Flipping the photo over, Ellie scanned the backside for a notation like the one on the picture of her parents.
There was none. But the next few items in the box told her all she needed to know.
A tiny pair of baby booties, crocheted out of scratchy yarn, the pattern one Ellie recognized—Estelle had made the same little shoes for pretty much every baby in Florence. This tiny pair looked like they’d never been used.
The booties were wrapped in a piece of stiff, official looking paper. And the words on it made Ellie’s world shift so quickly beneath her feet that she was sure Armageddon had come.
Who the hell was Tracy Cunningham?
Who on earth was Alexa Kendrick?
That, at least, she had the answer to, right in her hands. Her father had left her when she was barely older than this other girl in the photo. He had left her... and he had started a new family.
Shaking, Ellie tossed the certificate back into the box. On top of it, she threw the picture of her parents, the broken frame, the baby booties. Rising to her knees, she shoved the box across the attic floor. Its weight left a path in the thick dust, a clear mark that she had been here.
“No. No more.” Shaking her head wildly, Ellie crawled back across the floor to the hatch. Feet first, she lowered herself from the attic to the chair, then to the floor. Leaving the chair where it stood, a punctuation mark in the middle of the kitchen, she headed straight for the bedroom, where she began to toss her meagre belongings into her small bag.
She’d started to soften toward this town, and she should have known better.
Nothing good ever came of her presence in Florence, Arizona.
It was long past time for her to go.
Chapter Eight
It just about killed Gabe to stay away from Ellie.
And though he knew she would never believe it, it was about more than the bombshell that she’d dropped on him. Having her so close, but not being able to reach out to her...
It reminded him all too well of what it had felt like, back when he was seventeen. The clean cut captain of the football team, and the son of the sheriff as well, Gabe had been expected to live up to a certain standard of behaviour—and that standard did not include lusting after Florence’s wild child.
He’d given in eventually, but for the longest time, he was just—fascinated, there was no other word for it—from afar.
He’d known her, or known of her, since she’d first shown up in town. There had been mutterings, conversations at the dinner table about what on earth Estelle was going to do with the daughter of her estranged son.
Later, there had been stories, as his father had related to his mother all of the trouble that Ellie had gotten into, the things that she had done. He’d lived vicariously through those the stories, rebelling by proxy whenever she did something crazy.
So he supposed he’d always been drawn to her, but for years, it had been because she was a symbol. She represented everything he could never have.
The first time he’d noticed her, in the way that a boy notices a girl... he could remember that day with perfect clarity. It had been fall of his senior year. Late September. He’d been at football practice, on the big field behind the ugly brick high school.
The coach had called for a break. Sweaty, pumped full of adrenaline, he’d jogged over to the water cooler. He’d dumped a big bottle of icy cold liquid over his head, then refilled it and chugged.
He’d smelled smoke, the lazy, seductive curl of it. He’d never tried smoking, never even had a puff.
As he’d lowered the plastic rim... there she was, standing ten feet away. The smoke came from her cigarette, which she smoked right out in the open, though it wasn’t allowed on school grounds.
She’d been wearing a snug black tank top that showed amazing cleavage. Her legs had been clad in jeans cut so low that—sweet Jesus—when she moved the strings of her thong peeked out.
Her hair was the deep, inky color that came only in a box of color like the ones his mom bought from the drugstore. And though her eyes were ringed in a lot of black gook, he could see, even from this distance, that they were a shade of grey that reminded him of a stormy sky.
She’d simply stood there, smirking at him and smoking, until Coach had barked at her to go. She’d cast a slow, insolent stare at the teacher, flicked her cigarette butt in his general direction.
And then she’d walked—no she’d sauntered away. And with that swing of her hips, that hint of thong, and that devil may care attitude, Gabe had fallen in love the way that only hormone fueled teenage boys can.
They’d both been surprised when that electric connection between had grown stronger, deeper. They’d been each other’s everything—in retrospect, probably not the healthiest relationship.
But they’d been teenagers—they hadn’t know any other way. It was all or nothing.
Seeing Ellie again after all these years, it made Gabe feel like he was seventeen again. When he was in the same room with her, he was hyperaware of her every move, her every breath. She crept into his thoughts when she wasn’t around, no matter what he did to busy himself.
He wanted her. And not just her body, though he’d certainly noticed and appreciated those new curves of hers.
It was more that... as long as Ellie Kendrick was around, he was going to be drawn to her. And this time, knowing what he did now...
He was afraid that that wanting wasn’t going to disappear once she’d gone. And the damn woman was so stubborn, he didn’t have any hope of making her stay.
“Stood brooding, Gabriel.” Scowling to himself, Gabe shoved aside the paperwork that he’d brought him and that was spread over the entirety of his kitchen table. Standing, he stretched, surveying his surroundings.
The apartment was... crappy. There were no two ways about it. And he definitely could have afforded something better. But he’d never seen the point. It was a short walk to work, and he spent most of his time at the station, or on patrol.
On the rare occasions that he needed to relieve the pressure in his cock, he went to the woman’s home. He’d never had any desire to bring one here.
