“I don’t want to go to the doctor,” she protested.
He balanced her on his hip while he opened the door, then he slid her in onto the passenger seat. “Sit still,” he said firmly, while he reached for her shoulder belt. As he drew it across her body, his hand slid gently across her stomach…and stopped dead.
He looked down at her, frowning, as his big, lean hand settled curiously, gently, over the hardness of her swollen belly.
“What are you doing?” she asked, still dazed from the giddiness. “It isn’t appendicitis. I don’t have an appendix. When I was stabbed, the knife severed my appendix and one of my ovaries…”
The look on his face was inexplicable. She saw his eyes glitter and his face go almost as pale as her own was.
“You’re scaring me,” she protested. “What’s the matter?”
His hand pressed tenderly against her stomach for an instant before he finished fastening the shoulder harness and closed her door. His face was hard and unreadable. He didn’t say a word. He couldn’t. He was shaken to his very soul.
“I need my purse,” she protested. “It’s sitting on the hall table. The key’s in the door. You need to lock it if you’re determined to make me see the doctor.”
He was too dazed to argue. He went inside, picked up her purse, locked the door, dropped the key in and passed it to her before he climbed under the wheel.
He drove like a man sleepwalking. He knew his heart must be turning flips. Could she really be that naïve that she didn’t realize what had happened to her? He glanced at her curiously as he pulled out into the road.
“Are you eating anything at all lately?” he asked in an odd tone.
She shifted restlessly and looked out the window. “Whatever I’ve got keeps my stomach upset,” she said heavily. “Mostly I get milkshakes and drink them.”
She really didn’t know! He felt his breath catch as the possibilities rushed in like mosquitoes circling his head. He’d been like half a man during the past few years. He’d avoided women, and entanglements, and hardly dated at all. Now fate had delivered him up whole to this unexpected complication, and he felt as if he’d just won the lottery. But he didn’t know how to handle it.
He glanced at Grace’s averted profile. She wasn’t pretty, but she had a warmth and empathy that made him hungry. It had been so long since he’d had a reason to live. Now he had something to make life worthwhile. He had hope again.
“You’re acting very strangely,” she observed as they neared the Coltrains’s office building, which they shared with their colleague, Dr. Drew Morris.
“Am I?”
“And we’ll never get in,” she added, noting the cars parked outside the building. “I’ll bet half of Jacobs County is sitting in the waiting room. Why don’t you take me home, and I’ll see Dr. Coltrain next week?”
“Not on your life.” he parked the car and pulled out his cell phone.
She tried to protest what he was saying to the receptionist, but he held up a hand and cut her off.
“The side door?” he added. “Right. I see it. We’ll be right there.”
He drove to the side of the building and parked, got out and lifted Grace, carrying her toward the building.
“But I’m not dangerously ill,” she protested, flushing.
“I never said you were.”
“You told her I was unconscious!”
“A tiny white lie,” he said as he reached the building. “Better close your eyes unless you want to be here until midnight.”
She really wanted to argue, but the side door was opening. She didn’t want to spend the night in the waiting room. She closed her eyes.
“Bring her right in here,” the nurse instructed.
Grace felt herself being placed gently on an examination table.
“Doctor will be right here,” the nurse said, exiting the room.
Before Garon could get a word out, Dr. Coltrain walked in, a stethoscope draped around the collar of his white lab jacket. He looked uneasy as he took it off, stuck the earpieces in his ears, and bent to listen to Grace’s chest.
“I just fainted, that’s all,” Grace whispered.
He frowned, because her heartbeat worried him. He listened, had her cough, listened again and took off the stethoscope. “What were you doing, just before you fainted?”
“I was just walking…”
Without a word, Garon caught the redheaded doctor’s hand and placed it flat on Grace’s belly, with a meaningful look.
Taken aback, Coltrain’s hand smoothed over the hardness of her slightly swollen belly. He caught his breath.
