Текст книги "Take Care, Sara"

Автор книги: Lindy Zart

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Текущая страница: 3 (всего у книги 19 страниц)

3

Sara grew up going to Sunday school and church. She said her nightly prayers. Her family gave thanks at mealtime. She spoke to God in her mind on an almost daily basis. If she was scared at night in the dark, she asked Him to watch over her and only then could she sleep.

She’d believed so steadfastly in Him; all in His wonder and omnipotence; in her belief that He would always look out for her and keep her safe. She had been so unfailingly devoted. She’d felt sorry for people who didn’t have faith, for those who chose not to believe, for those who doubted.

Sara had always wondered how it was okay for them to tell their children to believe in Santa Claus and the Easter bunny and all those other mythical beings, but not in the one true solidarity, the one true Being. She’d known bad things happened to good people, but in the back of her mind, she’d always rationalized that if you were truly good, you would be salvaged and nothing too horrible would afflict you and yours.

She’d been wrong. Unequivocally wrong. Laughably so. Her faith hadn’t saved her husband; it hadn’t kept him with her. Her faith had done nothing to heal her pain; it had done nothing to ease her guilt. Sara had found no peace. It had been like a weight of deception on her shoulders, like she had been kidding herself her whole life, and finally, she saw the truth. He’d never helped her. He hadn’t saved the person she loved above all others. In fact, He wasn’t real. He didn’t exist.

And then…she just…gave up.

Sara tightened the tie of her old blue robe and glanced at the clock in the living room. It was church time. A look out the window showed her the Niles’, her neighbors with the two kids, were on their way to worship God, as they did every Sunday. She turned away and sat on the couch, staring at a blank television screen. She no longer had satellite service. When she’d forgotten to pay the bill three consecutive months in a row, it had been canceled. It had taken her another few months to figure that out. She had her laptop and the internet; both of which she rarely used, a cordless phone in the kitchen, and a cell phone she never turned on. That was it. Even having those seemed pointless. She was all alone, but that was how she wanted to be; how she needed to be. Sara felt like poison; anyone who came too close to her died.

She turned her gaze to the closed bathroom door. A shower determined how her day was going to be. If she got enough ambition to take a shower, then she normally got enough drive to do other things. Those days were easier to get through. It was such a small, simple task and yet its act had monumental power over Sara’s state of mind. On the days she couldn’t get enough energy to shower—those were bad days. Today was going to be a bad day. Not that any day was good, but some were easier to take than others.

The knock at the door startled her. Sara froze, not wanting to answer the door. She waited for whoever it was to go away. Instead the banging turned persistent.

“Sara. Open up.” The voice was muffled, but distinctly Spencer’s. No one else’s growled like that. Funny how she’d forgotten that about him.

She didn’t want to see him. He couldn’t badger her into feeling a certain way; he couldn’t make her think something she didn’t just by being an insistent pest.

“I’m not leaving, Sara. And unless you want my impending pneumonia on your conscience, you’ll open up, ‘cause it’s colder than…cold out here.”

With a sigh, she unlocked the door and flung it open. Her eyes blinked at the stinging sunlight and she shivered against the blast of icy air. “What do you want, Spencer?”

She quickly deduced Spencer wasn’t alone. A man stood next to him. They were dressed similarly in jeans and brown jackets. He was shorter than Spencer, which wasn’t saying much since Spencer was close to six and a half feet tall. Dark blond hair, unusual colored eyes.

Sara turned away from his penetrating gaze, feeling uncomfortable. Those eyes seemed to be able to see into her soul. It was disconcerting and she didn’t like it. She looked at Spencer. “What’s going on?”

“Colder than cold?” the man asked Spencer.

“Can we come in? Please?”

Sara wanted to say no. She wanted to close the door and never open it again, to have the world outside her house disappear. She wanted to disappear, or end, or be no more. Sara didn’t want useless conversations from people who meant well but had no clue.

