A Chance of a Lifetime (24 page)

It was a perfect description of the past few years: the darkest place he'd never imagined. Pure despair and utter hopelessness.

“You didn't get help.”

The rueful chuckle that escaped Calvin surprised him. “Oh, hell, no. The U.S. Army doesn't like it when their captains can't hold themselves together.” He paused a moment, thinking he could count on one hand the number of times he'd volunteered these next words: none. They'd been dragged out of him by doctors, police officers, and Chaplain Reed up there at JBLM, but he'd never offered them of his own volition. “Back in September I took me and my trusty .45 to a remote area in Tacoma and tried to kill myself.”

Dane's expression didn't change. Either he wasn't surprised, or he hid his emotions well. Calvin would put his money on the former. Every soldier knew someone who'd attempted suicide. Probably everyone knew someone who'd succeeded. “Did you change your mind?”

Calvin shook his head grimly. He wished he had, he really did, but that night he hadn't found a single reason to go on living. “This kid, fourteen years old, a runaway from a group home, living on the streets, was in the park that night. He saw what I was about to do, tackled me, knocked the gun from my hand, and broke my elbow. He even took me to the hospital, where he made sure to tell everyone exactly what I was doing when I got hurt. Hospital called the police, police called the Army, and…” He shrugged. Here he was, two months later, home with his family, falling in love with Bennie, finding hope and encouragement and, yeah, plenty of reasons to live.

“You were lucky he was there.”

Calvin considered how much he'd hated Diez that night, how furious he was. He'd had pretty much the same reaction the day the kid showed up at his parents' house. But he
was
lucky Diez had been there—lucky he'd had enough decency to intervene. He could have just waited until the deed was done, stolen everything Calvin had, and left him there to rot.

“Yeah, I was lucky,” he admitted, then amended it. “Am lucky. You want to hear the rest?”

Dane's nod was patient, measured.

“After taking me to the hospital and ratting me out, the kid stole my wallet, my keys, and my car.” They shared a laugh over that, and finally Calvin risked a long swig of coffee. It went down just fine and would stay down. “A few weeks ago, he brought it all back. Now he's temporarily living with my parents and making himself the second grandson my grandmother had always wanted.”

Silence settled for a while, Calvin contemplating that old saying, “Confession is good for the soul.” His soul felt better. He still had a long way to go and a lot of fears to overcome, but telling his story to Dane—and Dane's acceptance of it—had loosened something inside him. His breaths came a little easier, his burden a little lighter…as long as he didn't think about having to tell Bennie.

Finally he met Dane's gaze again. “How did you finally tell Carly?”

Dane exhaled, then smiled faintly. “I didn't have to say a word. She dropped by unexpectedly. I opened the door on crutches, my pant leg flapping, my bionic leg sitting on the chair.”

“Damn.”

“Yeah.”

“I can't put my nightmares, insomnia, and bad memories out on a chair for Bennie to discover.”

“No,” Dane agreed. “You'll have to talk to her, and soon. Keeping secrets from your girl isn't healthy.”

It was close to eleven when Joe finally returned to the lobby. Bennie's gaze darted to his face. She'd never seen him looking so somber, not even during the playoffs last year when his star quarterback had been injured. There was exhaustion in his eyes but relief, too, and other emotions she couldn't quite separate. Avi Grant had called it right a few months ago when she'd said Joe had a thing for Lucy. A virtual stranger had noticed while Lucy's best friends had totally overlooked it. Too taken with his boyish charm, she supposed.

“She's okay,” he said, and murmurs of relief swept the group. “In the morning, they're going to do a coronary angiogram, see what's going on, whether there's a blockage or she needs stents or whatever, then they'll send her to the cardiac floor and in a few days she'll go home.”

“She's so young. Why did this happen?” Fia asked.

That pesky little question that hardly ever had an answer. When Bennie was little and pestering her mother for something, Lilly ended the conversations with one word:
Because.
It wasn't satisfying, and she'd sworn when she was a mother, she would never fall back on it, but sometimes it was the only answer you had. Because things just happened.