Rolling his neck from side to side, Gabe looked out the window, judged by the setting sun that it was late evening. Past time for dinner.
He didn’t have much appetite. For a man who stood six two in his socks, that was downright strange.
Thinking that maybe a beer would whet his hunger, he cracked open the door to the fridge.
He almost didn’t register the knock on his door, simply because he’d never heard it. No one had ever come to see him here, not even Ed.
Though he tried to steel himself, to hang on to the anger that he’d been stewing in for the last week—damn stubborn woman hadn’t changed a whit—he still felt the clutch of anticipation in his belly.
It was Ellie.
He could feel that attraction between them, pulling at him from the other side of the door, like they were opposite ends of a magnet, drawn together. Distance might lessen the pull, but it never completely went away.
“Can I come in?” Ellie didn’t look at him; instead she kept her eyes on the floor. Her entire body was in a posture of defeat.
“What’s wrong?” He reached for her, instinct even after all these years, then snapped his hands back.
Lifting her head, she studied the movement wordlessly. He waited for the sarcasm, the attitude.
It didn’t come. So he bit his tongue, stopped himself from cynically asking what had changed, and instead stepped back, inviting her in.
She stood in the front entryway, arms hugged to her chest. Unsure, Gabe rocked back on his heels, waiting as she looked around his tiny apartment, curiosity evident on her face.
“Would you like... well, I don’t have any wine. But I have beer. Water, orange juice.” Grateful for something to do, he moved to the galley style kitchen, opened the fridge door. “Go ahead and sit.”
When he turned around, a fresh can in his hands, he f
ound Ellie standing by his small table, his open beer in her hands, a bemused expression on her face. He remembered belatedly that it was the brand she’d preferred when she was far too young to have been drinking anything at all.
“Here.” He held out the fresh one. Eyeing him over the can, she shrugged and sipped from the beer she already held.
“I don’t suppose it really matters at this point, does it?” Smiling wryly, she lifted his drink to her lips for a sip.
Gabe was floored. It was stupid, he knew it was stupid, but the unexpected intimacy—her lips touching the same place his had...
Despite the tension in the air that was so thick he could have scooped it up in a spoon, it heated his blood.
Heated it enough that he had half decided to just go ahead and kiss her—what could he lose, after all?
But she spoke first, clutching the metal can so tightly in her hands that her knuckles went white.
“I haven’t been fair to you.” She spoke slowly, haltingly, but she had Gabe’s full attention. This was the closest he’d ever heard to an apology, coming from the mouth of Ellie Kendrick.
“I didn’t mean to tell you at all, you know.” As if suddenly weary, she sat, bent until her elbows rested on her knees. Looked up at him through a fringe of long, rosy gold bangs.
“I didn’t see what good it could possibly do. Then once I let it slip, I thought that I shouldn’t tell you anymore. Partly because knowing more could only hurt you more. And partly because...” Her voice trailed off, and she reached for the can of beer, drank deeply.
“Partly because... it’s been mine alone for so long. I’m possessive. I got through it alone. So why should I share it with you?”
“Ellie.” Temper flaring, he wanted to curse. But Ellie had never been an easy woman, and she was just telling him the honest truth.
She held up her hand, stopping him from saying anything else.
“But I just realized... just today realized... it’s not fair to tell you just part of it. Just enough that you can wonder over it, and lose sleep over it, and, God knows, make up all kinds of ideas that may or may not be true.” There was an edge to her voice, a ripple of unease in it that made Gabe wonder what had happened to make the mule headed woman he knew change her mind.
But he was on the brink of discovering what he so desperately needed to know—the details of that secret that had turned his world on end.
Now wasn’t the time to push.
She sipped again, and a razor edge of irritation made him want to do just that. Why should he care if it hurt her, after all? She’d kept this from him for ten years.
It wasn’t in him to be that cruel. He might be the one charged with keeping Florence in line, but underneath, he was still that well mannered teen who’d looked at Ellie as a symbol of everything he would never, could never be.
No, he already knew that he would make this as easy on her as he could, even if his nerves felt like a million tiny lightning bolts, ramping up his anxiety to a nearly unbearable level.
But he sat in the free chair, pulled it closer to Ellie’s. She lifted her chin, eyes wide, as he entered her personal space, and when he took one of her small hands, folded it between his large ones, he felt her entire body stiffen.
He wrapped his fingers around her firmly, offering comfort. Just like he always had. And after a long moment and a giant sigh, she relaxed again, though he could feel her hand tremble in his own.
“I told you Estelle took me to a home for unwed mothers in New Mexico.” Ellie looked across the room as she spoke. Gabe wished she would look at him, but understood why she needed the distance.
She paused, but he was pretty sure she wasn’t waiting for a prompt from him. And he was afraid to speak, to break the spell, lest she run out the door leaving him with more questions than answers.
“They were nice enough, but I didn’t really participate in anything. They had classes to help us... how to care for the babies, how to write resumes, schooling for those of us who hadn’t finished. But even though I was shell shocked, both from discovering that I was pregnant and from losing everything I’d known, I still had that attitude. Part was the same old—holding back because caring for someone gave them power over you, and I’d just been thoroughly schooled in that.”
