He nodded super seriously. She smiled.
Lord, please may this work...
“I wanna get off the train!” Zander shrieked so suddenly and loudly that even though she’d just asked him to, the volume still viscerally knocked her back a step. His body flailed so hard she nearly dropped him. “I wanna go home! I wanna go home now!”
No! She hadn’t meant immediately! She’d meant once she was talking to Mr. Grand. But Zander was five. He’d never been good at waiting and clearly the opportunity to be helpful—or to throw a tantrum or both—had been too much temptation to bear. Okay. Well, now it was happening, and she’d have to roll with it. She barely managed to set him down as he kicked out hard, his tiny feet catching her in her knees. He flopped onto the floor and rolled. His hands pounded the floor like drums. The long whining wail that emanated from his lungs was so realistic she wondered if it was just pent-up anxiety from everything they’d gone through, or if he’d actually tried this trick on her before.
“Hey!” Julie looked up. The gun shook in Julie’s hands. “Make that kid stop that racket!”
“Don’t be a monster!” Tommy shouted. “The kid’s five. It’s one in the morning. He’s overtired!”
Thank You, God, for Tommy!
“Let me take him to one of the first-class cabins and put him to bed!” Erica’s voice rose over Zander’s theatrical wails. “You can’t expect him to sleep all night here.”
Chaos erupted in a cacophony that seemed to fill and echo in the car. Mr. Grand and Lou ran toward them, shouting. Julie was arguing with Tommy. Her son was caterwauling.
Suddenly her mind flashed back to the Knight family kitchen and the daily shouting matches between her mother and Tommy. No wonder she’d spent so much of her childhood escaping to the Henry farmhouse. No wonder a laid-back guy who didn’t seem to get worked up about much of anything was the one she’d fallen for.
“He just needs a nap!” Her voice rose, cutting through the noise with the power that only a mother’s could. She bent, scooped Zander up and pulled her son into her arms. Then she turned to Mr. Grand, almost able to feel the protective fire flashing in her eyes. “Let me take him and put him to bed in one of the sleeper cabins. You’ve got the beds right there. We might as well use them. We’re still just as trapped there as we are here! It’s not reasonable to expect a five-year-old to stay up all night without having a meltdown. I get that you want eyes on everyone. I really do. But I’m also guessing the last thing you need right now is a child throwing a tantrum.”
The noises and voices faded around her. Even Zander’s cries had turned to a sniveling whine.
Please, Lord, we need a break and Nick can’t cling to the outside of the train forever...
Mr. Grand cut his eyes at Lou. “I’m going to take Julie here and go work in one of the cabins where it’s more quiet than this. You stay here with the hostages. If the brat keeps screaming, eventually he’ll tire himself out.”
No! She gritted her teeth to keep from crying out. That was the opposite of what she’d wanted! Help me, Lord! What do I do?
“Don’t worry, Mommy.” Zander’s hands touched both sides of her face. “I’ll do it.”
Her son’s kiss brushed her cheek before she could even realize what he was doing. He slithered from her arms, hit the floor and started running.
“Zander!” she cried. “No! Stop!”
But as she watched, her little boy sprinted through the car, dodging his uncle’s grasp as Tommy reached for him. Where was he going? What did he think he was doing?
“Stop it! Now!” Mr. Grand’s hand reached out. He grabbed Zander by the back of his jacket and yanked him back. The boy dropped his weight and wriggled free.
“Grab him!” Mr. Grand bellowed.
Lou’s strong form blocked the aisle. He raised his gun. “Stop!”
They wouldn’t shoot a little kid, would they? Oh, Lord, protect him.
Her little boy dropped to the ground and rolled, slithering on his stomach like a soldier going into a combat roll. Lou’s large hands reached for him but, as she watched, Zander shot to his feet and pelted past him into a sleeper cabin.
* * *
It was like being stung by hundreds of very wet and angry bees, Nick thought as he clung to the accordion-like section connecting the engine and first-class car. For all the time he’d spent walking through that odd no-man’s-land connection platform between two train cars, he’d never stopped to think what it might be like to travel on top of it, wedged with his hands and legs against opposite sides. But, hey, as uncomfortable as it was, at least he wasn’t sliding.
