She stood up then and traded him glare for glare. “Listen to me, you arrogant, pigheaded fool! I was not talking Marian into reclaiming your son, I was encouraging her to walk away from her rotten husband before he breaks every bone in her body. I was repeating what you’ve been preaching all along and, for the first time since this whole mess of a marriage started, I truly believed what I was saying.”
“You don’t give a rat’s ass about Marian. All you care about is getting rid of her son to make way for your baby.”
“Your baby, too, Ben, or are you going to suggest you’re not the father?” She puffed out a little breath of disgust. “You once said that Marian is the victim in this whole situation and you were right. It’s not you and not me, and not, thank God, that little boy over there. She came here for one last visit with her son because she thought that once she signed him over to us, she’d never see him again. But I told her she didn’t have to worry because no matter who was looking after him, she was his natural mother and was welcome to see him whenever she wanted to. And while you might be sorry that I’m pregnant, I’m not. Because…” She folded her hands over her stomach, and her voice, which had started out full of fire, broke as she continued, “It’s taken this new life growing inside me for me to realize what a precious gift a child is and I wouldn’t deny anyone the right to that.”
She made him feel about as sensitive as a rogue elephant on the rampage. “Oh, Julia…!”
“Shut up!” she spat. “I’m not finished. I begged Marian to leave her husband because he’s a bully and a brute. Well, the way you’ve acted since you got home today, Ben Carreras, you’re not a whole lot better!”
He slumped down onto his chair again and dropped his head in his hands. “I’m sorry! I know that doesn’t exactly cut it, but I don’t know what else to say. My only excuse is that what I saw and heard scared me spitless, and the rest just…came spilling out.”
She didn’t answer right away. Instead she loaded cups into the dishwasher.
Eventually, she said, “It’s not all your fault. I shouldn’t have left Michael alone, and you’re right about the dog. He’s too big to be let loose around such a little baby. But they’re only symptoms of a much deeper problem, Ben. The real issue is you and I are both constantly looking for slights and betrayal where none are intended. We’re so busy worrying about what the other’s trying to take away that we don’t see what each has to give. I can’t speak for you, but I know I need to figure out how to repair the damage before it’s too late.”
CHAPTER ELEVEN
SHE picked up her purse then, and took out her car keys.
“And is this how you propose we go about it—by running out on me again?” he blustered, refusing to admit to himself how terrified he was by the realization that this time, he’d given her good reason not to come back. “Because let me tell you, now that you’re carrying my child, you no longer have that option. You’ll damned well stay here with me and that’s all there is to it!”
She looked at him as if he’d just crawled out from under a rock. “That’s probably exactly how Wayne Dawes speaks to Marian,” she said dully. “The difference is, while she’s prepared to tolerate it, I’m not.”
If she’d hauled off and decked him, he couldn’t have been more shocked. Him a carbon copy of Wayne Dawes? “For crying out loud, Julia, you can’t be serious!”
She bit her lip and sighed. “No, I don’t suppose I am. But your ongoing suspicion of my every motive is beginning to wear me down. You sneak around listening in on half a conversation and decide I’m conspiring against you. I say I want to spend some time figuring out what I can do to make this marriage work, and you immediately assume I’m leaving you.”
“Well, it wouldn’t be the first time you just disappeared.”
“But I’ve always come home again and the reason is exactly the same as the one that’s guided me to every other decision I’ve made regarding us and our marriage over the last few weeks. I love you. I’m beginning to see, though, that just saying so isn’t enough. It’s what a person’s prepared to do to prove it that counts and I guess I just haven’t given you enough reasons to believe me.”
She felled him with that parting shot and though his first instinct was to go after her and beg her to stay, he was too ashamed. He’d asked more of her than any husband had the right to ask. He’d taken her new-bride dreams and trampled them in the dust of a shabby affair that never should have happened. He’d faced her with one ultimatum after another and she’d conceded to him every time. He’d smeared the news of her pregnancy with insult, even though he knew having a baby had been the thing she wanted more than anything else.
He needed to have his butt kicked. Hell, he needed a lobotomy!
Michael was fed, bathed and asleep for the night before she came home again. It was dusk by then, and Ben was sitting in the library, the way he had the first time she disappeared on him, and even though the house was full of evening shadows when she came in through the front door, he saw at once that she’d been crying. Her eyes were red and puffy and if it was possible for her ever to look anything other than stunningly beautiful, she looked it then.
If there were words to cover the situation, he’d never heard of them. There was absolutely nothing he could say to erase the hurt he’d dealt her. So he did the only other thing at his disposal and prayed it would be enough. He went to her and took her in his arms.
She didn’t rebuff him, but then what reason had she ever given him to think she would? She’d loved him from the day they’d met but because he was a fool, he hadn’t believed she was just as beautiful on the inside as she was on the outside.
He’d waited for the inevitable ax to fall, the way it so often had when he was growing up. Waited for her to decide she didn’t want him around anymore and just to make sure she didn’t disappoint him, he’d given her every reason to walk away. Instead, she kept coming back for more.
To his horror, he started to cry, great rib-shaking sobs that rocked him to the soles of his feet. Big, thick-as-a-brick jerk that he was, he stood there bawling like a kid, dripping tears all over her hair and making idiotic glugging noises as if he were choking.
She just wrapped her arms around his waist and held on, the way she always did. “Thank you,” he croaked, when he finally pulled himself together enough to articulate the words. “Thank you for not giving up on us.”
Still, she didn’t speak. She just pressed her face into his shoulder and the next thing, they were heading up to the bedroom. He hadn’t eaten dinner and he didn’t think she had, either, but it wasn’t food they needed to restore them, it was each other.
The onshore breeze wafted the scent of flowers and summer through the open windows. He sank with her to the cool, smooth sheets, holding her close the whole time because he couldn’t bear to see the bruised hurting in her eyes.
