The Great Escape

Chapter Twenty-six

WHEN THE FILM SHOOT ENDED, Panda went back to the island, as if that would bring him closer to her. The house sat wet and lonely in the gloomy November afternoon. Leaves plugged the gutters, spiderwebs decked the windows, and tree branches littered the ground from a recent storm. He turned on the furnace and walked through the quiet rooms, his shoulders hunched, his hands in his pockets.

He hadn’t gotten around to finding another caretaker, and the furniture held a light coat of dust, but Lucy’s touch was everywhere: in the bowl of beach rocks on the sunroom coffee table, the comfortably rearranged furniture, the clutter-free shelves and tables. The house no longer felt as though it were waiting for the Remingtons to come back, but it didn’t feel like his either. It was hers. It had been since she’d first stepped inside.

The rain stopped. He pulled an old extension ladder from the garage and cleaned out the gutters, barely avoiding falling off when he slipped on a rung. He threw one of Temple’s disgusting frozen dinners in the microwave, popped a can of Coke, and tortured himself by going to bed in Lucy’s old bedroom, the one that used to be his. The next day he ate a cold breakfast, drank two mugs of coffee, and set off through the woods.

The cottage had a fresh coat of white paint and a new roof. He knocked on the back door, but Bree didn’t answer. Through the window, he saw a pot of flowers on the kitchen table and some school papers, so she and Toby were still living here. Since he didn’t have anything else to do, he sat on the front porch and waited for her to come back.

An hour later, her old Cobalt came into sight. He rose from the damp wicker chair and wandered to the steps. She stopped her car and got out. She didn’t seem upset to see him, merely puzzled.

She looked different from the person he remembered-rested, almost serene, no longer quite so thin. She wore jeans and an oatmeal-colored fleece jacket with her hair pulled up in one of those casual buns. She walked toward him with a new confidence.

He dug his hands into his pockets. “The cottage looks good.”

“We’re getting it ready to rent out next summer.”

“What about your bees?” Lucy would care about that.

“I made an arrangement with the family that owns the orchard next to the cottage to move the hives there.”

He nodded. She waited. He shifted his weight to the other foot. “How’s Toby?”

“The happiest kid on the island. He’s at school now.”

He tried to think of what to say next and ended up asking the question he’d never intended to utter. “Have you talked to Lucy?”

She was just like Temple. She nodded but didn’t offer any information.

He pulled his hands from his pockets and came down off the steps. “I need to talk to you about something.”

Just then, Mike’s Cadillac drove in. Mike jumped out, arm extended, looking as if seeing Panda again was the highlight of his day. “Hey, stranger! Great to have you back.”

His hair was shorter, no longer so carefully styled, and except for a watch, he’d given up his jewelry. He looked easy, happy, a guy without any demons. Panda stifled his resentment. It wasn’t Moody’s fault that he’d managed to do what Panda couldn’t.

Mike slipped an arm around Bree. “Did she tell you we finally set a date? New Year’s Eve. Toughest sale I ever made.”

Bree arched an eyebrow at him. “Toby made the sale.”

Mike grinned. “Chip off the old block.”

Bree laughed and kissed the corner of his mouth.

“Congratulations to both of you,” Panda said.

The day was warming up, and Mike suggested they sit on the porch. Panda took the chair he’d just abandoned, and Bree claimed the matching one while Mike perched on the railing. He talked about how well Bree was doing with her business, then offered up a list of Toby’s recent accomplishments. “He and his teacher are working together on a black history unit.”

“Toby knows more than she does,” Bree said proudly. “But you came here to talk to me about something?”

Having Mike around complicated an already difficult task. “It’s okay. I can come back later.”

Bree frowned. “Is it about Lucy?”

Everything was about Lucy. “No,” he said. “It’s a private matter.”

“I’ll leave,” Mike said genially. “I have some errands to run anyway.”

“Don’t go.” She gazed at him. “Despite appearances, Mike is the most discreet person on the island. And I’ll end up telling him whatever you tell me anyway.”

Panda hesitated. “Are you sure? This… has to do with your family. Your father.”

She looked wary. “Tell me.”

