He knew what he looked like.
And she plopped her hands on her hips and tilted her head at him. “If you wanted to kill him, you’d have done it by now. You’ve turned down chance after chance. It’s not that you don’t know how,” she added reasonably. “I’ll bet you know ways I couldn’t dream of-ways that would insure you were never caught.”
She sauntered up to him (yes, sauntered!) and tapped his chest with one shapely forefinger. “I’ll bet you could do it, and do it in a way that would make your fellow SEALs look like frigging heroes.”
A corner of his mouth kicked up.
“What?”
“You said frigging.”
It was her turn to smile. “So, I did. I’ve acquired all sorts of verbal abilities I never thought I had.”
She walked over to the table and switched on a lamp. She turned to him, her arms crossed loosely under her breasts. “You told me one time that you supported yourself and your mother with crime.”
Caleb nodded. “They say crime doesn’t pay, but it paid better than anything else in my neighborhood.”
“I suspect there are areas of crime that pay very well indeed.”
“Some.”
“I expect you knew what they were, and you knew the people you’d have to hook up with. You could have made the money you needed yourself, couldn’t you?”
“Maybe.”
“But you’d have had to get into the criminal world a lot deeper. You’d have been in at a level you never would have escaped. Drugs, human-trafficking-prob-ably other crimes I don’t know about, but illegal businesses where a lot of money and a lot of human suffering is involved. We both know how smart you are. If you had chosen that path, you could have succeeded. But let me repeat. The course of your life would have been set. You would never have gotten free. That world would have owned you.”
“And your point is?”
“I don’t think you needed Senator Calhoun to save your mother,” she spoke gently, as if to a slow student who must be carefully led. “You needed him to save you.”
“No, I never needed-”
She brushed his objection aside. “You’re in the right, Caleb. He was the grown-up, and he should have been responsible. But that’s hindsight talking. To find the truth we must look at the situation from the perspective you were dealing with then. If he had stepped in, you wouldn’t have to feel guilty because you drew a line.”
His heart beat stumbled, then found a new rhythm. At last she was pleading with him as he had expected her to do, but it sounded like she was pleading for him.
“There were things you wouldn’t do. If you had chosen the route of getting a lot of money in ways you knew how, whether she lived or died, you would never have been free. You felt guilty because you drew a line.” Tears filled her beautiful wide eyes, eyes the color of honesty. “And she died. And her death set you free, finally, at last.”
“How can you be so sure of this?”
Emmie made no attempt to stop her tears. She laughed through them, sadly. “After she died, you went to Six Flags Over Georgia and rode roller coasters for a week. And then you went to Charlotte Motor Speedway. And then you went to the beach.”
He could tell something about that trip really touched her. She thought it was significant. He wanted to understand it-if for no other reason, so she would stop crying-but he didn’t.
“ So?”
“Oh, Caleb,” she explained softly, “that’s what a kid who has been let out of school for summer does.”
Chapter 35
She’d talked enough, she thought, but she still wasn’t getting through. Teacher that she was, she asked a question. “You told me you liked the Navy. I kept wondering, what’s wrong with this picture? You? A natural-born rule breaker. Antiauthoritarian. Independent thinker extraordinaire. Tell me, what did you like about it?”
He shrugged. “Three meals a day. Somebody else bought the groceries and cooked them. All I had to do was show up. After my duty was over for the day, I had time to read all I wanted. They sent me to schools. They sent me to college.”
“And you had your friends, Tim and Weed, to teach you how to go on, how not get into too much trouble, and how to massage the system so it yielded what you wanted.
“You came to the Navy with an extraordinary, mature degree of discipline and the ability to accept responsibility. You’d already had the freedom teenagers say they long for and often must rebel to get. What the Navy gave you was the freedom most teenagers have and don’t appreciate. And when you’d had enough-you’d rested your soul and your extraordinary capacity demanded expression again-you moved to the SEALs.
“The Navy gave you the space and shelter in which to grow up. And you did.
“Caleb, I don’t blame your mother for confining you with her overwhelming need. I know you loved her. And yet, your life improved when she was gone. You need to face that. Whatever guilt you feel about being freed- accept it.
“Make reparation where you can, and ask God, or whatever deity or Power you understand, to forgive you for failing her. And I think you’ve felt guilty about that. You’re so generous, you probably wished over and over that you could buy her presents or take her places once those things were options for you. But if she’d been around, they wouldn’t have been options.