“Labwork?” Garon suggested solemnly.
Coltrain stared at him with growing comprehension. Grace was the only one who didn’t understand what was going on.
Coltrain went into the hall and called his nurse. He spoke to her under his breath.
“Yes, Doctor, right away,” she said and walked back down the hall.
He took a phone call while she came back and drew blood from Grace’s arm.
“It isn’t an ulcer,” Grace protested when the nurse had gone out of the room, closing the door behind her. “I don’t have stomach problems. Don’t you tell Coltrain that I do, either,” she instructed hotly, “because I know what an upper G.I. series is like, and he’s not doing one on me!”
Garon didn’t answer. He went to the window in the small room, shoved his hands in his pockets, and looked outside. His world, and Grace’s, was about to change forever. He didn’t know what to say, or do. Grace was going to be upset.
Coltrain was back in ten minutes, somber and taut-jawed. He closed the door, pulled out his rolling stool and sat down.
“We have some decisions to make,” he told Grace.
Garon moved to join them, his eyes on Grace, who looked completely perplexed.
“Have I got cancer?” she asked, aghast.
Coltrain took one of her hands in his and held it tight. “You’re pregnant, Grace.”
She just stared at him. “I can’t have a child,” she said in a choked tone. “You said I couldn’t!”
He drew in a sharp breath, aware of Garon’s stillness beside him. “I said it wasn’t likely, with only one ovary. I didn’t say it was impossible.”
Grace’s hands went to her belly, feeling its firmness, feeling the thickness of her waist. She was pregnant. There was a tiny life inside her. She felt herself glow, as if she were touched, radiantly touched, by ecstasy.
“You can’t have it,” Coltrain said shortly. “You’re barely a month pregnant, in time for a termination. I can send you up to San Antonio…”
“No!”
The word exploded from two pairs of lips at the exact same time.
Grace and Garon looked at each other, surprised, as Coltrain’s eyebrows reached for the ceiling.
“Excuse me?” the doctor asked.
“You’re not terminating my child,” Grace told Coltrain.
“Grace, it’s just too risky,” he said softly. “Listen to me, Jacobsville is still a small town, with old-fashioned views on unwed mothers. Even if there was no risk, how would you feel about having a child out of wedlock?”
“She won’t be,” Garon said curtly. “I’ll get a license first thing Monday. We can be married in the ordinary’s office Thursday morning. If a blood test is still required, you’ve got hers, you can do me while I’m here.”
Grace felt as if she were falling into an abyss. “You don’t want to marry me,” she said, knowing the statement was true even as if choked her pride.
Garon leaned back against the examination table and glanced from Coltrain to Grace. “This doesn’t go outside this room,” he said quietly. “Even my own brothers don’t know.” he sighed heavily. His dark eyes seemed to see into the past as he spoke. “It was two years after I graduated from the FBI Academy. I’d just been posted by the Bureau to a field office in Atlanta when I met Annalee,” he began. “She was a civilian employee who had a degree in com
puter technology. She did background checks for us. She was a strong, independent, intelligent woman. We both knew on the first date that we’d be together forever.” His jaw tautened. Beside him, Grace felt her heart sink. “We were married two months later. She got used to having me work long hours and sometimes travel out of the country on assignment. But she had her job to occupy her. We drifted along, we grew closer. We were happy. When we knew she was pregnant with our first child, we spent hours walking the malls, picking out furniture and toys…” He stopped until he could compose himself. “When she was five months pregnant, she started feeling tired all the time. We thought it was a part of the pregnancy, but she was having other symptoms as well. I took her to the gynecologist, who ran blood tests and sent us immediately to an oncologist.”
Coltrain’s jaw clenched.
Garon saw it. “The oncologist diagnosed it as non-Hodgkin’s Lymphoma.”
“One of the most aggressive cancers,” Coltrain said.