She was about to say so when something clicked inside her head. Her eyes flew to the stranger. He watched her, expressionless. Sara felt something like betrayal as she looked at Spencer. “What are you doing?”

“He can help. Please. Just talk to him.” Spencer gave her a beseeching look.

“No offense, but I don’t want to talk to you,” she told the man.

Even shorter than Spencer, he was still half a foot taller than Sara and she had to look up to meet his eyes. They were the color of wine and revealed nothing.

“None taken.” He stepped forward until Sara had to move back or be sandwiched against him. She moved.

Spencer gave her an apologetic look as he followed the guy into her house. Sara closed the door, stunned at the man’s audacity.

“We never got the chance to be properly introduced the other day,” he said, turning to face Sara.

The featureless man from Wyalusing State Park now had a face. It was sharply angled with a long nose and thin lips. It wasn’t handsome, but it was arresting.

“Who are you?” Sara tore her eyes from his and frowned at Spencer. Spencer wouldn’t meet her eyes. Why had he done this? All he was going to accomplish by this spectacle was her embarrassment and resentment.

The man moved in a slow circle, his eyes studying the bare walls. Sara wanted to hide from the knowing look on his face. His expression said he knew her secrets and he knew why she had them. They weren’t his to know. Her pain was hers alone and he had no right to act like he understood it.

“I was just about to get to that.” He stopped, giving her his full attention. “My name is Mason Wells and I’m a grief counselor.”

Sara stiffened, her face turning hot. “I don’t need a counselor.”

“Lucky for you I’m on vacation for the next month. So technically I’m not a counselor right now.”

“I want you to leave.” Sara looked at Spencer. “Both of you.”

“Sara, you need to talk to someone. Mason can help you. Just talk to him. Please?”

She shook her head, crossing her arms and uncrossing them. Sara wouldn’t look at either of them. They’d invaded her home, her privacy, and she wanted them gone. She wouldn’t forgive Spencer for this, not ever. He’d crossed a line, good intentions or not.

“I went to Wyalusing State Park to commit suicide once.”

Sara’s head snapped up and her eyes shot to Mason.

“It wasn’t the first time I’d attempted it. Actually, it wasn’t the last either. It’s so convenient; rocky cliff, choppy waters below. Imminent death.” He shoved his hands into his jeans pockets. “I hated myself for a long time. Carried guilt around like a blanket I couldn’t remove. I didn’t want to remove it. If I let go of the guilt, it was like saying what had happened was okay, and it wasn’t. It would never be okay. So I had to keep that blanket on, I had to feed the guilt, I had to hate myself, I had to never forget as penance.”

Her eyes burned and she swallowed thickly. She’d hated herself for a long time now. And the guilt…she didn’t think that would ever go away. “Never forget…what?” Sara whispered.

The door softly clicked and Sara looked up, surprised to find Spencer had left, leaving Mason alone with her. She tensed. Sara didn’t know this man. He was a stranger in her home. So what if Spencer knew him? So what if he was Spencer’s friend? Sara didn’t know him and he wasn’t her friend.

“I think you should leave,” she told him, backing toward the bathroom, her fingers tightly gripping the tie on the robe.

Amusement lit up his wine-colored eyes. “I will. In one hour. That’s how long our sessions will run.”

“We’re not—we’re not having sessions. You can’t just…come in here, into my house, and—and boss me around,” she stuttered, disbelief raising her voice.

Ignoring her, Mason said, “My brother died four years ago. Snowmobile accident. We were making jumps. He went first; didn’t make it all the way across. I didn’t know it and drove over him, killing him.” He paused. “I killed my brother.”

Sara’s stomach clenched as she looked at Mason. He was staring at his boots. When his tortured eyes found hers, she felt sick. She’d seen that look before; she saw it every time she looked in the mirror.

