The Truth About Toby

by Cheryl St. John

  He snatched the bear and held it tightly.

  That heart-stopping gaze lifted shyly to Shaine’s, now mere inches away. “I’m going to take care of you, Toby,” she promised and kissed his round cheek. “I’ve missed you so much.”

  She couldn’t resist hugging his little body closely. Oh, Maggie. Remembering the pandemonium at Samantha and Amy’s reunion, she used all her determination and restraint to keep from crying. The last thing she wanted to do was upset him.

  With a lump the size of Denver in his throat, Austin watched Shaine hug the child. He glanced over at Ken, relieved to note he wasn’t the only one trying to keep his cool.

  Shaine kissed Toby’s cheek and he clung to the bear. He did look like the photographs she’d shown him. His mouth, with the pronounced dip in his upper lip, looked just like Shaine’s. A cute kid.

  Shaine had her nephew. Her family.

  She would be eager to take him home and rebuild their life.

  Austin watched the reunion with a bittersweet satisfaction. He’d helped her. Together they’d assisted Ken in finding half a dozen children so far. And another dozen would follow.

  And after that, he’d return to his mountain, not at all the same man he’d been a few weeks ago.

  Toby seemed comfortable in the small room he’d shared with Maggie for a few months before the “accident.” After he’d been missing for about six months, Shaine had taken the crib down, realizing he would be too big for it by then. Maggie’s narrow bed was still there and, sleeping on it, he looked tiny and helpless.

  “I can’t believe you really found him after all this time,” Audrey said. She tiptoed away from the doorway and sat beside her sleeping infant on the sofa.

  “Neither can I. This ordeal since Maggie’s death has taken so long. Sometimes I didn’t think I’d get through it.”

  Audrey gave her a strained smile. “But you did.”

  “I’m going to have to buy him clothes,” Shaine said, thinking aloud. “And when Austin and I unpacked the toys, I realized they’re all baby toys. Well, he liked the cars, but he’ll need things to play with.”

  “Shaine?”

  Audrey’s serious tone interrupted her ruminations.

  “I want to apologize for doubting you.”

  “You don’t need to apologize.”

  “Yes, I do. I wasn’t as supportive as I could have been, I know that now. I was just so worried about you.”

  “It’s okay, really. Any sane person would have had their doubts about my obsession with finding Toby.”

  “What are you going to do now?”

  Shaine flattened her palms on her jean-clad knees. “Ken—that’s Austin’s FBI friend—wants us available until the rest of the kids are found. He thinks that will only take a couple more weeks. I told him I wasn’t going anywhere. I won’t take Toby traipsing across the country and I won’t leave him.”

  “What did he say?”

  “He said he’d use express mail or send someone to me.”

  Beside her, the baby squirmed, and Audrey patted his back. “What about Austin? What’s happening there?”

  “On the flight home he mentioned he’d be leaving. Maybe tomorrow. Maybe tonight, I don’t know.”

  Audrey gave her an uncertain look. “Are you okay with that?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “You know what I mean. You’ve fallen for this guy. Now it’s over? Just like that?”

  “I don’t have a whole lot of choices, Audrey. I went to him for help. He warned me from the beginning that he’d—”

  “He’d what?”

  That he’d take me to bed. “That if I wanted a commitment, he wasn’t the man. He never pretended anything more than what this was. An interlude. I accepted the conditions.”

  “I can’t believe this is you talking.”

  “Why not?”

  “You’re not an ‘interlude’ kind of person, Shaine. We both know that. When you love somebody, you love them forever.”

  Her words brought the sting of tears to Shaine’s eyes, but she blinked them away quickly and stood. “I have a lot of laundry to catch up on.” She emptied her suitcase into a basket and carried it to the appliances in her kitchen. She twisted a knob and scooped in detergent.

  These unfolding events all boiled down to the fact that she’d gained one person she loved, but was losing another.

  “I didn’t mean to make it worse,” Audrey said from behind her.

