by Loree Lough
Mitch tucked the photo back into his wallet and checked the time. Ten-thirty. Too early to knock?
He glanced at the front door. It had been painted black when he’d left home. Ciara had given it a coat of rustred, and it reminded him of the bright, welcoming doors of Ireland’s thatched cottages.
A lot had changed around here in the months he’d been gone, Mitch noticed. Spindly tree branches that had been brown and bare on the cold December night when he’d left now combed the clouds with leaves of every verdant hue. And in flower beds that once sat barren and bleak beneath the many-paned windows, white daisies and pink zinnias bobbed their brightly blossomed heads. She’d planted clumps of hosta along the shaded, curving walkway, yellow tea roses beside the privet hedge.
All by herself she’d transformed what had been an ordinary yard into a warm and welcoming retreat. He could only imagine what magic she’d performed inside, what more she might have been able to accomplish…if he’d been here, at her side.
Mitch got out of the car and slammed the door, wondering what to say when they were face-to-face for the first time in so many months. How are you? You’re looking well. Don’t shoot…I’m unarmed, he added with a wry grin.
Hands in his pockets, he debated whether to ring the bell or use his key. She had no doubt grown accustomed to her solitary status; he might frighten her if he barged in as he would have done before their fight.
He shook his head, hoping the hundreds of prayers he’d said while undercover had inspired the Lord to soften Ciara’s heart. Taking a deep breath, he straightened to his full height and rang the bell.
Ten seconds, twenty ticked by before impatience made him ring it again.
“Don’t get your socks in knots,” came her voice from the other side of the door, “I’m movin’ fast as I can….”
Mitch grinned. At least that hasn’t changed, he thought. She’s still the same little spitfire.
The light coming through the peephole darkened. His heart hammered with anticipation; maybe she would decide not to open the door when she saw who was standing on her porch.
But the door did open, slowly, and she peeked out from behind it. “Mitch,” she whispered, blue eyes wide, “you’re early.”
He wanted to take her in his arms and hold her close, inhale the fresh clean scent of her soap and shampoo, kiss her as she hadn’t been kissed…in seven months. “Didn’t take as long as I thought to finish up the report.”
Ciara stepped back, smiling a bit as she opened the door wider. “Well, come on in. The electric company already gets enough of my hard-earned money without air-conditioning the front yard, too.”
Mitch glanced around the sunny foyer. Last time he’d been in this part of the house, the floor had been piled high with as-yet-unpacked boxes. Now he could almost see his reflection in the highly polished hardwood. “Smells like pine,” he remarked, shoving his hands back into his pockets. “Nice…reminds me of my grandma’s house.”
The way she stood, half hidden by the door, Mitch had barely seen her. He yearned for an eyeful, and faced her now, fully prepared to apologize, eat crow or humble pie, or whatever else it took to get back into her good graces. He wanted to tell her how awful these months without her had been, how sorry he was for having left the way he had, how many thousands of times he’d thought of her. His gaze started at her tiny, white-sneakered feet, climbed to the shapely legs inside the black stretch pants—
And froze on her protruding abdomen.
“What’s the matter, haven’t you ever seen a pregnant woman before?”
He forced himself to look away from her well-rounded belly. Her eyes seemed bigger, bluer, longer-lashed than he remembered, but there were dark circles beneath them now. And despite her swollen stomach, Ciara appeared to have lost weight. “Well, sure I have. It’s just, well…”
“I’m eight months along,” she said, answering his unasked question. “You were gone a month when I knew for sure.”
He did the math in his head. “So…so you were—”
Ciara nodded. “We didn’t know it then, but we were ‘in a family way’ on the night you left.”
To learn that he was going to be a daddy, in this sudden, unexpected way, was by far the biggest shock Mitch had ever experienced. A myriad of emotions flicked through his head. One moment he was overjoyed at the prospect of fatherhood, the next, terror thundered in his heart, because, what did he know about being a dad? On the one hand it thrilled him to know that the girl of his dreams was carrying his child, on the other, his stomach churned as it dawned on him that she couldn’t have informed him.