“Derek was younger, smarter, better-looking; pretty much better in every way imaginable. He had his whole life ahead of him. He was going to be a lawyer. He was engaged to a girl who loved him like I’d never seen anyone love anyone.” Mason sucked in a sharp breath. “No matter how much Annie, his fiancée, hated me, she never could hate me as much as I hated myself.”

Sara felt something warm and wet on her cheeks, and was surprised to find she was crying. Why that surprised her, she had no idea. Maybe because this time, the first time in a long time, her tears were for someone else, and not herself.

“I’m sorry,” she whispered, fisting her trembling hands under her crossed arms.

“Everyone’s sorry, aren’t they, Sara?” Mason’s eyes drilled into hers. “Everyone’s sorry, but does it really do anything? Does it bring them back? Does it bring my brother back? How about your husband? Does it make you feel better? Is there really any point to it? Why do people say it, Sara?”

“I don’t…I don’t know.” She swallowed.

“Then why did you say it?”

Sara stared at him, flustered and confused. “Because—“

“Because why?” he interrupted, his expression stern.

“Because I wanted to help!” she cried, agitated from his berating of her.

Mason smiled briefly. “Spencer wants to help. I want to help. Talk to me. Let me help.”

Sara walked toward the kitchen, stopped, and turned back to Mason. “What good will talking do? It won’t bring him back. It won’t make what happened go away. It’s a waste of time, a waste of words. Just like saying you’re sorry. Right?”

“Spencer told me you’re an artist. Show me your artwork.”

Sara’s body jerked; her mind unable to keep up with Mason’s. “No.”

Mason moved to sit down on the recliner that was his and Sara lurched forward, throwing her body between him and the chair. She trembled as she met his eyes and her breathing was too rapid, her heart pounding. “You can’t sit here.”

His eyes narrowed, but Mason moved away, into the kitchen. Sara wanted him to leave. She opened her mouth to demand it when he directed his gaze toward her. There was stark pain there, so vivid Sara’s mouth went dry. It contorted Mason’s features into a mask of anguish.

“I did a lot of drugs. I’d always had a tendency to drink too much, experiment with illegal drugs, but after Derek’s death, I became dependent on them to function. They dulled the pain, but never for long enough. It was never enough. The pain always came back. The memories. The guilt.”

Mason tapped his fingers on the table, watching his hand. “You don’t have to talk, Sara. You can just listen. I’ll do the talking for now, and when you’re ready, you can talk. Whatever you do, though, don’t do anything stupid.” He looked up, freezing her where she stood with the directness of his gaze. “Don’t do something you can’t forgive yourself for doing.”

“I already have,” she choked out, her eyes burning with unshed tears.

“No. Not yet. That wasn’t your fault.” Yes, it was. It was Sara’s fault. It would forever be her fault and nothing would or could change that.

“So that wasn’t my fault, but what happened with your brother; it was yours?”

“I was drinking. I’d smoked marijuana that night. I think it’s safe to say it was my fault.”

“It could have happened regardless.”

“Only it didn’t.”

A tense silence ensued. Sara finally broke it, curiosity driving her to ask, “What got you to stop? The drugs and alcohol, I mean.”

“I had to find something to make me want to live. I had to find something that was bigger than the guilt and pain I carried around.”

“And you did?”

Mason’s eyes softened. “I did.”

She almost envied that; that Mason had been able to find peace when it continued to elude her for any length of notable time.

A knock came at the door, followed by Spencer. He looked from the kitchen where Mason stood to the living room where Sara was. “Do you hate me now?” he asked Sara.

Sara rubbed her face. Of course she didn’t hate him. She wasn’t especially happy with him at the moment, but she didn’t hate him. That emotion was reserved for herself.

When she didn’t answer, Spencer sighed. “Ready, Mason?”

“I’ll be back next week, Sara. Sunday. At nine.” He didn’t ask; he told. “Be dressed next time. Showered. Oh, and have coffee ready too. I like Dunkin’ Donuts. Spencer said you bake?”