  “You didn’t,” she replied, shoving clothes in the washer. “You couldn’t.”

  “Well, I won’t bring it up again unless you want to talk about it.”

  “Deal.” Shaine turned around.

  “I’m so happy for you that you found Toby. What am I saying? I’m so happy for him!”

  Shaine stepped into her impulsive hug. “Thanks.”

  “What have we here?” Nick came through the door, followed by Austin.

  “Where’d you guys go?” Audrey asked.

  “We thought we needed to celebrate,” her husband replied, and held up a bottle of champagne.

  “I can’t drink that,” Audrey said with a pout.

  “Sure you can,” he replied. “I thought of that.” He displayed the label specifying nonalcoholic.

  “Not near as much fun, but that’s okay,” she said, and turned to Shaine. “Glasses?”

  Shaine rinsed stemmed glasses that hadn’t been used since she could remember, and they toasted the arrival of their boys.

  The Pruitts left shortly after, and Shaine checked on Toby.

  Austin entered the tiny bedroom behind her. She sat gingerly on the bed’s edge and stroked her nephew’s hair back from his forehead.

  At her hesitant touches and cautious manner, Austin realized that Toby’s return still hadn’t struck her as reality yet. He wished he could see her with him in the coming days and weeks. He wished their worlds weren’t so very different and far apart. He wished he could be certain he had the capability to let someone into his life without seeing when they’d be taken away from him.

  “He needs new toys,” she said softly. “Maybe you could help me pick out little-boy things.”

  There was no way to say it except to say it. “I’ll be leaving in the morning, Shaine.”

  She brought the hand caressing Toby’s hair to her lap. Slowly she stood and stepped past Austin. Once he followed her, she closed the door gently. “Do you need something washed for tomorrow?”

  She headed for the kitchen.

  He came up behind her and caught her arm.

  She tried to pull away. “I can throw your jeans in with mine.”

  He held fast and pulled her back to him. “Shaine, talk to me.”

  She looked him in the eye. “What’s to talk about?”

  That stumped him. Indeed. What was there to talk about? How miserable he’d be without her? She didn’t need to hear that. How much he wished things were different, so he could be the kind of man she needed and deserved? That would serve no purpose.

  What else was there to say? Goodbye? He didn’t think he could handle that. He released her arm.

  She stared at him.

  A sick, cheated feeling convulsed in his belly. He couldn’t stay here until morning. He couldn’t prolong the torture. He wanted to possess her so badly, the desperate desire scared him.

  He had to go now. Before he spoiled everything they’d had up until tonight. Now. While he still had his fast-failing dignity.

  “I’m leaving now.”

  In the dim light from the hallway, he thought her face drained of color. “Where will you go?”

  He moved past her. “The airport.”

  He found his phone in his jacket pocket and called a cab.

  Shaine moved into her living room like a zombie. Austin’s suitcase still sat by the door; he hadn’t unpacked since they’d come back that afternoon.

  He went into her bedroom and returned with a smaller bag. “I think I have everything. If I didn’t have it
in my suitcase, I don’t need it.”

  His impatience and the finality implied stung. Shaine watched him with her heart aching.

  “We’ll keep in touch,” he said without looking at her. He hadn’t looked at her since he’d said he was leaving. “We’ll still be working with Ken for a while, so we’ll talk.”

  She didn’t have anything to say. If she tried to talk, she’d break into a million pieces.

  “I’ll want to know how Toby’s doing,” he said, pulling on his jacket.

  Finally he looked at her.

  Their eyes met and held.

  Shaine’s chest felt like he was taking her heart with him.

  He broke their locked gaze, tucked one bag under his arm and picked up the other.

  Without another word he turned and left.

  Shaine commanded her feet to carry her to her bedroom window. In the dark, Austin strode to the end of the drive and dropped his bags onto the concrete. He paced the street in front of the inn a few times. Finally he sat at the curb.

