by Brenda Novak
Mack took her hand. “Listen to me, Tash. It wasn’t your fault.”
“How do you know?” she asked as she stared glumly down at their entwined fingers.
“Because I know you.”
That simple answer caused the tears that’d been lurking just below the surface all day to well up again. Guilt and doubt ate at her constantly, especially on long nights like this one, when she was prone to blame herself for the divorce, too. After all, she’d known from the beginning that she didn’t love Ace nearly enough to make that kind of commitment. She’d just been grateful someone wanted her, and that smacked so much of her mother it made her sick. “I wish I would’ve wised up sooner,” she said softly. “You’d never expect...never think...that someone you know and like...”
He squeezed her hand. “You had no clue and you put a stop to what she was doing as soon as you learned.”
That wasn’t good enough. She’d been too late for one child, and she didn’t know if she could live with that. She wanted to tell him so, but the words jammed up in her throat.
Desperate not to allow herself to lean on Mack for the emotional support her own husband hadn’t been able to give her, she pulled her hand away under the guise of wiping an errant tear. “We had to call an ambulance to my office four times in the first eight months my practice was open.”
“I’m guessing that’s a high number of emergencies?”
“For dealing with routine office visits, yes. I kept racking my brain for the cause. At first, I thought it might be a strange allergen from the tenant improvements. We had new carpet and paint put in when I leased the space. After I ruled that out, I thought maybe a weird virus was going around, and we were unwittingly passing it from one child to the next because our cleaning service wasn’t being thorough enough. So I started sterilizing the place myself every night, which only put me home later and caused that much more friction between Ace and me. I never dreamed what was happening could be purposeful, that it could be Maxine. She seemed so nice, so normal, so innocent. She’d cry whenever we had something go wrong, and I would have to comfort her!”
“That’s evil,” he mumbled. “How was she doing it?”
“She was using a muscle relaxant, one that’s effective in small doses and very hard to detect, and that would send the child into cardiac arrest.”
“Where was she getting it?”
“From my own medicine stash, which is even more disturbing. But the closet was locked, and I was the only one with a key. Plus, I checked those shelves constantly. None of the medications appeared to have been tampered with and none were missing.”
“So what was going on?”
“She’d stolen my key, had her locksmith roommate make a copy of it and replaced it before I even noticed. He testified in court that he duplicated it for her because she said she needed it—didn’t even question why. My attorney thinks he was hoping to curry favor with her, thinking he might get lucky.”
“But you said none of the medications were missing.”
“They didn’t appear to be missing. Succinylcholine is a clear liquid that comes in a vial. She’d used a syringe to draw it out before filling the vial back up with water. It wasn’t until after the Grossmans lost their eighteen-month-old daughter that I overheard a Dateline episode Ace was watching about a nurse who killed his love interest with the same thing.” Her stomach hurt as she remembered that night. “It was late, and I was trying to clean up the kitchen. I hadn’t been to work in several days. After Amelia, I closed the practice for a week, couldn’t even go in. But I got in the car that night, drove over to my office and tore that closet apart using a magnifying glass to examine every bottle and package. That’s when I found the needle marks.”
“I’m so sorry.”
The anger and betrayal Natasha felt, along with everything else, made her grit her teeth. “I wish to God I’d never hired her, wish her application had never crossed my desk. I felt sorry for her, if you can believe that, because she was alone in a new place. She wanted to come over to my house all the time—now I think she wanted to be me—and I allowed it because I was trying to be a friend.”
“Just hearing about it is enraging.” He shook his head. “How’d you meet her? Where’d she come from?”
“Pennsylvania. She answered my ad, told me she’d recently been through a rough breakup—wanted kids but her ex wouldn’t hear of it—was tired of the cold winters back East and wanted to move to California. And she came with a glowing recommendation from the hospital where she’d worked before, so...how was I to know?”
“They liked her at that hospital?”
“Not really. It came out in court that they’d had several babies die under her watch. They were being sued by some of the parents and didn’t want to risk more trouble. So they asked her to resign, and she agreed as long as they gave her a recommendation so that she could move on.”
“They knew she was dangerous and gave it to her anyway?”
“They had their suspicions. But they didn’t have proof. They just wanted to be rid of her. And I relied on their recommendation. Her background check came back clean, and there wasn’t anything in her file that told me she might be dangerous.”
“You should sue the hospital.”
“That’s what everyone says. And I’ve thought about it. But it would take a lot of time, energy and money—and if I win, it would be the hospital that would pay, not the people who are responsible.”
“Don’t tell me they still work there.”
“No. They’ve been fired. I could sue the hospital anyway, of course, but do I really want something that terrible consuming so much of my life? Those things aren’t quick. And there’s no guarantee I’ll win, even if I go through the agony.” She preferred to bring an end to that chapter of her life as soon as possible—cut away the negativity and move on. “I’ve decided it’ll be better for me, and Lucas, if I just start over.”
