Daddy On The Run

by Carla Cassidy

  Although she hadn’t welcomed the police officer at her door, she’d welcomed the interruption. She couldn’t fall back into the same patterns, swallowing her unhappiness, allowing the power of their lovemaking to make decisions for her.

  That’s what she had done before he’d disappeared. She’d settled for a lifetime of hurried kisses and midnight caresses; she’d settled for Sam fitting her into his busy schedule. It wasn’t enough. It would never be enough.

  The euphoria over the new job disappeared beneath the weight of her thoughts. Starting the engine, she took a deep breath, wondering if Sam had made any headway on cracking Joseph’s computer program while she’d been gone. She hoped so. She couldn’t think, couldn’t make a rational decision concerning her marriage as long as Sam’s freedom was at risk.

  Driving to the baby-sitter’s, she tried to focus instead on the beautiful autumn evening. Twilight painted everything a lush gold tone, imbuing the world with a warmth she wished she could swallow to heat the cold spots inside her.

  There had been a brief time long ago when they’d first gotten married when Sam had been her twilight. He’d filled her with warmth, but those days had passed long ago and she feared they would never be able to recapture those golden moments of yesterday.

  Two weeks before Sam had disappeared, she’d finally confessed her unhappiness to her mother. “Julianne, the honeymoon can’t last forever,” her mother had observed.

  “I don’t expect the honeymoon to last forever. I’d just hoped my marriage would last a little longer,” Julianne had replied. “I don’t know what scares me more, living the rest of my life with Sam or without him.”

  Julianne thought of those words now. What had kept her in the marriage was fear…she’d never lived alone, wasn’t sure she was capable. Sam’s disappearance had taught her she could be alone. She knew now she could function as a single parent, could endure lonely nights and empty days. Of course, she had felt those same things being with Sam.

  She pulled into the baby-sitter’s driveway and rubbed her forehead wearily. There was nothing more exhausting than trying to make life-altering decisions, especially ones that tore at the heart.

  It would be so much easier to make the decision to leave Sam if she no longer loved him. But she did love him. She just wasn’t sure she could live the life he offered her any longer.

  Emily met her at the door, a bundle of energy and giggles that instantly soothed Julianne’s troubling thoughts. “Hi, pumpkin, did you have a good time with Susan?”

  “Yup. We did finger painting on the kitchen table.” Emily ran to the coffee table where a picture was laid out, apparently drying. “It’s a fairy dancing with a unicorn,” Emily explained as she handed the picture to Julianne. “Susan says it’s abstract.”

  Julianne laughed as Susan appeared in the doorway between the kitchen and the living room. “It’s a beautiful picture,” Julianne agreed. “Hi, Susan. Thanks for watching her.”

  “No problem. We always have fun, right, Emily?” Susan smiled.

  “Right,” Emily readily agreed. “Susan promised next time she watches me she’s gonna show me how to make pictures with macaroni and glue.”

  “Sounds better than macaroni and cheese,” Julianne replied.

  Emily tilted her head curiously. “Can you make pictures out of macaroni and cheese?”

  “Not in this house.” Susan laughed. “As it is I’ve got to get the finger-painting mess cleaned up before Mom gets home.”

  “Need some help?” Julianne asked, anxious to get home but not wanting to leave Susan with a mess of her daughter’s making.

  “Nah. It’s no big deal.”

  “Then we’ll get out of your hair. Thanks again.” Saying their goodbyes, Julianne and Emily left the house and got into the car.

  “Did you get the job, Mommy?” Emily asked as she buckled her seat belt.

  “As a matter of fact, I did. Isn’t that wonderful?” Julianne looked at her daughter enthusiastically. Emily was silent, her forehead wrinkled in a frown as she studied her seat belt with unnatural intensity. “Emily? What’s the matter, honey?”

  “Nothing.” Still the little girl refused to meet her mother’s gaze.

  A whisper of worry niggling in the pit of her stomach, Julianne pulled the car over to the curb. She turned and faced her daughter. “Emily, tell me what’s wrong.” She leaned over and lifted her daughter’s chin with her index finger. “Mommies can always tell when something is bothering their children.”