  The buzzer on her dryer went off, but she paid it no attention. She wanted to cry. She wanted to throw up. She gripped her stomach and wanted to run down to the end of her drive and throw herself at his feet.

  Miserable, Shaine tore herself from the window. She looked in on Toby once again, almost afraid she’d only dreamed him up, too.

  How bitterly unfair that in finding him, she’d found and lost the only man who’d ever meant anything to her.

  Returning to the window, she caught sight of red taillights disappearing in the distance. A morose sadness fell upon her. He was gone.

  She paced the apartment. Sat on the sofa. Picked up the unfamiliar remote and set it back down. She’d bet his tapes were still in her player. If she turned it on, she’d hear Frankie Valli or The Belmonts or The Drifters singing something that painfully reminded her of him.

  If she went to her bed she’d smell him.

  If she lived to be a hundred she’d want him.

  An hour later, she lay down beside Toby on the narrow bed, touched his baby-soft face and breathed in his childlike scent.

  She would not cry. She would not subject Toby to her internal trauma. He’d been through too much. He needed a secure home and a stable caregiver. He needed her.

  And she intended to be strong. For him.

  Chapter 21

  “Mama?” Toby repeated, pointing to the photograph of Maggie that Shaine held.

  “That’s right, sweetie. Do you remember her?”

  He nodded his head, but she’d discovered Toby nodded yes to everything, whether he understood what she meant or not. She smiled and kissed his forehead.

  “I play pickups,” he said, turning back to his favorite toys, a set of die-cast monster trucks that Austin had sent him.

  “Okay, you play pickups. I’ll play with you as soon as I put the macaroni and cheese in the oven.”

  She’d also discovered his favorites foods were hot dogs and macaroni and cheese, and after a month of boxed dinners, she’d been experimenting with casserole dishes he would like.

  The phone rang, and her heart skipped a beat the way it always did. She’d spoken with Austin several times as the kidnapping cases were concluded. He’d given her guidance just as he always had, coaxing her to see more on her own than she would have been able to without him.

  The man who’d pushed Maggie in her car into the river had been found and charged. Of course, Shaine had no part in the upcoming trial, but the evidence all pointed in his direction. He already had so many counts of kidnapping against him, the murder conviction would be the icing on the cake.

  Though emotion was evident in the long pauses, she and Austin never spoke of their feelings for one another, or their separation, and that exclusion left her aching.

  She grabbed it on the third ring. “Hello?”

  “Shaine, this is Sam.”

  Instantly she recognized Samantha Cutter’s voice. “Hey, how are you? I haven’t talked to you for at least, gee, two days!”

  The girl giggled. “I had to tell you my good news. I got accepted at the university!”

  “That’s great! Congratulations.”

  “Thanks. My mom is going to help me with Amy.”

  “I knew she’d come around.”

  “Shaine, he paid for an entire year’s tuition, can you believe it?”

  “He who?”

  “Mr. Allen. I got a call from the credit office. I had a million apps in for student loans, and anyway, they said I got a grant. When I pushed, the guy confessed it was an anonymous gift in my name. I know it was Austin.”

  Shaine knew it, too.

  “He’s already done so much. Every week something is delivered for Amy. She has the biggest rocking horse you’ve ever seen, a collection of Disney videos and more dolls than a little girl could play with in a lifetime.”

  “He’s never had anyone to shower with gifts, Sam. He’s enjoying doing it as much as Amy is enjoying getting them. And I know what you mean. I can’t walk in this apartment without tripping over cars and trucks.” She glanced around the crowded space, seeing Austin’s gifts everywhere.

  Just then the doorbell rang.

  “I’ll have to let you go, Sam. I’ll talk to you soon. Congratulations on your acceptance. Bye!”

  A familiar brown-uniformed deliveryman stood outside her door, an enormous box on the ground beside him, and a clipboard in his hand. “Hey, Miss Richards. Another delivery for Toby.”

  She shook her head and signed the invoice. “Thanks. Just leave it here.”

