Atonement (37 page)

“I trust you Tate. Go get our son back.” I said with a quivering voice. He was staring out the window now. He was trying to focus. I needed him to focus.

e pulled up to the curb evidently a few houses down from where we needed to be. My heart skipped a beat when I saw John running over to us. He came to Tate’s window first. Leaning in he took a quick glance at me then looked to the ground, and started to fill us in. He told us the white Camry was still in the driveway, and with the wires in the house, he was sure it was our baby and Lisa in the house. Tate whispered something to John and he caught another glance at me. Tate stepped out of the driver’s seat, and John scooted in. What? Tate was walking around to my side now.

“Opening the door, he hugged me hard. “Reese. I’m going to get Ty back. Stay put. Do you hear me? Stay Put!” He looked deep into my eyes.”

“No, no, no Tate! I don’t think this is good idea anymore. I don’t think you should go in. What if she has a gun or what if the house is booby-trapped?” I knew it was crazy talk, but this whole situation was absurd. Tate smashed his lips up against mine, and I clawed at him to get closer to him. I didn’t want him to leave. What if I never saw him again? This was more than I could handle. When we pulled apart, Tate stared in my eyes.

“John’s security will have my back the entire time Reese. Don’t forget, I need you more than I need my next breath, but I will come back to you…I promise…John.” He nodded to John and then to me. They had a secret conversation with that one nod. Tate closed the door, John locked it from his side. I was sobbing immediately. Only a split second passed, and John was wrapping his arms around me. It was déjà vu all over again and I was crying into his neck once again. Tate took one glance back with a quick look of fear and regret, but I knew he felt this was the only way. I was too worried to not be seeking comfort and he knew it. My crying was the only sound in the car for some time. John had a scanner in his lap, and he could hear the whispers from the guys on the forefront. I was afraid to speak for fear of missing an exchange of information.

I could see Tate getting instructions, and putting on a bullet proof vest and a wire. He had a determined, serious look on his face. Out of the corner of my eye I could see John staring at me. I took a chance and looked in his direction. Our eyes locked. “Reese, I’m so sorry. I can’t believe you’re having to go through this.” I looked down at his hand covering mine for a brief second, then back at his face. “Your son, he’s beautiful, just like you.” There was a long pause. “I wonder what our son would have looked like.” I was crying softly now, still trying to hear the radio. “This is the way it should be you know. I realize that now.” I was stunned at first. I looked at him with a tilt of my head. What did he mean? I was noticing how he looked just like he did when we first met, not like Maura said he looked when Ty was born. He must have been able to start over now. Maybe he was finally able to start a new life for himself.

I wanted to listen to John, and enjoy seeing him again. After all, he was my beautiful past, but I needed to hear and see what was going on. It looked like Tate was getting ready to knock on the door.

“Reese. I can’t tell you how sorry I am that we didn’t work out. I want the best for you. You know that, right. I have just always thought that was me.” His blue eyes were piercing my heart once again. Now I was seeing the touch of agony behind them.

“John. Tate and my son are what’s best for me, and I can’t begin to thank you enough for finding out who took Ty.” A sob caught in my throat. John took that as his cue to pull me tight to him again.

“So, does this mean you forgive me? I wanted to prove to you that I can be happy with whatever you choose for your life Reese. I didn’t think then it was best for you, but like I told you before, I know you should be allowed to make your own decisions, and I interfered with that. You’ll never know how sorry I am.” I looked at John with loving eyes. I did love John. But, what we had is and always will be, in the past.

The crackling of voices on the scanner caught our attention. Tate was at the door knocking.

The door was opening, but I couldn’t see anyone standing there as far back as we were. Tate went into the house and the door shut.

The door shut
.

I couldn’t feel my hands. I was numb all over. I stopped breathing. Time stood still. Then we picked up Tate’s voice on his wire.

Just as Tate started talking, we heard screeching tires. Looking on both sides of the street, we saw police cars. John shot out of our car and took off running to the nearest cop car, waving his hands frantically. How did they know? He saw the first cop take a survey of the area and notice the marksmen, and then he spoke into his scanner. Car doors remained closed. Hopefully, John had gotten to them in time.

At least I thought so.

The curtain to the front window flew open.

Lisa. She was looking out the window, glancing side to side.

There was scuffling on the radio. John took off towards the house, and so did another guard. I jumped out of the car. It’s like everything was happening in slow motion. Saying a quick prayer, I took off running toward the house myself. My feet were moving, but I couldn’t feel them. As soon as I got to the porch, John was coming out with…

“Ty! Oh God, my baby.” John ran my precious baby boy over to me hugging us both tightly. I was crying hysterically. Ty was crying and grabbing at me. The look on John’s face was pure terror. Why? Ty was out safely. Then it hit me. Where was Tate? Oh God, Tate. I hadn’t heard a gunshot. Please no! No gunshots! My eyes set on John.

