“Mary Hannah, you don’t need to do this now—”
“I have to finish. You need to know who I am. What I did.” She shook her head. “In my second trimester, I miscarried. It was my fault. Don’t even try to convince me otherwise. It’s a guilt I’ll have to live with for the rest of my life. I’m every bit as horrible a mother as the woman you knew undercover, Sheila. I put my child at risk, and my child did not survive.”
Those shades of gray tormented him, but if he said the wrong thing now, there would be no taking it back later. He could sort through his own thoughts another time. For now, he grasped at whatever logic he could find. “You didn’t know you were pregnant. And once you did, you tried your best to come clean.”
“That doesn’t make it hurt less.”
“I imagine not. Especially on a night like this.” He slid his arm around her again, drawing her close against his side. “But even here on this really tough night, you’re staying strong. Acknowledging there’s a problem and facing it head-on, going to rehab and staying clean. That’s more than ninety-nine percent of addicts I’ve met are able to accomplish. You went to rehab and completed the program.”
Another sigh racked her body, all the louder in the late-night silence of the hospital. “I wonder sometimes if I hadn’t gotten pregnant, would I have ever faced the addiction? I only checked myself in because I was pregnant. My baby saved my life, but it’s my fault the baby died and my husband left. I can’t blame him. There’s no way to make what I did okay.”
He couldn’t argue the point and didn’t know how to ease her pain. And he couldn’t be sure he would have reacted any differently from her ex. AJ simply held her. His world rocked.
Because somewhere along the way, the firefighter had just fallen in love with the arsonist.
* * *
LACEY WALKED DOWN the hospital hall toward the waiting room to update everyone. Sierra was awake and finally stable enough to be moved into a room. She’d insisted on getting in a wheelchair, and Mike had brought her to see their son.
Allen Michael. Four pounds one ounce. He was a good weight. Sierra had almost given her life hanging on those extra weeks to give her baby time to mature. Lacey’s hands shook as adrenaline rushed away in the aftermath of the most harrowing night of her life.
She’d already lost a husband. She could not lose their daughter. But right on the heels of that thought was a gut-wrenching fear that Sierra might still lose her child. A pain Lacey couldn’t bear for her no matter how much she wanted to.
Security opened the electric doors separating the maternity ward from the waiting area. The hospital was so silent, her gym shoes squeaked all the louder. She almost thought her friends had left, and then she saw them in the far corner. Mary Hannah was curled up asleep, her head on AJ’s shoulder. His head was back, his legs stretched out as he napped, too.
Wyatt sat in a chair watching the television on mute with the closed captions scrolling along the bottom. His eyes slid to hers, and he put a finger to his mouth, easing up from the seat to join her.
He palmed the small of her back and steered her away. “There’s a bench around the corner where we can talk. And before you ask, Nathan’s fine. He was asleep when I left the house. He said he would come in the morning so you can go home and change.”
“He’s had to grow up so fast.” She followed along on autopilot—exhausted, relieved, drained. She sat on the bench, Wyatt dropping into place beside her. “Sierra’s awake and they let her see the baby. Mike’s with them both now.”
“So everyone’s okay?”
“They’ll be in the hospital for a while, but I’m cautiously hopeful.” She couldn’t remember when she’d been so scared. Other than sending her husband off to war. Tears welled up and over. He should be here to see their first grandchild. The weight of losing him hit her all over again, and she bit back a sob.
Wyatt tucked a knuckle under her chin. “Lacey, no offense, babe, but you look exhausted. You should go home and rest or you’ll be no good to anyone.”
“I’m not leaving.” She forced herself not to wince at Wyatt’s touch, which felt so wrong right now with Allen so very alive in her thoughts, his smile, his even-tempered ways and humor that balanced her. She missed him so damn much.
“You’re no good to anyone if you wear yourself out.”
“I am not leaving. Not tonight. Sierra’s my child. You’re not a parent. You don’t understand.”
His jaw flexed. “I am a parent. You just haven’t chosen to tell me yet.”
Her head snapped back. “What did you say?”
“Are you pregnant?”
She weighed her words carefully, wishing she’d gone to the doctor earlier so she didn’t have those weeks of silence to account for. “No. I’m not. I thought I might be for a short while, but when I went to the doctor, he confirmed I’m not pregnant.” Then she realized . . . “Is that why you proposed out of the blue at Christmas?”
“Actually, no, not that you’ll probably ever believe me.” His smile was dark, bitter. “I guessed a couple of days ago when someone made a toast at the dinner table and you lifted that wineglass full of water. I realized how many times you’d passed up wine lately. Even at Christmas and New Year’s. I remembered you didn’t toast with champagne like everyone else. Everyone except underage teens and pregnant Sierra. You’ve been drinking water and juice in that favorite wineglass of yours for weeks.”
Guilt piled on top of more guilt. If she’d been pregnant, it had been with his child, too. He deserved to have been told, to celebrate the news rather than stumble on the knowledge.
She took his hand, wishing she could change what she’d done. Waiting had seemed so logical at the time. “You have a right to be upset that I didn’t share my suspicion with you.”