  “What’s zat?” Toby stood behind her.

  “I don’t know. Something else from Austin, it looks like.”

  “Open it?”

  She grabbed a pair of kitchen scissors and slit the packing tape. Beneath a mountain of bubble wrap, she discovered a hand-made wooden rocking horse. She wrestled it from the carton and carried it into the living room.

  “It’s for Toby?” he asked, pointing at the beautifully crafted toy.

  “It’s for Toby,” she said. “Aunt Shaine would look a little silly on it. Want to ride it?”

  He nodded solemnly.

  She lifted him on and showed him how to rock.

  Shaine backed to the edge of the sofa and sat, watching him. She wondered if Austin had ordered it on his computer, and a smile tugged her lips upward.

  A sense of familiarity nagged at her. She’d seen the horse before. She focused on remembering. It had been in one of her visions of Toby. She’d seen him sleeping in what looked like a loft bedroom, and this rocking horse had sat under the eaves.

  At the time, she’d been afraid that Toby would never be returned to her, and that she may have to resign herself to the fact that he was okay, but that he wasn’t with her.

  Her prophetic dreams could come true. Or they could be changed by circumstances. She recalled the dream of Toby and the dark-haired toddler playing in the sandbox. The man who’d come home was the dark-haired baby’s father.

  So...if Toby was with her now, and Toby had a little brother, the brother would be her child.

  She couldn’t really draw any comfort from that.

  Her dreams didn’t have to come to pass. Finding Toby in time had prevented the awful images she’d seen. She’d been able to take action to change the outcome. Thank God.

  Her dream of Toby with the brother and the man who hugged him didn’t have to happen, either. She might do something to prevent it.

  Shaine checked on her casserole in the oven and stood in the doorway watching Toby.

  The realization hit her like lightning.

  She’d already done something to prevent that dream from happening.

  By allowing Austin to pass out of her life, she’d stopped the chain of events that led to that moment in time.

  She would never want to marry anyone else. He had been the one.

  But he hadn’t wanted a commitment, she reminded herself.

  “I think our supper’s ready, Tob
y,” she said.

  He stopped his energetic rocking and looked skeptically at the floor. “Me want down.”

  “You got it, buckaroo.” She swung him off the horse and into the air. He laughed, and the sound eased her heavy heart. She kissed his cheek soundly and sat him at the table.

  “We have to blow on this. It’s hot.” She got him a second glass of milk after he spilled the first, and ate her macaroni and cheese happily because he enjoyed it so.

  He hadn’t wanted a commitment.

  Her feelings had been so raw, she’d taken that as the truth. But the truth crystallized before her like a divine revelation.

  Austin Allen was the king of self-preservation.

  He’d been shutting out people and tuning out feelings for so many years, it would take a lot more than a determined woman on his doorstep to crack his protective barrier and get him to place himself at risk.

  It would take...

  Love.

  He wouldn’t come to her. He couldn’t She understood it and she understood why. If she had the power, she was going to see to it that her dream of Austin as a lonely, haunted man didn’t come true. And at the same time see another dream turn to reality.

  “Toby?”

  “Hmm?”

  “You liked the big airplane, didn’t you?”

  He nodded. “I fwied in the big airpwane.”

  “Would you like to fly in an airplane again?”

  His blond head nodded.

  She picked up their plates, already planning. “We’re going to take a trip.”

  Austin stared at the array of colorful fish in his aquarium. He wished she could see them. It had never bothered him before that he was the only one to enjoy his mountain home and all the things in it. He’d always been alone.

  But he’d never been lonely.

  Until now. Until Shaine Richards had impressed her image on his brain and his body and his home. He could see her everywhere. He could smell her in the shower, hear her in the kitchen, feel her beneath his hands. She’d become a ruthless attack on his senses.

  He’d always been an outsider. But he’d never resented the cruel sentence of his unearthly uniqueness until now. If, for even a short time, he could be like any other man, he would leave the confines of this place and go to her.