Sara’s face heated at his demanding tone. “You’re bossy.”

He smiled. “Derek tells me that every day.”

She frowned, wondering what he meant. His brother Derek was dead. How could he talk to him every day? Was he loonier than she was? Sara sometimes thought she saw and heard her husband, but she didn’t hear his voice in her head on a daily basis. Not yet.

Spencer paused at the door. “I really did just want to help you, Sara. I hate seeing you like this.”

She hesitated. Spencer was almost out the door. “Spencer.” He stopped, looking over his broad shoulder at her. “I…” Sara blew out a noisy breath. “I know you meant well.” It was as close to a thank you as she could get.

He gave a brusque nod and left, the door closing with loud finality.

The quiet was too quiet. It usually didn’t bother her, but today, for whatever reason, she couldn’t stand it. Maybe because in the silence her thoughts morphed into one mass of questions and remembrances she couldn’t deal with.

You always thought they’d be there, day after day; alive, whole. Sara had thought he’d always be there. She’d imagined years and years of them together; growing old together, having children and grandchildren, and then when it was time, dying together. In her mind it had always been them as a couple; not her without him. If only she’d known. If only she’d known he would be taken from her. She would have done things so differently. But that was the thing about life: no one ever really knew when it would end.

***

Standing just inside the door, she stared at him, watching his black tee shirt tighten over his strong back as he held a nail to the wall with one hand and raised a hammer with the other.

“I’m pregnant.”

Cole dropped the hammer on his foot, cursing. He straightened, turning those magnetic blue eyes on her. He demanded, “What did you say?”

Sara inhaled slowly, shakily. Stomach in knots and alive with wild fluttering she knew had nothing to do with the life already growing inside her, she fought for a calm she did not feel. “I’m pregnant.”

She didn’t look at him; she couldn’t. It hadn’t been planned. Babies were in the future, sure, but not yet. They weren’t ready. They weren’t ready, but she was. Of course she was. Already she could feel the love for her unborn baby inside, already she couldn’t wait to hold her child; their child.

He slammed his hands on his lean hips, inhaling sharply. “What—?” Cole looked down and swallowed. “What was that? One more time. Did you say—did you say you’re pregnant?” His eyes met hers, brighter than normal and focused intently on her.

Nodding, eyes stinging with happy tears, Sara smiled. “Yes. Tell me you’re okay with this.”

Cole exhaled noisily, averting his face. His posture was stiff and he hadn’t moved his hands from his hips. He seemed to be struggling. Sara felt her joy dim. It was scary and new; they didn’t have a clue how to raise a baby, but they’d learn. No one was ever really ready to have one, mentally or financially. If Cole was completely against this, Sara didn’t know what she would do. She couldn’t take that.

“Cole? Are you not glad about this?” she whispered, dropping her purse to the floor. She rubbed her arms, cold in the stillness of his response. “I know it’s unexpected and business has been a little slow and…” Sara trailed off as he strode toward her, his eyes on fire and his jaw tight.

“How can you ask such a thing?” he said harshly, stopping before her. Cole’s body heat radiated off him, warming her with his nearness.

She swallowed against a suddenly dry throat. “You’re not saying anything. What am I supposed to think?”

“I am so happy,” Cole said slowly, cupping her face in his rough palms. “So happy. You have no idea how happy I am.” He took a shuddering breath, pressing his cherry Carmex-scented lips to her forehead. “So happy,” he whispered.

Sara cried, loving Cole more in the moment he knelt before her and pressed his cheek to her flat stomach than in any other moment she could remember. “Love you, baby.”

“Love you too.” She brushed his soft hair back from his forehead, loving the texture of it, loving him.

He looked up at her. “I was talking to the baby. You know, love you, baby.”

With a snort, she pulled away. “Of course you were. What were you attempting to hang up when I walked through the door?”

