Undressing Elizabeth
Page 9
When he reached over from his window to hers, she drew back in her seat, avoiding his touch. He spoke calmly and as he said it, the haze that had settled over her earlier that morning, started to lift and things looked just a little bit clearer. “Elizabeth, Elizabeth, you’re ten weeks. It’s not me, it’s not us. Your husband is the father, Elizabeth. This isn’t me. We’re going to be okay.”
He was right. He was absolutely right. She’d been with Jim for the first time just over a week earlier. There was no way that it was him, no way. David was the father. David was the father of her child. She let out a couple of deep breaths and laughed. She laughed a laugh of relief. Jim didn’t share in her delight. He had his hand back in his vehicle and just watched her as the cloud that had surrounded her for the past few weeks lifted.
In between her laughs, she sobbed, and somehow managed to speak to him. “You’re right, holy shit, you’re right.”
Shaking her head slightly, she looked away from him and stared forward. When she looked at him again, he had an odd look on his face. He just looked sad, very sad.
“Jim, you know that it’s done. We’re over. You have to know that, right?”
As he nodded back to her, she put the car into gear and prepared to drive off. She looked at him one last time before leaving. “You’ll be okay, Gretzky. There’s lots more conquests for you out there. You’ll be just fine.”
As she pulled out of the parking lot into the street she barely gave him another thought. She had something more important to deal with. She had to find David and she had to tell him everything.
Chapter Ten
She called the police station to see if anyone had seen him. Then her parents, just in case he’d gone there. They all heard the panic in her voice and asked if they could help, but she wouldn’t let them. She’d caused this so she would find him. She drove around their neighborhood, in little circles, the way that he’d taught her, the way he’d been trained. Drive in small circles then make the circles bigger, spreading out, covering more area, looking for your subject. David was her subject. She was searching for her policeman husband using the police training that he’d taught her. She tried his cell phone again. And again it went directly to his voice mail.
Her circles had become so large that she was now on the outskirts of the city. The streets were unfamiliar to her and in the darkness she couldn’t tell where she was. Every residential street and corner store looked the same. It was futile; she didn’t know where he was or where he’d go. The wetness of her tears ran down her cheeks, but still she kept driving, making bigger and bigger circles. When the night became so dark that she didn’t recognize where she was anymore, she pulled over and let her tired head hit the steering wheel. Crying and lost, she popped open the glove compartment, hoping to find a road map. That’s when she remembered. She stared into the glove compartment, seeing a map and the driver’s registration. That’s when she knew. Turning the car around, she headed for Burnaby Mountain, their mountain.
The road leading up the mountain was the same. It had been years since she’d driven it, but she could still anticipate each turn just before she reached it. It was dark now and the night was still. There were no other cars on the road. Elizabeth felt as though she was driving back in time, except this was different. David wasn’t in the seat beside her this time. It was just her, twenty years later, and she was carrying a baby, their baby.
She missed the turnoff. It looked different to her. The side road, where the shed was, seemed narrower, and more overgrown than she remembered it. Backing up, she pulled over to the side, and then down the utility road. At first she didn’t think he was there. There was just the old shed, and unused narrow road. Then, she saw him. He’d parked his car as far ahead as possible, and was sitting on the hood, gazing upwards, staring at the cross. Drying her eyes with the back of her hand, she took a moment and peered through the windshield, and looked up at it herself. The cross was still white and had been given a good coat of paint this year. It still looked majestic, but it was imposing, too, something about it made it look imposing. Taking a deep breath, she stepped out of the car, making her way towards her husband.
* * * *
At the same time that Elizabeth was driving up the windy mountain road, Jim Gretzky was cleaning out his car. Not all of it, just certain items. He’d parked at the far end of a mall parking lot, far away from other cars. At first he went into the trunk and pulled out the box that was wedged in by the spare tire. Refusing to look at it, he crunched it up in his hands. He didn’t open the flap to read the letter on it or count how many were left in the box. Then he opened the back door and removed his speaker-cover. Again he pulled out the box and squished it up in his hand. He took a few steps from his vehicle, and tossed them in a garbage can that was several meters away.
With his hands in his pockets, Jim stood and looked at his car, thinking about his one last hiding place, under the front seat. His tie was flapping in front of him and his usually perfectly pressed shirt was untucked. There was a buzzing noise from the big overhead lights of the mall parking lot and they gave the night an artificial glow. Nothing seemed real to him. In the distance he could see a young boy chasing after his mother and father, holding onto a bag that had a department store name on it. A toy store, he thought, they must have bought the kid a new toy. He watched as the parents held each of their hands out at the same time and the young boy bounced in between them. All three of them walked, almost skipping, towards their vehicle and he heard their laughter and chatter fading as they got farther away from him.
Spud’s age probably, he thought, maybe a little younger, but close, close to Spud’s age. He leaned against the side of his car and looked into the night, thinking about his stepson, and how he had christened him “Spud.”
