A woman.
Shana resisted the urge to step closer to the door and listen. It was probably just a family member or a work call. There was no reason to be suspicious.
Other than the fact that she remembered nothing about their marriage.
Her head started aching, her mind filled with other memories, of her father and how her mother hadn’t suspected his deception—right up to the point when she was confronted by the other woman.
Shana pressed her fingertips to her throbbing forehead. She needed to stop her roiling thoughts before she worked herself into a total meltdown. She needed to de-stress. Maybe a shower would help. At least it would keep her from standing here eavesdropping.
She made fast tracks to the bathroom and turned on the shower jets. Peeling off the T-shirt, she squeezed her eyes shut against the headache, willing it to go away. She stepped into the steamy stall, jets hitting her from all sides and easing her tense muscles.
Still, her mind spun, and she pressed her palm against the tile wall.
Flashes of memories blazed through her mind, like bursts of electricity.
Standing at the altar with Chuck.
Their anniversary trips became real, parts of them at least.
Overwhelmed, she sagged back, her legs unsteady.
The reel of fragmented memories culminated in an image of her throwing his clothes angrily into his suitcase, of her demanding that they separate.
She heard herself asking him for a divorce.
Oh God.
She pressed her fist to her mouth to hold back a cry.
How could Chuck have kept this from her? How could he have pretended this whole time?
Because she was pregnant.
The obvious answer.
She doubled over, grief and agony wracking through her. Tears streamed down her face, mixing with the pelting water. She didn’t need to remember more. She didn’t want to.
This was too much. It threatened to tear her in two. The pain was so intense it felt more than emotional.
It felt...
Real.
Her stomach cramped harder, harder still. Her knees gave way as she realized.
She was losing the baby.
Ten
Heart slugging in his chest, fear shredding his gut, Chuck paced in the ER waiting area.
He considered calling his family, but just couldn’t find the will to say the words out loud, words that would further end what had been a period of hope for him and for Shana.
Her panicked voice still echoed in his ears. He’d hung up on his call from work and raced to her, finding her tugging on a robe while doubled over in pain.
He hadn’t needed her to tell him what was happening. They’d been through this before.
The pain. The loss. The grief.
She’d been silent for the whole drive, not that he had felt much like talking, either. Fear for her seared him, threatening his focus as he guided the SUV along the icy roads. An ambulance would have taken longer, and he couldn’t bring himself to think about losing her, too.
The door to her exam room opened. His stomach lurched. The nurse gave him a sympathetic smile and waved him through. “You can see her now, Mr. Mikkelson.”
Shana lay on the examination table, her face as pale as the sheet covering her. “I lost the baby.”
Her voice was flat, beaten down, weary, and somehow her tone was more upsetting than outright tears.
Tears, he could handle and wipe away.
Right now, he didn’t have a clue what to do for her, and that made him feel helpless as hell.
“I know. I’m so sorry.”
“You don’t have to try and make me feel better.” Her fingers clutched the sheet, twisting it in her tight fists. “I know you’re hurting over this, too.”
He sank down into a chair, each drag of air stinging him with the antiseptic smell of defeat. “I knew the odds were against us. If there was anything in modern medicine left to try, we would have tried it. There isn’t.”
He needed to box up his own hurt over the loss, the pain no easier this time than it had been the first. If anything, it devastated him more. But somehow, he knew Shana hurt even worse.
She felt the loss even more deeply for having been the one to carry the child inside her.
“The doctor said much the same,” she said in that flat voice, refusing to meet his eyes, “that we couldn’t have done anything differently.”
“Shana.” He reached for her hand.
She pulled away. “You don’t have to.”
Why wasn’t she looking at him?
He couldn’t shake the feeling that something else was going on with her. “What do you mean?”
She shifted against the pillow, sitting up with a wince, her gaze skating to him briefly, then flicking past. “After we...uh...when I was in the shower, some of my memory returned.”
Chuck swallowed hard.
The worst-case scenario ran through his head like a warning siren. From her closed-off pose, it seemed she hadn’t recalled their wedding and honeymoon, but something far darker.
“What part?”
Her eyes met his solidly for the first time, and he saw more than hurt staining the blue depths. Outright anger flared.
“The part where we decided to separate.”
Words froze in his throat, in his mind. He’d entertained the notion of her remembering, but he had hoped she would recall happier times.
Anything but this.
“I don’t know what to say.”
“Nothing. There’s nothing you can say now,” she retorted tightly, swaying. “The time to tell me the truth has passed.”
He steadied her, gripping her shoulders. His first priority needed to be keeping her as calm as possible. “I didn’t want to upset you. We can discuss this later.”
“Later?” She shrugged away his touch. “There’s nothing more to talk about. Ever. I realize now that you were staying with me out of a sense of duty, because I was pregnant. But I’m not now. You can go.”
