It had taken Jonathan three months to call me that—Daddy. They’d warned me he may have a negative association with the term, and I had been told I should allow it to come naturally. Jonathan knew I was his father, and when he was comfortable, it would come out. When it finally did, it left me with without words and with Jonathan in my arms.
I still wasn’t sure whether I believed time could heal. Six years apart and the depth of what I felt for Maggie had never dimmed, could never be buried or contained.
But I was sure love could heal.
No. We would never be completely free of the past, and the memories could never be entirely wiped away, but we were healing. Jonathan’s dreams came further and further apart, their intensity less. Maggie rarely cried herself to sleep anymore, and I no longer stared unseeing out the window, but instead slept wrapped around the girl.
The girl I was going to marry as soon as she was ready. I didn’t want to push her. I would wait until just learning how to breathe didn’t consume her days.
I ran behind Emma and Jonathan as they rounded the end of the yard and headed back the other direction.
“Grammy is base!” Emma called and the two children ran, their legs sprinting them across the grass. Little Olivia did her best to keep up with the big kids, suddenly cutting across the yard midway, completely oblivious to the “rules” Emma had set up for their play.
Jonathan and Emma tumbled into their grandmother who waited with outstretched arms under the tree at the edge of the yard.
“Safe!” she cried as the two tackled her.
My dad whistled from his spot on the porch. “You made it, Emma and Jonathan!”
I laughed and fell to the ground beside them.
“You two are way too fast for me.” I panted as I tried to catch my breath. I tugged Jonathan onto my lap and hugged him close. He tucked his head under my chin and grinned up at me. A rush of emotion spread.
Joy.
“Hey, Will, can you give me a hand? These steaks are ready,” Blake said while he tried to balance a large metal tray in one hand and tongs and a spatula in the other.
“Sure.”
Mom stood from the grass and dusted herself off. She smiled as she took Jonathan and Emma by the hand. “Why don’t the big kids help me set the table? Do you think you could do that?”
Her suggestion was met with another squeal from Emma and a shy smile of delight from Jonathan as he glanced back at me.
I caught Maggie’s expression, saw it in her eyes, a thankful satisfaction, another small triumph for our son.
He’d come such a long way.
I crossed the yard and clapped Blake on the back. “Smells good.”
He handed me the tray and maneuvered the steaks from the grill. He smirked. “Well I made them, didn’t I? What’d you expect, little brother?”
“Don’t let it go to your head. I was just trying to be nice.” I shook my head sadly, my eyes dropping to the pile of steaks then back to my brother. “I mean, look...you ruined them. They’re all charred.” Laughing, I ducked when Blake tried to smack the back of my head. I wove back and forth as he chased me up the stone path. I tried to shove him back when he gained on me.
We were both laughing by the time we pounded up the porch steps.
“All right, you two, knock it off before your mom has to send you to your rooms,” Grace said, grinning up at her husband who swept in to kiss her.
“Mmm...I think I like that idea,” he said against her mouth.
Grace pushed him back and patted his cheek. “You only wish.” She stood, ignoring her husband who wrapped himself around her back. “Here, Will, let me take those for you.”
“Thanks,” I said and passed them off.
Blake followed her in, whispering something in her ear. Maggie struggled not to laugh, her face red with my brother’s overt display. I just watched them, no longer affected by that anticipated twinge of jealousy.
Instead, I smiled at Maggie and reached down to help her up. I was complete—whole—that place reserved for Maggie no longer aching to be filled. I pulled her close, and splayed my hand across her lower back. Her skin still burned me through her clothes.
“Hungry?” I brushed her bangs from her face, wondered again how it was possible to love someone so much.
“Starving.”
“Good, because those steaks smell delicious.”
Maggie laughed, and I tightened my hold.
Tenderness filled her eyes as she inclined her head to the side, her fingers fluttering up to caress my jaw.
I moved to run my lips across her fingers. “I love you so much, Maggie.”
A soft smile formed on her mouth. “I know.”
~
Maggie
I’d never known what home meant.
To me, it’d been a prison, a place I longed to escape. A place where horrors were harbored, concealed behind closed windows and lies.
I looked up at the small house as we pulled into the drive. That flame I’d once kept buried inside burned bright.
Home.
I knew it now—I knew what it meant.
William pulled into the garage. He pressed a warm palm to my cheek before he climbed out of the car. The warmth spread through my consciousness, covered every inch of who I was.
Jonathan had fallen asleep on the way back from his grandparents’. William unbuckled our sleeping child from the backseat. He kissed Jonathan’s head when he pulled him into his arms. A contented sigh flowed from Jonathan’s mouth as he struggled to sink further into William’s chest.
William murmured at his head—loved our little boy.
My spirit soared, the thankfulness I felt overflowing. How many times had I prayed for someone to save us? William had.
I followed them inside and down the hall. We passed by the small office where William did contract work. He wanted to stay close to us during the day in case we needed him, so he’d begun doing the books for a few of the small businesses around town from the house.
I flipped on the nightlight in Jonathan’s room so William could tuck him in bed. Jonathan stirred when William set him down, blinking as he took in his surroundings. William knelt down beside him.
“Mommy and Daddy are right across the hall if you need us, okay, buddy?” William said, his words a simple reassurance for our son. We are here.
Jonathan nodded. “Okay, Daddy.”
Then he closed his eyes and snuggled under the covers when William pulled them to his chin.
I climbed to my knees beside his bed. “I love you, Jonathan.”
I placed a kiss on the side of his head and ran my fingers through his hair. I’d spent so much time fearing for him. For his future, for his safety, and for his heart. I’d struggled to supply the needs I didn’t have the strength to provide, to give him hope when I had none, to give him joy when I had little to share. All I’d have to give him was my love.