“I’m hurt and disappointed. That’s different,” he pointed out rightly. “Because I know you’re making excuses because you don’t want to marry me.”
“It’s not that. I might—”
“You might want to marry me?” He tapped her lips to quiet her. “Pardon me if I’m underwhelmed.”
“I want you in my life—” She couldn’t make herself finish the sentence and commit to marry him. She loved him but wasn’t in love with him. Not the way he deserved to be loved.
There was no denying it. She’d made a mess. A big mess. “I promise to let you know the second I know either way.”
“Good,” he said curtly, pausing as if he needed to say more, then shoved to his feet. “I need to take a walk.”
With regret and an ache in her heart, she watched him lumber away, those broad shoulders stiff. She wanted to be able to lean on that strong chest and take the comfort he would have given if she’d offered even a bit of encouragement.
But tonight had reminded her how very much she’d loved her husband, and she could not settle for less.
* * *
I UNDERSTOOD AJ. We were a lot alike even though I’m a dog and he’s human.
Fear doesn’t discriminate or pick favorites.
I saw it in his eyes and in the way he struggled to hide a wince. The world is a scary place. Letting people see vulnerability was even more frightening, but often impossible to hide. To be honest, my fear was more obvious. There were still times I couldn’t stop trembling any more than I could stop breathing. AJ’s anxiety was better hidden from humans. But I could smell it.
My great sniffer. Remember? I can sniff more than the leftover pizza a person ate for lunch. My nose enables me to smell emotions and even health issues.
Like how I knew Sierra was going to have her baby early. And how I knew Lacey had the flu even before she went to the doctor. If I could have used human words, I also could have told her she was just having a perimenopausal pregnancy scare. I suspect it took her so long to go to the doctor because she was more afraid of saying good-bye to the mothering part o
f her life than she was of finding out she wasn’t in the family way. I was pretty sure it had something to do with saying yet another good-bye to her dead husband.
But when it came to sensing the emotions, I was more in tune to AJ and Mary Hannah. They were the ones I knew I needed to help. And there was no missing the turmoil inside AJ. He needed comfort, and for some reason he would accept it only from me. No matter how much I nudged, he wouldn’t let Mary Hannah be the one he leaned on.
Back then, AJ became like one of my puppies, and that meant I needed to protect him. That urge to protect was the only thing that stood a chance of overcoming my fears.
I just had to figure out a way to let AJ know he was in serious danger. Because I recognized a person very close to him.
A person who’d made regular visits to my old home in the meth house.
* * *
WALKING INTO AJ’S cabin, Mary Hannah was still in a fog of exhaustion and emotions. Lacey had woken them at the hospital to let them know Sierra and the baby were stable. They should go home to get some real rest now. She would call when she needed backup.
The night was so damn surreal. She and AJ had walked to his old Scout as if the conversation back at the hospital never happened. Was he just processing what she’d said? Or waiting for the crisis to pass before dumping her?
The drive back to the cabin had been quick and uneventful on the deserted roads, the rest of the world still asleep for the most part at four in the morning. The silence between them stretched. She considered asking him to just drop her off at her apartment, then decided to follow his lead for now. She was too drained to make decisions she could trust.
A quiet little voice inside her reminded her she was only delaying the inevitable.
She stifled a yawn that brought tears to her eyes—or maybe the yawn was a good excuse. AJ opened the front door and called for Holly to come out. He angled sideways, Mary Hannah’s body barely brushing his as she walked inside the warm cabin.
Absently, she picked up magazines off the sofa and stacked them on the coffee table. Her gaze skated to the hearth with logs stacked. How she wished they could go back to that night they’d lain in front of the fire and made love. She snagged a crocheted afghan trailing off the recliner and folded it. She draped it precisely along the back of the sofa.
Holly padded back inside, shaking snow off her coat.
AJ locked the front door and set the security code. “Quit looking at my house like you want to dust.”
“I’m not a germophobe.” She forced a smile and smoothed the afghan. “I just like order.”
“A person could eat off your floors,” he said wryly, teasing predictably.
“A person would have to eat off your floors because they can’t find the table under all those files.”
“I’ll concede, it’s cluttered with work. I’m still wrapping up loose ends on the meth-house bust.”
God, they were just going through the motions, but it was all so forced. AJ was too nice to give her her walking papers right after she’d torn her heart inside out to share her past with him after her friend nearly died. But Mary Hannah couldn’t escape the feeling that all their actions were stilted, that it was only a matter of time until the other shoe dropped. After her admission, something had changed between them back at the hospital. She felt self-conscious and vulnerable.
She just wanted to crawl into bed and curl up against his warm body to sleep. “You need more baskets to put things in.”
“Baskets? Mess isn’t mess if it’s hidden?”
Now, wasn’t that a loaded statement? She should just quit being silly and go to bed. She slept here more often than she stayed at her place. He’d driven straight here. Going to her apartment now would require more effort and bring up questions she didn’t want to answer.
She tugged off her boots and lined them up by the front door.
“Have you always been this, uh, organized?”
