by Noelle Adams
Alice was stroking Cara’s face and not looking at Micah when he hung up, but she turned to him when he stepped over to the opened door again.
“She said the urgent-care clinic is opened until ten, so we could take her there this evening, if it would make us feel better. She thought she’d be okay if we wanted to wait for tomorrow, but I’d rather just take her tonight, if you don’t mind.”
“Oh, that’s a good idea. I hadn’t even thought about that. Let’s take her there now. It’s not even nine yet.”
The clinic was about ten minutes away, and Alice checked her phone for any information on ear infections in babies as he drove them there, reading out loud the information she found.
They both felt better when he pulled into the parking lot.
The clinic was crowded, so they signed in and then had to wait. They found two seats in a corner, and Micah held Cara on his lap. She was mostly whimpering now, obviously worn out from the evening.
Alice leaned over toward Micah to stroke Cara’s back. “I guess people figure out how to take care of them eventually. I feel so clueless.”
“Not as clueless as me.”
She looked up at him, and saw his eyes were tender as he gazed down at her. “You’re not clueless. You’re doing a really good job with her. Seriously, Micah. She was just dropped into your life a couple of weeks ago. You can’t expect to have it all figured out yet. You’re doing great.”
He released a heavy sigh and didn’t answer, but he reached over with one arm and wrapped it around her shoulders, pulling her against him.
She nestled against him and kept stroking Cara’s back, feeling comforted, close to him. To both of them.
“I wish I’d known her before,” he murmured hoarsely, using his thumb to caress Cara’s little hand.
“Before when?”
“Before now. Her first five months I never even knew she existed. I missed out on those months of her life.”
It was a poignant thought, and there was nothing she could say to answer it. So she just breathed, “Yeah.”
After a few minutes, Micah spoke again without warning, “Sometimes I feel guilty.”
Alice’s breath hitched as she glanced up at him. He was gazing steadily at Cara’s unhappy face. “Guilty about what?”
“About Heather having to die so that I could know her. And about keeping her, just because I want to, even if it’s not the best thing for her. Maybe she’d be better off with a couple who wants to adopt her.”
“No. She wouldn’t. You’re her dad, and you love her. You have a stable life now, and you’re committed to taking care of her. You’ll get help when you need it. Stop beating yourself up about this, Micah. No one knows how to be a great parent right away. You learn as you go along. She should be with her daddy.”
He closed his eye for a minute and let out another long breath. “I just don’t know…”
“Don’t know what?” For some reason, she was holding her breath, as if he were about to tell her something really important, something she needed to know.
“I think sometimes about other men—men like Daniel, who’ve basically had it together their whole lives, who haven’t made such a mess of things, who haven’t…broken their lives like I have. I can’t help but think she’d be better off with someone like that. I just don’t think…I don’t think I deserve her.”
Her heart jumped, and she had no idea what to say. “You don’t think you deserve her because…because you don’t think you’re good enough to take care of her?”
He met her eyes for just a moment before glancing away. “I don’t think I’ve been good enough to deserve…getting her.”
So then she understood. She knew exactly what he was struggling with. He still felt guilty for things he’d done in his life and thought he needed to pay for it more. Since she knew what to say now, the words came spilling out. “But that’s not the way it works. You know that. God doesn’t give us things because we deserve them. He gives them to us because he loves us. Just because he loves us.”
“Yeah.” He stroked the fine hair on the little head with his long fingers.
“No one would deserve her. That’s kind of the point. We get her anyway.” Realizing what she said, she amended quickly, “You get her anyway.”
“I love her already,” he admitted, his voice slightly rough. “I didn’t think it was possible for it to happen so quickly. It’s just been a couple of weeks. But I do. I love her.” His arm tightened briefly around Alice.
She was so overwhelmed with emotion that her eyes burned slightly. “She’s going to love you too, Micah. I promise.” As if in response to Alice’s words, Cara whimpered and burrowed against Micah’s chest, one little hand gripping his shirt. Alice added, “She loves you already. She’s going to have a great life with you.”
Then he turned his head to meet her eyes. “Thank you for saying that,” he murmured.
Alice smiled. “I’m just saying the truth. Nothing to thank me for.”
“Yeah, there is.” He leaned down and brushed his lips very lightly against hers.
A wave of feeling and excitement swept over her, and she smiled even more against his mouth.
She wasn’t sure what she would have said—or if she’d have managed to say anything—because their name was called just then.
As they were walking back, a young woman in a nurse’s outfit down the hall gave a start when she saw Micah, as if his presence surprised her. Then she smiled in a very significant way and winked at him as they past.
Alice looked back at the young woman, who was quite attractive in a very made-up way, and then up at Micah. “Did you know her?” she asked, since it seemed clear that the woman had known him.
Micah looked rather stiff, and he didn’t turn his eyes from where they were focused directly in front of him. “No. I didn’t.”
Glancing back at the woman, who was still smiling in Micah’s direction, Alice had serious doubts about whether that was true.