“You thought looking after your mother was your responsibility. Looked at in that light, you failed her, and she died. Teague Calhoun is guilty of plenty, but don’t blame him for what you’re guilty of.
“Now, you’re trying to assuage your guilt by making Teague feel as you do. Except you’ve got the guilt in the wrong place. You were not guilty of your mother’s death. But if you allow your sister to die without trying to help her, you will be guilty, and you will turn against yourself.
“You were powerless then. You’re not now. Let go of your guilt. You don’t deserve to suffer the way you will. And your mother would never have asked this of you.”
Emmie let her hands drop into her lap. “Well, I’ve preached like the child of missionaries that I am, and I’ve lectured like the professor I am.” She stood and shook the wrinkles from her slacks. “You’ve listened to me patiently, and I think I’ve said all I have to say.”
Caleb halted her, one hand upraised. “One more thing. Why?”
She looked at him blankly. “Why what?”
He covered his chagrin at needing to ‘fess up to his hidden agenda with a little shrug. “I expected you to talk me into donating my marrow. I thought you would talk about duty, kindness, or mastering the situation by being generous.”
“Oh, Caleb.” She laughed a helpless, painful laugh. “You don’t need a ‘talking to’ about those things! You could give lessons!”
Now, he knew he had to be straight. “I was hoping you could talk me out of letting Vicky be my revenge. You haven’t mentioned her. In�
�stead you have talked only about the situation from my side. Only my side. Why?”
“You’re in a very heavy, hard place. I’m your friend.” Her eyes filled with tears again, and she smiled upside down. “I didn’t want you to face it alone. I will be your friend, and I’ll care for you no matter what. I want you to do what’s right for you. I would love to see Vicky get better. I will pray that she does through whatever agency God selects. But this isn’t about her.”
The moment felt fragile. And yet all the confusion he had known fell away. He loved Emmie and knew he loved her as never before. The whole time he’d used her, he tried not to use her, although it was not a distinction he was sure she could appreciate.
He took her carefully by her elbows to draw her to him, but he wouldn’t confine her in his arms. He kissed the tear tracks across her cheeks, drying her silken skin with his lips. The space underneath his heart contracted so hard he couldn’t breathe for a minute. She’d protest and get all prickly anytime he got high-handed with her, but she’d always turned her face up for his kiss with such simple trust. Just as she was doing now.
Their bodies knew how right things were between them. Always had. He could feel it now.
“Emmie,” he whispered against her lips. “Emmie, I love you. The best thing about all this is that it brought me you. Now that you know all of it, I realize you’re disappointed in me. Is there a chance for us?”
She twisted her shoulders hardly at all. But he was holding her lightly, so it didn’t take much to break the connection. She looked away for a second, a far off gaze, as if she could see a distant reality. She stepped back-if she wanted to put space between them she would have to do it, because he wasn’t going to move away from her.
“Oh, Caleb.” She took a deep breath, the way someone does when breathing through pain.
She smiled that upside-down smile again. A smile he couldn’t remember seeing her use before today. He hoped he hadn’t been the one to put it there.
“Oh, Caleb.” Slow and final, she shook her head. She sighed, and said, in a voice he’d never heard before, “There never was an us.”
She took another step back and ducked her head like she was embarrassed. Then turned and walked away.
Chapter 36
The kids were in the family room with the TV and the host of electronic gifts from Santa.
The adults, having cleaned up the supper dishes, the litter of paper from presents, and sticky fingerprints from every surface in the house, were sprawled in various states of exhaustion around the living room.
Tonight an eight-foot Christmas tree shed colored lights in the room, while only a month ago, the same space had been piled with wedding presents, a fact that had been remarked on again and again, as if they all needed to search for the roots of the mystery of change.
Grace got up to extinguish a guttering candle. “Emmie, I know you’re sorry that Do-Lord’s leave was cut short.” That had also been remarked on a number of times.
Emmie smiled, but didn’t comment. She hadn’t told anyone that the decision to leave a day early had been Caleb’s. Aching numbness would probably be replaced by pain tomorrow when the full truth that he was gone-and would be gone the next day, and the next-descended on her. For now, she was grateful for whatever anodyne was giving her a period of grace.
“Everybody come in here!” Grace’s oldest son called from the family room. “They said Vicky’s got a donor.”