Okay, Lord, now what?
How had his brothers even expected him to get inside the train when they’d lowered him in the rescue basket? True, the train wasn’t exactly going that fast, due to the storm and the terrain it was traveling through. According to Max, when they’d spotted the train, it had been going half its expected speed and incredibly slowly—for a train. But what might technically be slow on paper still felt plenty fast for someone clinging to the outside. What was worse, the wind and rain had picked up so fiercely by the time they’d reached the train that any hope of evacuating the hostages by basket would have to wait. No, the trip Nick had taken to the train had been a one-way trip.
And somehow he’d managed to convince two of the most responsible men he knew to let him drop from a helicopter rescue basket onto a moving train. He gritted his teeth and almost grinned. Probably because they knew he’d try to find a way to do it with or without their help. True, he’d usually been the one to take the easy way out. But it was like the sight of Erica through the back of the train before he’d crashed the motorcycle, and the knowledge that she and Zander were being held hostage, had somehow strengthened something inside him. He knew without a sliver of a doubt in his heart that there was nowhere else on earth he’d rather be than out there trying to rescue her.
Well, except for the inside of the train.
Okay, Lord, now what?
Thanks to his brothers he now had two guns, some sturdy rope, a first-aid kit, fire starters, even an inflatable life jacket with an emergency light—pretty much everything he could need in a survival situation—in a bag on his back. Everything but a way inside the train.
“Soldier Nick! Hello! Soldier Nick!” Suddenly a voice drifted toward him on the air, faint and yet determined and distilled with hope. No, it couldn’t be. He crawled over to the side of the train and looked down and saw nothing. Yet there was Zander’s voice, young, strong and unmistakable. “Hello! Soldier Nick! It’s me!”
“Where are you?” Nick called back, hoping the ambient noise of storm and train would keep people inside the train from hearing him.
“Over here!” Then he saw what looked like a window moving and realized two small hands were pounding on a screen. Was it a trap? Could be. But the boy sounded genuinely happy and at least this time nobody was firing at him.
“I see you!” Nick shouted. “Stand back!”
Okay, so all he needed to do was to somehow inch his way around the top of a moving train in the wind and rain to reach a small window that had apparently been opened by a five-year-old, punch out the screen and climb through. No problem.
Help me, God. I’m more worried about letting him down than I am of falling off the train.
Slowly and carefully, Nick edged and inched his way onto the first-class car and across the top, keeping his body as flat as possible. The metal ridges were thicker and better spaced than most rock walls and obstacle courses he’d climbed. But still. He slithered forward, feeling every time he’d complained about having to crawl through mud or under wire on an obstacle course in the rain come back and bite him. He reached the window and leaned forward, gripping the ledge so tightly his fingers ached, and holding on to the train with all his might as he slid his body far enough that he could look inside the window.
“Hi, Nick!” Zander waved at him enthusiastically through the window. Seemed the boy was all alone in a first-class sleeper cabin. Zander clasped a hand over his mouth as if suddenly realizing he should be quiet.
“Stand back!” Nick said.
He pulled himself up, turned around and slid down, feeling with his feet until he found the window. One swift kick and the screen popped loose. His foot slipped and for a moment he thought he was going to fall. But then the toes of his boots found the window ledge. He slid his legs through, pushed off like a kid going down a slide and let himself tumble into the train. A pull-out sleeper chair broke his fall. He looked up. He and Zander were alone in a sleeper cabin. The door was locked. Nick pulled himself slowly to his feet and waited for someone to pound on the door. Nobody did.
Instead, the sound of Tommy’s loud and obnoxious shouting seemed to fill the air outside the cabin. Yeah, he’d remembered what it had been like when Erica’s brother got worked up for a fight. It was like being berated by an implacable human bullhorn. Tommy was shouting, full volume, launching a full-out verbal assault on even the idea of opening the door. Other voices were shouting, too. Two men were swearing, one more colorfully than the other. A woman was screaming she couldn’t concentrate. Erica was begging Mr. Grand to let her talk to Zander alone.