And so he did. He sat there in the creaky wicker chair, leaning toward her, his forearms braced on his knees, and told her about her father’s relationship with his mother, then about Curtis.

When he was done, Bree had tears in her eyes. “I’m so sorry.”

Panda shrugged.

Mike came to stand beside her. Bree searched her pockets for a tissue. “After my father died, Mother made sure we all knew what a rotten husband he’d been, so it’s not exactly a surprise. But none of us imagined he had another child.” She blew her nose.

Mike curled his hand over the back of her chair and gave Panda a steady gaze, his easygoing demeanor vanishing as he assessed whether this information posed any harm to the woman he loved. “Why did you buy the house?”

Panda liked him for wanting to protect her, so he told them the truth. “Some kind of twisted revenge. I hated your father, Bree. I told myself I hated your whole family, but that was jealousy.” Panda shifted in the chair and then he shocked himself. “I wasn’t thinking too clearly when I bought the house. After I got out of the military, I had problems with post-traumatic stress.”

He said it as if he were confessing a tendency toward head colds.

Their expressions were a mixture of concern and sympathy, but they didn’t run screaming from the porch or dash around looking for a weapon to protect themselves. He had Jerry Evers to thank for this. Kristi had found the right guy for him to talk to, a no-bullshit shrink who’d seen combat himself and understood exactly how terrified Panda was that the demons he’d fought would reemerge and make him hurt other people.

Bree was more interested in Panda’s revelation about Curtis. “Do you have any pictures of him?”

He hadn’t thought of that, but he liked that she’d asked. He reached for his wallet. “I’ll send you some when I get back to Chicago. This is the only one I have on me.”

He took out Curtis’s final school photo. It was tattered, a little faded, the word PROOF still faintly visible across his T-shirt. Curtis was smiling, his adult teeth a tad too big for his mouth. Bree took it from him and studied it carefully. “He… looks like my brother Doug.” Her eyes filled with tears again. “My brothers need to know about Curtis. And they need to know about you, too. When you’re ready, I want you to meet them.”

Something else unexpected. “I’d like that,” he heard himself say.

As she held out the photo to return it, her thumb moved gently across the image.

“Keep it,” he said. And somehow that felt exactly right, too.

HE WAS OUT ON A run late the next morning when his cell rang. He never used to bring a phone along, but now that he had people working for him, he had to stay in touch, and he didn’t like it. His business might be thriving, but he still preferred working alone.

He glanced at the display. An East Coast area code. He didn’t recognize the number, but he knew that area code. He immediately slowed and answered. “Patrick Shade.”

The voice he’d been yearning to hear came buzzing through, very clear, very loud, and very angry. “I’m pregnant, you son of a bitch.”

And then the connection went dead.

He staggered to the side of the road, dropped the phone, snatched it up, and hit redial. His hands were shaking so badly, it took two tries.

“What do you want?” she screeched.

Oh, God. He had to be the grown-up. He opened his mouth to say-who the hell knew what?-but she was still yelling, and he never got a chance.

“I’m too furious to talk to you right now! You and your vasectomy.” She spit out the word.

“Where are you?”

“What do you care?” she retorted. “I’m done with you, remember?” She hung up on him again.

Jesus… Lucy pregnant. With his baby. He felt as if he’d been plunged into a pool of warm, rippling water.

When he tried to call back, he got her voice mail. He already knew where she’d moved, and not much later, he was at the ferry dock. Six hours after that, he was in Boston.

It was evening and already dark when he pulled his rental car up to the apartment where she was supposed to be staying. There was no answer when he hit the buzzer in the lobby.

He tried a few other buttons and eventually hit gold, an old guy with nothing better to do than spy on his neighbors. “She left this morning with a suitcase. You know who she is, right? President Jorik’s daughter? Real nice to everybody.”

He called her again from the sidewalk, and this time she picked up. He didn’t give her a chance to speak. “I’m in Boston,” he said. “The security in your building is shit.”

“So are you.”

“Where have you gone?”

“I ran home to Mommy and Daddy. Where do you think I went? And I am so not ready to talk to you.”

“Tough.” This time he hung up on her.

