“What’s the deal, Rog?”
“The deal is I want to go home,” he said softly. “I want to spend the time I have left with my wife.” Then he forced her face up and brushed the tips of his fingers over the dark, ugly bruising at her neck. “And I think we both know there’s not that much time left. But I’m not going to risk this happening again.”
“Who says it will?”
“There’s a chance.” Roger sighed, combing his fingers through her hair. “And if there’s a chance, then I either have somebody here to help you, or I won’t go back home. It’s this way, or I stay here.”
Blinking back tears, she clambered off his lap and started to pace the room. “Roger, you’re not going to do it again.”
“We can’t know that,” he said, shaking his head. Then he lifted his hands, closed them into fists. “Tell me something, and be honest. How long have I…how long have I not been acting like me?”
When he looked at her, those dark brown eyes of his so sad and broken, she wanted to sob. She wanted to scream. The cancer that was killing him, it was doing more than just killing his body—it was destroying his soul—that kind, gentle soul. Blinking away her tears, she said softly, “A couple of months. It wasn’t much, though. Not at first. Usually, you just get really mad for a few minutes, then, just like that, it’s gone.”
“What do you mean, not at first?” He stared at her, as though he was trying to see clear through to her soul.
Zoe sighed and looked down. “At first, you were just…well, grouchy, but mean with it. It made sense, though. I mean wouldn’t you be pissed off? I’m pissed off. But then it started happening more. I…I just didn’t think much more about it other than you being angry.”
“Zoe.” He laid a hand on her leg. “You’re not telling me everything.”
She winched. “No. I guess not. I just…I don’t know. You had these times when you were angry, really angry. And you’d get this look in your eye—it would scare me. A lot.”
He swallowed, his Adam’s apple bobbing up and down. “I know I’ve had times when I get angry…but, it was like it lasted just a second. I don’t even remember ever saying anything.” Closing his eyes, he rested his head on the back of the chair. “Did I ever hurt you before this?”
“No.” Laying a hand on his cheek, she leaned in, pressed her lips to his chin. “You’ve just gotten a little cranky here and there.”
He skimmed a hand up her back, rested it on the nape of her neck. “Thank God. I’ve been half sick, worrying, wondering. Thinking that maybe I’d done something, but you just didn’t want to tell me. You shouldn’t have kept quiet, though, about any of this, baby. Even if I was just being cranky.”
Zoe sighed and straightened up, combing a hand through his hair. “Honestly, Roger, it just didn’t dawn on me to say much of anything about it. I mean, why in the hell wouldn’t you be madder than hell?”
“But that’s the thing…I don’t remember really being madder than hell. Not exactly. Just times when I’d get mad, but then nothing else. It’s gone.” He touched a gentle finger to her face and said, “I remember this, but whatever else I did or said that was ‘cranky’, as you call it, I don’t remember that. If that was something that was kind of leading up to this, if we’d known…”
His face spasmed. “Baby, I can’t believe I did this to you—shit, Zoe. How in the hell could I do this?”
Then he took a deep breath, and before she could say another word, he pressed his lips to her cheek, gently, soothingly. Then he kissed her eye, the bruises on her neck. “This won’t happen again. I won’t let it. And you can’t argue me out of this. Zoe. Either agree, or just get your stuff packed and I’ll have James take you home without me. I…I can’t…”
There were tears in his eyes. Those big hands that had always held her so carefully, so gently, were shaking. “I damn near broke you,” he said, his voice harsh, sharp enough to cut. “It won’t happen again. I’ll slit my wrists first. If you want me home again, Zoe, you agree to this.”
Jesse leaned against the wall, trying to block out the conversation in the room behind him.
He couldn’t move any farther away, though.
Even if he hadn’t just given his word to Roger, he wouldn’t have walked away from Zoe.
With his dying breath, he’d protect her and although he doubted Roger was in that murderous rage, he wasn’t risking it.