“Yes. And she refused treatment. She wouldn’t risk the baby, even to save her own life. But the cancer was advanced and quickly aggressive.” He felt again the grief of that knowledge, the coldness in the pit of his stomach. “I lost them both,” he added flatly, forcing himself not to yield to grief. “That was ten years ago. I decided that I’d never take that risk again. I’d live for my job. And I did. I volunteered for the Hostage Rescue Team. For six years, I was on the front lines of any desperate situation where lives were in danger. From there, I went to one of our SWAT units. When I started losing my edge physically, I opted for a transfer to one of the Texas field offices. I was sent to Austin, and then transferred down here, to lead a squad in the violent crime unit. But I’ve only been going through the motions of living,” he concluded. He looked down at Grace and there was an odd light in his dark eyes. “I want this baby, Grace. You don’t know how much!”
Coltrain felt himself losing ground. He looked at Grace worriedly.
“I’ll be all right,” she assured him. “I’m not giving up my baby. I’ve never had anyone of my very own, Copper,” she added in a soft, husky tone. Her hands lay protectively on the small rise. She smiled with wonder. “He’ll be my whole world.”
Coltrain couldn’t fight that look on her face. And he wasn’t without sympathy for Garon, now that he understood the man a little better. It didn’t take a mind reader to know that Garon was the child’s father. But this was going to be more dangerous for Grace than she realized.
“I need to talk to your prospective husband,” Coltrain began.
“No, you don’t,” Grace told him belligerently. “There is such a thing as patient-doctor privilege. You don’t have my permission. That’s the end of it.”
Coltrain was worried. But she was right. He couldn’t betray her secret. He understood why she didn’t want Garon to know. That didn’t make it less risky. But he couldn’t force himself to go behind her back, not after all she’d been through. She obviously wanted this baby enough to fight any hint of interference. His lips compressed. “All right, I’ll do the best I can.”
Garon, who’d just relived the most painful episode of his life, was only half listening to a conversation he didn’t understand anyway.
He looked down at Grace with an expression she couldn’t decipher.
“I’m sorry about the complication,” she said worriedly. “I didn’t know…”
“It isn’t a complication, Grace,” Garon said gently. “It’s a baby.”
“But you don’t want to marry me,” she started again.
“No, I don’t,” he said honestly. “But it’s only for eight months,” he added. “After the baby comes, we’ll make decisions.”
Which meant he wasn’t ready for any happily ever after, and she couldn’t blame him. She’d been careless, but he was going to pay the price.
At least he wanted the child and wasn’t going to try to force her to get rid of it. She wasn’t going to tell him anything at all that might upset him. He’d lost one child. She was going to make sure, somehow, that he didn’t lose this one.
HE DROVE TO HER HOUSE, got out with her and went inside when she unlocked the door.
“Pack a bag,” he said. “You’re staying at the house until we get married.”
“But I just got home…”
“Do I have to remind you of the risk?” he asked quietly.
For one frightening moment, she thought he meant the other risk. Then she realized, relieved, that he was talking about the killer.
“He probably still thinks I have amnesia,” she said.
“He’s avoided arrest for twelve years and gotten away, if he’s the killer, with eleven murders. He’s not a stupid man. He must have lived here at the time.”
She’d never considered that possibility. She caught her breath and sat down heavily on the arm of her grandfather’s old easy chair. “Do you think so?”
“Most serial killers choose their first victim within a comfortable radius of where they live,” he said.
She bit her lip, thinking back. “We had two renters down the road,” she recalled. “One was married, but his wife was visiting family back east. The other was elderly and in a wheelchair.”
“He didn’t necessarily live next door,” he said. “He could have been involved in some program at school or church that brought him into contact with children.”
“He could have been anybody,” she said heavily. “All these years, I’ve wondered.”
“We’ll catch him,” he said with firm confidence. “I promise you we will. But right now, I’m taking you home with me. There’s no way in hell I’m leaving you here alone.”