“Hi, Nick!” Zander’s eyes were on his face, shining with excitement. “You made it! I saw you crash your motorcycle!”
Nick held a finger to his lips. Just because Tommy was shouting didn’t mean he was about to risk being heard. But suddenly the boy launched himself into Nick’s arms. A lump formed in his throat. He sat there, holding Zander tightly. He ran his hand over the boy’s head, feeling his curls under his fingers. Zander hugged him back so hard Nick struggled to breathe. Then Zander broke the hug and sat back beside him on the chair.
“I saved you,” Zander said very seriously. “I did. I opened the window. But I couldn’t move the screen. Then you kicked it.” He frowned and swung his legs, as if wondering if he could’ve kicked it out himself.
Okay, but that didn’t answer what he was doing alone in a sleeper cabin.
“How did you get in here?” Nick asked, his voice dropped to a whisper.
“Mommy and I saw you in the window,” Zander whispered back. “We knew we needed to open a window. Mommy asked Mr. Grand if she could bring me into a sleeper cabin to sleep. But Mr. Grand said no. So she told me to act like I was being naughty. I got really loud and started shouting, and then I ran. And they tried to grab me. But I got away and ran in here and locked the door. And Lou asked Mr. Grand if he should shoot the door down. Mr. Grand said no, that I wasn’t going anywhere, and maybe I’d tire myself out, and at least with me in here it would be quiet. I was very loud. Then Uncle Tommy got very, very, very loud.”
There was a quiver to his chin that implied he didn’t tend to like it when Uncle Tommy got loud.
“Okay, but now we have to keep our voices very quiet so nobody knows I’m here, okay?”
Zander nodded. “Okay.” He said it so quietly the word was almost silent.
“And how is your mommy?” Nick asked gently.
“She’s okay,” Zander said. “She wanted to open the window herself.”
Nick smiled. “Well, I’m sure I’ll see her soon enough.”
And figure out a way to get them all safely off the train. But for now he was on the train and with Zander, and the little boy was safe. Thank You, God, for that.
He unfolded slowly, stood and closed the window. The shouting seemed to be on the move. He walked to the door and put his eye to the crack just in time to see Lou force Tommy into one of the sleeper cabins and Mr. Grand force Julie into another. Seemed everybody was getting a time-out and breaking down a door to drag out a now-quiet five-year-old wasn’t high on anybody’s priority list.
He didn’t see Erica.
When he turned back, Zander was watching his face. The boy’s green eyes seemed to search out Nick’s. His chin quivered. Then his mouth moved and he said something so softly that Nick couldn’t catch it. Nick crouched beside him. “What did you say, Little Soldier?”
“I saved you,” Zander whispered again, only this time his eyes were wide, as if the thought shocked him to the core. “I saved a soldier!”
“You did!” Nick slid a strong hand on his shoulder. “You were very brave and heroic. You’re an amazing boy. You saved my life.”
Zander bit his lip and then his gaze dropped to the floor.
Nick felt his voice drop. “What is it?”
“I’ve never been a hero before,” Zander said. His chin quivered. “I’m not a ’mazing boy. I’m a mistake.”
Something fierce and protective rose inside Nick. His slid a second hand, gently but firmly, on the boy’s shoulders. “That’s not true. You are an incredibly amazing boy. People are never mistakes. People are people. And people matter. Who even told you that?”
“Nobody,” Zander said. His eyes searched the floor. “Nobody ever told me that. But Uncle Tommy gets loud sometimes when he thinks I’m asleep and not listening. Sometimes he’s very, very loud.”
At least Tommy had enough sense not to say anything like that in front of the boy. But it didn’t make it right.
“I’m sorry for what you heard Uncle Tommy say,” Nick said. “Your mommy told me your uncle loves you very, very much. Sometimes adults say things they don’t mean and shouldn’t say. But that doesn’t mean he thinks it’s true.”
Zander’s head still hadn’t risen.