Cole stood, rubbing the back of his neck. “Nothing.” He looked guilty.

Sara sighed, moving toward the living room. “What is it, Cole?”

“I won it,” he announced, a slight scowl on his face.

Eyebrows lifted, she looked at the 10 X 13 picture resting on the couch. “So everything you win must go up on the wall?”

“No. Just the cool stuff.”

The ‘cool stuff’ was a close-up photo of a vintage red Ford truck from the fifties or sixties. It sat in a field of grass, shining with the glint of sunlight on it and blue skies behind it. The body was rounded in a way the newer trucks had gotten away from.

“I thought you were a Dodge boy?”

“Well. Yeah. But look at it! And I won it.”

Sara smiled at Cole. “I like it. Not above the couch, but I like it.”

“So you’re saying I should put the wedding picture back up?” Cole laughed at the look on her face, grabbing her wrist and spinning her into his arms. He kissed her nose, saying, “We are going to be the coolest parents ever.”

Sara blinked her eyes and the sink full of dishwater came into view; a sink full of water and dish soap for two plates, one cup, and a fork and a spoon. The soap smelled like apples and the bubbles make a fizzing sound. Some things were hard to adapt to, even the lack of dirty dishes. She would give anything to have a sink full of dirty dishes if it meant he was still in her life. With a sigh, Sara quickly washed them and set them in the strainer, wondering how such a small task could so completely wear her out. The effort it took to get through each day wore her out.

4

It was Tuesday. Three weeks exactly from Tuesday the 29th of November. That was the date she’d been told to be there, to talk to Dr. Henderson, to do what had been chosen for her to do. It was a countdown of dread for Sara. She would never be ready to talk about what he wanted to talk about. It was unequivocally impossible for her to do what had been designated as her duty long ago.

Her feet unconsciously moved in the direction of the art room she hadn’t entered in months. Sara stopped by it, running a hand over the rough wood, closing her eyes at an onslaught of sorrow. She couldn’t bring herself to open the door. It reminded her of him. Everything in this house did. But she couldn’t forget. She didn’t want to forget. Maybe part of the reason she couldn’t let go, the reason Sara refused to let go, was because if she did, she feared she’d lose him as well. She couldn’t say goodbye to him.

Sara touched her forehead to the door, hot tears pooling in her eyes and dropping to her cheeks. She closed her eyes, shuddering breaths wracking her shoulders, her whole body. Her mind formed the image of his laughing face with the crinkles around his pale blue eyes and she couldn’t move from the pain that came along with it.

She missed his eyes the most. They’d been electrifying, charged with life and passion, able to see every part of Sara there was to see and those she’d rather weren’t seen. The thought of them never being open again, the thought of never staring into them and getting lost in the blue ocean that was her husband’s eyes, it was heart wrenching. Unbearable.

He used to watch her paint. He’d sit in a chair in the corner of the room and watch her for hours. He’d said it soothed him to watch her work. A sob was torn from her and Sara slapped her palm against the door. She wanted him back. Sara wanted to feel his arms around her; she wanted to have his scent cocoon her. This emptiness inside of her; it was killing her.

“Don’t cry, Sara.”

She inhaled sharply, spinning around. Her eyes scanned the kitchen, looking for a body and face to put with the voice. There was no one. I’m losing my mind. Sara slumped against the door. She put a shaking hand to her temples, closing her eyes.

“He wouldn’t want you to cry for him. It’s okay to be sad. It’s okay to hurt. But you still have to live. You have to go on, Sara.”

Sara kept her eyes closed. The voice seemed to leave only when she tried to find it. “I can’t go on without him. He’s supposed to be here, with me.” Pain tightened her throat, made it almost impossible to swallow.

“He is, Sara. He’ll always be with you.”

With a hand over her mouth and an arm across her stomach, Sara leaned over, trying to shrink in and away from the hurt that never went away. It had wrapped its arms around her and held her tightly within its grasp. She had to get away, from the pain, from the voice that wasn’t really there.