The loving came slowly. A kiss that landed at the corner of her lips and slid to her mouth with quiet, desperate need. A touch to her face, and then her throat, and then her shoulder; flowing like the tide, quietly, secretively almost.
When at last he entered her, she received him warmly, embracing him with all the generosity that was her trademark. Locked in her arms, he let the climax roll over him, slow sweet agony that he wished would never end. Loving had never been like that before. Never so reverent. And somehow never so sad.
“When did you last eat?” he asked her, suddenly afraid.
She lay beside him, her eyes closed. “I don’t remember.”
“Sweetheart,” he said, “you’re pregnant. You need to take care of yourself, of our baby.”
“I know.” She went to get out of bed, her movements listless and once again he caught the gleam of tears in her eyes. “I’m going to check on Michael.”
“No,” he said, tucking the covers around her shoulder. “You stay put and let me do it. Then I’ll fix you a snack before you go to sleep.”
He made sandwiches and hot chocolate, then we
nt looking for the dog, only to find it had gone missing. Oh, jeez, Clifford! he thought, scanning the path that led from the garden down to the beach. This is one hell of a time to pull a disappearing act!
He half-hoped Julia would have fallen asleep when he went back upstairs, but she was wide awake. “Honey,” he said carefully, laying the tray on her bedside table, “I don’t want to alarm you, but I can’t find Clifford. I figure he got out somehow and made tracks for the beach, so I’m going to—”
“He’s not lost,” she said, one fat tear rolling down her face. “I took him back to the shelter.”
“You what?”
“I took him back.”
“But you loved that crazy mutt!”
“He might hurt Michael.”
So this was what a worm felt like: lower than dirt and just about as unappealing! “Julia,” he said, “Clifford doesn’t have a mean bone in his body, and I know it. You didn’t have to do this.”
“Yes, I did,” she said.
“Oh, hell!” He wiped a despairing hand over his face. He wasn’t fit to look after a loaf of bread, let alone a baby. As for being a husband…a fruit fly could do a better job!
“Come to bed,” she said, patting his hand. “What’s done is done, and they promised me at the shelter they’d make sure Clifford goes to a good home.”
She slept late the next morning, an amazing feat, given that there was a baby in the house. When she awoke, she found a thermos of tea and a plate of crackers beside the bed—and a note.
Hi, sweetheart! it read. Don’t know if you’re having morning sickness but I once read somewhere that crackers and tea help prevent it, so thought I’d leave you prepared. Michael and I have gone for a walk along the seawall, but we’ll be back in time to take you out for lunch.
In fact, she did feel sick. Sick and miserable, if truth be told, but it had nothing to do with her being pregnant. She’d put on the best face she could last night, but the business with Clifford…
Oh, she’d loved him! Loved how he’d appointed himself in charge when Ben was away. Loved how gentle and faithful he was, how careful around the baby. She’d had such hopes, imagining the two of them when Michael was bigger: a boy and his dog wading in the warm shallow pools when the tide was out, chasing a ball on the sand flats…the kind of closeness with a pet she’d wanted when she was a child, but had never been allowed to have.
Silly of her, no doubt, to let herself get so upset about a dog she hadn’t even known existed a month ago, but she just couldn’t shake the way Clifford had looked back at her as he was being led away to the holding pen at the animal shelter. As if she’d just cut his throat. As if he was being led to the slaughterhouse.
Closing her eyes to stem the tears, she leaned back against the pillows. Instead of wallowing in self-pity, she’d be better off counting her blessings. She and Ben had weathered more storms in a few weeks of marriage than most people had to cope with in a lifetime. There’d been pain and heartache along the way, but their love had strengthened from it.
They had each other, they had Michael, and they had another baby on the way. Most people would say they were rich beyond deserving. Some would say losing a dog didn’t merit a mention. If only she could believe that…
Downstairs, a door slammed and she heard footsteps on the stairs. Shortly after, Ben appeared with Michael in his arms. “Hey, Mommy, you awake?”
She opened her eyes and smiled determinedly. “I’m awake.”
“Good,” he said, “because there’s someone here who’s very anxious to see you.”
“Well, let me have him then! I’ve missed him.”
“From all accounts, the feeling was mutual,” Ben said, and opened the door wider.
Expecting he’d simply bring Michael to her, she held out her arms and crooned, “Come here, my baby.”
Instead, Clifford came bounding into the room, leaped on the bed and with manic ecstasy, proceeded to wash as much of her as he could get at, which was plenty since she hadn’t a stitch on under the sheets.
“Oh, Ben!” she exclaimed, smiling and laughing and crying all at the same time. “You didn’t have to do this.”
“Yes, I did,” he said soberly, wrestling Clifford aside so that all four of them could fit on the bed. “It’s taken me a while to realize it, but I’ve done a lot of taking since we exchanged our wedding vows and I figure it’s about time I did a little giving for a change. And to quote a lovely lady I know rather well, how else do I prove that I’m committed to you and our marriage?”
She batted her eyelashes at him. “I could think of a couple of other ways, if you insist on being noble.”
“So can I,” he said, with an outrageously lascivious wink. “But if it’s all the same to you, I’ll take a number and stand in line. Michael’s too young to be taking lessons in the art of seduction and I don’t care to share your favors with a dog, even if he is one of the family.”
Heart overflowing, she said, “Do you know how much I love you, Ben Carreras?”
“I’m beginning to get the picture,” he said, planting a kiss on her mouth. “Do you know how proud I am to be your husband, and how glad I am that you’re the mother of both my children?”
ISBN: 978-1-4603-1132-5
THE UNEXPECTED WEDDING GIFT
First North American Publication 2000.
Copyright © 2000 by Catherine Spencer.
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