Like hell.
“I’m not leaving you.”
“The doctor said I need to stay here overnight. But you don’t have to stay.”
“I’m not leaving,” he repeated.
Blue fire sparked in her eyes, and her normally upturned lips thinned into an uncompromising line. “You have no obligation to me anymore.”
He understood she had to be upset—about what she’d remembered, about what he hadn’t said—but this complete slicing away was a surprise.
“This isn’t the time to make big decisions. You’re emotional.” He paused, scrubbing a hand over his jaw. “As am I, truth be told.”
Her brows shot skyward. That gorgeous face tightened with anger. “We’ve already had this discussion. There’s no more talking to be done. I’m sorry. But it’s time for us to end things.”
End things.
The second time their marriage had been declared over.
He searched for words to...what?
To not have this cold silence between them.
The ER door opened, admitting two staff members ready to move her to a room for the night.
Shana reclined back. “Chuck, you should go now. Please.”
The slight crack in her voice kept him from arguing with her. But no way was he leaving the building.
He’d told himself he was staying with her because he couldn’t let their marriage fail, especially not when they had been expecting a baby, but now he found himself thinking of all they’d shared since her amnesia.
And he couldn’t just forget about that, not like she seemed determined to do.
Chuck didn’t know what the future held for them. But for tonight? He was staying close to his wife.
* * *
Af
ter a restless night in an uncomfortable hospital bed with disquieting dreams startling her awake, Shana was no closer to repairing her broken heart.
How could she have become so attached so quickly to the idea of a future with Chuck when she barely knew him? She ached for everything she had lost and what could have been.
But whatever they would have created, it would have all been built on lies.
The hospital door opened, and Shana steeled herself for the possible impact of Chuck walking through.
Except it wasn’t him. And it wasn’t a nurse.
“Mom,” Shana said, her voice wobbling.
Her mother strode across the room and wrapped Shana in a familiar hug. Her mother smelled of lilac and orange blossom, her signature scent. Though it hadn’t always been. After finding out about her husband’s secret family, Shana’s mother had somersaulted, understandably. But the day she regained her footing was the same day she’d started wearing this scent.
For her mom, lilacs and orange blossoms marked hope, new beginnings.
The now-familiar fragrance comforted Shana as she looked at her elegantly styled mother, whose steel-gray hair flowed down her back in a sleek ponytail. Her mother had put her life together again with poise, grit and determination.
Her mom had always been there for Shana growing up, and she’d only moved on after...
The memory flickered, like a snowy mist Shana could barely push through, the frigid haze stinging. Her mom had moved forward with her dating life once Shana became engaged to Chuck. He’d proposed on a dinner cruise along the Alaska coast on a magnificent night with a sky full of northern lights.
Her throat clogged with tears.
She swallowed hard and said, “Mom, why are you here? How did you arrive so quickly?”
Her mother eased back. “Chuck called me last night and told me about the baby. He’s worried about you. I caught a red-eye flight.”
“But your vacation days—”
“Don’t worry about me.” Her mother smoothed back Shana’s hair. “I’m here for you. I would have come sooner but I thought it was best for you and Chuck to... I thought maybe...” She shook her head. “Never mind. Let’s focus on the present.”
“Thank you for coming. You must be exhausted after the night flight.”
The smile lines by her mother’s gray eyes deepened. Squeezing Shana’s hand as if to dismiss her concern, she continued, “We can rest once we get you home.”
“I’m going to be fine.”
Her heart was shattered but her body would recover.
For a moment, her mother’s slender face—normally sunny and full of life—seemed blanched of color. She focused those storm-gray eyes on Shana, a sad smile dusting her lips. “I’ve been through what you’re experiencing.”
Shana looked up in surprise. “You miscarried? You never told me. I mean, you didn’t tell me when I was growing up. Maybe you did in the past five years and I don’t remember.”
She’d only recovered a small portion of her memories. And she sure didn’t like some of what she’d seen. Fresh hurt cramped her belly for all her losses.
“I did share when it first happened to you.” Her mother sighed sadly, pressing a hand to her chest, smoothing along the collar of her orange sweater. “When you were a child, there just didn’t seem to be a time or reason. Then when you were a teen, there was...so much else going on.”
So much else with her father.
The wreckage of his actions had left a wake of grief and distrust that still tainted their lives. His choices had effectively made a lie of anything seemingly positive he’d done in the past, because it had all been covered in a cloak of deception.
Shana pressed her hand to her heart. How could Chuck have lied to her, too, knowing how much the truth meant to her?
She blinked back tears, wary of letting her emotions rise to the surface now. She might lose control completely. She just wanted to get home, to bed.
Except her home was Chuck’s home.
Theirs together.
A shaky exhale rocked her. She had few choices for now. She needed to recover first.
