by C. B. Stagg
As I readied for my graduation ceremony, I allowed myself a second to mourn the absence of Jase at such a monumental moment in my life. Over the last year and a half, I hadn’t seen him once, nor had I spoken to him. I’d received an email forward here and there, but I never responded, and eventually they just stopped coming. I took his disappearance to mean he’d finally moved on, and I was glad for him, though the thought of Jase sharing himself with someone else was a knife straight to my gut.
“Rebecca, I can’t tell you how proud Dad and I are of you. You are the most amazing young woman I have ever met, and it’s a privilege to call you my daughter.”
Oh, my mom, always with the waterworks. “Thanks, y’all,” I said, hugging both my parents at the same time. “I know I wouldn’t be here without you. Thank you for always making my dreams come true.”
Sometimes I worried that, by not adopting again after getting me already well into my teens, my parents had missed out on the full parenting experience. But in watching them dote on me as if I were more precious than life itself, I put that thought to rest. It was easy to remember that time in my life when I was a child without parents, and the Hansons were parents without a child. And because of the act of one special boy who brought us all together, we were now a family. None of us cared about age, or stages, or firsts. We were grateful to have each other, and nothing else mattered.
“No, baby, thanks for making our dreams come true. Now, let’s get to the arena and get you graduated, shall we?”
My dad not-so-secretly wiped the tears that had accumulated in the corners of his eyes, then offered me his arm.
We were on our way to campus.
“Just drop me here, then go park. I’ve got to go get lined up.”
Traffic had been insane. The entire campus, it seemed, was under construction. I’d been eyeing my watch, trying not to be too annoying… but my dad had been driving like Mr. Magoo and I had a call time to make. My parents pulled up to the curb, finally, and I got out as the biting December wind blew my gown up in all directions. I’d never been so glad I’d worn pants in all my life.
Glancing at the time again, I started to run headfirst into the wind. But as soon as I entered the building, I bumped right into a solid wall of familiar warmth. “Oh, I’m so—”
I looked up and met with Jase’s big, blue, smiling eyes.
Chapter 32
Jase
I CAUGHT HER BY her arms and watched as the color drained from her beautiful face, guessing I was probably the last person she expected to find. “Did you really think I would miss your graduation?” She wrenched herself from my grasp, noting a little too late I wasn’t holding on all that tight. Stumbling, I caught her again.
“Yeah, actually, I did think you’d miss it. You’ve missed the last year and a half of my life.” As soon as I let her go again, she stood tall, smoothing out her windblown hair. Her pointed stare told me exactly where we stood.
“And that is something I will regret for the rest of my life.”
At that, her confidence started to falter. “Wha-What do you mean by that?” Her words were barely audible, and she looked terrified.
“I mean, I’m an idiot, and it’s taken time away from you—”
She held her finger up to me, halting the speech I’d rehearsed the whole three hours it had taken to drive from Waco to College Station.
“No, Jase. Just, no.” Her head shook vehemently. “I spent months and months learning to live without you, then you show up here today? So you could do what? Say, ‘Hey, I may still love you, I might even miss you a little,’ only to leave and break my heart again? Well, guess what! You spent years fixing me, only to shatter my soul with a few words, so if you’ll excuse me,” she turned and started walking down the deserted hallway that led to the staging area. “I am going to try and pull myself together so my family can watch me walk across the stage before—”
“Becky!” I yelled her name with every bit of authority I could muster, and she spun around, anger flashing in her eyes, ready to read me the riot act. Then she stopped cold and her mouth dropped open wide.
Chapter 33
Becky
I RAN OVER TO THAT fool boy, hands covering my mouth, trying to hold back the flood of tears threatening to ruin my makeup. I had just half an hour before graduation. “Get up off that filthy ground!” I tried to tug Jase to a standing position, but he wouldn’t budge.
“No, I’m not moving. You need to listen to me!” He was frantic, so I dropped to my knees in front of him, and I lost the battle, bawling while he spoke.
“Rebecca Hanson, you’re the last thing I think about before I go to sleep and the first thing I think about when I wake up. Your whispers permeate my dreams. Your presence in my life was beautiful and magical and so very loud, but I was stupid and didn’t listen. Then, the silence of your absence drove me mad.”
His tears were the end of me.
I reached up to wipe his freckled cheeks, but he captured me in his arms. I whispered into his ear, “You were the first person who ever felt like home to me… ”
Jase whispered back, “When we were together, the world was right where we wanted it… ”
“I still look for your face in every crowd, even though I know… ”
“My favorite place in the world is pressed against your lips… ”
I was wrecked. Shifting to look him in the eyes, I grabbed his face—but before I could kiss him, he softly said, “Marry me.”
Chapter 34
Jase
THE FIRST TIME I ASKED Becky Hanson to marry me, it was a cold December day in 2006. And while she didn’t say ‘yes,’ she didn’t say ‘no’ either. She told me to ask her again, a little further down the line, telling me I would know the exact right time. I made a vow that day: I would never go another day without Bec knowing that she was my Earth, my moon, and my stars.