She saw that he meant it. Well, at least he was concerned for her. He did want the baby, even if he didn’t want Grace. She got up and went to pack her things.
Miss Turner was fascinated, not only with the news of the wedding, at which she would be a witness, but at the prospect of a baby. She didn’t even seem shocked that they’d put the cart before the horse. She was already picking out yarn and patterns for baby clothes.
Grace laid out her one decent dress, the blue wool one, on her bed the day of the wedding. Garon came into the room after a perfunctory knock, carrying a big box. He gave the blue dress a hot glare and put the box down right on top of it.
“What is this?” Grace asked.
“Open it.”
She lifted the lid. Inside, there was an oyster-white suit and a small hat with a white veil. There was a silk bouquet as well. She looked at him, astonished.
“I’m not marrying you in that damned blue dress,” he announced.
She touched the silk gently. She knew what it cost, because she bought it for her secret project that he still didn’t know about. “It’s beautiful.”
“I got your measurements from Barbara,” he said, and didn’t add that he’d had to apologize his way into her café after his last appearance there. But once she heard that he was marrying Grace, and that a baby was on the way, she backed down just enough to go shopping with him.
“Thanks,” she said in a shy, husky tone.
He shrugged. “Your friend Judy at the florists’ is making you a bouquet. Barbara and Miss Turner will be witnesses.”
She looked up. “Rick?”
He had to clench his teeth. “He has to work tomorrow. He couldn’t get off.” That wasn’t exactly the truth. He refused to watch Grace ruin her life, were his exact words. The young detective was furious when he knew why Garon was marrying Grace. Garon could understand how he felt, but he couldn’t jilt Grace when she was carrying his child.
“Oh,” was all she said. She knew how Rick felt about her. She was sorry she couldn’t feel the same about him. It was probably better that he didn’t show up in the probate judge’s office.
“I’m going to drive to the courthouse. Miss Turner will bring you.”
“Okay.”
He hadn’t asked if she wanted a church wedding, or offered her an elaborate affair with bridesmaids and
groomsmen. Probably he’d had that sort of wedding with his first wife. She didn’t protest. He was still grieving for the woman he’d lost. It was enough that he was giving their child a name. She’d never expected him to want her permanently. Nobody ever had.
THE PROBATE JUDGE was a woman, Anna Banes, and she’d been married herself for two decades. She knew Grace, and her family, and the ordeal Grace had been through. She gave them a short but dignified and poignant service, with Barbara and Miss Turner standing to the side of them.
She didn’t think Garon would buy her a wedding ring, but he had. It was a wide gold band with platinum edging and a grape leaf pattern. He didn’t buy one for himself. That was hardly surprising. The judge declared them legally married, and Garon bent to brush a cool kiss against her cheek. It had been a long time, but he still remembered the joy of his first wedding. He was fond of Grace, and he wanted the child, but he couldn’t separate himself from the past.
Garon treated them to lunch afterwards at Barbara’s Café, and the owner herself brought out a magnificent wedding cake that she’d made for the occasion. Grace felt tears running down her cheeks at the thoughtfulness. She hugged the older woman warmly, because she was the closest thing to family that Grace had.
They were on the way home, with Miss Turner returning separately in Garon’s Expedition, when Garon’s pager beeped. He pulled it out, slowed to check the text message and grimaced.
“I have to go in to the office,” he said, stepping on the gas. “We’ve got a new lead in the case.”
“The killer?” she asked excitedly.
He nodded. “I’m sorry,” he added. “But I don’t work a nine-to-five job.”
“Grandaddy was a deputy sheriff,” she replied. “He had to go out at all hours of the night if there was an emergency. Granny always raised the roof,” she added quietly. “I thought it was selfish of her. He saved lives.”
He glanced at her with a warm smile. “That’s why we’re all in the business.”
“I have lots to keep me busy,” she said easily. “Including my jobs.”
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