The Marine's Babies

by Laura Marie Altom

  “What?” Jace’s eyes narrowed.

  “When we met, it was just about the babies. When I saw your ad looking for a nanny, I wanted the job to prove to myself I was a great mom to Henry. To prove my ex was a fool for having blamed me for what happened to our son. I needed to prove I could still be a great mom. I mean, I always liked you, but my main focus was on the girls. And, then—”

  “Wait—” Holding his hands palms out, he said, “You’re telling me the only reason you’re with me is because of some experiment? Your baby died, so you wanted to replace him with mine?”

  “That’s not at all what happened. You’re putting words in my mouth. I mean, yes, at first, that may have been the case, but now, Jace, I love you.”

  Snatching the black leather folder holding the bill, he pulled a hundred from his wallet, and placed it inside. “Let’s go.”

  “Jace?” There was so much she wanted—needed—to say, but he’d already stood, and was halfway across the elegant dining room to the restaurant’s exit. Trailing after him, entering the moonless night felt akin to descending into a hole. The same black depression she’d only just crawled out of. She couldn’t do it again.

  Couldn’t.

  Soundlessly, Jace opened the passenger-side door of his Mustang. Not only did he not look at her, but he didn’t even wait for her to get into the car.

  BY THE TIME Jace drove home, it was late, meaning that thankfully, Pam and Granola weren’t in the mood to talk. After a quick debriefing on the girls’ diaper and feeding status, the couple left, leaving Jace and Emma alone.

  He wanted to talk to her, but words wouldn’t come—only anger and misgivings and distrust. Like Amanda, the whole time she’d been with him, Emma had lived an entire life she hadn’t shared. She’d never lied, but she also hadn’t been entirely forthcoming.

  It killed him to see her standing in the nursery doorway, arms folded, fresh tears glossing her cheeks. But dammit, he was hurting, too. Had any of what they’d shared been real? How was he ever supposed to know?

  “Jace…” Her voice was so hoarse, he almost didn’t hear her over the central air’s hum. “Please talk to me. Say something—anything. I know we can get past this if you’d just let me explain.”

  “You know,” he said with a sad sigh, “ordinarily, I would. But first Amanda duped me at our wedding, then Vicki pulled her stunts, and now you—the only trustworthy woman I thought was left on the planet—aside from my daughters and mother—have also played me for a fool.”

  “No,” she said with a vehement shake of her head. “It wasn’t like that. You’ve never lost a child. You couldn’t begin to understand. I needed to prove I was a good mother in order to be whole. You have to believe that I never set out to hurt you.”

  Hand clamped to his throbbing forehead, he said, “All I can even begin to comprehend at this point is that I want you gone. I want the pain of your so-called secret to stop hurting. But pretty much the only way to accomplish that is by cutting you out of my life.”

  Her complexion pale, she said, “You don’t mean that. In the morning, once you’ve had time think about it, you’ll feel better.”

  “You’re wrong. I felt better back when I was under the impression that you loved me for me—not just the girls. Besides which, I don’t have a clue what Sudden Infant Death Syndrome is. How do I even know your ex wasn’t right in placing his blame with you?”

  The second the words left Jace’s mouth, and he witnessed Emma clutching the nursery’s doorknob for support, he knew he’d gone too far.

  “I’m sorry,” he said, going to her, drawing her into a hug. “I’m so, so sorry.”

  “Don’t touch me,” she said, eerily calm, shoving him away. “Don’t ever touch me again. One thing this experience has taught me is that I’m an amazing mother. I was to my sweet baby Henry and I have been to your girls. No one—not even you—will ever take that knowledge from me.”

  AFTER A sleepless night alone in Jace’s bed, Emma was relieved when his 5:00 a.m. alarm went off on the coffee table in front of the living-room sofa. He’d chosen to sleep away from her, but truth be told, after the horrible things he’d said, she was glad to be alone. Her heart had wanted to flee the night before, but the practical side of her knew it was most logical to wait until daylight.

  While Jace showered then dressed for Saturday duty, Emma feigned sleep. Only after his Mustang’s powerful engine could be heard roaring off, did she get out of bed.