“He says it’s funny that Mommy called me Zander Moses Knight, because my daddy’s the one who should’ve been sent away down the river.”
Moses. The words hit him like a punch in the gut. Erica had been the only person he’d ever told his middle name to. And he’d never minded the way his brothers had joked about it because he knew his parents had chosen it as a sign of God’s hope and salvation.
“He says my daddy was a stupid jerk.” Zander shrugged. His green eyes rose to Nick’s face. “He says things about my daddy I shouldn’t say.”
Nick’s heart was beating so hard he could feel it in his throat. He didn’t need Zander to tell him what Tommy had said. He could guess what Tommy had said about Zander’s father. That he was immature and irresponsible and selfish...
People are really good at not seeing what they don’t want to see. Erica’s voice floated through his mind, followed by the pointed look in his brother’s eyes when Max had asked, “Are you telling us that Erica Knight and her son, Zander, are your family?”
Erica knew. Tommy knew.
And I’ve known. Somehow I’ve always known. I just didn’t want to believe Erica would ever keep something like that some me.
He was a father. And the amazing little boy in front of him was his son.
TEN
The train rumbled on. The rain continued to beat against the windows. But Nick sat, frozen, staring into a pair of curious and adventurous eyes, the same green as his own, feeling like someone had taken hold of his heart and turned it inside out.
This boy was his.
This amazing, brave, strong, incredible, daring child who’d risked everything to save both his mother’s life and now Nick’s was his own boy. He and Erica Knight had a son, a child, together. The most beautiful and amazing woman he knew was the mother of his child.
It was so obvious he should’ve seen it. The boy’s age. The boy’s eyes. The things he’d said Tommy had said about the father. The fact that Tommy had never told Nick about Erica’s pregnancy.
But he’d been blinded by the pedestal he’d put Erica on. He’d been blinded by how perfect he told himself she was, or maybe how perfect he’d needed her to be, because telling himself he wasn’t good enough for her had been a pretty handy excuse for pushing her away.
The idea Erica Knight would’ve kept somethin
g like that from him was worse than the kidnappers or the motorcycle crash or the feeling of clinging to the outside of a train. It was worse than every broken bone and torn ligament he’d ever suffered. He’d never admired, never respected, never cared for or looked up to anyone as much as her. And the fact she’d done this to him was unthinkable.
But right now, for this moment, he couldn’t let that distract him from what really mattered.
“Listen to me.” Nick locked his eyes onto his son’s, feeling a fierce and protective pride well up inside him. “You are not a mistake. You are very special and very precious. You are brave and strong and smart. You are important, you hear me? You are important to your mother and to your family and to God and—” he swallowed hard as he felt his voice break “—to me. You are very important to me. You are the most important boy I’ve ever met, and I really hope that one day I can introduce you to my family. Because I have three bigger brothers, two sisters-in-law, a new baby nephew and two really cool parents, and I think they’d all agree you’re really special, too.”
“Really?” Zander’s eyes looked into his, so wide, innocent and eager to be loved.
“Really, really.” Nick pulled him into a hug. Zander’s arms locked around him and squeezed him back. Suddenly, Nick felt almost paralyzed as he was hit by a whole new understanding of what Erica could’ve been going through. How could he storm the train now? How could he do anything knowing it might put his own son at risk?
God, I...I don’t know what to pray right now. I don’t know how to process this. I don’t know what to think or how to feel. But thank You for everything that has led me here. Now, please help me get Zander home safely.
There was a knock on the door, so strong and firm it echoed in the small room.
“Zander, honey?” Erica called. “Can you open the door for Mommy?”
Nick froze. Was she alone? Was someone holding a gun to her head? If he opened the door, exactly who and what would come bursting through? He glanced through the crack between the door frame and the door. Her large eyes and worried face filled his gaze. She seemed to be alone. But he didn’t exactly have a view of much more than just a foot or two in front of the door. Nick put a finger to Zander’s lips, warning him to stay quiet. With the other hand, he slowly reached for and unholstered his weapon.
Rescuing His Secret Child Page 12
