His throat tightened, and Rick held on to her. “Steve was alive. My father wasn’t. I called Sarge to tell him about Dad’s death. He arranged for the press to have the information he wanted them to have. I was due back on base in two days and I had no idea what to do with Steve. Sarge had already offered me a position on his special ops team.” He grimaced as he said that. “I’d already accepted because I knew I had to make a lot of money fast to get Steve away from my father. And when I called Sarge to tell him about the accident, he came up with a plan to take away any vulnerability I might have. And to give Steve protection from anyone who could come after me.”
“Oh, Rick,” Erin whispered.
He went on as if she hadn’t spoken, as if he had to get it all out.
“Sarge told me to report that both my father and Steve died that night. He arranged to have the crash site deemed military jurisdiction and to have the ‘bodies’ picked up and taken to the nearest military base, where a coroner pronounced them both dead.”
“And he gave Steve a new identity.” Erin filled in the rest.
“Yeah. Steve Miller. I told Steve it was our secret.”
“And he’s kept it all these years.”
“Yeah.”
“Because he loves you that much.”
Rick hoped so. Because his big brother certainly owned his heart. He always had.
“Ron Fitzgerald called while you were in with Steve’s doctor,” Erin said, moving her body more fully onto his. The doctor was at Lakeside, watching over him for the night, although they didn’t expect any serious repercussions. Everyone thought it best for Steve to be in his own space. In his own bed. At least for the next few weeks, until the horror of the kidnapping and explosion faded.
“We owe him,” Rick said now, thinking of Fitzgerald’s immediate generosity that day, arranging for private investigators at his own expense.
“He’s a good man,” Erin said. “A very wise man. He told me that when he heard I was in danger, he realized Caylee could have been here with me last night. She could’ve been at risk, too. And that although he’d spent all these years trying to protect his wife and me and Caylee and the others from the pain of Noah’s death, it isn’t possible. He believed he was trying to make life easier for us, when, in reality, he was the one with the unresolved issues regarding his son’s death. He was holding on to us all so tightly, suffocating us, because he was afraid to admit that ultimately he can’t hold on at all. But his possessiveness gave him back the sense of control Noah’s death stole from him. He told me that today he realized there are no guarantees. But that if he truly loved us, he had to let us all be free to live our lives as we need to live them. Caylee’s going to Yale. She and Daniel plan to get married once she graduates.”
“I think Johnson knows I’m in love with you.”
The words were a mistake. An aberration. They hung in the room like a dark cloud that threatened rain.
So much for sharing. For speaking aloud the thoughts in his head.
Erin didn’t say a word. She didn’t move. And Rick had absolutely no idea how to extricate himself.
“Johnson told me that Paul Wagner was killed for the fifty dollars he had in his wallet,” he said. “He’d picked up a hitchhiker. Some kid high on drugs. They picked up the kid this afternoon. He was wearing Wagner’s watch….”
He wasn’t even sure Erin would remember that Wagner was the husband of Charles Cook’s married lover.
He hadn’t remembered it when Johnson passed along the news as they drove back to Temple earlier that night. Erin and Steve had been taken by ambulance to the hospital in Ludington—the same ambulance, at Steve’s insistence—and Rick and Huey Johnson had followed in Rick’s truck.
Rick had spent the trip in a daze, partially brought on by the odd concept that he wasn’t the only person in the world who cared about Steve anymore. Or the only one Steve cared about.
Johnson had also destroyed the tape after Rick gave it back to him. And with it any questions about the money Rick had earned over the past fifteen years. Money that would insure Steve’s care for life.
“Did you just say you’re in love with me?” She still hadn’t moved.
He’d promised her no more secrets. “Yes, but…”
“No.” His beautiful attorney turned, placing her finger against his lips. “No buts. Just yes is fine for now.”
He felt he owed her more, anyway. The statement had been so random. The feeling so…out of place. He hardly knew her.
“Truth is, I don’t know how to love a woman,” he said. “I’ve never said those words, or anything even close, to a woman in my life.”
“I find that hard to believe.” Erin’s grin told a different story. His guess was that she believed him. And was glad she’d been the first. “You’re one of those men who wears his experience all over him,” she said.
“I’ve slept with a lot of women,” he told her. No more secrets. “But I’ve never loved one.”