  As on any other morning, she diapered, fed and bathed the girls. She sang to them and cuddled them and all the while, with a huge knot in her throat, told herself that saying goodbye to them wouldn’t be nearly as hard as it had been with Henry. This time, she wasn’t standing at a graveside on a bitterly cold January day. This time, she knew Bronwyn and Bea would grow and learn and thrive. And even if she couldn’t be with them, she herself would grow and learn.

  Learn to not be so quick to trust.

  Grow to depend on herself for emotional support.

  At ten, Emma took a deep breath and called Pam. Fingers crossed, she told her friend that there had been a family emergency in Chicago. And that she had to go.

  Today. At once.

  Pam assured her that she would watch the girls for as long as it took Emma to return.

  Upon Pam’s arrival, sidestepping her questions while accepting her comforting hug, Emma almost told her friend the truth. That she wouldn’t be coming back. Ever. But in the end, she decided against melodramatics. What was the point? More tears wouldn’t help, nor would talk.

  At this point, Emma knew her fate was sealed.

  As she gave the girls and Pam a final goodbye, trudged down the flower-adorned porch she so loved only to tuck her lone suitcase into the rear of her car, she had only one thought…

  Jace Monroe, you’re a fool to let me go.

  Or, would that be the other way around? Was she the fool for still loving him?

  Chapter Nineteen

  “You’re an idiot.” In Jace’s kitchen, Pam punctuated her observation by slamming a jar of baby peaches on the lowest cabinet shelf. “I should’ve known something was up the second Emma said she was leaving. Do you even know where she is?”

  “Mind your own business,” Jace said, unloading hot dogs, boxed mac and cheese, bologna, white bread and those teething cookie-things the girls liked. Man food and baby food. Pretty much life’s essentials. He regretted having to rely on Pam to sit for the girls, but in the little under a week since Emma had been gone, he’d had no luck in finding new full-time help. Currently, the girls were in their living-room playpen, kicking and swatting at their baby gym. He was glad that they, at least, were for once acting normally. Since Emma’s leaving, they’d been fitful at best. Inconsolable at worst. He’d take the normalcy as a good sign. If they were getting over Em, he could, too.

  “In the time she was here, Jace, Emma happened to become a good friend—which pretty much makes her leaving my business. How could you be such a fool to actually think Emma doesn’t one-hundred-percent adore you? Have you ever noticed the way she moons whenever you enter a room? And how could you say such an asinine thing as to imply that just because Emma’s poor baby died, that she was in any way a threat to your girls? SIDS is a horrible tragedy. One that—”

  “I know,” Jace said, tugging a hot dog from its bag, and then popping half in his mouth to chew.

  “If you know, then how could you be stupid enough—cruel enough—to treat Emma the way you have? Throwing her away like she meant nothing to you?”

  “Pam—” Jace almost told off his best friend’s pregnant wife as sharply as he would a new recruit, but bit his tongue. The last thing he needed was Granola coming down on him, too.

  “What, Jace?” Pam got in his face. “What can you possibly say to justify what you’ve done?”

  Sighing, turning his back on her to rest his forehead against an upper cabinet, he said, “You remember how screwed up I was because of Amanda?” Laughing, tu
rning to face her, he shoved his hands in his pockets. “Bottom line, just like Amanda, Emma lied to me. Not once, but dozens of times. In retrospect, I feel like a fool. I’ve got too much honor to let a woman play me like that again—especially after what Vicki’s done.”

  Weary of the whole issue, Jace retreated to the living room, plucking up his girls. Unfortunately, like a snapping dog, Pam followed.

  Girls in his arms, he backed onto the recliner.

  “You can’t run away from this, Jace. Emma’s part of you. I’ve seen it in your eyes.”

  “And? Does that fact change anything? She lied. My entire life is based upon honor and service. Yet, everything she’s said and done since we’ve been together has been a game to her. A means to an end. Her goal was to absolve herself of guilt. Her method was by using my children. My children. How low can a woman get? At least Amanda only hurt me.”

  Shaking her head, Pam said, “You just don’t get it, do you? Yes, Emma came to you—us—needing emotional healing. She’d lost her son, Jace.” Cupping her still small belly, she softened her voice. “Can you even fathom what it would be like to lose one of the girls? I’m only newly pregnant, yet I already feel a bond with the child growing inside of me.”