He scrubbed a hand over his face. “Well, you did everything you could. The death of that child is on the person who gave her the recommendation, not you. No other doctor could’ve seen her coming.”
“That’s what I keep telling myself.” She swallowed hard. “I just wish I could believe it.”
He put his arm around her, but she was so tempted to lean into him that she leaned away instead, and he let his arm drop.
They sat in silence for several seconds. Then he said, “I’m sorry, you know.”
She could tell by his tone and manner that he was now broaching an entirely different subject. “I don’t want to talk about us.”
“Okay, but...can I just say one thing?”
“No.”
“Come on, Tash. You’re the one who never came back, not for good.”
Only because she couldn’t take the soul-crushing rejection. Because she was determined to build a meaningful life instead of sticking around Whiskey Creek with her heart in her hand, hoping he’d eventually see her differently. She refused to beg for a man’s love the way her mother did; she’d seen how far that had gotten Anya. “If that’s the way you see it, I’ll take the blame.”
“I’m not blaming you. I’m... I want you to know how sorry I am that—”
“You don’t owe me any apologies,” she interrupted, too afraid to let him finish. “You’ve done a lot for me over the years, and I’m grateful.” He’d also smashed her heart into a thousand tiny pieces over and over again, which had eventually caused her to marry someone she shouldn’t have, but she wasn’t going to try to explain how he’d triggered that cascade of bad decisions. Mack couldn’t love her the way she’d always loved him. Period. End of story. Given that, nothing else mattered.
“I know I’ve hurt you, and I feel terrible about it,” he said. “That was never my intention. I’ve always wanted you to be happy, tried to look out for you.”
“I’ve just been
through the worst year of my life,” she said. “I can’t deal with this right now, okay?”
The reedy sound of her voice must’ve gotten through to him. He pursed his lips as he studied her. “All right.”
“I’m getting tired.” She covered a fake yawn. “I think I’ll go in and move Lucas so that we can get back to bed. See you in the morning.”
He didn’t answer. Neither did he follow her inside.
* * *
After the screen door shut, Mack sighed. Natasha wouldn’t trust him. In the three days they’d been together, she’d been careful to show her appreciation for his help, but she remained wary of anything too reminiscent of where they’d been before.
He couldn’t blame her. He’d let her down. But whenever he looked at the past, he couldn’t see how he could’ve done things any differently. Except for that Christmas seven years ago when his desire for her had simply overcome his restraint, he’d been as circumspect as he could be, especially considering how difficult it had been almost from the start.
She’d been only sixteen when he met her, and yet she’d let him know right away that she wanted him. He’d thought it was a childish crush, at first, but she never wavered. And when he started to feel the same attraction, he became alarmed. He didn’t want to be the kind of lech who would move in on a sixteen-year-old! Besides, he and his brothers had let her and her mother come live at the house to help Tasha get through school, which would’ve made a physical relationship with her even more predatory—as if he was taking advantage of the fact that she didn’t have a mom decent enough to look after her properly.
He’d never admitted his true feelings—to anyone, especially her. He’d resisted even when she came into his room right before she left for college and told him she was in love with him and wanted to give him her virginity. Although she’d been nineteen at the time, technically an adult, he’d refused because he’d been thinking of what was best for her. In his mind, nineteen was still too young. Not only was his father still married to her mother at the time, he’d known if he took her to bed, she wouldn’t leave. She’d stay in Whiskey Creek to be with him, and he wanted her to have the opportunity to experience more of life, to see what was outside their small town before she tied herself down to him or anyone else.
He cursed under his breath at the memory of how difficult that night had been. But even if there hadn’t been such an age difference between them, he couldn’t do anything that would embarrass or humiliate his brothers. He wasn’t going to make it any harder for them to live down the stigma of what their parents had done. If not for Dylan, Aaron, Rod and Grady, he didn’t know where he’d be. His older brothers were the ones who’d always looked out for him. They’d all warned him to stay away from Natasha. And he’d listened—until that night in Whiskey Creek when he’d finally succumbed. After that, he’d freaked out because he couldn’t believe he’d crossed that line, and while he was trying to come to terms with whether or not he could allow himself to take what he wanted, she’d gone back to seeing Ace.
“Damn it,” he muttered and scrolled through the photos he’d saved on his phone. They were pictures of Lucas that Natasha had sent to Dylan periodically and Dylan had shared on their brothers’ group chat. Mack had saved every single one of them, because it was the only way he could watch Lucas grow without running the risk of screwing up Natasha’s life again.
Until this opportunity arose.
He wasn’t sure how things would go while he was here. What’d happened in the past had created too many scars. But now that Natasha’s life had already been disrupted, he wasn’t leaving until he learned about Lucas.
And if it was what he thought it was, he was definitely going to be part of his son’s life.
Four
Lucas woke up at seven. Of course. Natasha groaned when she heard his voice. She wasn’t ready to get up and face the day, but just when she thought she had no other choice—like every other morning since she’d become a single parent—she heard a much deeper voice coming through her bedroom door.