“John, where is Tate? Why hasn’t he come out? What’s happening? Then there was hollering coming from the house. Other guards had run in. Still no Tate. Thankfully, still no gunshot. I wanted to kiss my baby from head to toe, I wanted to stare at him for hours, but I couldn’t pry my eyes from the door. Please Tate come out!

“Reese,” John spoke to me softly. “Lisa had a knife. She threatened to kill herself and Ty when she saw the police cars.”
I froze, and stole a glance at my baby who was sucking his fist now, soothing his self. John nodded his head to one of the guys watching the house. “He heard it and started to ask for clearance to shoot her, but couldn’t get a clear shot. I just reacted. I couldn’t let anything happen to your baby Reese.” He was rubbing Ty’s head and looking at him longingly. “I don’t get to have you and Ty, Reese, but you should get all you want out of life.” His eyes were locked on mine. I couldn’t linger though. I had to get to Tate. I was just about to hand John my baby and take off towards the house when I saw them bringing Lisa out in handcuffs. Oh. My. God!

Her dark eyes found mine, and I instinctively hollered for the cops to stop. I handed Ty off to John, who willingly took him as I walked up to Lisa. She looked down to the ground. “Look at me Lisa! Why did you do this? Do you hate me this much, or are you just plain crazy?” I didn’t give her time to answer; I slapped her hard across the face. My hand stung, but I couldn’t acknowledge it. I ran like my life depended on it into the house. I stopped with a jerk as I saw Tate lying on the floor, blood all over his shirt, a policeman at his side. I dropped to my knees. “No! Tate, Oh God, No!” Crawling over to him, my life flashed before my eyes. Then it happened.

Tate groaned.

“Ohhh. Reese.” He whispered. “I’m fine baby. She just grazed my chest, that’s all, I promise baby, I’m fine. Come here.” I let out the breath I’d been holding and I threw myself on Tate. I kissed him all over his face, chin, neck. Our family was back together, forever.

“Tate. Thank God!” I found his lips and smashed mine against his. This man, the love of my life, was alive.

“Ma’am. He really is okay. We just need to clean his wound, and slap a bandage on it.” I made sure he was truly okay, and I ran outside to find Ty again. I was already feeling a void again from leaving him. Now that I knew both of my boys were okay, it was time to reclaim my son.

Walking out of the house, I caught John sitting on the curb, Ty in his lap facing him. He was talking to him like he would an old friend. Ty was searching his face for recognition I think. But he wasn’t crying. He trusted John. It was time I did too.

“John, I can’t thank you enough for doing all of this.” I looked around at all of the chaos in the street. “Are you going to open a detective agency? You really are good at it.” I lightly chuckled.

“No Reese, I just have to have constant surveillance on the oil refineries. It’s the main duty my grandfather has put me in charge of right now, so I know how to operate all of this.” He said scanning the area with his eyes.

“How did the cops know we were here?” I was still baffled by that one. That truly did almost screw up what John had going. But, luckily it all ended well.

“They traced your phone Reese. You could have been a target too, so they had your phone under surveillance. Just phone calls though, not texts… When you left, and they realized it, they tracked you down.” I guess that made sense.

“How did you know it was Lisa?” I didn’t think it could have been her. She was all the way across the country, or so we thought.

“Penderton is a small town. My detectives ran a report of all members of the community who had bought a ticket to California in the past month. We were lucky, because Lisa’s
ticket was one day shy of missing that cut-off. And as far as starting with that theory, it was just a hunch. Otherwise, looking for a crazy fan of Tate’s is like looking for a needle in a haystack. Speaking of…” He stopped bouncing Ty and motioned for me to sit beside of him. I gladly took over my son. “I would like to offer you and Tate a new surveillance system of your home, and better security, with a gated entry. With Tate’s fame and fortune Reese, you and Ty could be exposed to more craziness.” I couldn’t believe he was willing to do that, protect my whole family.

“John, you really do love me don’t you?” And just like all the times before, Tate was suddenly there behind me, without me even knowing it.

“He does Reese. And for once in my life, I am ever so grateful that this man loves you and would do anything for you.” Tate’s eyes were first locked on John’s and then on Ty’s. John quickly stood up and rubbing his hands on his jeans he offered his hand. Time stood still, but not for long. Tate reciprocated. These two men from opposite ends of my life were making amends. John had proven himself able to make full atonement of his actions.

ne big happy family. That’s what we were. We were having a Fourth of July cookout at Elle’s house tonight. A month had passed since that awful memory was etched in our brains forever. The day our baby was taken. Ty was a laughing, beautiful bundle of joy (most of the time). I had been worried he would be attached to our hip at every second, traumatized if you will, but that wasn’t the case. Evidently Lisa (I could barely say her name without wanting to hurl) had taken good care of him. She was deranged enough to think she could be his mother so she acted accordingly, doting over his every need.