  “I get it, okay? But she lied. Over and over. What don’t you get about that?”

  Gazing to the ceiling, Pam harrumphed before snatching her purse and heading for the front door. “I give up. Sit here alone forever. See if I care.”

  “I’m not alone,” he fired back. “I’ve got my girls. They love me. Them, I can trust.”

  Pam rolled her eyes, and then walked out the door.

  JUST OVER a month.

  Thirty-eight days.

  Yet at nine-thirty on a Monday morning, Emma sat at the desk of her eighty-third-story office, feeling as if it’d been years since she’d last seen the girls. As for Jace, he’d hurt her to the point that she didn’t care if she never saw him again.

  Early-September fog cloaked her Lake Michigan view. Whereas she usually drew comfort from staring out upon the world, today gray surrounded her. Inside and out.

  Returning to the investment firm hadn’t been the balm she’d hoped for. Her days were generally hectic to the point that with her focus centered on fluctuating markets, she rarely had down time to dwell on her personal losses. Nights, however, were lonely. Long. The house she’d lived in with Rick had finally sold, so she’d rented an apartment on her office building’s forty-third floor.

  The place was small and bare.

  Not a problem, seeing how she was there as little as possible.

  A knock sounded on her office door.

  Hallie, her secretary, opened it, and then peeked through. “I’m making a coffee and muffin run. Want anything?”

  “No, thank you. If you want, stay gone through lunch. I really appreciate you putting in so much extra time for me this weekend.”

  “Not a problem,” the cute blonde said with her trademark wink. The twenty-four-year-old had been blessed with loopy curls, freckles and soulful brown eyes. Most of the guys at Wallace, Walker and Stromfeld were smitten. But Hallie was working her way through law school, and had much bigger things on her plate than dating. She slipped through the partially opened door, closing it behind her. “What is a problem is your mood. Sweetie, you need to get out of here. Party. And just between us,” she said in a stage whisper, “Peter in accounting has been asking about you. He likes your butt.”

  “Stop,” Emma said, wadding a sheet of yellow legal paper and aiming for the woman’s grinning head. “The guy’s so uptight, he probably wears a tie in the shower. I doubt he’s eyeing anything but my personal portfolio.”

  “You’re clueless—not to mention, hopeless.”

  Grinning, Emma said, “Better than being deranged like you.”

  “Seriously…” Hallie parked herself in one of Emma’s burgundy leather guest chairs. “Has he called?”

  Coughing, Emma asked, “Has who called? Richard Grayson?”

  With a sarcastic shake of her head, Hallie said, “The Grayson account has nothing to do with this, and you know it. We all feel for you about what happened with Rick and poor Henry, but ever since you’ve been back, you’ve seemed in a worse funk than when you left. We’re concerned, and wondered if you might’ve met someone while you were gone.”

  “No, and I’m fine,” Emma assured. “Today, the weather has me down. It seems too early for summer to be over.”

  Hallie sighed. “That accounts for today. What about the rest of the time you’ve been home?” Emma’s friend rounded the desk for a brief hug, and then left on her coffee run—leaving Emma gripping the edge of her desk and squeezing her eyes shut. Has he called?

  On the surface, such an innocent question. But inside, it tore Emma apart. Jace felt he’d been lied to by the second woman he’d loved. Boo-hoo. Emma had not only been abandoned by the second man she’d loved, but she’d now lost three children instead of one.

  If emotional pain were a quantifiable thing, Emma won.

  “WANT ME to stay?” Mrs. Prioux, the girls’ sitter, cast a worried glance toward Bronwyn. The mother of six and grandmother of ten clucked. “Poor little thing hasn’t been herself all day. She didn’t eat a bite of breakfast, lunch or dinner.”

  “Thanks,” Jace said, wanting nothing more than to kick back on his own and watch some mind-numbing TV, “but I’ve got it handled.” Bea sat in her walker, bouncing up and down. Mrs. Prioux handed him Bronwyn, whose cheeks looked flushed. “But I think I’ve got it handled. She probably needs burping.”

