by Anna Adams
“I wouldn’t like that.” Ben yanked at the hem of his shirt. “But I still don’t like when you fight.”
“I don’t either, son.”
“Do you like my mommy?”
Heaven help him, he more than liked her. He wanted her to stay here in the mountains that owned him, body and soul. He wanted to share all the little towns she’d enjoyed discovering, and he wanted to show her the trails to his favorite spots where they could talk together about the things that mattered most to them. Above all, he wanted a chance to make a family with her and Ben.
But what mattered most to Lilah was getting away from here.
“I like your mommy. A lot.”
“But you were mad at her, and she was mad at you.”
“I’m sorry you heard us argue.”
“I want to be with both of you. I get sad when she wants me, and you want me. Why can’t we all stay together?”
“Good question, buddy.” Owen squeezed toothpaste onto Ben’s toothbrush and handed it over. “We’ll talk about it tomorrow,” he said, as Ben yawned wide enough to break his jaws. “I promise you.”
“Okay, Daddy.” He started brushing.
Owen leaned down to scoop up Ben’s wet towel and the rug that was always more like a swamp after Ben’s shower time.
“Daddy?” Ben looked up, toothpaste dripping from his mouth on to his shirt.
Laughing, Owen cleaned his chin. Every time Ben called him daddy, he felt like shouting for joy. “What’s up?”
“I love you.”
Owen knelt and hugged his son as tight as he could. “I love you, too, buddy. With all my heart.”
When Ben finished brushing, they walked together to his bed. Once he was under the covers, Ben quickly turned on to his side and closed his eyes. Owen dimmed the light as he stepped through the door. He looked back in a rush of gratitude that his son was safe and asleep in his own bed.
He tossed the towel and rug into the laundry room and cleaned the bathroom sink before he made himself go back downstairs. Bracing for the argument to come, he was not surprised to find Lilah at the door, gripping her scarf in fisted hands.
“No raised voices or frightening my child tonight,” she said. “We aren’t discussing this. I’m taking him home tomorrow, and if you want to fight it, you’ll have to explain to him.”
Of course. “I’ll let you go tomorrow, but believe this—I will have my son back in my life. You aren’t taking him for good.”
“Ben and I live the way I want to from now on.”
He stared her down. Today had frightened her. He was relieved they only had to deal with a sprained wrist. But tomorrow they were going to discuss the cold, hard facts of Ben’s new life, and that included shuttling between Vermont and Tennessee.
* * *
IN THE MORNING, nothing had changed. Lilah woke to the unutterable relief of knowing her son was safe. Knowing that he’d be safer, and so would she, when she got him home.
No more considering Owen’s feelings. No more worrying that Ben’s grandmother or his aunt or uncles would forget to look after him.
No more worrying that Owen would find she’d somehow let herself care for him. She didn’t want to see these hills through his eyes. She didn’t want to share her life with anyone except Ben. The second she’d let someone else in, Ben had hurt himself. She packed her things and put her bags in the car, going back inside to thank Suzannah for her hospitality.
“You’re leaving?” Owen’s mother wiped her hands on a dish towel as she turned from the sink. “I don’t understand.”
“I just can’t stand being here anymore. Ben has been chased by goats, he almost injured himself with power tools, he was neglected by Chad and Celia when they were looking after him, and then he spent a day lost on a mountain.”
“Chad found him, too. And everything else has just been childhood stuff. Children get hurt now and then. They run away. All mine did. He’s fine.”
Lilah closed her eyes for a second and steeled herself with a deep breath. “That’s some comfort, Suzannah, but I’m taking him home.”
“What about Owen? And us? We love him, too.”
“Then you can visit him in Vermont.”
“He never scraped a knee in Vermont?”
“I’m not discussing my son with you, Suzannah. Thank you again for letting me stay here. Thank you for wanting to get to know Ben. You can come to us anytime you want to see him.”
Suzannah opened her mouth to speak, but stopped herself.
“Goodbye, then.” Lilah nodded, uncomfortable with her sudden urge to hug the other woman. Owen’s mother had been kind to her, and it was obvious she loved Ben.
“I understand fear,” Suzannah said. “Do you think I don’t wonder, every time I look at a man who interests me, if I’ll end up hiding from him so he can’t hit me—or worse?”
Lilah froze, her hand on the kitchen door. “I’m not talking to you about this.”
“Odell once held a gun to my temple in the middle of the night for three hours. Owen doesn’t know that. Neither does Noah or the younger children. I never told even my therapist or the ladies in my support group. You know why?”
“I don’t want to know.” Because she could feel Suzannah’s fear. It crawled down her own spine. She knew Suzannah had kept quiet those three hours because Odell might have hurt one of the children if she’d made a noise and woken them. Lilah knew because Timor Blanton had said he’d go back and take her little brother if she made a noise when they were in stores together, or stopped at a gas station.
“I never told anyone because that was the moment I knew Odell owned me. If he shot me, one or all of my children would come to save me, and Odell would have killed them, too. I’m humiliated because I stayed with him for ten years after he pushed that gun into my head.”
