The Marine's Baby, Maybe

by Rogenna Brewer

  She had an awkward rhythm and he helped her into that, too.

  She threw her head back and closed her eyes until he made her look at him. “Say it again.”

  “I want you, Calhoun,” Caitlin said over and over again until she was completely sated.

  When he wrapped her in that arm with the intricate tribal design, she felt protected.

  Chapter Fourteen

  “WHERE DO YOU THINK YOU’RE going?” Cait hauled him back into bed and snuggled up against his bare backside.

  “You’re insatiable,” Lucky said, rolling toward her.

  “Hmm…I’m hormonal.” She closed her eyes and a smile curved her lips.

  “I’m just going for my run.” He may fall asleep in her bed every night, but that didn’t mean he felt he belonged there. He stole out of her bed at the crack of dawn just to try to put it all in perspective.

  He cleared his throat to broach a subject he’d been trying to get her to talk about ever since that first night they’d made love. “I think we should have talked about this before becoming lovers, Cait.”

  “Lovers,” she said, propping herself up on her elbow and giving him her full attention. “Is that what we are? Don’t sweat it, Calhoun. I know this is just a fling. Nora Jean will be here all the time after the baby’s born. My father’s coming for a visit. I won’t even be able to have sex for six weeks. I’m sure I won’t feel like it, anyway, because I’ll be busy with the baby. So you can leave with a clear conscience anytime you want. Just not this morning,” she said.

  What about a contingency plan for his staying?

  Looking at her, he didn’t ask.

  They never talked about future plans because they didn’t have any. There’d be no room in her life for him, not even as a lover, after the baby.

  He was still Luke’s brother, the baby’s Uncle Lucky—the guy who’d breeze in on birthdays and Christmases.

  The guy who was falling in love with his sister-in-law, the mother of his child, and didn’t know what the hell to do about it.

  THE DISPLAY CASE CAITLIN HAD asked Big Luke to order on her first visit to Calhoun Cycles had arrived. She had plenty of time to put it together before the commercial shoot tomorrow. So when Maddie, Big Luke’s current wife, tempted her with a mother-to-be makeover, Caitlin accepted.

  Caitlin was relaxing with a fruit-juice spritzer in the lounge. The log cabin–like atmosphere was anything but rustic and provided the perfect mountain view from the tall windows throughout the five-star resort.

  Maddie sat down and showed Cait the new ring she’d purchased to show off her manicure. “He’ll be mad when he gets the bill,” she was saying about her credit card spending. “But what the hell, he’s got the money and he can’t take it with him, right?”

  It wasn’t that Caitlin disliked Maddie, but she’d had enough already.

  She reached into her own shopping bag and pulled out the matching T-shirts to show Maddie.

  Big Guy. Little Guy.

  The purchase had been a guilty indulgence. She didn’t even know if she’d ever give it to him. Only that they’d created an impossible situation for themselves, made all the more difficult by becoming lovers.

  The truth would hurt too many people. And the deception…It had never felt like a deception until now. The sperm bank mix-up wasn’t his fault. And she wasn’t going to tie him down because of it.

  “Isn’t that cute,” Maddie said. “I want a baby,” she whined. “And not just because of the prenup, either. But of course, the chemo and radiation fried his sperm.”

  “Big Luke has cancer?”

  “He had a lung removed last year. He’s in remission now, but who knows how long he has. The doctor told him to give up smoking, and he didn’t. I’d give up smoking if I were pregnant,” Maddie said in her rather roundabout logic. “And if I were pregnant Big Luke would have to give up smoking, too.”

  Cait was still trying to digest the news of Big Luke’s remission from lung cancer. She knew people didn’t have to smoke to get the disease. But it seemed as if a life-threatening illness should have been enough to make both Big Luke and Maddie quit smoking. And if not, she doubted either of them would quit for a baby.

  “Maddie, give up smoking first.”

  LATER THAT AFTERNOON CAITLIN stopped by the VA hospital and checked in on her favorite patient.