  Though he couldn’t be sure, seeing how the white-haired grandmother wore bottle-bottom glasses, Jace swore the kindly old woman cast him a squinty-eyed glare. “Trust me, with no appetite, a cough and a low-grade fever, the child needs more than mere burping. A visit to her pediatrician is probably in order. If she doesn’t improve overnight, I’ll call in the morning. With infants, you can never be too careful. Their health can change on a dime.”

  “Thanks,” he said, ushering her out the door. Good grief, he knew his own kids, and while Bronwyn didn’t look so hot, he didn’t think her life was in grave danger. “I’ll keep my eyes on her.”

  “I’d appreciate it.” Cupping her wrinkled hand to Bronwyn’s flushed forehead, she frowned. “I’ll sleep better, knowing you’re being vigilant.”

  Once the sitter had finally left, with Bronwyn still riding his right hip and Bea safely conking around in her walker, Jace dumped a can of Spaghetti-Os in a bowl, then nuked it.

  “Looks good, huh?” he said to Bronwyn in an exaggerated, goofy tone. “I’ll bet one bite of these will perk you right up.”

  Usually, when he joked with Bron, she grinned for him, a sight that never failed to raise his spirits. Tonight, she merely drooped her head to his shoulder, fisting his camo-green T-shirt.

  After planting a sideways kiss to her head, he grabbed a spoon from a drawer, and then aimed for his DVD collection. “What do you feel like?” he asked the infant. “I’m thinking something with lots of action. Something exciting that helps me not think about your bad mommy.” Not Vicki, but the woman Jace had truly considered to be his girls’ mom. Vicki had been none too happy to hear Emma was out of the picture, but Jace assured the twins’ biological mother that their daughters still had excellent round-the-clock care.

  “You remember her, don’t you?” Jace asked. “The one who made us love her, and then ripped out our hearts?” He glanced down at his daughter to find her eyes shut.

  Bea, however, rammed her walker into the front door, with each bang, giggling and shrieking with glee.

  It was mid-October and outside, though the skies were clear, a blustery wind blew in from the Gulf, shuddering the small home’s bones. The branches of the pecan tree in the side yard clattered against the roof and windows. The sound was unnerving, worsening his mood all the more.

  Beep, beep, beep.

  “Dinner’s done,” he called to Bea, “how about you help
me put your sister to bed, and then you and I will watch a movie?”

  Ignoring him, Bea went right on with her game.

  Leaving her, Jace tucked Bronwyn into her crib, snagged his meal from the microwave, and then popped the original Rambo into the DVD player before settling into his recliner.

  It’d been a bitch of a day. He’d bucked forty-mile-an-hour headwinds, combined with a tight navigation run with a target the size of a freakin’ can of soup.

  Kicking up the footrest on his recliner, he downed his meal before Sylvester Stallone had wounded his first victim. “This here’s a classic,” he said to his little Devil Puppy—slang for the offspring of a Marine Devil Dog.

  Bea had lost interest in the door and was now trekking across the living room, making a beeline for the entertainment center.

  “Check out his masterful moves with that Bowie.”

  She ignored his movie talk in favor of grabbing three DVDs off a low shelf, then trying to cram them into her gaping, slobbery mouth.

  “Whoa…” he said, instantly up to snag her out of her walker and into his arms. He took her favorite pink fuzzy blanket and purple fish teething ring from the playpen, and then headed back to his recliner. “Okay, Little Miss Grabby, time for you to settle down and watch a good movie.”

  Hours later, Jace woke to a numb right arm and a drool-covered chest. Bea was conked and the DVD was over, running its opening music loop.

  “Crap,” he mumbled, struggling upright with the baby still in his arms. The pins and needles of his slowly waking limb made him wince on the way to the nursery. “So much for watching our movie, huh, sweetie?”

  The sleeping angel just mewed as he slipped her into her crib.

  Checking on Bronwyn, he placed his hand to her forehead and found her skin still warm, but no worse than it had earlier been. “I love you,” he whispered to the girl. “Hope you feel better in the morning.”

  WHEN JACE’S bedside alarm pealed at 5:00 a.m., he felt like crying. How could it already be time to get up? He’d just gone to bed.