  Emily’s frown deepened and she twirled a strand of her hair, a sure sign that something bothered her. “If you go to work, does this mean I won’t see you anymore?”

  “Oh, no, sweetheart. In fact, you can come with me to my new job,” Julianne replied. “You’re going to like it. It’s a preschool with lots of fun things to do and lots of kids to play with. They even have a pet rabbit there.”

  “A rabbit? What’s his name?”

  “Peter, I think,” Julianne answered absently. She frowned and stroked a strand of her daughter’s shining hair. “Why did you think my working meant we wouldn’t see each other anymore?”

  Emily shrugged. “I dunno.” She twirled her hair faster, then stopped the motion and looked at Julianne. “When Daddy was going to work, we never saw him. He was never home for tea parties or to tuck me in at night.” She smiled and released her hold on her hair. “I like it now that Daddy is a ghost daddy ‘cause now he spends lots of time with us and we can have fun together.”

  A bleak wind of despair blew through Julianne. How sad and how very telling of how things had been before Sam had left. As long as Sam remained a fugitive hiding in their attic, Emily had her daddy and Julianne had her husband.

  How heartbreaking it was that when Sam cleared his name he’d go back to his work, back to the company, and Emily would lose her daddy once again. Just as Julianne would lose her husband.

  Chapter Seven

  Sam stretched with arms overhead, then rubbed the back of his neck tiredly. For the past three days he’d been cooped up in the attic working on cracking the code to the mysterious file. After three days of work, he was beginning to realize how futile his efforts were.

  Punching off the power button on the laptop, he stood and once again stretched, trying to unkink muscles and relax the stress that tightened his shoulders.

  He’d made it a point each day to take a break and have lunch with Julianne and Emily. They’d even had another tea party, but there had been no slow dancing or lovemaking afterward. In fact, each day he felt Julianne slipping further and further away from him, and that scared the hell out of him.

  Sighing in frustration, he went downstairs to make himself something to eat. Julianne and Emily had left early that morning, Julianne as excited as a child on the first day of school as she anticipated beginning her new job.

  As he stood in front of the refrigerator, the house surrounded him in silence…a silence that pressed heavily on him. He’d grown accustomed to hearing the presence of his wife and daughter while he worked, their voices and laughter comforting him. Without their presence, there was no comfort, only a cold, empty silence and he realized if he lost Julianne, that’s what his life would be like…cold and empty.

  Was this what it was like for Julianne while he was at work? Did the hours of the day stretched empty and endless? Surely not. Julianne was involved in activities, she had women friends to talk with on the phone, things to do to pass the time.

  He slammed the refrigerator door, appetite gone beneath the unappetizing flavor of his thoughts. Sinking down at the table, he burrowed his head in his hands, for a moment overwhelmed with hopelessness. He was never going to crack the file. Julianne was. going to leave him and Emily would grow up the child of a broken marriage and with a father in prison for murder.

  Perhaps the best thing he could do for them both was let them go. Let them build a new life without him. Julianne was a beautiful woman. Eventually she would find another husband, one
who could fill her heart with happiness. Emily was young and loving, and would eventually grow to welcome another daddy without question.

  But no matter how rationally he considered this option, his heart wouldn’t allow him to seriously consider it. He loved Julianne like no other man could, and he couldn’t imagine his life without her and Emily. He was Julianne’s husband and Emily’s father, and he didn’t want that to change.

  What frightened him was that he knew he was no longer in control. The ball was in Julianne’s court. Whether they would have a marriage, a life together, was her decision, her choice.

  He froze as a knock banged on the door. The knock was firm, authoritative in sound, and it evoked a moment of panic inside him. Was it the police? This time did they have a warrant? Would they burst into the house and find him here, sitting at the table, nursing regrets instead of a cup of coffee?

