Oh, Dane. I’m so sorry. It was a hollow apology. It meant nothing. Nothing. He had left....
A sob rose in her throat and fear took on a totally different meaning. Dane had left and she—oh, God, she had to stop him. She ran, knowing she couldn’t let him leave. Not now. Not ever.
Jerking open the front door, she rushed onto the porch and her heart plunged to a halt when she saw him standing there. His hand gripped the wooden post and his back was to her. He stiffened at the sound of her appearance.
“This is as far as I could go,” he stated scornfully. “Where you’re concerned, I don’t seem to have the courage of my convictions. I love you, Amanda. I don’t know how such simple words can convey all I feel for you. How can saying I love you reveal the emptiness, the total nothing I am without you? How can it describe the inanity of just waking up alone? I wish I could walk away without a backward glance. I wish I could hate you, turn this futile needing and longing and yearning for you into hatred. But I don’t even have the strength to do that. I don’t have any fight left. I love you.” His jaw clenched in agonizing control and his voice faltered into a heart-rending whisper. “I just—love you.”
In her whole life Amanda had never felt so humble, so completely unworthy. While she had been searching for a way to apologize for the unforgivable, he had forgiven her. From a heart that loved beyond her comprehension, he’d forgiven her.
A solitary tear formed on her lashes and slipped onto her cheek, lingering there in helpless humility. “Don’t leave me, Dane,” she pleaded softly. “Please, I want this baby—your baby, but more than that I want you. I need you. Now and always.”
He turned. His eyes were liquid dark as he stared at the teardrop on her cheek and then gently lifted its shimmering wetness onto his fingertip. His face blurred as another teardrop replaced the first and was quickly followed by another and another.
Amanda raised her hand to his cheek in mute offering. “Until just now I didn’t know what loving really meant. But I love you, Dane. I don’t know how I can ever show you, but….” The tears bunched and clogged in her throat and she gave in to their healing river.
With a sigh Dane pulled her into his arms, quietly glad that he was there to hold her. Cry, Amanda, he told her in his heart. Cry. Feel again. Love again. Cry. And when you’re through, I’ll still be here, holding you, loving you. Always loving you.
When the tears dwindled to a mist, she pressed a kiss to his dampened shirt and looked into his eyes, eyes that were as moist as her own. Her love swelled as the wall around her heart dissolved and she committed herself to him without reservation.
“The past can’t hurt us anymore,” she said. “Nothing will separate us again. I won’t allow it. I’ll fight to keep you close to me. You’ll have to share my fears during these next few months, because I can’t face them without you.”
His hand stroked her face. “Everything will be all right with this baby. It has to be. But whatever comes, we’ll share it, good or bad, happiness or sorrow. Promise me that you’ll share it all with me, Amanda.”
“I promise.” No matter what happened, as long as she had his love, everything would be all right.
It was almost spring. A time of new life, new beginnings. “Dane,” she whispered. “I think it’s time for us to go home.”
His smile was like the rainbow after the storm. “Don’t you know that in my arms you’re already there?”
“Home,” she whispered in soft, sweet contentment. “Forever.”
As he bent to seal her vow with his lips, the promise drifted upward to catch on the wind like a benediction, sacred and enduring ... forever.
Copyright © 1984 by Karen Whittenburg
Originally published by Dell (044013093X)
Electronically published in 2012 by Belgrave House
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
No portion of this book may be reprinted in whole or in part, by printing, faxing, E-mail, copying electronically or by any other means without permission of the publisher. For more
information, contact Belgrave House, 190 Belgrave Avenue, San Francisco, CA 94117-4228
http://www.BelgraveHouse.com
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This is a work of fiction. All names in this publication are fictitious and any resemblance to any person living or dead is coincidental.
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