The World is a Stage

by Tamara Morgan

  Lily Hewitt. Gone before she was here. Loved before she was lost.

  Rachel reached across the island to grip Molly’s fingers, which were so cold they were almost lifeless. “What happened?”

  “I’m pregnant.”

  Rachel was not a woman given to fainting—she had far too much hot blood and hot air running through her. Still, the room tipped on its side, threatening to topple them both over. Rachel clutched at her sister’s hand even harder, afraid if she let go, they’d never be able to find one another again.

  “How can that be? It’s impossible.”

  Molly’s laugh, bitter and heart-wrenching, came out a sharp jab that Rachel felt right in the center of her chest. It hurt, but it also jolted her out of her stupor. Molly. Pregnant.

  Again.

  “I promise—not only is it possible, it’s true. I saw my doctor yesterday.”

  Warning bells, which were so loud they made her head ring, told her not to say the words forming on her lips. But she couldn’t help it. How could one woman—a woman she cared about more than anything else in the world—be so careless with her life?

  “For crying out loud, Molly. Haven’t you ever heard of a condom? For all you know, you could be carrying a heck of a lot more than Eric’s child—you could have dozens of his STDs. You’re a grown woman. Please tell me you know better than this.”

  Rachel braced herself, fully expecting an outburst of tears, but there was nothing. A stifling, heavy nothing.

  “Stop trying so hard, Rachel. I don’t always have to break down in tears, so you can stop wearing that stupid martyr face. It makes you look constipated.”

  It most certainly did not, but she wisely refrained from commenting.

  “How far along are you?”

  Molly looked down at her stomach, which, as far as Rachel could see, showed no signs of life. “Nine weeks. I’m due in November.”

  Rachel drew a deep breath. The next question wasn’t likely to yield anything positive and sisterly between them, but she had to ask. “What are you going to do?”

  “You know the answer to that,” Molly said, not nearly as angry as Rachel had expected. “I’m keeping it, of course. It’s just…”

  Rachel held her breath. Not screaming her frustrations to the world was going to end up causing some sort of brain trauma. She was sure of it.

  “…I haven’t told Eric yet.”

  “Well.” Rachel weighed her words carefully. “There’s time, Molly. It’s still early. You know I’ll do whatever you need me to.”

  This time, her sister did let out a choked sob, dropping her face so she was just a pair of hands surrounded by bouncy yellow curls. “I meant I haven’t told him about Lily.”

  Oh, Molly. Rachel bit her lip so hard it bled.

  This was what Molly did. She tumbled headfirst into love, and nothing else in her life—past, present or future—mattered. She shared the parts of her that were enticing to a man, and all those broken and bleeding parts simply got tucked away. Though what was left of her other than the gaping hole between those broken parts, Rachel had no idea.

  “Does he know any of it? Justin, the hospital—anything?”

  “No. I didn’t want him to think I’m…”

  Broken? Bleeding? Anything other than a cute piece of ass?

  “…too complicated,” Molly filled in lamely. “Look—don’t say anything to Michael, okay? I’ve got to figure things out with Eric first.”

  “I think I can safely promise that,” Rachel said wryly. She tossed the empty bottle of Gatorade into the recycling bin. “He’s the last man on earth I’m going to divulge the family secrets to.”

  Rachel didn’t know why she was surprised when, a few hours later, the telephone rang. Molly’s excitement was palpable from the other end, and she screamed as if her mouth was feet away from the phone rather than inches.

  “He asked me to marry him, Rachel. Can you believe it? I’m getting married!”

  “I hear yelling, dear. Who is yelling at your phone?” Indira looked up from the magazine she sat reading on the opposite couch.

  “It’s Molly, Mom. Hang on a sec.”

  She dashed from the room, one finger plugging the opposite ear so she could make out the exact words. But Molly must have been in some kind of frenzied delirium, because she just kept squealing and saying married and baby over and over again. Like it was a mantra and only through repetition could it possibly be true.

  “Don’t you think this is awfully sudden, Molly? How can you possibly have everything worked out already? What about Lily?”

  As she expected, her concerns were ignored. But it wasn’t until Molly sighed, dropped her voice and said, “This is it, Rachel—he’s the One,” that she realized just how big her concerns were.

  A baby was a big deal, a lifelong association with the Peterson family that could never be erased. That was bad enough. But marriage? The One? As far as Rachel was concerned, that was the end of the line.

  There had been three Ones before. Each time, Molly allowed herself to be completely absorbed into the man-of-the-hour’s life. She disappeared into a hole where all the air and light and food and joy was centered around and provided by the One. And she loved it in there. It was warm and cozy, and in some deluded sense only she understood, it was safe.

  But when the One became abusive and mean, treating her body and her soul like they were garbage—she was usually too deep inside that hole to be able to scream for help.

  “Be careful, Molly,” she pleaded into the phone, though she doubted her words were making any impression at all on the rainbows and cartwheels inside her sister’s heart. She was too far gone, baby and man and family in one package. Molly’s American Dream. “Please.”