A muscle pulsed in his jaw as Roger said, “I damn near broke you. It won’t happen again. I’ll slit my wrists first. If you want me home again, Zoe, you’ll agree to this.”
Roger was a born politician, it seemed, something that surprised Jesse to no end. Oh, Jesse knew he meant every damn word, but he knew exactly what words to use.
There was no way Zoe would refuse him.
He’d used a similar tactic on Jesse. “She’ll insist on me coming home, but I can’t do it unless I know she’s safe. I need her safe. Help me out here, Jesse. I know you don’t owe me anything, but do it for her.”
There had been an unspoken message in his old friend’s eyes. One that said, I know you still love her.
There wasn’t anything he wouldn’t do for Zoe, it seemed.
Anything…including temporarily moving into the house where she lived with her husband.
Her dying husband.
This whole thing was so beyond fucked up. Scrubbing his hands over his face, he sighed and waited.
She’d say yes.
She’d do anything to get Roger out of here.
Jesse idly wondered if this was the price he was paying for the many, many screw-ups in his life. If this was karma’s way of making sure he paid, then karma was doing a damned good job.
Damned good…and unfortunately, if this was karma, then Jesse had a good, long bout of suffering ahead of him, because he had so many years of screw-ups to account for, it could be another fifteen years before he was square again.
More than likely, this was the price he had to pay for what he’d done all those years ago…walking away from Zoe…even though he’d loved her more than life itself. He’d loved her, but he’d been too fucking selfish, too fucking not ready for her.
And now he had to do the exact opposite of what he’d done then, because that was what she needed—he had to think of nothing but her, be completely selfless, and even though all he wanted was her…she would never be ready for him. Not now.
Closing his eyes, he slammed a fist against the painted concrete and waited. Waited. Waited.
Chapter Five
“You don’t need to hang around here on your off day,” Roger said tiredly as he made his way down the hall way. “Zoe’s gone anyway—out to see that crazy bitch of a mother of hers.”
It had been five days since Jesse had moved in.
He had left the house only when Zoe did, and he had altered his hours at the store to match hers—she only worked eight hours a week right now, hours when Roger’s sister and her husband were able to come stay at the house, or when James could come by.
Fortunately, Jesse had a damn good assistant manager.
Saluting Roger with a half-eaten sandwich, Jesse shrugged and gave him a casual smile. “Hey, the food here is better.”
Roger didn’t respond.
He had a tight, tired look around his eyes, and there was a mean, ugly slant to his mouth.
That was why Jesse wasn’t leaving. He’d heard Roger snapping at Zoe more than a few times today and if he was slipping, he wasn’t going to not be here if Zoe came back home for something.
Easing himself down on a chair, Roger muttered, “Can’t even have peace and quiet in my own fucking house.”
Jesse ignored him.
That didn’t seem to do the trick because with each passing minute, Roger got more angry, more volatile. The feet of the wooden stool scraped off the floor, warning him and Jesse was up on his feet and moving just before Roger would have tried to grab him.
“There a problem, buddy?”
Roger curled his lip. “Yeah, buddy. You. I see how you look at her. Staring at my wife like she’s your little whore. She ain’t. She’s my whore.”
Jesse curled a hand into a fist. “That woman is the woman you love, Roger. You shouldn’t talk about her like that,” he said quietly.
Roger jabbed himself in the chest with his thumb. “My wife. Can do whatever I want. You don’t like it, then you shoulda never left.
Ain’t that the truth. “Why don’t you go lay down? I can get some of your pain medicine for you. Call over to hospice.”
“I don’t need medicine or hospice,” Roger bellowed. He swung out with his arm, sweeping the counter clear. Glass went flying. “I just want my fucking wife here where she belongs and I don’t want you sniffing around her.”
“I’m not, and I won’t.”
“Fucking liar, you fuc…” Roger sagged, swayed. He stumbled to the side and would have collapsed into the bar if Jesse hadn’t caught him.