PHYSICAL COURAGE CAME EASILY TO him, but this was something else entirely. He’d known he had to clear the air with Bree before he could take the next step toward getting Lucy back, but he’d planned to give himself another week to talk to Jerry Evers and make sure Jerry was as convinced as Panda that the darkness wasn’t coming back. Then he’d intended to write up a script and memorize it so he didn’t screw up again. Now here he was, on a late flight to Washington, completely unprepared and with his entire future at stake.

He arrived at Dulles long after dark. Even though he was too juiced to sleep, he couldn’t show up at the Jorik home in his current condition, so he checked into a hotel and lay awake for what was left of the night. When dawn arrived, he showered and shaved. With nothing more than a cup of coffee in his stomach, he set out for Middleburg, a wealthy community in the heart of Virginia’s hunt country.

As he drove along winding roads, past wineries and prosperous horse farms, he grew increasingly miserable. What if it was too late? What if she’d come to her senses and realized she could do so much better than him? By the time he reached the Jorik estate, he was sweating.

The house was invisible from the road. Only the tall iron fence and elaborate electronic gates announced that he’d reached his destination. He parked in front of them and took in the video surveillance cameras. As he reached for his cell he knew one thing for certain. If he buckled now, it was all over. No matter what he had to do, he couldn’t let her see what a wreck he was.

She picked up on the fifth ring. “It’s six-thirty in the morning,” she croaked. “I’m still in bed.”

“No problem.”

“I said I wasn’t ready to talk to you.”

“Now that is a problem. You have one minute to get these gates open before I ram them.”

“Send me a postcard from Gitmo!”

Another hang-up.

Fortunately, he didn’t have to follow through on his threat because, thirty seconds later, the gates swung open. After a brief conversation with a Secret Service agent, he drove along the curving lane that cut through the heavily wooded property to the house, a large brick Georgian. He parked in front and got out. The chilly air carried the smell of fall leaves, and the clear morning sky promised sunshine, which he tried to convince himself was a good omen. Not an easy task when he felt sick to his stomach.

The front door opened, and there she was. His stomach jumped to his throat. Everything that had been murky to him was now crystal clear, but obviously not to her… Instead of inviting him in, she came outside, a black windbreaker tossed on over bright red pajamas printed with green bullfrogs.

The last people he wanted to face right now were her parents, so having this showdown outside was an unexpected gift. She’d shoved her bare feet into a pair of sneakers, and her hair was a beautiful, shiny light-brown rumpus. She wore no makeup, and a sleep-crease marked her cheek. She looked pretty, ordinary. Extraordinary.

She stopped between a pair of pillars at the top of three wide steps. He walked toward her along the brick sidewalk. “Who died?” she said, taking in his suit.

She had to know he wouldn’t show up at the home of the president of the United States in jeans and a T-shirt. “No time to change.”

She came down off the steps and into the crimson and yellow leaves scattered along the walk. Despite her small features and the frog pajamas, she didn’t look anything like a teenager. She was a fully grown woman-alluring, complicated, and angry, all of which scared the hell out of him.

She jutted her jaw at him as belligerently as a prizefighter. “There’s a big difference between having a vasectomy and planning to have a vasectomy.”

“What do you mean? I never said I’d already had one.”

She blew that off. “I’m not arguing with you about it.” She tromped onto the damp, leaf-covered grass, moving in the direction of a tree that looked like it could have sheltered Thomas Jefferson while he proofread the Declaration of Independence. “The fact is,” she said, “somewhere along the line one of your little buggers hit a home run, and now you’re going to be a father. What do you think about that?”

“I-I haven’t had time to think.”

“Well, I have, and I’ll tell you what’s not going to happen. I’m not pretending I went to a sperm bank, and I’m not getting rid of this baby.”

He was horrified. “You sure as hell aren’t.”

She went on, still highly pissed. “So what are you going to do about it? Crack up again?”

The way she belittled his past mental problems, as if they weren’t all that important, made him love her even more, if such a thing were possible.

“Well?” She tapped her foot in the wet grass, just as if she were his third-grade teacher. “What do you have to say for yourself?”

He swallowed. “Good job?”

He expected her to take a swing at him for that. Instead, she pursed her lips. “My parents are not going to be happy.”