“Then I have to warn you, Thomas, loving a woman can be a challenge. We have needs and desires and emotional breakdowns and sometimes we just plain get bitchy.”
“That’s all the good stuff. What about the bad?”
She burst out laughing. And then she wasn’t laughing anymore. With her body along the length of his, she turned over, her stomach against his, and looked him in the eye. “I love you, Rick Thomas. With all my heart and soul and everything in between. I can’t promise the future will be easy. I can only tell you that as long as you are in my life, I will be there for you. I will believe in you. I will have your back.”
“And I, Erin Morgan, have yours.”
“I’d kinda prefer it if you had another part of my anatomy right now.”
She wiggled against him and he realized she’d known what she was doing to him all along.
She’d known and had been doing it on purpose.
And Rick was lost.
That night, for the first time in his life, Rick Thomas made love.
Chandler, Ohio
Thursday, October 28, 2010
It was late. I should’ve been in bed but was too restless, so I sat at the kitchen table and sipped half a glass of wine. I’d just gotten off the phone with Erin Morgan. I could hardly believe everything that had happened since Maggie and I had left her three days before. And I had to admit, it warmed me that she’d called to tell me about it.
I’d helped Maggie with some homework earlier. Sitting at the table poring over geometry problems. I couldn’t believe how much I enjoyed the experience.
And wanted more of it.
Camy was tired. She scratched at my arm as I lifted my glass, her little paw curling around my wrist, pulling my hand to her.
She was right, of course. I had to get some sleep. I had a full day of appointments starting at eight in the morning. Turning off the lights as I made my way to the back of the house, I stopped outside Maggie’s door. She left it open every night.
And every night I stood there for a moment on my way to bed to listen to her breathe and watch her sleep.
And offer up a whisper of thanks along with a request for guidance.
We had some tough times ahead of us. I knew that. Maggie believed herself in love with a man who should be in jail for what he’d done to her.
But there could be lots of joy in store for us, too.
“Kelly?” The girl’s sleepy voice startled me.
“Yes?”
“Thank you.”
“For helping with your homework? No problem, sweetie. I was happy to do it.”
“For that, yeah, but no.”
“What, then?”
I could barely see the girl’s face in the glow from the hallway night-light, couldn’t really make out her expression.
“For caring about me.”
Oh. “Of course I care, Maggie, how could I not? You’re a very special young woman.”
“You’re special, too, and…”
“What?”
/> “You know that stuff about keeping me?”
The conversation we’d had while painting Maggie’s room. “Yeah?”
“Well, you’re going to, right?”
“Keep you?”
“Yeah.”
“You bet I am. I have custody of you, which means you’re stuck with me until you’re eighteen.”
“Or unless you get married and have kids of your own.”
“No, Maggie. You’re my child now. If I get married someday, whoever marries me will be getting a package deal. And if I have babies, you’ll be their older sister.” These were all pretty outlandish ifs, considering my non-dating status, but I understood Maggie’s fears.
And needed to put them to rest.
Maggie had to feel loved, secure, if she was ever going to be free of David Abrams’s insidious hold on her.
“You say that now, but—”
“No, Maggie.” I went in and sat on the side of her bed. “I haven’t just taken you into my home,” I said, feeling the tears welling up. “I haven’t just taken on legal responsibility for you.” The teenager’s eyes were wide and staring intently at me. “I’ve taken you into the deepest parts of my heart. If you were to go, I’d be heartbroken.”
I willed the tears away, but my will wasn’t strong enough. They pooled in my eyes and I sat there, helpless, as they slid down my face.
“I’ve got a double bed,” Maggie said. “You want to stay for a little while?”
And I had my first parental insight. Maggie didn’t want to sleep alone that night.
“How about if you come into my room?” I said. “My bed’s bigger and we can watch TV until we fall asleep.”
The girl was out of her bed and in my room before I was. She pulled down the covers and slid beneath them and I tossed her the TV control as I went into the adjoining bathroom to brush my teeth and put on my pajamas.
By the time I returned Maggie was sound asleep, with Camy snuggled next to her.
Turning off the lights, I slipped carefully onto my side of the bed so I wouldn’t disturb either of my princesses. They were right. We didn’t need TV. We just needed to know we had one another.
ISBN: 978-1-4268-7438-3
THE THIRD SECRET
Copyright © 2010 by Tara Taylor Quinn
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