The weekend after her graduation was Casey’s wedding to Kris, though they’d been living together for years. Becky and I both stood up for him as had been planned all along. We smiled, we laughed, we joked… but neither of us was convinced Casey’s marriage was for the right reasons. I know Becky was torn up watching her best friend make such a monumental mistake, but he was his own person. And ultimately, we both had to accept that Kris was now a part of our little unlikely family.
I took the bar exam the day before the wedding, and true happiness was seeing Waco, Texas in my rearview mirror for the last time. Every single solitary second of law school had been the loneliest of my life, and I wanted nothing more than to forget all about the black period of time when I was away from Becky. I’d left for law school searching for the meaning of my life, when all along she’d been sleeping right beside me for years. I was able to join with a few other members of my graduating class to open a small family law practice in College Station, and as soon as I got back home, I settled back into the blue house with Bec.
In the spring of 2008, after years of hard work and determination, Becky received her Ph.D. and was immediately hired on as a professor in the College of Education at Texas A&M. She thrived in that environment, and in turn, our relationship grew even stronger than before.
It was clear that, for both of us, our time apart showed us we needed nothing but each other to conquer the world.
“Hey, gorgeous!” Becky pranced into my office with a wide, toothy grin splitting her face and plopped into my lap.
“Someone looks like the Grinch after he ruined Christmas for all those little Who people. Care to tell me what has you so happy?” Seeing her sassy side made me want to clear the desktop of my home office in one swipe and take her right on the mahogany, which I was seriously contemplating when she continued.
“Well, since you asked… ” She kissed me full on the mouth. “You remember me telling you about that mentor program Dr. Kline asked me to be a part of?”
I rolled us away from my desk, and Becky straddled my lap. “I seem to remember something about it. What hap
pened? Is your mentee some hot freshman stud? Do I need to go to campus and publicly stake my claim on you?”
She laughed. We still hadn’t shared our relationship with the world, and I was savoring each moment we had because I knew, soon enough, we’d have to come clean. I wasn’t quite ready for the backlash that would most likely entail, having kept our secret from almost everyone close to us for just about ten years.
“Baby, you know I only have eyes for you.” Her whispered words were sweetened by more kisses. She spoke my language, and I wanted nothing more than to take her straight to bed, but the seven files currently open on my laptop told a different story. “No, my mentee is this beautiful, frail, redheaded girl with more drama than a daytime talk show. But more important than that, I think she’s a perfect match for Casey.”
I hated to burst her bubble, but… “Whoa, now. You do remember Casey is married, right? I was there, you were too… remember the whole ‘til death do us part’ thing?”
“I know, I know,” she said, brushing away my concern. “I watched it all, unable to look away like a bad accident on the side of the road. But I’ve decided that this is his starter marriage. That’s a thing now. Mark my words, Jase… this girl, Vaughn Jennings, is Casey’s missing piece. She’ll be the one to heal his soul, just as he will heal her.” Her dreamy look was so incredibly sexy, I was ready for the conversation to end, case files be damned.
“Whatever you say, babe. How ‘bout you lose some of these clothes… ”
In the time it took me to answer two pressing emails and save the open files on my desktop, the shower had started and stopped. The whole time the water was running, the boy in me wanted to just forget everything in front of me and run in to catch Becky while she was still wet, naked, and slippery; but the more responsible, adult me, wanted a clear conscience, so I could fully take advantage of Becky’s playful mood.
In our bedroom, the lights were all off, but the moonlight through the window bounced off of Becky’s naked form, stretched out on our bed, creating this magnetic glow.
“I missed this, you know,” I said, low and soft as I shed the remainder of my clothing. “Every moment I was away from you, all I wanted was you back in my bed.”
She rolled to her side to watch as I climbed in beside her. “From what I remember, I spent most of those nights in your bed. You were the one missing from the equation.” I hooked my arm around her body and pulled her on top of me before capturing her lips, intent on making sure she always knew that she was the center of my universe.
In the months following our reunion, we spent countless hours in exploration, almost like the teenagers we’d never allowed ourselves to be. We discovered once again how beautifully our bodies fit together, lock and key. The intimate closeness became a way to heal the hurts of the past, and with each kiss, touch, and caress—Becky learned to trust me again—with her heart and with her body.
“I love you, you know. I love this face, this body, this—” I smacked her bare bottom, and she squealed. Her lips brushed mine gently, then again and again until I’d had enough and unleashed a kiss full of everything I’d missed during our time apart.
“And I missed this. You touching me. I love your hands on my body.”
“You’re perfect.” I moved from her lips to her jaw. “Every bit of you is perfect.” Then, from her jaw to her neck and down her shoulder, allowing my body to slide down hers, open and waiting for me. “You’re it for me, Bec. You’re it.”