Surely an understatement. He spoke carefully, fully aware that he was treading on dangerous territory. “What do you want me to do about this?”

She went supersonic. “That’s it! I’m done with you!”

She stomped back toward the house, and since he couldn’t manhandle a pregnant woman like he’d manhandle an unpregnant one, he cut around her. “I love you.”

The brat stopped in her tracks and sneered at him. “You care about me. Big difference.”

“That, too. But most of all, I love you.” His throat grew tight. “I’ve loved you from the moment I found you in that Texas alley.”

Those green-flecked eyes flew wide open. “That’s a lie.”

“It isn’t. I’m not saying I knew I loved you, but I felt something important right from the beginning.” He wanted to touch her-God, did he ever want to touch her-but he was afraid that would only make things worse. “Every moment we’ve been together, I fought to do the right thing. I can’t tell you how tired I am of that. And I think you love me, too. Am I wrong?”

This was the question that haunted him. What if he was wrong? What if she’d meant it when she’d said he’d only been a fling? His instincts told him otherwise, but he was all too aware of the power of self-delusion. He braced himself.

“So what?” Lucy had elevated sneering to an art form. “I thought I loved Ted Beaudine, and look how that turned out.”

He got so light-headed he could barely respond. “Yeah, but he was way too good for you. I’m not.”

“Okay, that’s true.”

He wanted to pick her up, dump her in his car, and drive off, but he doubted either she or her mother’s Secret Service detail would go for that. He dragged in some air and made himself say what he needed to. “Kristi found a counselor for me who’s a veteran. He’s seen combat. We hit it off right away. I won’t say everything’s perfect, but I will say he’s convinced me I’m saner than I thought.”

“He’s wrong,” Madam Sensitive declared. Still, he thought he detected a softening in those big brown eyes, although that might be wishful thinking.

“Tell me how you want to handle this mess,” he said, stopping just short of pleading. “You know I’ll marry you if that’s what you want. I’ll do anything for you. Just tell me what you want.”

Any tenderness he’d imagined vanished, replaced by an icy hauteur. “You’re hopeless.” She stomped through the leaves and up the steps toward the front door. She didn’t slam it in his face, so he deduced he was supposed to follow her inside for more ass kicking.

The imposing entrance hall held a sweeping staircase, impressive oil paintings, and antique furniture that shouted old money, but the abandoned backpacks, bike helmets, and single multicolored kneesock tossed in the corner spoke of younger occupants. She flung her windbreaker on a chair that looked like a loaner from the Smithsonian and turned to face him again. “What if I’m lying?”

He’d stopped trying to wipe the leaves from his shoes on the Oriental carpet that stretched across the doorway. “Lying?”

“What if I’m not pregnant,” she said, “and I’m making this whole thing up. What if I finally saw through that charade you built to protect me-as if I weren’t perfectly capable of protecting myself-and what if I really do love you and this is the only way I could think of to get you back? What would you do then?”

He forgot about his wet shoes. “Are you lying?”

“Answer my question.”

He wanted to strangle her. “If you’re lying, I’m going to be more pissed than you can imagine because, despite everything I’ve said, I want a baby with you. Tell me the truth right now!”

Her eyes seemed to melt. “Really? You really do want a baby?”

Now he was the belligerent one. “Don’t screw with me about this, Lucy. It’s too important.”

She turned away. “Mom! Dad!”

“We’re in here.” A male voice boomed from the back of the house.

He was seriously going to kill her, but first he had to follow her through the grand house into a roomy, sun-splashed kitchen that smelled of coffee and something baking. The squared-off bay window held a trestle table that looked out over the autumn garden. President Jorik sat at one end, the Wall Street Journal open in front of her, another paper folded at her side. She wore a white robe and gray slippers. Even without makeup, she was a beautiful woman, in addition to being an imposing one. Her husband sat across from her in jeans and a Saturday-morning sweatshirt. Although her hair was combed, his wasn’t, and he hadn’t yet shaved. Panda hoped like hell they were both on their second cup of coffee, or this was going to go even worse than he expected.

“Mom, Dad, you remember Patrick Shade.” Lucy said his name as if it were spoiled meat. “My guard dog.”