It was four hours later before Jesse and Roger were alone again. The nurse from hospice had come over. Zoe had rushed home from work.
Now she was downstairs, talking quietly on the phone to Roger’s doctor.
Neither Roger nor Jesse had told her about what had happened right before Roger’s collapse.
Jesse had wondered if Roger remembered, right up until his friend looked over at him and muttered, “Hey, man… ‘m sorry.”
Jesse just shook his head. “Don’t be. It’s not like you can help it.”
“Shit. Not all the way true. Only get mad about her. You. That’s it. And it’s ‘cause I look at the two of you and remember.” Then he sighed. “Shit.”
Roger stared blankly up at the ceiling, his eyes open, but what he was seeing, Jesse didn’t know.
“Why did you leave her?”
Jesse looked up. He didn’t need to ask who Roger was talking about. Anymore than Roger needed to explain.
“It wasn’t her I left,” Jesse said softly. “I just needed to get out. I could already see the rest of my life planned out for me, and I…I dunno, man. I felt it was choking me and I couldn’t breathe.”
“What life was that?”
It seemed so fucking stupid now, Jesse thought. “Following in my dad’s footsteps. I could see me doing my four years in the Army, just like he did, writing a letter to Zoe every single week, and waiting for her to write me back. When I got out, I’d marry her…I’d go to college, I’d come back here and take over my dad’s old job. It was like it was already written, already planned out. And I didn’t want that life. Or at least not all of it. The only part I wanted was Zoe.”
“But you left her behind too.”
“Yeah. Yeah, I did.” Sighing, he got out of the chair and went to stand by the window, staring at the sprawling green lawn of their backyard. It was large, richly green. There was a swimming pool, still closed off for winter, but in the summer, he imagined it sparkled like a jewel and he could see Zoe diving in, cutting through that water like a mermaid. “But I wasn’t ready for her, you know. I wouldn’t have been any good for her if I’d tried to make myself stay, or even if I’d tried to take her with me. I was too fucking selfish, too fucking focused on what I wanted. What I needed. It took losing her to figure that out, I think.”
He sighed and shook his head. “I didn’t mean to stay gone as long as I did. Time just slipped away from me. I was out there trying to figure out who I wanted to be…not just follow down some path everybody else assumed I’d follow,” he murmured. Then he glanced at Roger and gave him a wry smile. “Looks like you settled into that spot pretty well.”
Roger reached up and rubbed at his head. “I didn’t intend for any of that. Not even Zoe. Although I won’t deny that I had a thing for her. Always. Even back in high school.” He gave Jesse a small smile. “I’d be lying and I don’t think now’s the time to be adding any more sins to my conscience.”
“You don’t need to explain this to me,” Jesse said, forcing the words past his tight throat. Shit, he didn’t want to know. Not at all. “I don’t need to know any of this.”
“Maybe there’s just some of it that I need to tell you.” Roger closed his eyes. He looked so gaunt, so pale and tired. His cheekbones pressed harshly against his flesh, like blades that might cut through his skin. “I didn’t mean to move in on her, but she…well, she needed me. Needed somebody and I wanted to be there for her. I think part of her kept hoping you’d come back, but both of us, I think we realized it wasn’t happening. We knew somehow.”
Jesse pressed his head against the glass, closed his eyes. Two months. They waited all of two months. I left in June, you married her at the end of August. Yeah, you really gave me a chance to come back.
But even he knew how stupid that was. He’d had no plans of coming back at that point in time.
“She cried for you. A lot,” Roger said, his voice stronger, harder. “Especially that first year. There were times when I hated you.”
Slowly, Jesse turned around and met Roger’s mild brown eyes. “And what do you want me to do now? What do you want me to say? I can’t undo past mistakes, and even if I could, I don’t know if I would.” He couldn’t look away from Roger’s face, couldn’t make himself seriously think about whether he’d undo his personal fuckups. He was terribly afraid he’d say yes, and that made him feel like a selfish monster.