  “Guess you really are an apothecary,” he said when she showed off her license to Master Sergeant Hobbs. His voice lacked his usual boom. Caitlin adjusted his pillows without a single complaint out of him.

  She’d read his charts. His stump wasn’t healing. His body wasn’t fighting off the infection. He was losing his battle with diabetes.

  “Stryker won’t leave his side,” she said.

  “He’s taken a real shine to him, then?”

  “They’ve taken a real shine to each other.” She smiled sadly. Would he take Stryker with him when he left? Or would he leave Stryker with her?

  She showed Master Sergeant Hobbs the T-shirts she’d purchased.

  “I want to hear more about that new house of yours.”

  “You mean I haven’t bored you with the details?”

  “So, you let him pick out the color to the nursery. What color did he pick?” he asked, laying his head back against the pillow and closing his eyes.

  “Blue.”

  BLUE FLAMES, ON BLUE. Lucky crouched to admire the custom paint job on the first bike crafted to his own custom design. He’d worked many hours to get this machine done. It didn’t hurt that he had an entire staff and everything he needed at his disposal.

  Big Luke had been very generous.

  Making up for lost time?

  Guilty conscience?

  It didn’t matter. The past was history.

  “What are you going to name it?” Jose asked as he free-handed the finishing touches to the flames with a fine paintbrush. Jose was a master of detail artistry.

  Cait was the first name that came to mind. But a street bike needed a biker name. Something tough.

  “Stryker,” he said.

  Jose chose his angle carefully and painted it on.

  For the most part Big Luke left Lucky alone to run their new customization service. He briefed the old man on those things he thought Big Luke should know about and didn’t bother him with the day-to-day operations.

  Speak of the devil. Lucky pushed to his feet as Big Luke headed his way.

  He stopped to look at the bike.

  “Nice job,” he said, giving it his patent understated approval. “Let’s use it in the commercial tomorrow.”

  CAITLIN SPENT THE FOLLOWING morning at Calhoun Cycles, putting together her display. Her heart filled with pride for Luke.

  The case was backed against a wall, where it could be considered inconspicuous, but where customers might also wander over and take a look.

  The male bust filled out the uniform nicely.

  These ribbons and medals were actually ones he’d received, including his posthumous Purple Heart.

  She’d stopped by the Army/Navy surplus for accessories, putting the hat and gloves at just the right angle.

  And she’d included a picture of their wedding and of his funeral. And a sampling of their letters.

  A brass plate on the woodblock stated his name and rank on one line, Lieutenant Luke Calhoun, and his date of birth to date of death on the next. Below that, his date of service.

  Big Luke came out of his office to admire her handiwork.

  “Here,” he said. “You asked about Luke’s motocross days. I dug these up for you.” He handed her a stack of videotapes. “Old family movies of Luke I haven’t had transferred to DVD yet.”

  “Thank you. I can do that for you,” she said, accepting the tapes.

  He nodded toward the display case. “That’s going to look real nice for the commercial, Cait.”

  “Remember, nothing too overt. You’re going to stand right here—” she indicated the tape on the floor beside Luke’
s display case “—and say…”

  “CALHOUN CYCLES, A TRADITION of proud service.”

  “Cut!” the director yelled. “That’s a keeper, Mr. Big. Now the one with Junior and the puppy in the shot.”

  “On your marks.”

  They moved into place, standing side-by-side with Lucky holding the puppy.

  “And mark.”

  “Scene Two. Take One.”

  “Calhoun Cycles, a tradition of proud service,” they said in unison half a dozen times. Then Lucky had to repeat that another half-dozen while crouching to pet Sergeant Stryker.

  Then they moved the whole thing outside for a wide-angle shot of all the Calhoun Cycles’ employees in the parking lot, the service staff lined up behind Lucky and the sales staff lined up behind his father.

  Maddie, of course, as his father’s secretary and wife, was in the picture. And when the director mistook Cait for Lucky’s pregnant wife as she was standing on the sidelines, he pulled her and the puppy in, too.

  According to the director, pregnant women and puppies tugged at the heartstrings.