He couldn’t afford to be awestruck by either of them, and he nodded.

President Jorik pushed aside her Wall Street Journal. Mat Jorik closed the cover of his iPad and pulled off his reading glasses. Panda wondered if they knew about the baby… or if there even was a baby. Leave it to Lucy to toss him into the lions’ den without a clue. At least he’d been spared the presence of her sisters and brother. It was Saturday, so they must be sleeping in. He wished her parents had stayed in bed, too. “Ma’am,” he said. “Mr. Jorik.”

Lucy wanted her pound of flesh. She flopped into an empty chair next to her father, leaving Panda standing in front of them like a peasant brought before royalty. She glared at her mother. “You will never guess what he just said. He said he’d marry me if that’s what I want.”

President Jorik actually rolled her eyes. Her husband shook his head. “Even stupider than I figured.”

“He’s not stupid.” Lucy propped her feet on the wooden trestle under the table. “He’s… Okay, he’s sort of stupid, but so am I. And he has a big heart.”

Panda had heard enough. He gave Lucy what he hoped was his most menacing glare, then turned to her parents. “I’d like permission to marry your daughter.”

Lucy narrowed her eyes at him. “You’re way ahead of yourself. First you have to tell them all the reasons you’re unworthy.”

Up until now, he hadn’t understood much of what she was doing, but he did understand this. She wanted him to rip off the Band-Aid fast.

“Would you like some coffee, Patrick?” President Jorik gestured toward the pot on the counter.

“No, ma’am.” She’d been his commander in chief, and he realized he was automatically standing at attention. The position felt good, and he stayed that way, feet together, chest out, eyes forward. “I grew up rough in Detroit, ma’am. My father dealt drugs, and my mother was an addict who supported her habit any way she could. I did some drugs myself. I have a juvenile record, spent time in foster homes, and I lost my brother to gang violence when he was way too young. I barely made it through high school, then went into the military. I served in Iraq and Afghanistan before I joined the Detroit police.” He was going to get it all out if it killed him. “I have a college degree from Wayne State, and-”

“College degrees…” Lucy interrupted. “He has his master’s. That used to bother me, but I’ve decided to overlook it.”

She was deliberately making him sweat bullets, but he was perversely glad she was forcing him to lay it all out. He switched to parade rest, hands clasped behind his back, his eyes just over their heads. “As I said, Wayne State. The only time I’ve been near an Ivy was working security for a Hollywood actress at the Harvard-Yale football game.”

“He’s got good table manners,” Lucy said. “And, let’s face it, he’s hot.”

“I can see that,” her mother agreed in a shockingly suggestive voice, which made him wonder exactly how different she and Lucy really were.

He plowed on. “There was a time when I stayed drunk for too long and got into too many fights because of it.” He clenched his hands behind his back. “But the main thing you need to know about me…” He made himself look at them. “I had problems with PTSD.” He swallowed. “It seems to be behind me, but I’m not taking any chances, and I’m in counseling again. For a long time, I was afraid to care too much about anybody for fear I’d hurt them, but I don’t feel like that anymore. I do cuss, though, and I have a temper.”

President Jorik glanced at her husband. “No wonder she fell in love with him. He’s just like you.”

“Worse,” Lucy said.

Her father kicked back in his chair. “I’ll take your word for it.”

Panda wasn’t letting any of these Joriks sidetrack him. He unclasped his hands. “With my past, I’m sure I’m not what you have in mind for your daughter.”

“Mr. Shade, none of your past is news to Mat or myself,” the president said. “You don’t really think we would have hired you to guard Lucy if we hadn’t had you thoroughly investigated.”

That shouldn’t have taken him aback, but it did.

“You’re a decorated soldier,” she said. “You served your country bravely, and your record with the Detroit Police Department is exemplary.”

“But,” Lucy said, “he can be a real idiot.”

“So can you,” her father pointed out.

Panda let his arms fall to his sides. “I also love your daughter very much. As you can see. Because if I didn’t, I sure as hell-pardon me, ma’am-wouldn’t be going through all this. Now, with all due respect, I need to talk to Lucy privately.”

Ms. Maybe-I’m-Pregnant-Maybe-I’m-Not suddenly turned wary. “Muffins first. You love muffins.”

