Something Borrowed (New Castle Book 3)

by Lydia Michaels

  * * * *

  Trent was selfishly relieved it was Sue’s last day. He knew the nurse did a wonderful job restoring Chloe’s confidence, but he wanted to be the one to do that. He wanted to take care of her. When she finally left, Chloe cried, and he felt terrible for wanting the nurse to go.

  Trent went to comfort her, but, again, she shouldered away his touch. He tried not to panic at the gaping distance building between them. Now that she was more lucid, taking her pain meds less and less, she probably resented him for not being the hero she’d thought he was—if she even remembered saying such things.

  Entering Dayton’s room, he shut the door. He’d been sleeping in the small bed, finding it slightly more comfortable than the couch. But tomorrow the boys were coming home and that left him wondering if it was back to the couch or back to his empty home. He didn’t like the thought of leaving her when things still felt awkward between them.

  He’d been there for days but never found the right time to address his worries. The last thing he wanted to do was put more on her shoulders, so he kept his mouth shut and tried to be there when she needed something. But she definitely didn’t seem to need him.

  Needing some air, he headed out back and walked to face the trees at the edge of the property. He gripped his temples, palm over the bridge of his nose as tears of frustration burned his eyes.

  “Hey.”

  Sucking back his emotions, he quickly blotted his eyes and turned to find Adam. “Hey.”

  “You okay?”

  “Sure.”

  The man studied him. “No one’s going to judge you for falling apart, Trenton.”

  He swallowed. He needed to stay strong for her. “I’m good.”

  “Wanna talk about it?”

  “What’s there to say?”

  “Plenty.”

  Trent’s shoulders sagged. “I feel like I can’t reach her. Every time I try to comfort her, she pulls away.”

  Adam took a few steps closer. “You know, when we first moved here, Chloe never let anyone touch her other than the boys. It took years for her to actually hug us. At first, we thought it was because we were gay, but then we sort of figured it out.”

  “I can’t make it years without being able to hold her hand. She lets Tommy sit with her and—”

  “Tommy only wants to sit with her. Maybe she’s afraid that won’t be enough for you.”

  His gaze met Adam’s. “I just want to be there for her.”

  “Then be patient. She’ll come around.”

  He nodded, knowing the man was right. “She has nightmares.”

  “I’m not surprised.”

  Last night he’d heard her crying. She’d been sleeping with the lights on and he brought her a glass of water and a pill for the pain, but she didn’t want the medicine. “She hasn’t talked about what happened.”

  “And she might never talk about it. We can’t force her.”

  “I’m not even sure she wants me here.” Adam was silent and he worried he knew something Trent didn’t. “Has she said anything to you?”

  “She misses the boys. She won’t be herself until they get here. Even then it might take a while for her to find normal again.”

  The question was, was he a part of that normal?

  * * * *

  The day the boys returned home, Trenton understood how deeply she’d missed them. Chloe gathered them into her arms, kissing their heads as she cried. Her love for her children was so pure and profound it moved him in ways nothing else could. As an outsider looking in, it became a palpable truth how much she would endure to save them from the slightest danger, and his heart ached for the lengths she must have gone to see they were, for the most part, unharmed by Marcus Hunt.

  As their young voices filled the house, so did tons of other visitors. People were constantly coming and going, wishing Chloe a fast recovery.

  Some discoloration remained around her eyes and she still had her foot in a boot, but Trenton had no clue how the rest of her body was faring. He made sure she was eating three square meals a day, drinking plenty of fluids, taking her antibiotics, and resting. If she needed anything from the store he was her go-to guy. Adam kept the house tidy and Tommy was there to entertain her with the boys.

  Once she started getting around easier, she moved from her bedroom to the living room where she’d sit with visitors throughout the day. Eventually, she began attempting more of her regular tasks, getting frustrated whenever he offered to do something for her.

  She wanted to be the one to make Mattie his peanut butter and jelly sandwiches so she could cut the crust just right. She also wanted to play video games with Dayton and sit outside in the sun, watching the boys while they kicked the soccer ball around.

  She savored her time with her sons and decided they wouldn’t be returning to school that year, as there were only a handful of days left. Trenton visited their teachers and collected work for the summer so they didn’t start the following year behind. The school was very understanding of the family’s circumstances.

  As the days passed, the distance between them continued to grow. She no longer looked him in the eye and was often short and snippy when she spoke to him at all. They rarely talked, and when he asked her a question her answers were always matter of fact.

  He frequently caught himself massaging his chest where an ache had formed. He never thought a breaking heart could actually cause physical pain, but he believed different now. The more he accepted he’d worn out his welcome, the harder the ache was to ignore.

  He would always love her. He loved her then. He loved her now. Hell, he might have even loved her six years ago when he watched her straighten her shoulders and use her last dollar to call her boys. But he wasn’t sure if she’d ever love him.

  She knew the words and said them often to others, but never once uttered them to him. He tried not to let it bother him. He had said from the beginning, if she was home safe that was all that mattered. He just never expected her shutting him out to hurt this bad.

