Marry Me Again (The Second Chance Love Series, Book 1) (16 page)

Not really. Except for the way she found his hand at the small of her back, guiding her down the walkway and helping her into the car. The way he sat a little too close at times. The way he brushed past her in the kitchen.

And he just kept coming back. She found herself hoping he would and praying he wouldn't.

Because he was driving her crazy.

She couldn't sleep, couldn't stop the pangs of her jittery stomach or the ache in her head that came from lack of sleep. She'd driven him out of her heart long ago. She just couldn't get him out of her life now. Years ago, she'd literally made herself sick over the man, and she was close to doing so again.

At the door to Sammy's room, she paused to collect herself. Sammy had been wound up all week because tomorrow was the first day of school. Her baby was going to be in first grade. She could hardly believe it.

She peered around the door without opening it. Sammy lay perfectly still on his back in the shadows. His thick, sandy-blond hair was mussed, and his brown eyes were so big as he stared at the calendar on the wall.

The first day of school was circled in red on the calendar they'd made together.

"Sammy?" She finally opened the door.

He looked up and smiled for just a moment, then gave in to the worried look again. "Can I have s'more milk?"

"All right." It wasn't what he really wanted, but she'd get it for him.

She collected the glass from the nightstand and for the second time that night walked down the stairs and into the kitchen.

She could probably use some milk herself. It helped settle her stomach. Rebecca got her own glass, filled both, then downed two more aspirin that she hoped would help her headache. She returned to Sammy's room.

"Thanks, Mom."

"You're welcome, sweetie."

"Mom?" he called as she headed out the door. Maybe they would get to the heart of the matter now. "Do you think those other kids at school will make fun of me?"

Rebecca settled herself on the bed beside him and tried to smile with more confidence than she felt. "Why would they do that?"

"Because this is Jimmy Horton's school, and a couple'a kids from the soccer team go here, too. What if they tell all the other kids that I'm no good at it?"

She chose her words carefully. She wouldn't lie to him, because Jimmy Horton might well tell everyone about Sammy's problems on the soccer field.

Sometimes Rebecca felt capable of strangling that kid.

"Sammy, you'll be in first grade and Jimmy Horton's in second, so you probably won't even see him. And even if you did, he's going to be busy with friends who are in his class. I don't think he's going to make trouble for you."

"Really?"

"Really." She gave him a kiss and tucked the covers around him.

"Mom?"

She paused again at the door. "Yes, Sammy?"

"Do you hate my dad?"

Oh, no!
He'd really blind-sided her with that one.

Did it ever get any easier to help a six-year-old make sense of his mixed-up life?

"Why would you even ask that, Sammy?"

"Jimmy Horton said since you and Dad and me don't live together, you must hate each other, so I—"

"Stop right there. I think it's time for Jimmy Horton to worry about Jimmy Horton, and time for Sammy to worry about Sammy. Okay?"

"Okay."

She'd spoken more harshly than she intended, and Sammy looked chagrined. She smiled and kissed his cheek.

"But, Mom?"

Caught at the door again. Would she ever make it out of this room? "Yes, Sammy?"

"Dad doesn't hate you. He told me so."

Rebecca walked out the door. She wasn't stopping this time.

* * *

"Bad night, Rebecca?"

She whirled around in the direction of an unmistakable, unforgettable male voice coming from the sidewalk across the school driveway. Her bad day had just gotten worse, and it probably showed on her face.

She hadn't slept at all last night, much of it his fault, though she'd never admit it to him.

"You made it." She should have known the new Tucker would.

"Too late to see the little guy off to school, but I was hoping I might catch him here—" He stopped and turned her face up to his. "Hey? What's this?"

Damn, she thought with a sinking feeling deep in her heart. He'd caught her crying again. Why did this always happen? He moved to brush her tears away, but she stepped aside in a panic. The morning's emotional strain threatened to overwhelm her, and she couldn't let him touch her now, not even in that small way.