“North Carolina senator, Teague Calhoun, announced from his home in Wilmington, where he and his wife are spending the Christmas recess, that a bone marrow donor has been found for his daughter, Vicky, who is suffering from a rare form of anemia.”
The picture switched to Calhoun and Charlotte on the porch of the mansion, the huge Christmas wreath behind them.
“Do you know who the donor is Senator?” a heavyset reporter called out.
“The donor wishes to remain anonymous, nor will they be told that Vicky is the recipient-though I imagine they might guess.” He flashed his famous folksy smile. There was a murmur of chuckles. “Charlotte and I wish to express our gratitude to him or her. Not only for Vicky, but for all lives that are extended and made better by the extraordinary generosity of people willing to give of themselves in this way.”
There was a bit more with the anchor recapping the procedure and an interview with a doctor who made it clear that Vicky wasn’t out of the woods-there was no telling if she would survive the procedure-but at least she had a chance.
In the family room, children were cheering and clapping-even the littlest who probably didn’t know what was happening-while adults were embracing one another and wiping away tears. Parents stole looks at their children and whispered prayers of gratitude that for tonight their children were safe and well.
Emmie sat on the big teal hassock where she had landed when her legs had given out beneath her.
There was only one possible donor.
He had done it. Somehow, he had found the generosity or the forgiveness or the healing to free himself of the past and had chosen to have a sister-one he could hold in his heart, even if the relationship was never acknowledged. The first truly altruistic prayers of her life had been answered; her tragic hero was tragic no longer.
“Emmie, darling!” Grace-Sarah Bea- someone- exclaimed. “What is it? What’s the matter?”
The adults, their faces full of shock, concern, or embarrassment, according to their temperament, were staring at her. Emmie regarded them in confusion.
“You’re sobbing.”
Emmie touched her face. It was true. Her cheeks were slick with hot tears; her fingers came away wet.
Faces swam into and out of her line of vision. She could hear voices over the babble of the TV.
“Is it Vicky?”
“Are you worried about her?”
“She’s sad Do-Lord left.”
“She and Do-Lord spent a lot of time with them in the hospital.”
“Tell us what’s the matter.”
“Someone, get Pickett!” Mary Cole snapped.
In a minute, Pickett was there, wrapping her in the scent of wholehearted comfort, murmuring and stroking. She took Emmie in her arms and led her from the room.
She shepherded her upstairs to “Emmie’s room,” lay down with her on the candlewick bedspread, and held her close, even after the tears ceased.
Jax stuck his head in the door and pantomimed “Need help?” and “I’ll take Tyler.” Pickett smiled her gratitude over Emmie’s shoulder and continued to hold her.
Chapter 37
“What do you want?” he growled from the hospital bed.
Well, she hadn’t really expected him to greet her with open arms. He was a proud man. The last time they met he had let himself be vulnerable to her. He had told her he loved her and
she had walked away. He wouldn’t easily let his guard down again.
After she had collapsed, overcome with mingled grief and joy, she had leaned on Pickett for twenty-four hours. And cried. And poured her heart out to Pickett and cried some more. She’d pictured Caleb in a hospital facing needles. Big needles through which they would extract the marrow from his hipbone. He’d be under anesthesia, of course, but still. He was facing needles and not even for his own good. For someone else’s.
“I want to hold your hand.”
“Why?” he growled again.
He was trying to put on his hard face. It didn’t fool her. She could see his stoic, brave, generous face, and the hard face just made her ache for him. Maybe someday he would be able to hear her say, because you need me.
“Because you’re my friend,” she said. “Can you please hold my hand?”
He was generous. If someone asked him for what he had to give, he would give it. He offered his hand.
She put her hand in his and almost cried at the warm, rough weight of his fingers as they curled around hers.
She took a deep breath for courage. With a lot of help from Pickett and others, she had come this far.
Because it didn’t matter where the extraction was done, Caleb had elected to go on to his new assignment at the SEAL training base at Coronado, California. However, Caleb wouldn’t return her phone calls, so she’d called Lon Swales, the kindly senior chief. He’d found out the date of the marrow extraction in time for her to catch a flight across the country. Now it was up to her.
“Caleb, I told you there was no ‘us.’ I was wrong. There is an ‘us.’ This” -she gripped his hand more tightly-“ this is us, and to be us, all we need to do is sit together and hold one another’s hand.”
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