William had shown me that was enough.
William helped me to stand, and a soft smile filtered across his face as he drew me near and wrapped a strong arm around my waist. I flattened myself against his warmth, and he rocked me in the solitude of Jonathan’s room.
“Let me get ready for bed,” I said.
He kissed me gently below my ear. “Don’t be long.”
“I won’t be.”
As if I could stay away from him for long.
He turned his attention back to Jonathan as I headed out the door.
In the bathroom, I tugged my shirt over my head and shrugged out of my jeans. Sometimes my mind still fought to recognize what had happened that night, and other times, the memories would slip over me like the residual of a nightmare. My blood would run cold as I was struck again by what Troy had planned to do.
I still had at least two more surgeries to remove the scars, but even when they were gone, I would never be able to forget.
William had saved us. He had been willing to give it all. He would have given his life to save ours. Ins
tead he’d taken Troy’s.
I knew it haunted him more than he’d ever admit.
I’d never known more fear than the day that had been spent in that field. Troy had snapped. The true derangement he’d hidden behind a hardened exterior had finally broken free. I’d begged him to spare Jonathan, telling him I’d do anything if he’d let him go. It’d only incited Troy more.
By nightfall, I’d given up and succumbed to the realization that it was the end. Again, I had failed, and my son would pay the ultimate price for every mistake I had made.
And then William was there.
Shaking off the memories, I washed my face, brushed my teeth, and slipped into the little white nightgown. I paused in the doorway between our bathroom and our bedroom. William was stretched out on our bed. His was propped up on a pillow that rested against the headboard, wearing only pajama bottoms. His body was lean and strong, and his hair flopped over his eye as he angled his head so he could see the book he read in the light from the small lamp on the nightstand.
A thrill shot through my middle. It was a feeling I couldn’t quite describe, something that hinted at desire, though it went so much deeper than that. It was unending trust, an overwhelming love, and an intense passion. A consuming need that made me want to bury myself in the man who smiled over at me when he noticed me standing there.
“Hey you,” he said as he placed his book on the nightstand and shifted to his side.
There’d been so many things I’d never been able to appreciate before. The way his bare feet looked when he stood on the tile floor, how rumpled he was in the morning, how he squinted when he was absorbed in what he read.
But all this time, I knew him.
I knew the kindness and the goodness.
None of what I felt was a result of my past or anything I’d been through in my life. I wasn’t clinging to William as a savior or blinded by the circumstances.
Underneath all the scars that lined my body and lined my soul, William saw me. And he loved me as much as I loved him.
I crossed the room, and the hem of the little white eyelet nightgown I wore brushed over the tops of my thighs. I’d picked it out just for him—just for tonight. I’d been building up to this, searching for the courage to find my voice, for the place inside me that knew it was okay to ask for what I wanted.
His expression shifted when I climbed on top of him and straddled his lap. I leaned in and kissed his mouth, grasping his face as I showered this man who’d been willing to sacrifice everything for me and our son with love.
“What are you doing?” he mumbled with a smile against my mouth.
“Kissing you.”
He laughed low. It was a sound that originated somewhere deep inside of him, and he grinned and flipped me onto my back.
I gasped when he pounced on me.
“I like this,” he said with his mouth at the strap of my nightgown. He nudged it aside with his nose. He kissed my shoulder, the warmth of his mouth traveling over my collarbone and under my jaw. He pulled back to look at me. The emotion in his eyes was so powerful—enough to fill me up and sustain my life. He ran his knuckles down my cheek. “But I love this.”
I felt the flush that washed my face and neck, a feeling of innocence that sent butterflies flitting through my belly.
I touched his face and got lost in the man who had always made me feel this way—both special and normal. The man with gentle hands and a pure heart.
He edged the straps lower. His hands ignited a fire where they caressed over my skin.
The night when I stood in his childhood bedroom and he’d first told me he loved me, I’d known it. It was the night he’d made a choice to fight for me, no matter what the consequences. And I knew it now.
I wanted it to be him. In every capacity. In every way.
I ran my hands up his arms and palmed his perfect face. My nerves raced as I searched the eyes of the man I’d would never stop loving.
“Marry me?” My voice broke when I uttered the words that were filled with hope for a future that for so long I’d never believed I’d have.
William blinked softly, as if he had to take a moment to comprehend my words, and then he pulled my hand from his face and pressed my palm to his mouth. “Do you have any idea how happy that would make me, Maggie? I meant it then and I mean it now. Nothing could make me happier than promising you my life.”
But he’d already promised it. He had been willing to give it. For me. For our son.
Finally, I was brave enough to give him mine.
As many as one in three girls and one in seven boys will be sexually abused at some point in their childhood.
-Briere, J., Eliot, D.M. Prevalence and Psychological Sequence of Self-Reported Children Physical and Sexual Abuse in General Population: Child Abuse and Neglect, 2003, 27 10. —10/01/2012
If you need help, please call ChildHelp at 1-800-422-4453
One in every four women will experience domestic violence in her lifetime.
An estimated 1.3 million women are victims of physical abuse by an intimate partner each year.
Almost one-third of female homicide victims that are reported in police records are killed by an intimate partner.
-National Coalition Against Domestic Violence —10/01/2012
If you need help, please call The National Domestic Abuse Hotline at 1-800-799-7233
Read more by A. L. Jackson
Pulled ~ A story of attraction and separation, of destiny and duty, of a love so strong it refuses to give up even when all others have.
Take This Regret ~ They say everyone deserves a second chance.
Connect with A. L. Jackson at www.aljacksonbooks.blogspot.com
Table of Contents
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Chapter Twenty-Two
Epilogue
When We Collide Page 28
