honest I’m not,” she continued slowly. “But can you see what I’ve been dealing with?”
Her tone was the same as that first evening, too, a plea for understanding. “Like now—you tell me I have a cousin named Sarah McGivern, and I believe you, but it’s as foreign to me as the concept was of me being Sara McGivern. Soon they’re going to walk through that door and tell me I’m supposed to be someone else—that I’m supposed to feel all those feelings I didn’t feel for Loren for another man who’s going to be a complete stranger to me, too.”
Disconsolately, she let her hand drop to her lap. “It just seems like such a—a failure on my part,” she said softly, “not being able to deal with the events in my life, so much that I’d block out what’s happened and the people who meant something to me. But I’m so afraid, Cade—afraid of discovering what it was I couldn’t live with. The fear, when I get even a little close, is indescribable. I’m scared, too, to stay this way, not knowing. Maybe never knowing. And that I’ll go on indefinitely in this unreal existence, in between living my life and someone else’s. In between loving you, and loving someone else.”
Her voice dropped to a whisper. “Because that’s the one thing that hasn’t changed, Cade. Just because we know now Loren’s not my husband, I still can’t make myself stop loving you.”
He let go of her hand and sat back, his upper lip firmly gripped between his teeth to keep from giving in to that rush of emotion again. It seemed a useless action, because she was right. Whatever the reason, however it had come about, in that darkest of nights and fiercest of storms, they had forged a bond between them that was now unbreakable. He had given his word; she had given her trust. There was no going back to the way it was before, no matter what.
But what, really, would happen when Loren and her cousin showed up? Would the sight of them and the truth they brought with them trigger Sara’s memory? And once she remembered, how would that change her feelings for him?
The mere thought set his own fears raging out of control. But they couldn’t stay this way forever, either, with neither of them knowing.
Because it occurred to Cade then that perhaps it was only in facing yourself and your own true nature that you could begin to understand the forces, both within and without, that were at play in your life. No, neither of them—nor anyone, for that matter—had a choice in what happened to them, but everyone had control over how they dealt with those events.
But how to make Sara understand that? How to convince her to keep pushing ahead through the fear, especially now when she stood back at the beginning of not knowing who she was or where she belonged?
And if he didn’t try to do the same himself, then was he shirking his responsibility—to her, and to himself?
“Look, Sara,” Cade said, rather desperately, “you know how you argued with me that we can’t control the good things that happen to us any more than we can control the bad things?”
She perked up a little at his question.
“Y-yes.”
“Well, I’m willin’ to concede that point to you. You’re right. But I’m thinking sometimes it’s hard to tell when you’re in the situation whether somethin’s gonna turn out good or bad. Except a lot of how it does turn out is in choosin’ how you deal with it.”
She gave him a blank look, and he had to wonder if it was because she didn’t understand or a result of that trance she seemed caught in. “What do you mean?”
“It’s like when this baby of yours was tryin’ to be born. At the time, it didn’t seem to you like it was a good thing, especially if he was early. And especially if you were gonna have to deliver him alone.” Needing to, badly, he took the baby’s other velvety soft foot between his thumb and forefinger, stroking it gently. “But we were both determined the situation was gonna work out for the good. And he was sure enough ready to be born. And you didn’t have to do it alone.”
She said nothing for a long time before, thankfully, he saw in her eyes the understanding he’d wanted so much for her to have.
“So what do we do now, in this moment?” she asked, her voice hushed—and hopeful.
It was hard not to give in to that hope. It would be stringing them both along, though, and keep them from facing up to the real truth—that more often than not the events in our lives didn’t work out for the better.
And not everyone lived happily ever after.
“Well,” Cade said, his voice as hushed, “how about we do like we did the night Baby Cade here was born?” He gave the infant’s foot a gentle shake. “Y’know—try for now to let go of what’s past, let what’s to be, be. And put all our efforts in the here and now.”
Yet uttered now, after all that had transpired between them for which they both did have a past, the platitude seemed highly inadequate.
Well, it was the best he could do right now, the most he could offer her. The most he dare offer her.
It seemed he’d have no chance to do anything different, anyway, as the windows rattled in their frames with the back door being thrown open, thrusting Cade and Sara both headlong into the moment.
“Cade?” He heard his brother’s voice. “Sara Jane? We’re here!”
Cade started to rise but was arrested by the sight of Sara’s face. At the sound of his brother’s voice, she’d gone paler than ever. Her head actually reared back, as if she’d heard the most shocking of news, and Cade realized only then how truly frightened she was. Almost as much as when she’d learned he didn’t know who she was that first night, and he’d seen that soul-shattering forsakenness in her eyes.
And it was there now, fighting its way past the trancelike numbness.
For once he didn’t leap immediately to her aid. Because the idea flashed through his brain that she just might need to go to that terrible place in her mind, if not now, then sometime, if she were ever to confront her fate and what it meant to her future. And that every time he jumped to her aid, he locked her more securely to this time and place. More securely to him.
Talk about really taking control of a situation.
Yet now...now, in this moment
, with her whole world set to shatter all over again, he simply couldn’t let her feel as alone as that, no matter what.
Sitting back down again, Cade clasped Sara’s hand between both of his, trying to prevent her from going to that place her mind seemed determined to take her away to, whether it be the recesses of her memory or into another cavern of oblivion where she might forget even more of her life instead of remembering it.
He didn’t want her to go to either of those places, at least not until they’d heard what Loren and his wife had to say. Because however slim, there still might be a chance, maybe not for him, but for her...
“Sara. Sara.” She looked at him, distracted and dazed at once. He grasped her hand even more tightly in both of his, feeling almost as if he were pulling her back from the brink of some terrible danger. “Sara, listen to me. I know you still don’t know what’s happened to you. But you’re not alone, and I’m not just talkin’ about because your cousin’s here. I made you a promise the night Baby Cade was born. I mean to keep it for as long as you need me to.”
He wondered if she’d even heard him, she sat so still, as if in the eye of a hurricane, and sure destruction all around her. Finally, she shook her head, her gaze dropping to their twined hands, then lifting to focus on him. Tears pooled in her eyes.
“Oh, Cade,” she said achingly. There was a world of emotion in those words, and he felt every bit of it resonate within him.
“Cade?” Loren called impatiently. “Where is everybody?”
They jerked apart.
“Go,” Sara urged. “You haven’t seen your brother in seven years.”
“You’ll be all right?”
“Y-yes.” She nodded, wiping her cheeks with a shaking hand. “I’ll just see to the baby and then I’ll be out.”
With a final squeeze of her hand, he left her, closing the door behind him, feeling drained and shaky himself.
Then he turned to see Loren.
From either end of the hallway, he and his brother just stood and took in the first sight they’d had of each other in seven years. Cade had long envisioned this moment, through many a weary day on the range, many a sleepless night in bed. And in none of his imaginings had he known the strength of sentiment that now poured through him, surprising him with its intensity and genuineness.
New Year's Baby (Harlequin Heartwarming) Page 14