  His insides jumped as the knock resounded again. Soundlessly, he walked from the kitchen into the hallway, then crept up the stairs to Emily’s room where the windows overlooked the driveway. He breathed a sigh of relief as he saw the white Lincoln Town car in the drive. Garrison.

  For a moment Sam fought an impulse to run downstairs and open the door, admit the man who had been his father’s business partner for years and Julianne’s main emotional and financial support while he’d been gone.

  Perhaps Garrison could offer some sound advice as to what Sam should do; maybe he’d have an idea on how to get into Joseph’s secret file.

  Despite the impulse, Sam remained at the window, watching as Garrison got back in his car and drove off down the street. Once again the silence of the house grew to oppressive proportions and his thoughts once again turned to his wife.

  It was time he and his wife had a talk about where their marriage was going. He needed to know how she felt; what she wanted. She was sending him too many mixed signals. On the one hand, he felt her distance, knew she was emotionally and physically withdrawing from him. Yet on the other hand, he felt her gaze lingering on him often, her eyes mirroring what he perceived as love.

  If she did love him and wanted to live a life with him, then he would do everything in his power to make her happy. He knew there had been mistakes made in the past and he would do what he could to rectify those errors.

  One thing was certain, he needed to know that if he fought to clear his name and get his life back, that Julianne intended to be a part of that life.

  He waited until late that evening, after Emily had gone to bed. They had shared a pleasant dinner together. Julianne loved her new job and spent the meal telling Sam each and every detail of her day. He listened absently, focusing instead on the brightness of her eyes, the beauty of her smile. It had been a very long time since he’d seen her so happy. A tinge of guilt gnawed at him as he remembered how many times she’d tried to talk to him about needing something of her own and his own countering that she had enough to do in being wife of the vice-president of Baker Enterprises.

  He’d dismissed her needs, her obvious desires, because he’d been blinded to everything but the family business. He hadn’t wanted to think she needed anything but him. He’d been a selfish, foolish man.

  It was with this in mind that he went searching for Julianne. He found her in the bedroom. He entered the room just as she stepped out of the adjoining bathroom wrapped only in a towel. “Oh, sorry,” he exclaimed, finding it strange to be embarrassed at catching her nearly undressed. “I—I wondered if we could talk.”

  “Could you give me just a few minutes to get changed?” she asked, her cheeks pinkened with a blush. She looked pointedly at the door.

  “Sure. I’ll just wait out in the hall.” He stepped outside and closed the door behind him, suddenly aware of how mixed up and dysfunctional their marriage had become.

  She was his wife, yet she hadn’t wanted to dress in front of him. Somehow they had lost the intimacy that formed a good marriage.

  He closed his eyes, remembering how it had been when they first got married. They’d often showered together, drying each other then falling onto the bed to make love.

  He imagined himself slowly removing her towel, his hands caressing the silky softness of her skin, his mouth kissing the spot behind her ear that always made her moan. Her skin would be damp, flushed from the heat of her bath and would smell of the floral bath oil she often used.

  He drew in a deep breath to steady the desire that instantly flared at his thoughts. He wanted it back…the intimacy, the lovemaking, his marriage. He wanted to taste the skin of her flat stomach, feel her arms entwined around his neck as her body pressed against his with need.

  He jumped and turned as the door creaked open. “Okay,” she said, this time dressed in a blue silk nightgown and matching filmy robe. Her hair was caught up in a ponytail, damp tendrils clinging to her neck and forehead. She sat on the edge of the bed and looked at him expectantly. “What did you want to talk about?” she asked.

  He sat down next to her, able to smell the sweet scent of her bubble bath mingling with the minty odor of soap. His body responded to the scent of her and the lingering thoughts of their lovemaking in the past.

  “Us.” He cleared his throat, reaching for control. He knew she wouldn’t welcome any kind of a sexual advance from him, and in truth, although he would love to physically possess her, that wasn’t what he needed most from her at the moment. “We need to talk about us.”

  “Sam.” Her brow wrinkled and she gave him a look filled with pain. “I don’t think now is the time to talk about us. We have a lot of hurdles to get over before we can begin to even think about us and any kind of a future we might have together.”