  It became apparent she no longer needed him there when she had so many other people by her side. Any one of the guys could run to the store or cut her grass. Although she couldn’t carry laundry down to the basement, she still did the folding. She couldn’t vacuum, but she swept. Her determination to find her independence again was remarkable, but the more she recovered the less reason he had to stay. Perhaps she was waiting for him to leave.

  He began searching the house for things to fix so he could keep himself busy when she had visitors. Wrapping up the fix he was making to Mattie’s door, he collected his tools and followed the sound of voices into the den, for once grateful to see a recognizable face smiling back at him.

  Jade grinned and held out her arms. “Trenton!” She gave him a hug and he sighed, needing it more than anyone realized.

  “Hey, scrappy.”

  The man with her turned and Trent did a double take. Apparently, Nathan Lithe was the lawyer handling the paperwork for Marcus’s estate, Jade explained. Another decision he hadn’t been a part of.

  He shook the man’s hand. “Good to see you again.”

  “Once again I wish it was under better circumstances.” The conversation halted and Nathan glanced expectantly at Chloe. When no one said anything, Lithe asked, “Is there a private place we can talk, Dr. Wolfe?”

  Trent frowned when she glanced up at him and quickly looked away. “I guess I’ll just put my tools in the truck.”

  He walked out and let the screen door snap shut behind him. Apparently, he wasn’t welcome to sit in on such private matters. Rather than go back inside he sat on the porch steps.

  The door opened and Jade shuffled out. Leaning her hand on his shoulder, she plopped down beside him and sighed. Her short legs stretched and a flip-flop fell off.

  “That’s gonna be a bitch picking that back up.”

  Trent reached down and retrieved the tiny sandal, handing it to her.

  “Thanks. You okay, big guy?” />
  “As good as can be expected.”

  “Hmm. That good?”

  “That good.”

  She gave him a shoulder bump. “Wanna talk about it?”

  Everyone kept asking him to talk, but he had no idea what to say, so he sighed. “I think Chloe wants me to leave.”

  “Why do you think that?”

  “Everything’s different now. I can’t figure out where my place is in all this.”

  “Where do you want your place to be?”

  “I love her. I wanna be with her. I’m doing my best to fix this.”

  “Some things can’t be fixed, Trent.”

  That’s what he was afraid of. He had a reoccurring nightmare where he was back at that house and Chloe was by the door, but he was too late. She’s already gone when he got there. How was it he’d returned her home and still somehow felt like he lost her?

  “Tell me it gets better over time, Jade. I need something to hold onto.”

  Her hands rested on her belly, smoothing down the fabric of her sundress. “It gets…” She tipped her head as if trying to find the right word. “There’s no universal definition of normal, but eventually you find balance again. Trauma affects everyone differently. I can’t remember who I was before last August. I mean, I remember what I did, but I can’t remember how my mind processed things. I may look the same, but I’m totally different on the inside.”

  He looked down at her belly, an affectionate smile curving his lips. “You look a little different with that bean in the belly.”

  She smiled. “Two beans.”

  He raised a brow. “No shit?”

  “I shit you not.”

  He wrapped his arm around her shoulders and gave her a brotherly hug. “Two beans. God love ya.”

  “She’ll come around, Trent. One thing Chloe taught me was that everything’s a process. It just takes time.”

  His mom used to say to him a watched pot never boiled. “Maybe I’ll take a job.”

  “That might be a good idea. She’s not going anywhere. It’ll be a good distraction to get away.”

  Since January, he’d spent almost every waking minute thinking about Chloe. Distance wasn’t going to stop that. The ache in his chest tightened. “What if we’re over?”

  Jade looked up at him and gave a sad smile. “I wish I could make you promises.”

  “I know you can’t. No one can.”

  “I don’t think she’d resent you for leaving. The space might do both of you good. Sometimes we need a little distance to see the whole picture.”

  He nodded, already mentally collecting his belongings and trying to picture that goodbye. “Just promise me… If she asks for me…”

  “I promise I’ll let you know.”

  “Thanks.”

  Chapter Thirty-Seven

  “What do we tell her?” Mattie asked as Chloe walked the boys to a small office located just behind the local mall.

  “You tell her whatever you want, whatever you feel.” Though she’d yet to start therapy herself, she insisted her boys sit down and speak to someone. Their father had died, and though they didn’t have a long history with him or all the gory details of his death, grief counseling seemed a necessary step in the search for normal. Her appointment was tomorrow, but she wasn’t thinking about that.

  Dayton held the door to the office and Chloe signed them in. The pen hovered over the clipboard, her mind picturing tomorrow when she’d be signing her own name. She placed the pen on the counter with an unsteady hand and sat beside Dayton.

  A few minutes later he was invited back. She sat with Mattie while his brother had his session and when that was over she sat with Dayton while Mattie had his.

  On the way home, Mattie asked, “Do we have to go back?”

  “Didn’t you like talking to Dr. Shields’?” Her eyes watched through the rearview mirror as he shrugged.

  “I dunno.”

  Her gaze shifted to Dayton. “How about you?”

  Her eldest shrugged as well. “Dad was a jerk.”