But it was none of her business, and Micah clearly didn’t want to talk about it, so she let it go.
Cara did indeed have an ear infection, and the doctor didn’t think it was at all strange that they took her to see him that evening instead of waiting until the next day. So, fifteen minutes later, Micah was paying the bill when Alice discovered that Cara needed her diaper changed, so she took the baby into the women’s restroom to take care of it.
She came out a few minutes later and saw that the woman who’d winked at Micah before was now talking to him.
From his expression, he’d rather not be talking to her. He looked frustrated and rather impatient. Then, as Alice watched, the woman put her hand on Micah’s chest and stroked down.
A surge of possessive resentment surged through Alice—the likes of which she’d never before experienced—and she had the sudden urge to go rip that hand off Micah’s body.
But Micah moved the woman’s hand himself, straightening up and walking away from her. He gave a little start when he saw Alice with Cara in her arms, waiting.
“Ready?” Alice asked, a little too brightly.
“Yeah.”
Micah’s expression was a frozen mask as they left the building and headed for the SUV. Unable to hold back the words, Alice said softly, “So you did know her.”
“Not really. I hardly knew her at all.”
Alice was absolutely certain about who the woman was. Micah must have had a one-night stand with her at some point in the past.
She didn’t like the idea. She didn’t like the idea of him being with anyone but her. But it was a reality of who he was, and there was no going back now.
He wasn’t the boy she’d known at summer camp. Not anymore.
Micah was peering at her face. “Are you…are you upset?”
She was upset, but about so much more than that woman. Because just then it hit her with a deafening blow that she loved Micah—the man he was now—more than she’d ever loved the boy.
Th
e knowledge rocked her. Took her breath away.
“Alice?” he asked, his voice cracking slightly. “Are you okay?”
“Yeah,” she managed to say, although she wasn’t sure it was true. She let out a breath and made herself move. “Let’s just get Cara home.”
When they got home, Cara was still fussy. They gave her a bath and put on her pajamas and fed her a bottle. They gave her the baby Tylenol the doctor told them to use and put a warm washcloth over her ear.
Eventually, she quieted down, and Micah carried her into the room to put her to bed.
He was in there for a while, and Alice heard her fussing some more, so she must not have been quite ready to sleep yet.
Exhausted from a long day and a long week and a revelation that seemed to change everything, Alice curled up in the recliner as she waited for him to come back. She listened as Cara’s fussing slowly waned.
She kept listening until she dozed off.
The next thing she was aware of was opening her eyes as her body was adjusted. “Huh?” she mumbled, trying to figure out what was going on and where she even was.
“Sorry,” Micah murmured. “Don’t wake up.”
Her eyes were so heavy that she took his words at face value. She relaxed again, this time against him instead of against the leather. She was warmer now, since his body was hot and his arm was around her. So she just went back to sleep.
***
She was completely disoriented when she woke up the next time.
She shifted, trying to stretch her cramped legs, and she realized she was sprawled all over someone else—not a normal situation on awakening.
She opened her eyes and lifted her head, and she realized she was sleeping on Micah in the recliner.
Then she realized he was asleep too.
Instinctively, she tried to pull away to sit up, since she felt overly vulnerable. But his arms tightened around her, and he mumbled out some sort of an objection.
At least, it sounded like an objection, although she couldn’t understand any words.
She managed to look at the time and saw that it was just after midnight. “Micah,” she murmured. “I should get back.”
“No,” he said, just slightly more coherently now. “Don’t leave. I want…you…my Dormouse.”
It was exactly what she wanted to hear. He might not be awake. He might not know what he was saying. And it might be a ridiculous nickname. But it made her heart swell with feeling all the same.
He released a long sigh. “Alice.”
So there was no way she could make herself pull away after that. She relaxed against him again.
After all, she could sleep just as well here as at her place.
***
A couple of hours later, she was awakened again, this time by Micah pulling away from her.
She was too groggy to do anything more than mumble out an objection, and soon Micah’s hot, hard body wasn’t against hers anymore.
She felt cold and lonely, so she curled up into a ball, not yet awake enough to focus. After a few minutes, he came back and got into the recliner beside her.
She cuddled up against him, resting her head on his chest. He felt more relaxed, somehow, and she liked it.
“Are you awake?” he murmured.
“Not really.”
He chuckled softly, and she felt him kiss her hair.
“Did you check on Cara?”
“She’s sleeping,” he said.
“Good.”
They didn’t speak for a few minutes, just held each other. And, because Alice was so sleepy, her defenses weren’t strong enough to keep her from asking a random question, prompted by seeing that woman at the clinic earlier in the evening and realizing that she loved him.
“Why haven’t you dated anyone for the last year?”
“How do you know I haven’t?” He sounded more curious than defensive.
“News gets around in this town, you know.”
“Oh, I know.”
“So why haven’t you?”