  He didn’t have to tell Lucky that.

  LUCKY RUSHED HOME WITH STRYKER at the end of another long day to find Cait in bed with a bag of potato chips. She was wearing Luke’s T-shirt as she lay surrounded by videotapes. Homemade movies from the look of it.

  “Everything all right?” he asked, putting the puppy down on the bed.

  “Uh-huh,” she answered without looking at him.

  She put another chip in her mouth, and he glanced at the motocross race on the screen. More old tapes of Luke? No wonder she looked as if she’d been crying.

  “Wait.” She stopped him as he turned to leave.

  She picked up the remote and aimed it at the TV. “I think this is the part where you break his collarbone.” She turned the volume way up.

  He didn’t have to see the screen to know which race that was. She looked at him, and he saw the accusation in her expression.

  She reached behind her for a pillow and threw it at him. He knocked it to the floor. She threw the remote and hit him in the chest. It fell and the batteries rolled out, across the floor.

  “I’m not that kid anymore, Cait” was all he said in his own defense. He slept in the FOB that night with Stryker.

  ON THE EVENING OF HER BABY shower, Caitlin had taken half a day just to get out of bed. Her back ached and it upset her to realize just how deep Calhoun’s hatred for her husband ran. That one race wasn’t the only evidence. There were many instances of his aggression toward Luke caught on tape.

  Nora Jean arrived early to decorate. Evelyn and Dottie arrived after work with the cake. Calhoun was nowhere to be found. Cait hadn’t seen him since she’d thrown the remote.

  When the guests arrived, all she could think was who were these people—these strangers showering her baby with gifts? She must have smiled her way through it. She just didn’t remember.

  When it was over, Dottie cleared her living room while Evelyn helped Caitlin clean up in the kitchen and Nora Jean took inventory.

  “Who in the world gave you this?” She came out of the nursery with a Babies R Us bag. She plucked the Big Guy T-shirt from the bag and held it up. “How inappropriate,” she said, tossing it aside.

  Then she went into the living room for more stuff to haul into the nursery.

  Evelyn glanced at Caitlin. “Cait, you look exhausted,” Evelyn said in a voice meant to carry into the living room. Then Evelyn had a quiet word with Nora Jean and Dottie and the other two women left.

  When Evelyn came back into the kitchen she plucked the T-shirt off the floor, where it had dropped. “You did a pretty good job of faking it tonight,” Evelyn said, folding the Big Guy T-shirt and putting it back in the bag with Little Guy. “I don’t think anyone knew your heart was broken. What’d he do?”

  “I wish I had a mother like you.” Cait threw her arms around Evelyn’s neck. “Why does he hate Luke so much, Evelyn?”

  Evelyn took a step back and sat down, patting the stool beside her. “Luke was seven when he stopped going by ‘Junior.’”

  That got Cait’s attention. She sat down. His mother never used Calhoun’s given name. And she was talking about Calhoun—Cait could tell by the way the woman’s voice had taken on a note of nostalgia.

  “We were in the grocery store when we bumped into Nora Jean. Bruce and Little Luke must have been about three. Bruce was in the cart, but Luke was too big. And Little Luke was running all over the aisle.

  “Nora Jean and I had never been on the best of terms,” she continued. “I must have said something about getting her child under control. Anyway, Big Luke boomed from the end of the aisle, ‘Luke, come here.’ When their father spoke like that the boys listened.”

  While Caitlin fidgeted, Evelyn continued. “Luke thought his father was speaking to him. He took a couple steps in that direction. Big Luke picked up Little Luke and left….The boys knew each other from visitation, of course. But his father had a new wife and a new family, and I think, in that moment, Luke believed Little Luke had been born to replace him.”

  Evelyn reached over to pat Caitlin’s hand. Caitlin’s fidgeting had turned into full-blown restlessness, and she got up to make tea.

  “He was quiet for the rest of the shopping trip and on the way home. I was unloading the car when he told me he didn’t want to be called Junior anymore. I said, ‘Okay, we’ll call you Luke from now on.’ I knew this had something to do with the incident in the grocery store, but I didn’t know what.