  “Julianne, I need to talk about it now.” He raked a hand through his hair, his gaze lingering on her, trying to read what was in her mind, in her heart. “During dinner tonight I saw your eyes sparkling as you told me about your day at work, and I realized it had been a long time since I’d seen your eyes sparkle with such enthusiasm, such life.”

  He reached out and took her hand in his. Enclosing it, he felt a flare of hope as she responded by squeezing his. “I’ve been wrong in encouraging you to be a stay-at-home wife, expecting you to find satisfaction in hosting business dinners and charity functions. I was wrong in not supporting and encouraging you to find something fulfilling, something that made you happy.”

  She nodded, then sighed. “But, Sam, your support of my working or lack of support is not the real issue.”

  “Then tell me what is the issue. Tell me what is wrong so I can fix it.” He squeezed her hand. “Julianne, I’m working as hard as I can to crack that file and clear my name. But it doesn’t mean anything if when I finally succeed you aren’t there beside me. If I can’t count on you being with me when this whole mess is worked out, then what’s the point? If I’ve lost you, then I might as well just turn myself in to the police now and let them throw me into prison for the rest of my life.”

  She snatched her hand from his, her eyes shooting fires of anger. “That’s not fair, Sam.” She got up off the bed, her movements jerky as she walked several paces away. She turned back and glared at him. “How dare you put the pressure on me? If you’re going to fight to clear your name, you do it for yourself. This isn’t a game show where you win the contest and get to keep your wife as a prize.”

  “Juli.” Sam rose and walked to where she stood, trembling with the emotion of her outburst. “You’re right, that wasn’t fair of me. I just need to know that when this is all over, we still have a marriage. I want a life with you, Julianne, and I need to know you want the same thing.”

  Her anger escaped her with a heavy sigh and her eyes held a sadness that twisted his insides. “Sam, I wish I could tell you that when this is all over, no matter what the outcome, our marriage will be intact, but I can’t make any promises.” She smiled, a bittersweet expression. Tilting her head, she looked at him, again her eyes holding a profound sadness. “Does that sound familiar?” she asked.

  He
shook his head and gazed at her curiously. “Does what sound familiar?”

  “I can’t make any promises. You used to say that to me each time I asked you if you’d be home for supper, or if you could make it to a particular event. You’d always say, ‘I don’t know, Juli. I can’t make any promises.”

  He took a step closer to her. “Is…is there somebody else?”

  She looked at him incredulously. “You think I might have a lover?” She laughed, a bitter sound that jarred his insides. “Oh, that’s rich. If I had a lover, we probably wouldn’t be having this conversation. I’d be happy living two lives and wouldn’t be considering a divorce.” She shook her head. “No, Sam, there isn’t anyone else. There never has been anyone but you.”

  “Are you telling me you don’t love me anymore?” he asked softly.

  “No.” She smiled and placed a hand on his cheek, her fingers cool and slightly trembling. “I’ll always love you, Sam.” Her hand dropped back to her side. “I just don’t know if I’m in love with you anymore.” She bit her bottom lip, her eyes dark with confusion. “Sam, I can’t make any promises where our future together is concerned. I just can’t.”

  He nodded, a black despair washing over him. Too late. The months of unhappiness prior to his disappearance combined with the months he’d been gone had combined to create a situation he didn’t know how to handle.

  It wasn’t until he was back up in the attic, staring blankly at the computer screen that he realized it might not be too late. He’d seen the confusion that darkened her eyes, heard the uncertainty in her voice when she’d said she wasn’t sure if she was in love with him any longer. She wasn’t sure. That implied hope.

  He’d done it once. Surely he could do it once again. Hopefully he could make his wife fall in love with him again. But first he had to clear his name and make certain he actually had a future to share with her.

  “I’m just afraid it’s too late.” Julianne couldn’t quite meet Colleen Baker’s eyes. Sam’s youngest sister had always hero-worshiped her brother, and this was one of the most difficult conversations Julianne knew she would ever have.