  But she’d already hung up. Rachel fell to a kitchen chair, torn between a strong desire to cry and an even stronger desire to call Michael just to hear his voice. If there was one thing she knew for sure, it was that he could be counted on to make a joke, to make her feel better. The low rumble in his voice was exactly in tune with the timbre of her heart, and she was beginning to fear that the organ inside her chest could no longer function without him near.

  She felt cold inside and dead. The only person who could get her kick started and going again was him.

  Rachel had gotten half of his numbers punched into her phone before she realized what that meant. Michael was her One. She was deep inside the hole of her own making, and the only way she could see out was him.

  She was just like Indira. She was just like Molly. No. She was worse, because she knew better. She’d let him get to her—let him rip open her soul out there on the plains yesterday, and all because she couldn’t say no to his soft lips and softer hands.

  That didn’t deserve tears. That deserved a swift kick to the ass.

  In the end, she chucked her phone aside and went to her room. And with her hands trembling, she opened the envelope.

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  No Jot of Blood

  Practice was going like hell.

  For once, Michael had actually been looking forward to it. It was taking some time, but the transition from trainee to trainer wasn’t quite as terrible as he’d thought. Maybe he couldn’t run the sprints alongside the guys, but someday he could probably manage a little distance running. He couldn’t do any of the climbing and crawling and rolling of the barrels, but he could still watch and push and throw insults that kept everyone going.

  Or rather, he had been able to. Today, Julian was away on a promotional gig, and Peterson was mooning around like a man in love. Nick hadn’t bothered showing up or calling, and McClellan kept checking the scoring updates on his phone.

  And Rachel…

  Something was definitely wrong with Rachel.

  He’d been polite, he’d been affectionate, and he’d called her names right to her face. So far, not a single method got more than a tight smile out of her. She participated in the drills, but she wouldn’t look any of them in the face
. Well, except for Peterson. Him she was staring at so closely a less confident man might feel a little intimidated.

  Not him, of course. “Peterson! Drop and give me fifty!”

  It was a running gag of theirs, Michael making commands on a whim, but no one seemed to enjoy it today.

  Forget this. He was calling practice early and whisking Rachel off to feed her and force some kind of interaction. He wasn’t a man for talking out his feelings, but people didn’t have mind-blowing sex like that only to ignore each other for days.

  Where he was from, mind-blowing sex equaled more mind-blowing sex. Lots of it.

  He sat unabashedly watching Rachel’s ass as she worked through a series of squats, so he didn’t see the squad car pull up until all the color drained from Peterson’s face. When he turned around to see the source, it was as if he was watching through some kind of movie lens. Two uniformed cops, their hands on their weapons, strolled forward. And these were big guys. He’d seen local policemen before, usually scrawling out parking tickets just as he was about to get to his car. They were rarely intimidating—especially to someone like him, and especially when he was around his friends.

  But these two… They’d been sent knowing what to expect.

  “Eric Peterson?” the first one asked, planting his feet and fingering the handle of his weapon. He could have been an actor in a spaghetti western, except they were all in color and there was nothing entertaining about the scene.

  Ghostly fingers ran up Michael’s spine. This wasn’t good. This wasn’t good at all.

  “Yeah. That’s me.” When Peterson stepped forward, he did so slowly, his hands where they could be seen and interpreted as perfectly benign. “Can I help you?”

  “We’re here to invite you down to the station. There’s a few questions we’d like to ask.”

  “I see. Am I under arrest?” His friend’s face was a rock, but Michael knew there was a hell of a lot working just underneath the surface.

  “No,” the first cop started to say, but the second one let out a low growl.

  “Not yet,” he bit out.

  “Can I ask what this is about?”

  “It’s about your brother, Nicholas Peterson. He was picked up this morning in connection with some assault charges. We received an anonymous tip that you might have some information that will help us figure out the details of the case.”

  Peterson nodded once. “Fine. Michael—will you please call Molly and let her know that I’ll be back as soon as I can? She may need to keep the girls for the night.”

  “Shouldn’t you just ask Rachel—” Michael started to say, but then he saw her face. She stood behind and to the left of the cops, right within Peterson’s view. It was almost as if she was allying herself with them.

  She was.

  Her face had always been open and readable—at least to him—but she wasn’t even attempting to hide what was going on there now. There wasn’t a glimmer of surprise, not a breath of concern. The look she cast over Peterson was one that no man should have to bear. It was hatred, pure and simple. No—it was more than that. There was fear there too.

  She’s done this.

  The cops didn’t handcuff Peterson, but he was led away and placed in the backseat of their cruiser with little ceremony and even littler respect. McClellan and Michael watched, perfectly still, as the car pulled out of the parking lot and onto the main road.

  It wasn’t until the car was a white speck in the distance that he was able to turn to Rachel.

  “You,” he said. It wasn’t a question.

  And she didn’t answer.

  “What did you do, Rachel?” He strode to her, taking two large steps only to find that she fully intended to meet him halfway. “What. Did. You. Do?”