She had gone through all this alone.
Mitch didn’t know whether to throw his arms around her or get on his knees and beg her forgiveness or continue standing there, gaping with awe at the sight of her.
Ciara headed for the kitchen. “I’m going to have some lemonade. Can I pour you a glass?”
Mitch stood alone in the foyer a moment, staring after her, then followed her down the hall. “Are you all right? Is everything okay? With you and the baby, I mean?” he began, falling into step beside her. “Gee, Ciara, I wish I had known….”
She opened the refrigerator door, wincing as though the slight effort caused her discomfort. “I tried to tell you,” she said again. Ciara inclined her head and placed a fingertip beside her chin. “Goodness. It seems our devious Lieutenant Bradley has been scheming on both sides of the street!”
The sarcasm rang loud, and Mitch knew it was proof she didn’t believe he’d written any letter. Mitch clenched his jaw, fully prepared to tell her what he thought of Lieutenant Bradley. But when he noticed her, struggling to lift the half-full pitcher from the fridge, his ire died.
This isn’t like her, he told himself. She was always such a sturdy little thing. Instinctively, he relieved her of it. “Sit down, will you, before you fall down,” he scolded. Frowning, he added, “You look…”
“Terrible?”
“Yeah.” His cheeks reddened as he realized he’d unintentionally insulted her. “No, of course not. Well, gee whiz, Ciara,” he fumbled, “haven’t you been taking care of yourself at all?”
“Well, golly gee, Mitch,” she mocked, hefting her bulk onto a long-legged stool at the snack bar, “you sure are great for a girl’s ego.”
He grimaced. “I didn’t mean to— It’s just that you look like you haven’t slept in—”
“I haven’t slept in days.”
“In your condition,” he continued, “shouldn’t you be paying more attention to your health? You know, eating smart, taking vitamins, getting plenty of rest….”
“You try sleeping with a watermelon superglued to your body, Mahoney, see how well you rest!”
Ciara pointed to the cabinet above the dishwasher. “Since you’re so determined to ’do’ for me,” she said, “the glasses are in there. And while you’re pouring, give this some thought, Secret Agent Man—you can’t just waltz in here after all this time and start bossing me around.” She aimed a forefinger at him. “And stop pretending you’re so concerned about my well-being. I might have appreciated it…seven months ago!”
Anger had put some color back into her pale cheeks, and the flash had returned to her blue eyes. If she didn’t look so all-fired beautiful, he might have shouted his response. As it was, Mitch’s defense was barely audible. “I’m not pretending anything. I wrote you, the night I left, and I tried—”
She tucked in one corner of her mouth and raised a brow. “Maybe it would have been a good idea to attend a couple of those meetings Chet scheduled, so he could have delivered your concerns.” Ciara tucked a wayward lock of hair into her ponytail. “He warned me you’d have a list of lame excuses for not having been in touch.”
He’d known the guy more than a decade, and even he didn’t call him Chet. Mitch rummaged in the freezer for a handful of ice cubes, dropped them noisily into the tumblers. “Chet?”
“He asked me to call him by his first name,” Ci
ara explained, “and I agreed because—” she frowned, crossed both arms over her chest “—because at least he was here for me, every week of the seven months you were gone.”
“Here for you?” he thundered. “If he didn’t deliver my letter to you, and he didn’t give you any news at all, exactly what was he here for, Ciara?” He glared at her for a moment, then poured the lemonade and shoved a glass toward Ciara. He sat the pitcher down with a thud, splattering the countertop with drops.
“So you’re saying you wrote a letter,” she said, grabbing a napkin to blot up the mess, “personally handed it to Lieutenant Bradley, and he didn’t bother to deliver it.”
“That’s what I’m saying.”