“You can sleep a little longer, Tash. I got Lucas.”
Mack. The man she’d dreamed about all night. She’d almost convinced herself that having him with her the past three days was merely a dream, too.
“It’s okay.” The rasp in her voice forced her to clear her throat so she could speak clearly. “I’ll get up. We have a lot to do.”
“There’s no rush to unpack. You have a whole week before you start work. We’ll be done by then.”
But they needed to return the truck before they incurred yet another charge. And she hated living out of boxes, not knowing where anything was. For her own peace of mind, she had to get organized as soon as possible. That was the only thing that might make her feel as though she’d regained control of her life. “No, Lucas will be hungry,” she said. “I need to get him something to eat.”
“I’m sure I can manage to feed him while you grab a couple more hours.”
She was tired enough to attempt a trade. “If you’ll feed him breakfast, I’ll make us all a nice dinner. Does that sound fair?”
“You don’t have to pay me back for every little thing I do,” he grumbled.
In her mind, she did. She didn’t want to feel indebted to him. That would only undermine her strength and determination where he was concerned, and she needed to maintain her position, remain on guard, now more than ever.
Otherwise, she might wind up making another catastrophic mistake—like allowing herself to get hurt yet again.
Letting her eyelids slide closed, she retreated from the light slanting into her room. She’d get out of bed in fifteen minutes, she told herself.
She could hear Lucas, down in the kitchen. “Can I have some Fruity Pebbles?”
“Fruity Pebbles!” Mack replied, as though her son had suggested eating worms for breakfast. “Why would you ever want to eat those?”
“Because they taste good,” Lucas said.
“They’re fine for wimps, I guess. But you don’t want to be a wimp, do you?”
“No, I want to have big muscles, like you!”
“Then you should eat a better breakfast. How about some oatmeal with bananas?”
“Oatmeal?” her son repeated, clearly not excited by that suggestion.
“With bananas,” Mack reiterated, as if that should change everything. “Surely you like bananas.”
There was a slight pause, as though Lucas was thinking it over. “How many bites do I have to take?” he asked at length.
“Ten, to be exact. You need to take ten big bites a day. Can you count that high?”
To be exact? If she wasn’t so tired, Natasha would’ve chuckled at the bullshit Mack was selling her son. But he was doing it for a good reason, and she was glad that he was taking the job of caring for Lucas so seriously. She knew Luke would be safe in Mack’s hands, and that made it even harder to drag her butt out of bed.
“Of course I can count that high,” Lucas said, slightly affronted that Mack wasn’t more aware of his capabilities. “I’m six. I can read, you know.”
“I had no idea you were so smart,” Mack told him, acting shocked.
“Want me to show you?”
That was the last thing Natasha remembered. She couldn’t say if Mack agreed to hear Lucas read or whether Lucas showed him.
The next thing she knew, Mack was knocking on the door. “Tash? Someone’s here to see you.”
Startled, she sat up so quickly she felt dizzy for a moment. She’d dropped off in spite of her decision to get up. How long had she been out?
She grabbed her phone from where it was charging on a box next to the bed to check the time. It was after noon. She’d slept for five hours since Lucas had gotten up this morning. “Shit!” she whispered and sprang out of bed. “I’m sorry, Mack,” she said, louder. “I never meant to go back to sleep, let alo
ne zonk out until lunchtime.”
“It’s fine,” he said. “You needed the rest.”
“Where’s Lucas?” she asked, slightly alarmed that she couldn’t hear him.
“He’s in the kitchen, having a peanut butter and jelly sandwich.” He raised his voice so that Lucas could hear, too. “Or he will be after he finishes his carrots, right, buddy?”
“All done!” her son cried out. “Can I eat my sandwich now?”
She should never have left Mack babysitting all morning. But she couldn’t dwell on that right now. He’d told her that someone was at the door. Was it the internet company? She didn’t think they were scheduled until tomorrow.
“I’ll be right out,” she said and pulled on some cutoffs and a fresh Namaste T-shirt from her overnight bag before pulling her hair into a ponytail.
A draft of warm air, coming in from outside, hit her as she approached the door, which Mack had left standing open.
“Hello,” she said when she saw a redheaded woman, about ten years older, through the screen.
“You must be Dr. Gray,” the woman responded.
Natasha opened the screen door and noticed a picnic basket at the woman’s feet. “Yes.”
“I’m Camilla Ricci. I own Da Nonna, the Italian restaurant down the street. Aiyana Turner—Buchanon since she got married; I always forget that—planned to visit and welcome you in person, but something has come up that means she won’t be able to get away today. She asked me to bring you dinner, so that you wouldn’t feel so alone in your new house.” She lifted the basket to hand it over. “Welcome to Silver Springs.”
Natasha could see why she’d set it down. It was too heavy to hold for long. “That’s very nice of her. And you,” she said. “Thank you.”
“You’re welcome. Aiyana’s excited you’re here, and I hope I’ll have the chance to get to know you, too.”