“Lucy. Now.” He jerked his head toward the doorway.

She hadn’t finished punishing him, and she took forever getting out of her chair, looking exactly like a sulky teenager, which seemed to amuse her parents. “She used to be such a sweet girl,” her mother said to her father.

“Your influence,” he said right back to the former president.

If it hadn’t been for the baby issue, he wouldn’t have begrudged any of them their fun.

Her father wasn’t done. “Maybe you two would like to settle this in Mabel?” He made it both a question and a mandate.

The president smiled at her husband.

Panda had no idea what was happening, but Lucy seemed to understand. “I guess.” She displayed zero enthusiasm as she sauntered toward the back door.

He strode past her in what he hoped was an assertive manner, held the door open, then followed her across a stone terrace and into a backyard with well-defined gardens and mature shade trees. Lucy’s sneakers swished in the fallen leaves as she followed a brick path around what he guessed was an herb garden toward a large garage. As they got closer, she cut behind it onto a dirt path that led to an ancient yellow Winnebago. He finally remembered. This was Mabel, the motor home Lucy and Mat Jorik had traveled in all those years ago when they’d picked up Nealy Case at a Pennsylvania truck stop.

The door creaked on its rusty hinges as Lucy opened it. He stepped inside the drab, musty interior. There was a tiny kitchen; a saggy, built-in couch with faded plaid upholstery; and a door at the back that must lead to a bedroom. The small banquette table held a baseball cap, a notebook, a bottle of green nail polish, and an empty Coke can. Her siblings must use this place as a hangout.

If he asked Lucy why her mother had suggested they come here, Lucy would give him one of those looks that said he was a moron, so he didn’t ask. “This thing run?”

“Not anymore.” She plunked down on the sofa, picked up a paperback copy of Lord of the Flies, and began to read.

He tugged on his shirt collar. The place might be sentimental to the Joriks, but it was claustrophobic to him. Are you really pregnant? Do you really love me? What the hell did I say that was so wrong anyway? All questions he wanted to ask, but couldn’t yet.

He opened his collar button. His head nearly touched the ceiling, and the walls were closing in on him. He wedged himself sideways onto the banquette bench across from her. Even from here, he could smell the fabric softener from her red pajamas, a scent that shouldn’t have been erotic but was. “I told Bree about her father,” he said.

She didn’t look up from the book. “I know. She called me.”

He stretched his cramped legs across the motor home. She turned a page. His nerves had stretched to the breaking point. “Now that you’ve had your fun, are you ready to talk seriously?”

“Not really.”

If anybody else had given him such a hard time, he’d have either walked away or punched them, but he’d hurt Lucy badly, and she deserved whatever blood she could draw. She’d drawn a lot.

He made himself accept the fact that there was no baby. She’d lied. As painful as that knowledge was, he had to accept it. He couldn’t even let himself be angry, because her lie had accomplished what he hadn’t yet worked up the courage to do. Bring them together.

With a sense of resignation, he gave her the ammunition she needed to attack. “You won’t like this, but at the time, I really did think I was doing the right thing by breaking it off with you.”

She slammed the book shut, her icy reserve shattered. “I’m sure you did. No need to ask Lucy what she thought about the situation. No need to give her a vote or a voice. Go ahead and make all the decisions for the little woman yourself.”

“I didn’t exactly see it like that at the time, but I get your point.”

“Is that how this partnership is going to work? If there’s a partnership. You making the decisions for both of us?”

“No. And there’s definitely going to be a partnership.” He suddenly felt steadier than he could ever remember. If he needed proof of his new stability, all he had to do was remember the exhilaration he’d felt when Lucy had called to tell him she was pregnant. He’d experienced no fear, no doubts at all. Knowing she’d lied was a blow, but he’d fix that the first chance he got by making her well and truly pregnant.

“You took away my power, Panda. Instead of laying out all the pros and cons and asking for my opinion, you cut me out of the discussion. You treated me like a child.”

Even in pajamas with every button fastened, she didn’t look anything like a child, but he couldn’t start thinking about what was under that red flannel or he’d lose his focus. “I’ve learned a lot since then.”