“Why didn’t you leave the first time he turned his back?”
“I told you before I wasn’t like you. Owen said you ran into traffic one day so someone would stop and help you. I never trusted anyone to stop for me.”
“I wanted to die,” Lilah said, surprising herself because she’d never admitted the truth out loud. “So if they hadn’t stopped...”
“I ache for you because you didn’t want to die. I think you were that desperate to live.”
People had stopped for her. Enough of them to scare Timor off. He’d jumped in his own car parked nearby and sped away. Where she’d found the courage to make that one desperate bid for safety, she didn’t know, but it had worked. She took a step back from Suzannah, unwilling to admit she might possibly be right.
“But now you think anyone who’s close to you might hurt you like that man did.” Suzannah stared down at her hands. “I understand that. You were in trouble. The people who should have protected you didn’t. You can’t trust anyone, so you won’t let Owen be part of Ben’s life.”
“I’m not like that. This is about Ben’s safety. Goodbye, Suzannah. I know Ben would like it if you’d come to visit us in Vermont.”
She drove toward the cabin, her hands sweaty on the steering wheel, her mouth parched with dread.
The house looked so still, she feared for a second that Owen had left with Ben, and she’d never see her baby again.
Wasn’t that what she planned to do to him?
She parked in front of the door and got out, hurrying up the steps. How many times had Ben opened the door for her as she reached it? Not today.
She rang the bell.
No one came, and the minutes stretched out endlessly.
“Owen,” she called. Silence was the only reply. “Ben?”
The sound of the lock being turned brought her a jolt of relief. Owen opened the door. He hadn’t slept. Dark circles framed his eyes. He didn’t smile. “We’re ready.” He back
ed up to let her in.
“Where’s Ben?”
“In the kitchen.”
She moved in front of Owen. Ben had pulled a chair to the glass door, and he leaned on it, his back to her, staring out at the mountains where he’d scared her half out of her wits the day before.
“Ben?”
“What, Mommy?”
“Time to go. We have a plane to catch this afternoon.”
“No.”
Ben had never said no to her—at least not since he was two. “We need to go, buddy. I have to return the rental car, and we have a reservation.”
“I want to stay here. I like it here.”
Owen’s eyes were rimmed with red when she glanced his way. He swallowed hard, but went toward their son.
“Ben, I’ll come see you as soon as I can. Everything’s going to be all right.”
“Will Grandma come? And Uncle Chad? I like it here, with all of you.”
“But Mommy needs to go home right now for a while, and you can come back. This is always going to be your other home.”
A niggle of guilt wormed its way into her conscience. She didn’t intend that to be the case.
The bare, bony trees climbing up the ridge outside reminded her again how afraid she’d been yesterday when she couldn’t find her little boy. Taking Ben home to Vermont was the only answer.
“Time, Ben. Now.”
He dragged his feet as he went to the couch where his coat and gloves and scarf waited. He and his father looked like twin images of misery.
This wasn’t her fault. Being a parent wasn’t easy, and until Ben was old enough to understand he couldn’t run as if he were one of the goats he loved so much, they wouldn’t repeat this experiment.
Owen picked up Ben, who wrapped his arms around his father’s neck. They were sweet together, the man and the boy. Lilah pressed her hand to her chest where an ache begged her to change her mind.
Why not try this again?
Because I can’t keep Ben safe here. This is not where we belong. And I can’t trust Owen to keep his promises.
Owen opened the front door. He walked through it, carrying their son. Without acknowledging her, he went to the car and helped Ben into his seat with one skilled hand. He’d learned how to care for Ben.
But he hadn’t learned that you couldn’t take chances with a little boy’s happiness.
“You’re welcome to come to Vermont anytime,” she said as he straightened from the car.
The warmth of the past few weeks had fled, and he eyed her as if she were a stranger.
“My lawyer will be in touch,” he said.
“So we’re going to fight?”
“For Ben?” He lifted his stubbled chin, masculine and strong. “I’d fight even you for Ben, Lilah, and I never let anyone down in my life the way I let you down.”
“I don’t know what you mean.”
“I wanted to be the right man for you back then,” he said. “Now, I’m glad I didn’t make the mistake of thinking I was.”
His coldness froze her. Goose bumps tingled on her skin. “I have to go.” She opened the driver’s door.
Inside the car, Ben was crying. Not hard, not like a child. He cried like he did everything else, with a soul too old for his little boy self. His soft weeping tore through her.
She shut the door and started the engine.
“Daddy.” Ben struggled to turn around in his seat. He waved frantically at his father, who stood there, waving back until they turned out of his driveway, on to the road that passed by the inn.
Owen looked like a man trying to pretend a fatal injury was only a flesh wound, and Lilah felt weighed down with guilt.
“Ben, I’m sorry. We’ve been gone so long. It’s time to go home.”
“Mommy, I’ll be good if you let me stay. I won’t run away. I’ll stay right where you tell me. I don’t want to go home yet.”