And she was. Life without Becky was no life for me, and I was ready to tell the world and make her mine, forever.
Chapter 35
Jase
December 2011
IT WAS ODD, SEEING MY grandfather’s personal office number pop up on my phone. The last time I’d seen that, a few months back, it had been his personal assistant telling me he’d been rushed to the emergency room. My mother had been in court that day, and I was the only other family he had. By the time I’d gotten a message to her, and we’d flown to Dallas on a charter flight, he was gone. The Dallas office was in good hands, though, so I didn’t understand why MVP Family Law was glowing on my caller ID.
“Ah, Jason, this is George Preston. Am I disturbing you?”
“No, George, is everything okay? Did something happen with my mother?” She’d been in Dallas, last I heard, so that seemed like the most logical reason he’d be calling me at home.
“Yes, thank you for asking, and your mother is fine. Now, I know you’ve had several conversations with your grandfather over the years about a cold case from 1999, and I hope you don’t mind, but he’d asked me to do some digging into the Toby Carraway case.”
“Okay. And?” I’d been changing into running shoes in an attempt to get a few miles in before the bad weather hit, but I stopped, frozen stiff. “I assume there have been developments, then, since you’re calling?” Toby had been a plague for Becky, haunting her dreams for as long as I had known her. To find a lead that would ultimately lead to his apprehension would be worth more than gold.
“Well, yes, that’s why I’m calling. He was captured this morning. Investigators were able to follow an anonymous tip that led to his discovery in an abandoned barn.”
“That’s amazing news. Best. Christmas. Ever! I can’t wait to te—”
“There’s more.”
I stopped, fear creeping up my spine at the severity of his tone. “The barn was located in Grimes County, between Navasota and College Station. Apparently, he’d put down roots in the area. It appeared he’d been there for quite some time.”
I knew he had family all over Central Texas, but it chilled me that he was so damn close. “The FBI found pictures, Jase. Lots of pictures.”
My stomach flipped, and my heart pounded in my ears. “Pictures?”
“They were of you, Jase. And Rebecca Hanson. There were several of you two… together.”
“Together? Like… ?”
“Like I will request they be destroyed so your mother never sees them. That kind of together.”
“Oh my God… ” I sprinted for the bathroom, hoping I’d remember to mute the phone before I lost my lunch.
“They also found a schedule of Rebecca’s classes and the address you two share on his phone. Rope, duct tape, and a loaded firearm were also uncovered in his vehicle, as well as a Texas A&M campus security uniform and ID tag.”
No mute button apparently, because George Preston waited until I was finished retching before continuing. “Jason, there’s something I need to discuss with Rebecca, rega—”
“Regarding the Toby Carraway case? I don’t think so.” Tears stung my eyes, and I was still out of breath from the events of a few minutes before. Although it felt as if I’d barfed the entire contents of my stomach, the sound of George’s voice made it start churning again.
“No, not directly. What do you know about Rebecca’s past? About where she came from before she appeared on your doorstep and the Hansons adopted her?” I thought about it.
“Not too much, actually. She’s not been very forthcoming, and I’ve never felt the need to push, but if there’s something you need that may help the case ag—”
“No, no. That won’t be necessary.” I looked up and saw Becky staring at me intently. How had I not noticed her slip in and onto a barstool directly across from where I stood in the kitchen? “I’m sure you could ask her whatever you need to know, Becky’s pretty easy to talk to.” I’d lightened my tone and smiled when Becky crossed the room to stand in front of me, her heels click-click-clicking on the newly installed ceramic tile.
“Who is that?” she mouthed, but I shook my head, ignoring her for the moment.
“When could we speak? It’s rather urgent.” George was a calm, likable guy, but his words were crisp, almost staccato, making me aware that there must be even more to the story than what I’d already gotten.
“Well, Bec and I leave for Houston the morning of the 23rd, maybe we can—”
“Okay.” I could hear mu
ffled talking in the background. “Jase, something’s come up and I need to let you go. I’ll be in touch.”
The line went dead.
“Who was that?”
I looked at Becky. How a woman could come straight home after a full day of teaching looking even better than when she’d left fresh-faced twelve hours earlier… I’d never know.
“Sit down. I have news.”
Chapter 36
Becky
“OH, NEWS!” I CLAPPED my hands together like a little girl. “Is it about Vaughn and Casey?” I smiled at him.
“I’m pleading attorney-client privilege on that one, but since you asked, she’s coming home from the hospital day after tomorrow, and there’s more… ”
“What? Tell me,” I begged, bouncing on the balls of my feet, thirsting for another little tidbit of their story. For months, Jase and I’d been watching our newly divorced best friend fall head over heels in love with my friend, Vaughn, and loving every minute of it. But if the saying, ‘What doesn’t kill you makes you stronger,’ is true—Casey and Vaughn would be Chuck Norris strong when her battle with cancer was all said and done.
“I sold the house.”
“What house?” My hands dropped to my sides as I tried to process what he was saying with little success.