He’d told Stephen that when he met him, and he was still a baby, he looked like a little shriveled up potato so he nicknamed him, “Spud.” Stephen loved the story and loved the nickname. Once his mother, Amanda, had tried to tell the story, but Stephen cut her off, telling her that Jim had to tell it. Jim knew the story better than her. That was the night Jim looked at Amanda and knew he was in the right place. He wished he’d stopped then, but he hadn’t. There had been many women after that, some he remembered and some he didn’t.
Opening his car door, he reached under the seat and pulled out the last box. He looked at it for a moment and thought about Elizabeth, and how happy and relieved she’d looked when she realized she wasn’t carrying his child. Solidly, he crushed it in his hand, just like the others. As he walked back to the garbage can, he let his mind wander back to a night some years ago when he visited his ex-wife’s apartment. He could remember it, the details, the humiliation, but it didn’t hurt as much anymore. The sting was going away.
He sat in his front seat, and silently, he made a pledge to himself. He thought about Amanda, and Spud and the life that they’d made. It was a good life and when he participated in it, he was happy, content. A car pulled up close to his and an attractive young woman stepped out. As she closed her door, she dropped her purse and bent down to pick it up. As she leaned over, her skirt eased up, showing off her shapely legs. Jim watched her for a moment and when she looked over at him, and saw the attractive man behind the wheel, she smiled. Jim nodded back, and turned the key in the ignition, put the car into gear and drove away, remembering Spud, and Amanda, and his pledge.
* * * *
David hadn’t moved as she made her way towards him. He just kept sitting on the hood of his car. His eyes may have been closed, she couldn’t tell. Or maybe, she thought, he really is looking at the cross.
“It’s me, honey. It’s me.” Still he didn’t flinch
She folded her arms in front of her and shivered a little, feeling the coldness of the night. “David, I’m sorry. This isn’t what I wanted. I don’t know what I wanted, but this wasn’t it. It was you. It was always you. I just didn’t see that.” Her eyes welled up as the realization hit her. She w
as sure. She’d never been so sure of anything in her life.
David turned to face her. His face was wet and tired and he looked like a man who’d been through a war. “I knew, Lizzy. I knew. I’m a cop. It’s what I do.” He laughed at the irony of it for a moment before continuing. “I knew, but I didn’t want to know.” He paused and then raised his voice slightly. “And yes, I was angry. I was mad, but in between it all, with all of it going on, it was you that I wanted still. It’s always been you. Have you come home now, Lizzy? Is it over with him?”
Elizabeth moved a little closer to her husband and stood in front of his car, his knees almost touching hers. The tears had stopped but the words were still difficult to come out. “Yes, I’m home. I’m here, David. And the baby, there’s a baby. David, we’re going to have a baby.”
David looked at her the same way that he always had. He looked at her the way he looked when he offered to get her a blanket, the evening he proposed to her. It was the same look he had when she got the flu and he’d make his special chicken soup for her and take it upstairs on a tray to serve her in bed. It was the same look that he had when he told her he loved her and meant it. “Our baby, Lizzy, our baby?” As he said it, he reached out and gently placed the palm of his big hand on her stomach.
“Yes, David, our baby. I wasn’t sure at first, but it is, it’s our baby.”
When he held his arms open for her she didn’t hesitate. She moved forward into the arms of the man who she’d fallen in love with in the same spot over twenty years earlier. When he touched her, she remembered. She remembered everything, and she knew that she was home.
* * * *
As Elizabeth held onto the man that she was going to build a family with and Jim Gretzky was greeted at his door by his wife and stepson, a car cruised slowly down Elizabeth and David’s street. The car had its interior light on and a middle aged woman held a little piece of paper with an address on it. Her hands shook as she read the house number that corresponded to the number on the piece of paper and she stopped in front of Elizabeth and David’s house. Seeing no cars in the driveway, she put the vehicle in park and turned off the engine. The woman looked at the carefully tended garden and the concrete slabs that formed a curved path to the door. A nice home, she thought, the kind of home that a family lives in. If she’d been able to look through the front window, she would have seen that sitting on the mantle, above the fireplace, there was an old picture of a young boy with his father. She hadn’t seen the picture in many years. She hadn’t seen it since she’d packed it into a box and sent it away with her son. After a minute, she started her car and pulled out into the street, promising herself that she’d come back. Maybe later in the week, or the week after, she’d cruise by and see if she could see him. She’d see him and tell him. It was time to tell her son what had really happened.
About The Author
Jacquelyne Alberta lives on the west coast of Canada. In addition to writing steamy romantic stories she enjoys long-distance running, yoga, and camping under the stars. She loves to hear from readers, and can be contacted at jacquelynealberta@yahoo.com
Secret Cravings Publishing
www.secretcravingspublishing.com
Table of Contents
Copyright
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
About The Author