  “I didn’t do anything,” she said tightly, her lips pursed around each word. “I’m not the one who lies. I’m not the one hiding all sorts of secrets about my past.”

  “What are you talking about? Rachel—this is me.” He opened his arms wide. “Remember me? Your friend? The guy you slept with two days ago? I’ve been honest and upfront with you since almost the beginning—you know that.”

  “Please. If you were honest and upfront, you wouldn’t have let my sister go out with a man capable of that kind of violence. He put a man in a coma, Michael. You don’t think there’s anything wrong with that?”

  His breath came short and fast. “You found out about the bar fight?”

  “Of course I found out,” she snapped. “I’m not an idiot. And I’m not the kind of person who’s going to sit here and let bad things happen to the people I care about.”

  His hands came up, and it was all he could do to force them back at his sides, balled up tighter than the knot in his stomach. “The people you care about? You mean…Molly.”

  Her anger fell away then. He could see it in the slight slump of her shoulders, a softening just around the edges of her eyes. They were small cues, but they were there.

  So he held his breath. He waited.

  There were a lot of things Michael knew Rachel would never be. She would never be the type of woman who asked for help or admitted weakness. She would never voluntarily open herself up to pain. She would never make things easy.

  These were the things he loved about her—they were the reasons he was falling in love with her.

  But that didn’t mean he was going to let her get away with this. Personal anguish wasn’t a good enough reason to hurt other people. It wasn’t a good enough reason to hurt him.

  “Yes,” she finally said. Although she looked in his general direction, her gaze fixed itself a few inches above his head. “It’s always been for Molly.”

  It was getting harder to wait, harder to breathe. “And that’s all you have to say about it?”

  “I don’t know what else you want from me, Michael.” She started to turn away but stopped, as if thinking the better of it. This time, when she looked at him, she did meet his gaze full-on. And it was scary. Not because she was angry, but because she seemed so overwhelmingly sad.

  And even that wasn’t enough.

  “No. You know what?” she added. “I do have something else to say.”

  He didn’t move. He didn’t dare.

  “You can stand there acting like I’m the big bad monster and you’re Mr. Perfect, but that’s not fair. You have secrets too.”

  “Ask me anything you want,” he said, the words tight and controlled. He wanted her to react. He wanted her to do something to show that she cared. “I have nothing to hide.”

  “No? Not even that you apparently have enough money to buy your friend’s way out of jail? Or how about that by not turning Eric and Nick in to the authorities when you had the chance, you’re practically an accomplice to their crime?” Her words were rapid-fire, and he didn’t have time to process them before the onslaught continued. “You lied to me and to the police. As far as I can tell, Michael, that makes you the monster. Not me.”

  “You think I’m a monster.”

  “No. I think we both are.” She took three steps back. It might as well have been a thousand. “Which is why we’re done here, and you know it.”

  For the first time in his life, Michael didn’t have a glib reply.

  He didn’t have anything to say at all.

  On the surface, Peterson’s lawyer was all business. A matronly woman of around fifty, she had the look of someone who worked in the back offices, researching precedents and answering phones. Michael knew from experience, however, that no one had Peterson’s back more than Laura Bremerton. She’d gotten Peterson his kids and she would get him out of jail. There was no question of it.

  “I’m working as fast as I can, Mr. O’Leary,” she said from behind piles of paperwork on her desk, her hand scrawling furiously at a yellow notepad. She worked at one of the larger law firms in town, her office a museum of sleek hardwoods and a strange glass paperweight menagerie, but you could barely see the floor through all her files. “We should get bai
l for Mr. Peterson set tomorrow. Until then, you have to sit tight.”

  “What about Nick?”

  She looked up, her pen stilling. “What about him? He’s being tried on different charges. I’ve got a witness willing to testify that Eric was the one who stopped Nick from doing further damages, which is good news and a possible first-time misdemeanor for Eric. It’s not so good for Nick. The kid’s probably looking at felony assault charges and at least a year of jail time. That’s if we’re lucky.”

  Michael bounced his leg—his good one—nervously. He didn’t like this fancy office stuff, and he really didn’t like the button-up shirt and slacks he’d worn to make the visit. But if he was going to undo some of these damages, he needed to play his cards right.

  It was his fault—all of it.

  He’d thought he could trust Rachel. He’d been the one to tell her about the plan to distract her, the one to set these wheels in motion. When he’d talked to Molly this morning, she’d said something about a file Rachel showed her containing everything about Peterson, including the police sketch. It also contained everything about him.

  She’d run background checks, knew everything there was to know about their lives.

  What Michael wanted to know was if that happened before or after he’d made love to her and told her what an amazing person she was. Before or after he’d come to the realization that her tears on his shoulder hurt more than a thousand knee injuries.

  “I’m his employer—well, sort of,” Michael explained, pushing all thoughts of Rachel aside. He took a deep breath and forced himself to look the part. Businessman. Upstanding citizen. Man of the World. “See…I’ve got this lentil farm.”

  “I’m sorry, Mr. O’Leary. A lentil farm?”

  “I know it sounds stupid, but please hear me out.”