“Since I was a little girl, yes.” She walked into his bedroom.
“That’s a lot of pressure to put on yourself.” He pulled a T-shirt out of his drawers and passed it to her.
She unzipped her jeans and kicked them free before folding them by habit. “So my psychiatrist has told me more than once.” She flinched. “Shit. I didn’t mean to say that.”
“Then I didn’t hear it.” He peeled off his clothes, down to his boxers.
When had they gotten into this routine? It made her stomach jumpy.
Steeling herself, she slipped out of her sweater and bra and pulled on his T-shirt, the cool cotton sliding over her skin and carrying a hint of his scent mixed with laundry detergent. “I really don’t want to talk about my messed-up life anymore tonight.”
He flipped back the covers, inviting her to slide in beside him. He pulled her close to his side before turning off the bedside lamp. The moon shone through a part in the curtains.
Holly padded into the bedroom, straight to her new dog bed under the window. She turned around three times before settling with a huff and resting her face on her paws.
His heart beat beneath her ear, a steady soothing sound that should have lulled Mary Hannah to sleep, except now she felt wide-awake. “I do put a lot of pressure on myself. You may have noticed I’m a bit of a perfectionist.”
“Nah. Really?” He toyed with a lock of her hair.
“Be nice.” She tickled his side lightly.
He captured her wrist and kissed her pulse. “I’m growing fond of paisley.”
This small-talk game was tearing her apart inside. She couldn’t just not talk about what she’d told him earlier tonight. She had to explain. Not justify. So he would understand the choices she’d made even if there was no excusing them. “I had to keep my scholarships.”
“College expenses can be crippling.”
Except it wasn’t about the money. “My dad had the means, but he had expectations, and if I didn’t meet them, the stress at home would make things very . . . difficult for my mother.”
“Difficult?” He went still against her.
“Are you asking if he was abusive? Not in the traditional sense. He was just very controlling, as if he could make my sister well by managing every aspect of our lives.” She wasn’t making excuses. She just wanted AJ to understand, except maybe she was seeking some kind of forgiveness after all. “I’m positively mellow in comparison.”
“That’s no way to grow up.”
“Even in college, I still couldn’t stop feeling the need to keep the peace. So I studied my ass off to make perfect grades. And it wasn’t enough. College was different from high school. I was just one of a group of honors students who’d been valedictorian. I got scared, really scared. I went to the campus clinic and they gave me something for my nerves. That helped for a while, until the classes got harder. I got another B—”
“You mean D?”
She shook her head. “When I say I needed to be perfect, I mean perfect. There was enough stress with Sarah Jane’s seizures. I moved on to meds to help me stay awake, then ones to help me sleep. By the time my father passed away of a heart attack my junior year, it was too late for me. I was already addicted to prescription drugs and living a lie with Ted.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Me, too. When I realized I was pregnant, I used Dad’s life insurance to check myself into a really good rehab program outside of Nashville. There’s an irony in that.”
“It worked.”
“It did. For me anyway. The place catered to a lot of the Nashville scene. The rich and famous sent their kids there to detox. That’s how I met Billy Brock, since his daughter was there.”
“Now you help counsel others.” His hand stroked up and down her back.
Finally, she asked the question that was keeping her awake, that had been tugging at her since her revelation at the hospital. “Will you e
ver be able to look at me the same way? Won’t you always be suspicious of every move I make? Wondering if I’m another Sheila?”
He was quiet for a long time. Or perhaps it only seemed that way since she was holding her breath.
“Maybe you’re too scared of what we’re feeling. This connection between us is messy, Mary Hannah. It doesn’t fit into one of your orderly binders.”
As she looked into his eyes, the moonlight streaming across his handsome face, she realized he could very well be right. She was every bit as afraid as Holly had been that first day in the meth house. Chained to her past. Afraid of the outside world.
She had rehabbed the drug addiction, but maybe she wasn’t done fixing the rest of her. Maybe she’d never brought her heart back to life enough to let anyone in. And AJ—this man who helped her to see that truth, a man who just might give her another chance at love—deserved a whole lot better than that.
Twenty-one
Let the games begin.
—HOLLY
MARY HANNAH HAD visited Sierra every day for the past two weeks. But today was different. A momentous day for her friend. Sierra and baby Allen were being discharged this afternoon. Mary Hannah had offered to keep her company until the afternoon release. They waited together in the hospital room as Sierra looked forward to a new life with her son and Mary Hannah braced herself for the end of her time with AJ once the Mutt Makeover was finished.
Things couldn’t be any more hectic with the competition only a day away. The morning after the event, Sierra and Allen would fly home and Mike would drive back. This had been such a tumultuous time, being so happy for her friend yet feeling like a failure herself. She’d failed her baby, her ex-husband and now she was failing AJ because she couldn’t trust herself not to screw up all over again.
She cradled the tiny infant her arms, six pounds now and no one would guess what a rough start he’d had. He was perfect. Ten angel toes and ten tiny fingers grasping at the air. He wore a cap now, but hints of feathery blond hair showed. Such perfection.
Rescue Me Page 24