Joe shrugged. “No idea. Now she works on keeping it from happening again.”

Bennie glanced at Calvin, sitting between her and Dane, while the others talked. He'd been quiet since they'd returned from the cafeteria. Probably just thinking again. A little smile curved her lips. He was handsome when he thought. Lord, he was handsome no matter what he was doing. Even angry, there was a spark in his dark eyes and little wrinkly lines across his forehead that looked so unnatural, she wanted to laugh when she saw them. When they were kids, she usually had laughed, hardly ever failing to coax him back into a good mood.

They weren't kids anymore.

And she wouldn't wish to be. It was frowned upon, kids doing the things she'd like do with him.

After a moment of chatter, Carly said, “I'd suggest we get out of here. Patricia, Marti, you still up to doing the boxing and cleaning at the bakery?”

“Sure,” they answered simultaneously.

“What boxing and cleaning?” Therese and Bennie asked simultaneously.

“Just washing a few pans and getting Lucy's baked goods for tomorrow boxed up and ready to deliver,” Carly replied.

Choruses of
I can help
joined Bennie's, and Patricia hugged them all around. “There's not that much to do or that much extra space in the kitchen. The rest of you go home and get a good night's rest so you can see Lucy tomorrow. She'll need some loving before her mom gets here around noon.” She winked. “We'll all get chances to help until she's back on her feet.”

Bennie said her good-byes, then caught Calvin's hand as they strolled toward the exit. “I appreciate you coming and staying.”

His only response was a squeeze of her fingers. They walked into the cold night, the air fresh and sweet after the recycled hospital air. About the time they reached the car, he finally spoke. “I like your friends.”

“They're the best people in the world.” But underneath her light words, she couldn't stop the faint little question of whether J'Myel would have liked them. Would he have appreciated her definitely-light-skinned besties? Would he have appreciated
her
? After all, she was doing the same thing Calvin had done when J'Myel accused him of trying too hard to be white: going to school for a better job, improving her life, being ambitious. Would J'Myel have had problems with her, too?

It was a fact of life that people changed. It was also a fact that she and J'Myel had been apart far more often than together after high school. He very well might have decided he wanted to be a different kind of man—not the small-town life and small-town wife kind—and thought because she loved him, she would automatically have gone along with him.

Maybe she would have. After all, she'd changed, too. Though it was hard to imagine.

Calvin opened the passenger door, but instead of sliding in, she wrapped her arms around his middle. “Do you know how much we take for granted? Mama says she wakes up every morning and thanks God that she's still alive. I figured when I was her age, I would do the same, but in the meantime…it's like I'm entitled to life. Like I don't have to be thankful for each day. I bet Lucy woke up this morning, thinking it was just another Saturday. She would run errands, clean house, work at the bakery. She never dreamed that before the evening was over, she would be facing a life-altering—potentially life-
ending
—event. It just makes me feel so much more thankful that I'm here and healthy and happy and strong. You know what I mean?”

For a long, long time he gazed down at her, his eyes shadowed, the emotions radiating off him intense enough to send heat through their clothing and into her. When he answered at last, his voice was husky, as if the words were squeezing their way out. “I do. And I'm getting there myself.”

She didn't ask why he felt the need to get healthier, happier, and stronger. Lord knew, he had plenty of reasons to have lost his way. Tonight, right this minute, she didn't want to know more than that. She didn't want to talk about things that had happened, whether wonderful or too ugly to relive. She wanted to forget the past, focus on the present, and hope for the future. She wanted to stay in his arms, long after the sun had risen on Sunday, long enough that she would have to scramble to get to church on time.

Her head rested against his chest, and she fancied for a moment she could hear the steady beat of his heart. The cold didn't bother her. Even a whistle from a passing pickup—only Jessy among the margarita girls could whistle like that—didn't do more than curve her lips into a smile. His arms held her with gentle pressure, his hands moving slowly along her spine, tempting her to stretch and arch her back, wanting to do that and much more as soon as they got someplace private.