Sara lurched forward, toward the phone. One voice could ground her. One voice could give her relief. She punched in the numbers, pacing in front of the refrigerator, jittery and sick feeling. One ring. Two. Three. Sara whimpered, beginning to pull the phone from her ear.

“Must be one of those days again, huh?” She closed her eyes, immediate relief dropping her shoulders. Sara leaned her back against the fridge as she listened.

“First time he talked about you I knew you were it for him. There was this look on his face. It’s hard to explain, even now. It was shock and joy and kind of a sick look all rolled into one. The look of love. I teased him about it and he punched me in the gut, so I knew it was true. He fell for you fast and hard.” He went silent.

Sara wiped her eyes with the back of her hand.

His voice was softer when he spoke again. “He said you were the most beautiful thing he’d ever seen. More beautiful than the sun or a flower or any kind of scenery I could imagine. That’s what he said, Sara. He said when he looked at you he couldn’t breathe and his stomach went all crazy. He said when he looked at you he was home.”

A sob escaped her and the phone dropped from her hand, clattering as it hit the floor. Sara went to her hands and knees next to it, her head dropping forward. It hurt too much. The pain swept through her, wracking her body with tremors. Make it go away. Please. Make it go away.

Sara pulled herself to her feet, eyes trained on a drawer next to the sink. She was pulled to it by an invisible force, her fingers locking on the top of it. Once it was open, Sara stared at the collection of knives; all different shapes and sizes. She closed her eyes, jumping when someone pounded on the front door. Her eyes went back to the knives.

The door burst open and Sara reflexively slammed the drawer shut, whirling around to face the intruder, her pulse racing. How had he gotten there so fast?

They looked nothing alike. Lincoln Walker was bigger, taller, with gray eyes and darker hair. But when Sara looked at him, she saw his brother. It was in the perpetually lowered eyebrows, the square jaw, and the stance. Lincoln was the moodier, easier to anger, brother; her husband the more amiable, if slightly wild, brother. Nothing alike in personalities or looks and yet she saw her husband in Lincoln. Maybe because she wanted to.

“What are you doing, Sara?” he demanded.

“I’m—what are you doing?” she shot back.

“You look guilty.” Lincoln strode for her, not stopping until he was inches from her and looming over her.

Sara had to crane her neck back to meet his eyes, and when she did, she saw they were red-rimmed and bloodshot. She took in the dark stubble of his jaw and the unkempt, shaggy hair he used to always keep short. She’d never noticed before how it waved up around his ears on the nape of his neck. Brackets had taken a place around his mouth and he seemed thinner than she remembered. It was wearing on him too.

“You can’t just barge into my house, Lincoln.” Sara backed up a step and Lincoln followed.

He had on a gray hooded sweatshirt and faded jeans and brought the citrus and mint scent of soap and toothpaste with him. It was all wrong. Wrong man, wrong scent, wrong everything.

“Yeah, I can, ‘cause technically, it’s my brother’s house too. You look like shit. When’s the last time you showered or ate a decent meal?”

Lincoln had always been blunt, something Sara had admired. Now, though, she really wished he wasn’t quite so blunt. This was why she had been avoiding him as much as she could. Because she knew he’d do this. He thought he had to look out for her, he thought it was his responsibility to take care of her for his brother. On the phone he could talk to her and not expect anything, because he knew he wouldn’t get anything; not even a response, but in person, Lincoln agitated and pushed her and made demands; he always had. They’d used to argue as a form of communication, something that had forever irritated her husband.

“You’re one to talk. You don’t look much better.”

He opened his mouth, and then closed it. “What happened on the phone? You were there and then you weren’t.” Lincoln’s eyes went to the floor and he leaned down to pick up the beeping phone. He turned it off and resituated it on the wall before narrowing his flint-colored eyes on her. “I miss him too, Sara, but at least I work. At least I try to be normal. I don’t hide in my house and push everyone away. You lost your husband, but I lost my brother.”