She felt him tense up just a little. She thought for a moment he might pull away, but he didn’t. “I just…I had too much to get together in my life, and I couldn’t try to date someone while I was doing it.”
She nodded against his chest to show she was listening.
“There wasn’t anyone I really wanted to date anyway. Until…”
She held her breath as he concluded “…recently.”
She was still processing that as he went on. “Even if there was before, it wouldn’t have been right to inflict all that on someone else.”
“All of what?” She lifted her head to look at his face.
“All of my crap. My broken life.” He was staring at a spot in the air now, rather than her. “It wouldn’t have been right.”
She didn’t like the note she heard in his voice, but she couldn’t exactly argue with his sentiment. So she said hesitantly, “I guess it makes sense for you to have waited until you were in a better place first.” When he didn’t reply, she added, “You’re in a better place now, aren’t you?”
“I thought so. But I don’t know. Now I don’t know.” His voice was so low it was barely audible. “Just because I want something doesn’t make it right.”
There was no way to deny this was true. Almost everything Alice had wanted in her life had turned out to be painfully wrong.
She’d pulled away from him slightly, trying to understand exactly what he was saying and what it really meant. Trying not to be upset by the implications until she knew for sure.
But he tightened his arm around her and pulled her back down beside him. She relaxed, recognizing the feeling in his touch and unable to not respond to it. She nestled against him, and he began to stroke her long hair—gently, slowly, almost delicately.
She really wanted to know exactly what his feelings were and whether he thought they had a possible future. It sounded like he was torn about things, like he hadn’t figured it out. But too much was too uncertain for her here, and she needed a little certainty if she was going to invest any more into this relationship.
But asking him would mean she’d have to break her rules, and she had very little now protecting her except for them.
She wasn’t going to break her rules and destroy the one wall she had left around her heart.
She could wait a little longer.
Ten
The next day was Good Friday.
Alice didn’t feel very well that morning, since she hadn’t been able to get back to sleep when she’d finally returned to her apartment the night before.
Her head was hurting a little, and Micah still hadn’t said a thing—not a single, definite thing—about the nature of their relationship.
She knew he must feel something for her, but she didn’t know if he was going to pursue the feelings, which is what she needed if she was going to continue hanging out with him without getting her heart stomped on.
Her heart was all in. It had been almost from the beginning. So she needed to pull it back now—all the way—if there was no future here.
Alice wasn’t going into the church to work until mid-morning, so she went over to the house before eight, since Micah wanted to head out early to get some work done.
As she walked over to the house, she tried to decide if it was okay to lead into a conversation about their relationship. She didn’t need any sort of commitment, but she did need to know he was thinking seriously about her.
Surely that was a reasonable thing to expect and not a symptom of her stupidity with men. Surely, gently leading into a conversation at this point wouldn’t be breaking any of her rules.
She heard Cara crying even before she tapped on the side door and Micah said, “Come on in.”
“Hey,” Alice said, walking into the kitchen. “How is she?”
Micah stood in the kitchen, shirtless and with just a pair of jeans on, holding Cara with one arm and a cup of coffee in the other. “She slept okay, but she woke
up early and she won’t let me put her down. Every time I do, she screams.”
Alice gulped and tried not to look at his chest, but it was hard to resist. He was toned and broad and impossible to ignore with impressive muscle development, coarse dark hair, and lovely flat abs. “I can take her. You can go finish getting dressed, if you want.”
He glanced down at himself, as if surprised that he wasn’t fully dressed. “Thanks,” he said, handing Cara over. “I’ve actually not even taken a shower yet.”
“Oh. Well, go ahead, if you want. Did you give her the medicine yet?”
“Yeah, I just did, so hopefully it will start helping soon.”
He looked distracted and exhausted, and Alice figured this wasn’t a great time for bringing up his feelings about their relationship. So she got a cup of coffee for herself and carried it and Cara into the living room.
Cara was obviously happy to see her, and her screaming lessened considerably. Alice fed her a bottle and tried to plan a good way to lead into the conversation with Micah that she wanted to have.
A few things she was sure of. She wasn’t going to corner him. She wasn’t going to pressure him into something he didn’t want. And she wasn’t going to fool herself into believing there was a future unless he clearly wanted one too.
After she fed and burped Cara, she tried her in the bouncy seat, but the baby immediately started crying, so Alice picked her up again.
She was straightening up when Micah came in, fully dressed in jeans and a black shirt. “Are you going to be okay with her today?” he asked.
“Of course. Why wouldn’t I be?”
“No reason. She’ll just be hard to deal with, I think, since she feels bad.”
“We’ll be fine. I think she’ll settle down when the Tylenol starts to work.”
“Okay.” He took the last gulp of his coffee and went to the kitchen to set his mug on the counter. Alice followed him in. “I’ll be back mid-afternoon.”
“Okay. If Cara is up to it, I’m going to the church to work for a couple of hours today, so if I happen not to be here, then that’s where I’ll be. But I won’t go if she’s feeling too bad.”