  “He said, ‘I don’t want to be Luke, either.’ I could see his heart was broken. It was unkind of Nora Jean to choose that name for her son. And unconscionable for Big Luke to allow it. I didn’t know what to do to make it right. So I said, ‘Then we’ll call you Lucky because I’m so lucky to have you.’

  “If he can’t see how Lucky he is to have you, Cait, then he doesn’t deserve you. But you’re going to have to find it in your heart to forgive him, because that’s something he’s never going to forgive of himself.”

  Chapter Fifteen

  THE NEXT DAY CAITLIN called Bruce just to hear a friendly voice. “What’s up?” he asked. “The big guy treating you all right?”

  Big Guy. Little Guy.

  “I can’t make sense of any of this, Bruce.” So she told him. Everything. CryoBank. Calhoun’s sperm, his baby, everything.

  “You don’t sound surprised.”

  “Lucky didn’t tell me. I guessed.”

  “Do you know what this would do to Nora Jean? It would devastate her. And I feel as if I somehow tainted my husband’s memory. And why does it have to be that Calhoun hates the man I loved so much?”

  She explained to Bruce what she had seen on the motocross tapes.

  “I think I might have something to ease your mind on that score.” It took him several minutes to find and send the file he was looking for. “I captured this on my cell phone a couple weeks before Luke died.”

  It was a basketball game. A night game from the look of it. Just a couple of three-on-three teams shooting hoops.

  Luke was on one team. Calhoun on the other.

  “Why am I watching this?”

  Calhoun was aggressive. Used foul language. And went after Luke every chance he got. In short, he was a bully. And on one particular play where Luke had the ball, Calhoun stole it with a shoulder hit that knocked the ball away from Luke. Luke hit the ground hard.

  A whistle blew and a foul was called. “Just keep watching,” Bruce said.

  Action stopped for a moment. Calhoun was breathing heavily from exertion. Sweating, he paced in a circle. When he turned to Luke, Calhoun reached down and helped Luke back to his feet.

  Action resumed with Luke’s free throws.

  Caitlin heaved a sigh. “That makes me feel better,” she said. Even if her heart ached just a little knowing that had probably been her husband’s last basketball game.

  THAT EVENING NORA JEAN CALLED to say she couldn’t mak
e it to that Thursday’s Lamaze class. She had her monthly bereavement meeting in Colorado Springs with other mothers of fallen soldiers.

  Caitlin left a note for Calhoun.

  She was already sitting on her mat alone in class when she saw him, a silhouette in the door frame. She caught her breath.

  He removed his leather jacket and joined her on the floor. Her heart knew a moment of pure joy. There was only one person who belonged in the delivery room with her.

  “Hey, Coach,” she said, trying to keep the mood light as he snuggled up against her backside.

  “Hey,” he responded, and she relaxed against him.

  What would he say if she asked him to stay until after the baby was born? What would he say if she simply asked him to stay?

  “YOU WANTED TO SEE ME?” Lucky asked as he stepped into Big Luke’s office.

  “We’re getting good press on that new commercial.” Big Luke put down the newspaper he’d been reading. “In fact, we’re getting good press on the custom service we’re offering. I think we should show off that bike of yours in the motor and boat show coming to town.”

  “Sounds good.” His response sounded flat, even to his own ears. He stood there a moment with his hands tucked in the front pockets of his jeans. “Was there anything else?” he asked, already turning to leave.

  “Yes,” his father said, surprising him.

  Lucky took a step back toward the desk. Instead of inviting him to sit, his father stood. Big Luke opened the glass-front cabinet that hid the wet bar. “Bought this the year you were born.” He pulled out a bottle of Scotch and two glasses. “Think it’s long past time we cracked it open.”

  Hearing something close to sentiment in the old man made Lucky shift uncomfortably. But he nodded.

  Big Luke poured two tumblers and handed one to him. “I’m not going to be around forever. I’d like you to be part of the business.” His father raised his glass expectantly.

  Lucky had waited all his life to hear those words.