“And you expect me to believe that?”
“Yes, I do.”
His words hung in the air like a spiderweb, intricately taut, yet fragile enough to disintegrate with the slightest disturbance. The last time he’d spoken the words, he’d stood in front of the altar at the Church of the Resurrection. “Do you, Mitchell Riley Mahoney, take this woman to be your lawfully wedded wife?” Pastor Rafferty had asked. Heart pounding with anticipation, and love, and joy, Mitch had gazed deep into Ciara’s eyes, taken her small hand in his and breathed, “Yes, I do.”
Her voice brought him back to the present. “I’m surprised you’re having so much trouble with the numbers…considering you have an accounting degree and all. When you left me seven months ago, you said you’d be back in a few hours.” She wasn’t smiling when she tacked on, “Were you lying to me then, or are you lying to me now?”
“I’ve never told you a lie, Ciara. And I don’t see how you can say I—”
“There’s a lot you don’t see, Mahoney, because you’ve got your blinders on again, just like…just like the lieutenant said.”
Mitch snorted, knowing she’d hesitated because she’d wanted to say “Chet” instead of “lieutenant.” “Your buddy Chet doesn’t know diddly about me, Ciara, but it’s beginning to look like even he knows me better than you do.”
She shrugged. “Can’t get to know a man who isn’t around.”
He planted both palms flat on the counter, leaned forward until they were nearly nose to nose. “Listen, I don’t know what he told you—or why—but I know this— I had a tail on me every minute. If I had tried getting in touch with you, we’d both be—”
He clamped his jaws together, knowing he’d just put himself between the proverbial rock and the hard place. By admitting he couldn’t contact her, he was supporting her claim that his job was too dangerous.
Just tell her you love her, Mahoney. That’s what she needs to hear right now; you can work out the rest of this mess later. He opened his mouth to do just that when the tight, skeptical look on her face stopped him cold. His lips formed a thin straight line. “Seven months ago you asked me to choose. Sounds to me like you’ve chosen to believe that slimeball Bradley over me.” He ground his molars together. “Believe whatever you want,” he snarled. “Everything I’ve said is true.”
Her eyes misted, and she swallowed. “While you were gone, I saw a movie about an agent who went undercover. He managed to call his wife. Even managed to sneak off and visit a few times!”
“This isn’t Hollywood, Ciara. In the real world we do things by the book…or die.”
“It was based on fact.”
“Did your buddy Chet tell you that story, too?”
Ciara only stared at him, eyes blazing and lips trembling. “You know what, Mitch?” she said after a moment. “I was an independent woman before we met, and believe it or not, I managed quite well after you left…once I got used to the idea. I’ll admit, those first couple of weeks were pretty rough, but look around you,” she added, upturned palms drawing his attention to their surroundings, “I got a lot accomplished, all by myself. This house is a home now, thanks to the endless hours I’ve spent working on it…alone.”
Suddenly she was on her feet, pacing back and forth across the black-and-white linoleum tiles, arms swinging, eyes flashing. “What was I to think, when you vanished like something from a magic show…and never came back?” she demanded, coming to a halt in front of him.
“I’ve given it a lot of thought and prayer since you stormed out of here that night.” Hands on her hips, she raised her chin slightly. “I think it would be best if you just packed your things and moved out.”
In response to his grim expression, she tossed in, “I can afford the mortgage on this place, thanks to my teacher’s salary, so don’t you worry about how I’ll manage. In fact, every time one of your checks arrived from the Bureau, I put it into my bureau, uncashed. I didn’t need your help turning the house into a home, and I don’t need your money to stay in it. And I am staying, because it’s a nice, safe neighborhood, with plenty of children, and good schools, and…”
She has every right to be angry, he told himself. She’s been alone for a long time, not in the best of health, listening to Bradley’s lies. Maybe if he sat quietly and let her vent, the anger and resentment would fade, and she’d look at him the way she had on the cruise ship, as she had at the altar, on their wedding night….