“Well, Mom, I guess it’s no surprise my brain defaulted to amnesia.” Bitterness stung her tongue. “Our family has been good at keeping secrets.”
“Or trying to put a positive spin on everything as if that covers the pain.” Her mother nervously picked at her chipped polish.
“Thoughts that are too deep for me today, I’m afraid.”
“Of course. Let me help you get dressed to check out of the hospital. Chuck is at the nurses’ station getting the discharge paperwork rolling.”
He was still here?
“Chuck? I told him he could go.”
Her mother’s beautiful face scrunched in surprise. “Why would you do that?”
Chuck hadn’t told her mother about the separation. And he hadn’t left.
She should have known he wouldn’t listen. He’d given in too easily last night. That same sense of duty and obligation that had made him stay with her after her memory loss was making him stick around now.
But having him nearby hurt too much. She would accept the ride home to keep the peace, but after that they needed to talk about how to sever ties for good.
* * *
The next day had brought no peace, but Chuck took some comfort in action, accomplishing things by rote, restoring some form of order to his chaotic world.
By the time the doctor had cleared Shana, the paperwork had been completed and they’d driven home, dark had already set in due to the shortening days in Alaska now that winter approached. But there would be no holiday celebrations together for them this year, or any other.
He believed her when she said they were over. She remembered enough, and his deception now had sealed the deal.
He’d rolled the dice and lost.
Back home, Chuck settled his mother-in-law in her suite with a light dinner, although he imagined she would be asleep on her way to the pillow. Shana had gone straight to their room without a word. Not that he suffered any delusions that he was welcome back in the bed beside her, to comfort her the way he’d done in the past.
But she needed to eat. And he wasn’t going to take no for an answer.
He carried a tray of food—pesto meatballs made of lean moose alongside skewers of mozzarella, grape tomatoes and spinach. Hot tea finished out the meal, steaming the scent of spices into the air.
Shana sat on the small white sofa by the fireplace. Moonlight splayed over the mountain scape, downward and through the window. Her blond hair glowed with a honey hue that made him ache to haul her into his lap and press her head to his chest. Her pale paisley robe made him think of watching her reach for it when stepping out of a shared shower.
They’d worked so damn hard to save their marriage, to have a child, and all of that had burned away, like ashes in the grate.
He set the tray on the claw-footed coffee table in front of her. “You need to eat.”
She glanced at him, her eyes shadowed. “Thank you for the food, and for calling my mother.”
“I’m glad Louise is here for you.” He’d held back on contacting his family, not wanting Shana to be exhausted by a flood of people. Well-meaning people, but a mass, all the same. He didn’t want her to feel overwhelmed. “Can I get you anything else?”
“No thank you.” Her voice was hoarse with held-back tears.
“Shana,” he said, his gut clenching. “For what it’s worth, I’m so damn sorry.”
She studied his face for five heavy heartbeats before saying wearily, “I wish I could believe things would be different between us. But it’s so hard to trust anyone after what my father did to my mother.”
Unsure how much she remembered now, he let her continue, curious to see where this conversation would lead, if it could bring eithe
r of them peace.
She shook her head, clutching the neck of her robe closed. “Never mind. I’m sure we’ve talked about this before.”
“You don’t remember those conversations between us?” he prodded, sitting in a chair on the other side of the fireplace, the flames crackling in the early evening quiet. “Maybe it will help jog more memories if you talk.”
“It seems silly to repeat it when I know you know.”
He didn’t answer.
“Fine,” she caved. “I’m not going to go through all the gory details, though. I’ve thought it through so many different ways and why I can’t seem to get over it. Unless, maybe I did get over it while we were married?” She watched him out of the corner of her eyes as she filled a plate with dinner.
“I’m sorry he hurt you so deeply.” He meant it. Wished he had more to offer her than words. “We both have our fair share of baggage.”
“What’s yours? Other than lying.”
He winced. He couldn’t deny what he’d done, and it stung like hell because he considered himself a man of impeccable honor, professionally and personally. He realized now what a mistake he’d made, but he’d been so desperate to accept the second chance for his marriage.
“I’m a perfectionist and a workaholic.” He picked up a plate, not really feeling much like eating but wanting to encourage her to do so. She needed to regain her strength. “I expected too much from both of us and our marriage.”
“And I kept miscarrying.” Her hand went to her stomach.
“I never thought that.” He took her dish from her and held her hand. “Wipe that notion out of your mind.”
“I want to.”
“Then trust me on this much at least.” He willed her to believe him, not that willing it had ever worked in the past. “Okay? Now, please, I want to hear what you’re thinking about your dad.”
“All right... My father liked to give gifts. When he was on the road—which was a lot—he would send elaborate presents for missed birthdays and holidays. I pretended to like them, but I just wanted him home.”
“That had to be difficult when you found out the truth of where he’d been during those absences.”
The Second Chance Page 13