  Unanswered questions rushed through her head, but she worried she might not be able to handle the truth. “It’s okay to be sad.”

  “I don’t care,” Dayton said, his attention focused on the window as they drove. “He can’t yell at you anymore and that’s what I care about.”

  Had he been able to hear them fighting? Hear her screaming? “I think we should visit Dr. Shields a few more times before you decide whether or not to go anymore.” Because she would never be able to properly counsel them about Marcus. Too many demons of her own clouding her judgment.

  The next day when she returned to Dr. Shields’s office, she stared down at the clipboard, gripping the pen, her hand hovering and shaking violently. She silently placed it on the counter and left the office. She couldn’t do this.

  She was a hypocrite, knowing if she were the therapist in this situation she’d do everything she could to help a client in her shoes. But in all her experience, no one else ever came to her with the same situation. And as much as she would want to help, she couldn’t see how an outsider might do so. It was a paralyzing and lonesome realization that stole any hope. She was on her own and until she figured out her own thinking, she didn’t have the energy to voice her thoughts to someone else.

  She missed walking without crutches and couldn’t get far without getting winded. But she made it to the mall and sat on a bench, watching people stroll by. There were mostly women, hardly looking up from their shopping missions and finding some sort of satisfaction in the act Chloe could no longer conjure.

  When couples passed her brow tightened, her eyes studying the way the men positioned themselves protectively at the women’s sides, or perhaps flirtatiously. The women seemed to hold all the power. They were the lure and the men were the hungry fish. Didn’t some of them feel slightly hunted?

  The smiles and laughter she sometimes saw made her chest ache. Sitting in the mall, surrounded by dozens of people, filled her with a sense of loneliness almost too painful to bear. When would someone hold her hand like that again? The thought made her shoulders hunch inward. How many therapy session would she skip before she accepted that she might never heal?

  She’d lost her faith in herself and the profession she’d built her life around. What a hypocrite. For all the coaxing she’d done, trying to get clients to open up and bare their deepest scars, she couldn’t even face her own. Festering wounds too ugly to show, too shameful to name, too many to count.

  Of course, therapy would probably help with some of these concerns, but she couldn’t speak of the things that happened. Most days she could hardly make sense of it in her head. If she couldn’t understand, how could anyone else?

  She refused to force herself into another vulnerable spot, too raw to risk the scrape of criticism or some outsider pointing out a way things could have gone differently. She had her own cruel conscience for that.

  They’d rush her back to normal when she still needed time to heal, deciphering her longing for companionship and making suggestions that she follow those yearnings. She couldn’t. It would feel forced and she’d been forced into enough.

  The things companionship entailed... The closeness, the touching, the exposure… No. Her mind shuddered at the thought of anyone trespassing into those private territories, yet her heart continued to yearn for that nearly forgotten bond she’d lost with Trenton.

  Her inadequacies frustrated her to no end. This wasn’t a throw yourself back on the horse after a fall situation. This was anger. Eventually, there might be acceptance, but right now she was too pissed off about the husk of a woman Marcus had left in his wake to predict when those other stages might show, when she might—if ever—find normal again.

  Using her crutches, she slowly walked back to her car. Another day, the same redundant epiphany. No matter how much she envied couples and the closeness they shared, she’d likely be alone for the rest of her life.

  Trenton was gone, off on some job,
and she was here, not healing, not coping. Just … existing. Whenever he returned, he’d find the same broken woman he left behind. And no matter how much she wished things could be different, how she wished she could be the woman he used to know, she knew she’d never be that person again.

  His attention and affection would wane the more he realized that truth. And eventually, he’d wise up and move on for good. She was better off letting him go first. She’d be better off doing a lot of things, but that didn’t mean she could force herself to do them.

  At the end of every day, he was one of her last thoughts. She was losing him because, after everything she’d been through, she’d lost herself. She didn’t much care for the woman she’d become. Chances were Trenton wouldn’t like her either. Being in love had never hurt so badly.

  Chapter Thirty-Eight

  On the fourth of July, Chloe and the kids went to Kat and Tyson’s Independence Day cookout. It was a sweltering one hundred degrees, the air so thick with humidity it seemed drinkable rather than breathable.

  Her boot was driving her nuts and she couldn’t wait until her appointment the following Monday to have it removed. Between the heat and the way the gnats kept swarming her head, she wanted to scream. Luckily, she wasn’t the only miserable one in attendance.

  Kat had been having contractions all day but insisted on having the picnic anyway. Chloe sipped a slushy margarita while Kat and Jade enjoyed virgin ones, their swollen feet submerged in a kiddy pool.

  The children were having fun in the sun, playing under a sprinkler, and the men seemed to be hiding from the women at the grill. Trenton wasn’t there.

  It had been two weeks since he’d left her home to take a job. Chloe wasn’t sure if he was back in town yet or not. He hadn’t called and it hurt too much to mention his name to the others.

  She understood his absence was probably for the best. Once she had permission to take the boot off, she’d be, outwardly, healed. Trenton probably had better things to do than wait around for the internal damage to fade—if it ever would.