The cruise ship, the marriage, the separation, the pregnancy. All these things had happened in less than a year, yet it seemed like an eternity to him now.
Mitch leaned against his stool’s backrest, wondering what she’d do if he just gathered her up in his arms and silenced her with a big kiss. But before he had a chance to put his plan into action, she plunged on, fingers drawing quotation marks in the air, reminding him of something he’d said the night he left:
“So don’t feel ‘duty-bound’ to take care of me. I know your old-fashioned need to meet your responsibilities is supposedly the reason you work as hard…and as long as you do, but…”
Was it his imagination, or had her face paled even more in the last few minutes? All this ranting and raving couldn’t be good for her or the baby. Suddenly it didn’t matter who was right and who was wrong. Calming her down, that was all that mattered.
“Ciara, I know I said those things,” he began, his voice softly apologetic, “but I never meant it to sound as though taking care of you is a burden. Bottom line—I love you. Have since the day we met, will for the rest of my life. Providing for you will always be an honor, a privilege.” He grinned slightly. “Believe me, I’ve had plenty of time to think about that while…”
Oh, how she wanted to believe him! But Ciara had convinced herself that she must focus on the pain his absence had caused in those early days, when she’d been forced to admit the ugly truth: the oath he’d taken for the Bureau meant more to him than the vows he’d made to her. She loved him with everything in her, but if she was going to survive, if her heart was ever to heal, she must stand firm on this issue. She could not give in simply because he was standing there, looking at her with those sad brown eyes of his, imploring her to be something she believed she could not be.
She forced a cold, careless tone into her voice that she did not feel. “I’m sure you did have lots of time to think while you were away. Well, guess what, James Bond? While you were off living your life of adventure, I had a little time to think, too, and…”
He held up a hand to silence her. “I want to show you something,” he said quietly, pulling out his wallet. Slapping her photograph on the counter, he said, “You see that? That’s what kept me going for seven months. That’s what gave me the incentive to think smart, to do whatever it took to drag my sorry self home.
“I won’t deny that before I met you, I liked the danger and excitement of undercover work, but back then, getting the job done was the only focus.” Mitch shrugged, then emphasized his point. “That’s why I took unnecessary chances. That’s how I accomplished in nine years what it takes most agents twenty. Because who was I, that my passing would make such a difference?”
She picked up the photograph. He must have held it in his big, strong hands hundreds of times, and the proof was that the paper it had been prin
ted on now felt soft and supple as cotton. Her aching heart pounded. All right, so maybe he loves you a little bit after all, she thought.
But wait…something he’d said pinged in her memory. He couldn’t possibly believe his life had no value, that his existence wasn’t important to anyone. He mattered plenty—to his parents, his siblings and their children—to her.
Ciara handed back the photograph, tensing when their fingers touched, for she yearned to hold him, to be held by him. “Everyone would miss you if you were—” Ciara hesitated, unable to make herself say “killed in the line of duty.” She began again. “A lot of people would be very upset if anything happened to you.”
He dismissed her comment with a flick of his fingers.
Ciara straightened her back, reminded herself that she’d decided she couldn’t, wouldn’t go through that agony again. Even if she had the strength to survive the next case—and the next, and the one after that—their children deserved a full-time dad.
“I saved some of the boxes from our move,” she began, looking anywhere but into his haunted eyes. “They’re in the garage. If you like, I could pack for you. I wouldn’t mind….” She was rambling and she knew it, but seemed powerless to stanch the flow of words. “Your brother, Ian, has an extra room, now that Patrick is off at college. Did you know he was accepted at Stanford? Of course you didn’t…. Well, I’m sure Ian wouldn’t mind if you stayed there until you found a place to—”
“Shut up, Ciara. Just shut up.”
He’d never spoken to her in such a vulgar, vicious way before, and she felt a sharp pain, deep in the pit of her stomach.