The words were bitter, and Gabe could taste them on his tongue, too.
“But part of it... I didn’t think I belonged there. Thought I was above it all. I didn’t need these remedial classes in math and spelling. Some of the girls there didn’t even know how to read. I’d been educated. I was smart, when I applied myself. I was different from all of them, because I’d been in love with you.” She smiled humorlessly, daring to glance at him. “I’m not a nice person, you know.”
Gabe couldn’t help it; he barked out a laugh. Ellie blinked in surprise. “That’s not news for me, El. I’ve always liked your mean streak.”
Ellie let out a forced chuckle. Swallowing thickly, she continued.
“The pregnancy itself was pretty uneventful. I had really bad morning sickness, well past the first trimester. They told me that happened for some women, but I thought it meant something was wrong with the baby. And I clung to that notion, that maybe something was wrong, and that it would all go away.” Lifting her chin, she stared him right in the eyes, defiance written in every line of her body, daring him to condemn her for it.
And part of him wanted to. Part of him still wanted to be angry, because if he was angry he didn’t have to deal with anything else.
But he kept that to himself, and, holding her gaze, waited for her to continue.
“I felt that way right up to my due date. Then past my due date. I was terrified.” Ellie resumed looking off into space.
“I think... I think I knew something was wrong. Before I went to the doctor that day. When you’re that far along you do these counts every few hours, tallying up the number of movements that you can feel. And they were there—I’m still sure I didn’t imagine that. I mean, he was still in there, right? Nudging against me, even though he was... gone.” She swallowed hugely, and Gabe felt pain, physical pain, as he tensed, waiting for the rest.
“I was due to be induced that day. They checked me in at the hospital, put me in the gown, gave me a bed. A nurse came in with a... it’s called a Doppler... it’s how they hear the heartbeat. She couldn’t find it, but she wasn’t too worried, so I wasn’t either. Apart from, you know, the terror over thinking I’d be leaving the hospital with a small human.”
“She went and got another nurse, who couldn’t find the heartbeat either. Then the doctor came in. He was still pretty reassuring, but he said they were going to send me for an ultrasound to see what was going on. I still didn’t realize... didn’t fully realize what was happening. But then when I watched the face of the tech... I knew. She had this really good game face, you know? But there was just this split second where her expression faltered, and I just knew.”
Gabe wondered if Ellie was aware that her voice had thickened, grown hoarse, though her eyes were still dry as bone. How was she holding it together, when each of these words was like a blade in his own heart?
“But even then, I just... I pushed it away. Retreated, I guess. Full-on denial. I was sent to this room to wait for the doctor. A nurse came in, brought me some water, and gave me this sad little half smile. And I just looked at her like I was high. I just sat there. For almost two hours. Finally the doctor came in, and he looked rough. I could tell he’d been running around trying to figure out what the hell had happened, but I still... I just didn’t feel anything. Not even when he told me. The baby has died. That’s exactly what he said. I’m so sorry, the baby has died.”
Ellie’s voice cracked. Gabe fought the urge to gather her in his arms, for his comfort as much as for hers.
“After that, it’s kind of a blur. I thought they would just... cut me open. Take him out. But apparently that would hurt my chances of... of delivering a baby naturally, at some later date, so they w
ouldn’t. So I was induced. Not with a drip, but with these tablets that they insert. It starts these muscle contractions. All the books, they say that labour is slow, and long, warming your body up. But this... it was zero to sixty. Not feeling anything at all, to screaming because it hurt so bad, begging for drugs, for anything that would make it stop.”
“Oh, Ellie.” Gabe couldn’t stay quiet. Jesus. He’d done this to her. He had. And he hadn’t been there to help her through it. He should have tried harder. He should have... he should have done something.
He opened his mouth, to say what, he wasn’t sure. But then Ellie continued.
“It happened in the bathroom. I was sitting down to... to go to the bathroom, I thought. Just an hour before I’d barely been dilated at all. But when I sat... it just happened. I felt his pressure and then this awful, tearing pain, like I was being split in two. I looked down and saw...”
Here, finally, her voice broke. She pressed her lips together, shook her head when he leaned closer.
After a moment she sucked in a deep, shaky breath.
“I saw the crown of this tiny little head, these damp swirls of dark hair. Same color as yours.”
Emotion rose so fast inside of him that Gabe thought he might vomit.
“But it hurt. It hurt so much. I was alone—the nurses had left me to get some sleep—and I couldn’t reach a call button. So I just screamed. I screamed until someone came, this blonde nurse who knelt at my feet. And then the room was full of people, and I was still screaming, and right then I didn’t care if the baby was dead or alive, I just needed him out. And then finally he was, and I just sagged. Right there on the toilet. A doctor came skidding into the room after he—the baby—was already out. It felt like forever to me, because it hurt so bad, but it had been just a few minutes. It wasn’t even my doctor, just the one who was nearest in the hospital.”
“One nurse took him away to get him cleaned up before I saw him. I thought that was weird, but now I understand. He’d... he’d been dead for a few days, and they... they wanted to make sure the picture I carried of him, in my head, was as perfect as it could be.”
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