“Is that so?” Real tears glistened in her eyes. “Then why didn’t you come to see me? Why did I have to be the one to call you?”

He wanted to take her in his arms and never let her go, but he couldn’t do that yet. Maybe never if he didn’t get this right.

He squeezed off the bench and crouched in front of her. “I was working up my nerve to see you. I told you the biggest lie of my life when I said I didn’t love you, but I was scared to death I’d hurt you. Things have changed since then. I’ve stopped being afraid of loving you. Now go ahead and yell at me.”

She sniffed at the offense. “I never yell.”

He was too smart to point out the fallacy of that statement. “I’m glad, because you’re not going to like this next part.” He tried and failed to find a more comfortable position. “Leaving you was hell, but as it turned out, it was the best thing I could have done for myself-for both of us-because I finally had something at stake that was bigger than worrying about all my symptoms coming back.” A branch tapped the roof of the motor home. “I figured out that, at some level, I believed I deserved to suffer. I lived, and a lot of my buddies didn’t. Once I understood that, other things became clear, and for the first time, I started to believe in possibilities instead of inevitability.”

He could see the last of her defenses beginning to melt, but she still had some struggle left. “I would never have put you through what you’ve put me through.”

She was kind of doing that now, but since she’d only begun torturing him yesterday and he’d been putting her through hell for months, he couldn’t complain. “I know, sweetheart.” He took her cold hands. “You can’t imagine how miserable I’ve been without you.”

That made her happier. “You have?”

He rubbed his thumbs into her palms. “I need you, Lucy. I love you, and I need you.”

She thought that over. “You do know, don’t you, that you’re on your knees.”

He smiled. “Yes, I do know that. And while I’m down here…” His smile faded as his collar started choking him again. “Luce, please marry me. I promise to love you and cherish you and respect you. I’ll laugh with you and make love with you and honor you with every breath I take. I know we’ll argue, but in the end it won’t matter because I’d give up my life for you.” Now he was sweating bullets. “Damn, I’ve never done this before…”

She cocked her head. “What about protecting me? That’s what you do best, so why aren’t you promising that, too?”

He couldn’t take it anymore, and he yanked off his necktie. “About that…” He loosened another collar button. “I… can’t figure out exactly how to say this.”

She waited, giving him time, her eyes so tender that the words came out more easily than he expected. “You’re my safe harbor. You don’t need protecting half as much as I do, so how about you take over that job for a while?”

She stroked his hair, her fingers like feathers, her eyes giving him the world. “I’ll do my best.”

“What about the rest?” he said, his voice unsteady as his life hung in the balance. “Are you tough enough to marry me?”

She brushed her fingertips along his cheek. “Tougher than you can imagine.”

His relief was so intense he felt dizzy, but he gradually steadied as she murmured her own love back to him. Then she got up from the couch, crossed to the door, and clicked the lock. As she turned back to face him, her fingers began opening the buttons on her pajamas.

He rose to his feet. A moment later his suit coat hit the floor.

Her pajama top fell open as she came toward him. She looped her arms around his neck, kissed him, the sweetest kiss of his life, full of passion and promise and the love he’d been looking for since he was born. But when their lips finally parted, she looked troubled again. “There’s more.”

“I sure as hell hope so,” he murmured, caressing the small of her back, just under her pajama top.

“No, not that.” She rested her hands on his shirtfront. “Once I stopped being furious with you long enough to realize that you really did love me, I had to figure out a way to get your attention.”

He understood. “It’s all right, sweetheart. I know you’re not pregnant.”

But that didn’t seem to satisfy her. “I came up with a plan. Temple and Max agreed to help me kidnap you, and-”

“Kidnap me?”

She looked suddenly smug. “We could have done it, too.”

When hell froze over. “If you say so.”

“The point is”-she tugged on one of his shirt buttons-“about me being pregnant…”

“I intend to take care of that real soon, but please don’t lie to me again.”

She opened one of his buttons and then another. “The thing is… I really wasn’t feeling well, so I started counting, and then I went to the doctor, and then…”

He stared at her.

Her mouth dissolved in a soft smile. She lifted her arms and cradled his face in her hands. “It’s true.”