She kept driving, hitting the gas a little as they passed Suzannah’s place.
It was like all those years ago. She was escaping, and she couldn’t get out of here fast enough.
* * *
BEN KEPT A stony silence on the plane and even after they got home. He refused her help getting ready for bed, and when she went in to his room to kiss him goodnight, he was crying again.
“Ben, buddy, I’m sorry about all this. You’ll see your father again when he comes up here.”
“You don’t want him here.”
“I want you and your daddy to have time together.”
“You can call him and tell him to come here.” He took a deep breath that ended in a sob. “Please.”
His begging went on for what seemed like forever. She didn’t know what to do with the tears pressing behind her own eyes. For the first time, she doubted herself, questioning whether she was doing what was best for Ben.
Her parents had tried to keep her safe. They’d let down their guard for just a second. She’d let her guard down by allowing Owen back into her life.
“Daddy. I want my Daddy.”
She sat back on her knees, clueless, guilty. She knew his ache. She’d missed Owen that much after she’d sent him away. As if she’d excised part of herself.
“Ben, honey, give him a chance to come visit.”
“But I want my daddy now. I want to go on the chair lift. He promised.”
“You knew we had to come home sometime.”
“Because I was bad?”
“No.” She hated that whole bad-boy thing. He’d never heard it until he went to day care. She should have hired a nanny.
“I won’t be bad anymore. I promise.”
Another thing she’d tried to avoid. Having Ben blame himself for something that wasn’t his fault. “You didn’t do anything.”
“I ran away. That made you mad at Daddy and me.” He rubbed his fists in his eyes. “He didn’t even call me tonight.”
She shook her head. It couldn’t be this way. She couldn’t do this to him.
“We’ll call Daddy, and you can ask him when he’s coming to visit you.”
He brightened. “Right now?”
She felt her jeans pockets for her phone, but it wasn’t there. “You stay here. I’ll go downstairs and find my phone, and we’ll call him.”
After Owen talked to Ben, they’d discuss how he’d visit Ben in Vermont.
* * *
WHEN THE PHONE RANG, Owen stared at it from across the room. The room seemed darker than usual, and the kitchen counter looked farther away.
A trick of the wine. A mere trick.
He ignored the sound. There wasn’t anyone he needed to speak with. Except Ben.
What if Ben had somehow persuaded his mother to let him call?
Owen struggled to his feet and started across the room, but his foot hit something, and he nearly fell. He glanced down. The empty wine bottle. That stuff was like vinegar anyway.
He grabbed his phone. It was Ben. Lilah’s number, but she wouldn’t be calling. “Buddy,” he said. “How are you?”
There was silence. Long silence. He dragged the phone down and stared blearily at the screen. It was definitely Lilah’s number.
“Ben?”
“Owen?” Her voice was faint.
She had the nerve to sound injured with that one word. As if he’d done something wrong. He hadn’t touched that bottle when Ben ran away, and he hadn’t touched it when his son came home, barely injured after a day in the frozen woods, even though his relief had demanded a nice, numbing drink.
Shame struck him. “What do you want?” he asked.
“What have you done?”
Seriously? “I felt a little sorry for myself, and I opened the wine.”
“Why would you do
that?”
“Why did you leave?”
“Because my son got hurt in those mountains, and I can’t count on you.”
“Yeah. Well, I wanted to forget about your opinion of me.”
“Forget?” Her voice rasped. “You wanted to forget me and Ben and your whole life. Your future. None of it mattered to you.”
“You matter.” He didn’t mean to say it again. He was furious she’d thrown his feelings in his face, and she’d only made him more determined she’d never take his son from him again. “You both matter, but I will get him back.”
“You just made sure we’ll never come near you again.” She threw the accusation at him.
He took a deep breath. “Do you think I don’t know that? I wanted to hurt you and myself, because I am your worst nightmare. And my own.”
She gave a small gasp. Of rage? Couldn’t be regret. “Then you won’t fight me anymore for Ben.”
“You got that wrong. I forced you to bring Ben here, and I’m not proud of pushing you around, but we began to make a relationship out of what we feel now. I was as frightened as you when Ben disappeared, and just as relieved when he was safe. I thought we’d pulled together with our shared love for Ben, and I got this image of us as a family in my head—and the suggestion made you run for your life.”
“Are you blaming me? This is my fault?”
He was blaming her. She’d been easy to blame. But he’d just proved her every decision had been correct—because he’d wanted that drink. “I’m trying to be honest with you. I thought I knew how to handle the worst if it ever came again, but losing Ben...and having you be the one who took him away from me, because I asked you to try to love me again? I wanted to stop thinking.” He stared inside his own dark soul. He’d wanted that drink. “It wasn’t the right choice. But maybe this is just who I am.”
“So you’re never going to stop drinking?”
He didn’t know how to answer. Drinking hadn’t worked. He couldn’t forget. He’d been an idiot and a fool, and he finally understood he’d never be able to run from his grief again. He kept making his own problems, and then making them worse.
“I want to lie to you right now and promise I’ll never touch another drop.”