Those words pierced her with overwhelming anguish. “Why don’t you hate me?” she asked raggedly.

Lincoln slammed his fingers through his hair, messing it up more. One lock went to rest against his forehead. “I think you hate yourself enough for the both of us.” He pointed a finger in the direction of the living room. “Go take a shower. Now.”

She shook her head. “No.”

He shifted his jaw back and forth, determination darkening his features. “You get in that shower now or I’ll put you in it myself.”

A trickle of fear went down her back, but Sara didn’t really believe Lincoln would do that. But the look on his face; it said he would. “I’m fine, Lincoln. I just…I dropped the phone and…”

“Don’t lie to me, Sara. Believe me; I’ve said it all before myself. Maybe instead of wallowing away in self-pity, you should think of how Cole would feel knowing you’re like this. Is it your goal to end up like him? Is that it?”

Sara recoiled at the use of his name, sucking in a sharp breath and turning away from Lincoln. He kept talking, but she couldn’t hear him over the roar in her ears. She fought for every breath, wanting to drop to her knees. Sara closed her eyes. Hearing his name was too much. It hurt too much to hear it, to say it, to even think it. So she didn’t.

The tears streamed down her cheeks, dropping to the white and gray linoleum floor. Sara braced a hand against the fridge and hung her head. She felt his warmth like he was behind her, holding her. Only it wasn’t him. It would never be him again. Lincoln touched her shoulder and Sara jerked away, stumbling back and bumping into the stove. “Don’t touch me, Lincoln.”

His jaw clenched. “Why? What happens when someone touches you? Do you melt?”

“You’re an ass,” she told him in a voice that shook.

“I’ve been gentle with you, Sara, but no more. This has gone on long enough. Now get in the shower and get dressed. We’re going to go see him.”

She mutely shook her head. No. She couldn’t. Sara couldn’t go to that place. She couldn’t see him. It wasn’t him. It wasn’t her husband. Sara wrapped her arms around herself and hunched over, trying to make the hollowness go away, trying to make the unrelenting sick feeling disappear. She was dying on the inside, losing herself, turning into a pulsating mass of pain and nothing else. That was all she was now. Sara didn’t know how to make it stop. She longed for it to stop.

Lincoln grabbed her arms and pulled her up and toward him.

“I said don’t touch me!” she shrieked, trying to tug her arms from his grasp, but he only tightened his grip. “Lincoln, let go of me. Let go of me!” Sara moved to slap him, to push him away.

He brought her body against his. Panic made her fight harder. No one’s arms but his should be around her. Not ever. Sara lurched away, wanting Lincoln’s hands off her. Not letting her get away, Lincoln pulled her to him again and rested his chin on the crown of her head; large, resilient, and unmovable. Sara made puny, pitiful attempts to remove his touch, but it wasn’t going anywhere. He was too strong and she was too weak.

“Lincoln, please,” she whispered, unable to stand the touch of another man. It felt like disloyalty to him.

He didn’t answer; just kept holding her.

Shaking, spent, she finally went still. Her arms were wedged between them and of their own accord her palms rested on his hard, warm chest. His heart pounded beneath her hand. Bu-bum…bu-bum…bu-bum. Sara turned her attention to that, her breaths slowing, and her body relaxing the longer she concentrated on the steady, strong beat.

The minutes they stayed like that were endless. For the first time in a long time Sara felt not quite so alone. Relief washed over her in the safety of his arms. Lincoln knew her pain. He knew what she was going through. He was going through it himself. He’d lost him too. The catastrophic difference between them, though, was that it wasn’t his fault. It was Sara’s. It was a glaring truth she couldn’t ignore or forget. Sara stiffened as the remorse came back in full attack, punching her in the stomach and taking her breath away.