Finally, with her extremities on the verge of numbness, she tilted her head back to smile at him. “Want to go home with me and do things on the couch that would make Mama blush if she found out?”

Calvin snickered. “Mama doesn't blush. She grabs a wooden cooking spoon and makes other people turn red.”

Bennie hesitated before suggesting, “We could go to your place.” Her smile was flirtatious, her tone sly, but inside every nerve was quivering. Was she ready for this? For sex with Calvin, the man who'd been like a brother to her most of their lives? The man her husband had loved, then hated till the end of
his
life?

There might have been a voice in the rational part of her brain saying,
Let's think about this,
but all the irrational, emotional, womanly parts were dissenting loud enough to drown it out. Yes, the boy he used to be had been like a brother to her, but as she'd thought earlier, they weren't kids anymore. And yes, J'Myel had ended their friendship, but she'd thought he'd been wrong at the time, and she was sure of it now.

And J'Myel was dead. She was alive, and she'd never stopped loving Calvin in one way, and she wanted to try the way that included all the fun, naughty things. She wanted to be with him, physically, emotionally, sexually.

But it wasn't going to happen tonight. She could feel the regret seeping through him before she saw it in his face or heard it in his voice. Disappointment rose inside her, but she tamped it down, keeping her smile in place through sheer will.

“I— You know— The timing…” His hands stopped that lovely stroking of her back to move to her shoulders, and though he faced her, he kept his gaze locked somewhere around her chin. “I'm sorry, Bennie. I just can't—”

She pressed her fingers to his mouth to silence him. “It's all right, Calvin. Really. You, me, J'Myel…I know. It complicates things.”

His eyes fluttered shut, and he pressed a kiss to her fingertips, slow, erotic, quivery, and intent, before moving a few steps away. “It's cold out here. We should go.”

She had to command her feet to move, her body to slide onto the car seat. She settled on the old quilt, fastened the seat belt, held her tingly, shivery hand with her other hand, then gave him another grin. “Yeah, we should. Wouldn't want you to freeze off anything important.”
Because I have plans for you, Calvin Clyde Sweet.

Plans that required every single part of him.

The Sweet house could have been mistaken on smells alone for a fine restaurant Sunday afternoon. Calvin arrived before his family and let himself in, stopping in the hallway, and simply inhaled for a long moment before finally shucking his jacket and moving toward the kitchen. The pastor must have thrown in a few extra prayers. It was a good thing Gran had no plans for going out to eat, or the Mount Zioners might get there first and scarf down all the food.

Three slow cookers on the counter held their dinner: pot roast with potatoes and carrots; pinto beans and ham in the second; and collards soaking in a ham-vinegar-chili pepper-infused liquor. On another counter waiting to reheat was a dish of corn bread and a dozen sweet rolls from CaraCakes Bakery. “Never let it be said that the Sweets skimp on calories,” he murmured.

A voice came from the kitchen table, startling him. “Huh. You should eat here on weeknights sometimes,” Diez said. “Miss Elizabeth fixes a lot of salad and grilled chicken and baked fish that Mr. Justice complains about but eats plenty of anyway. She says she's watching his cholesterol. This kind of food is weekend treats mostly.”

Calvin faced him. “Why aren't you at church?”

“I went to Sunday school. Miss Elizabeth let me come home when the church service started because I didn't sleep much last night.”

“Huh. Lack of sleep never got me out of sitting through a sermon.” Calvin studied the kid a moment, Dane Clark's words echoing:
You were lucky he was there.
It might not have seemed lucky at the time, but he'd come to his senses since then. And Justice's words on the subject:
Suicide is a permanent solution to a temporary problem.
Calvin owed Diez for stopping him from taking that permanent solution.

He just hadn't found a way to tell him so.
You boys,
Mrs. Ford used to say,
you think it'll kill you to be the first one to make amends, but trust me, it won't.
And then she would flash them a bright smile.
Because if you don't stop fussing, I'm gonna kill you both.