All Roger had in his life was Zoe.
Soon, he wouldn’t even have his life…or Zoe.
Roger stared at him, silently, for the longest time and then abruptly, he said, “You still love her, don’t you?”
Jesse looked away.
“Shit, man, it’s not like I’m in any shape to jump out of the bed and punch you out for it. Just tell me the truth.”
Without saying anything, Jesse reached up behind him and freed the clasp of the gold chain he wore around his neck. He held it up to the light, watching as the stylized Z swung back and forth in the air.
“Zoe gave me this on prom night. More than fifteen years ago. I’ve kept it all this time, had it with me the day I came back home,” he murmured. Then he lowered it, studying the design on the Z, rubbing it with his thumb. “When I saw the picture of you two, your wedding picture that first day, I thought it just might kill me. It hurt like a son of a bitch. I almost threw the necklace away.”
“But you didn’t.”
“Can’t.” Jesse put the necklace back on, tucked it out of sight under his shirt. “Yeah, I still love her. Part of me has just been waiting for the time when I was ready to come back here. When I would be worthy of her. I didn’t want to leave her—I just had to get away from here, and to do that, I had to leave her. I’ve been waiting all this time to come back, to her. Hoping I could make her mine again. Never knew it was too fucking late…practically from the get go.”
“Not too late.” A faint smile curled Roger’s lips. “Timing is just about perfect.”
Closing his eyes, he sighed. The breath rattled in, out of his chest. “She never completely got over you either, I don’t think. We’ve had a good marriage, and I know she loves me. Marrying her, it was the smartest damn thing I ever did. But there’s always been a part of her heart that was yours.”
Now he opened his eyes up and the intensity of his gaze burned through Jesse. “She’ll need time. But don’t wait too long. Go after her again, and this time, make her yours. Take her. Marry her. Make her happy. Part of her has always belonged to you anyway. Don’t screw it up this time.”
Jesse’s heart slammed against his ribs. But he kept his face blank. He’d learned a long time ago not to show his emotions. “What?”
“You heard me.” Roger smiled. “You still love her, man. Don’t let guilt over me, or whatever, keep you away from her. I had a good life with her—something I wouldn’t have had if you’d stayed, if you’d taken her with you. I love her, and I want her happy. You can make her happy, I think. Do that. For me. For her…for you.”
“You want me with Zoe.”
“You make it sound like this a done deal, Roger. But you seem to forget…Zoe’s got some opinion in this too. And for all you know, she doesn’t give a flying fuck about me anymore.”
“I know Zoe.” His eyes opened just a little, but there was a certain, sure light in those dark eyes. “Spent nearly fifteen years married to her while you were out doing whatever in the hell you felt you needed to do. I know what she wants, and what she needs.”
He grimaced, his thin face twisting with pain. He glanced at the IV rigged up next to him and muttered, “This shit isn’t doing much good any more, you know?”
Then he focused on Jesse again. “I know what she needs, and when this is over, she’s going to need you.”
Then he closed his eyes, and with a deep, erratic sigh, he slipped into sleep.
She woke up to find Roger lying on his side, watching her.
There was a knee-jerk fear, one she couldn’t completely smash. More than two weeks had passed since the attack, but the bruises had yet to completely fade and she knew the memories, the nightmares, would take months—or longer—before they were gone completely.
But she didn’t let them show as she reached up and stroked a hand down his cheek.
He’d lost so much more weight. They probably weighed about the same now. It broke her heart just to look at him.
Forcing a smile, she cupped his cheek in her palm. “Hey.”
“Hey, yourself,” he murmured, his voice low and warm with sleep, and thankfully, free from pain.
“Why are you awake?”
“Because I’m not asleep,” he said easily. He caught her wrist and nuzzled her palm. “I’ve just been laying here a while, watching you sleep. You’re so damn beautiful, Zoe. Sometimes I still can’t believe I’ve had you for the past fifteen years. How did I get that lucky?”
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