She turned her head away and hastily dried her cheeks herself. "It's nothing."

His look said he knew it was a lie, and she wondered how he could always be around when she was feeling so vulnerable.

Silly question, she decided, her mood sinking even lower. He made her feel vulnerable, along with everything else in her life right now.

Every woman had a day now and then when the whole world seemed to be too much to handle, and Rebecca was having one of those days. She'd had a lot of them lately, and it wasn't like her to feel sorry for herself, but she just hadn't been able to escape it.

"It's definitely something, Rebecca."

He stared at her and waited—an old trick of his. He wouldn't say another word. He wouldn't do another thing. He'd wait, right there, until he found out what he wanted to know.

But she couldn't talk to him about this. He was the last person she wanted to talk with about this.

Rebecca felt trapped, caught up in something she couldn't understand, something that wouldn't let go.

He just kept coming back, and everything kept getting worse.

"It's silly." She shrugged and tried to make light of it.

"Then you should be laughing."

Point for him. She drew a little bit deeper inside herself. Why couldn't he leave her alone, today of all days?

"I guess I'm just a little upset at watching my baby go off to first grade. That's all." A half-truth, but maybe it would be enough for him. "He went to a little pre-school at a church nearby, and he was so happy there. They had a kindergarten program, so he did it there. This is like big-boy school."

"Oh?"

He said it so innocently, so sweetly. He could sound like that, but he'd never been innocent and seldom been sweet. Charming, handsome and a little wicked, but not sweet. She needed to remember that.

"It's not anything I want to talk to you about, Tucker."

"I know." He put an arm around her shoulders and steered her toward a wooden bench along the sidewalk. "But I'm the only one here, so you'll have to make do with me today."

Feeling like fate was conspiring against her, she sat down on a bench, one that gave them an unobstructed view of the children and a few parents streaming into school. She'd been watching for a while now. She couldn't seem to tear herself away from the sight, just as she couldn't shake the somber mood that came over her as she thought of all she'd expected her life to bring her.

"Well?" He settled himself beside her on the bench. The bench was nearly too small for both of them. The only way to sit there was to have his side pressed against hers.

She shrank away as far as the confining space would allow and wondered if someday she would feel his touch without it unsettling her so.

Then she made the mistake of looking over at him, of watching him watch the kids go into school, and she wondered if he could ever understand what she was feeling. She wondered if he ever felt this way as well.

"Sammy's growing up so fast," she said, resigned to the fact that he wasn't going to leave until he found out what was wrong.

"Yes?"

"And I just wish I could make him stop somehow. I wish I could hang on to this time a little longer, but it's slipping away."

He laughed a little, teasing her then. "Feeling old, Rebecca?"

"Not exactly." More like used up. She was feeling all used up inside, and that was so much worse than feeling old. She imagined her future spread out before her, and she didn't like what she saw.

"You're what? All of twenty-eight? That's practically ancient."

"Twenty-nine in a few months." She smiled sadly. The feeling had nothing to do with age. It was about wanting things she feared she'd never have.

Rebecca waited and watched the schoolyard. A young mother came along with her three children. The first boy, maybe eight or nine years old, was running ahead of her. The woman had a baby in her arms, and her third child, another little boy, was pushing the baby's stroller, with nothing but a doll in it.

The woman was calling to the older child not to get so far ahead of them, rubbing the baby's back and trying to convince her other son to keep the stroller on the sidewalk—all at the same time, until her husband caught up with them and pulled the two boys into line.

It looked like chaos.

And it looked like everything she'd hoped her life would be, everything it wasn't, everything it probably would never be.

Rebecca sat there and watched that woman, surrounded by her big, boisterous family, with a baby in her arms and a husband looking on, and tried hard to blink back her tears.

She had been blessed, she told herself. She had Sammy, and he was wonderful. They were healthy and happy and safe. It seemed selfish to want more than that, but some days—like today—it got to her. Some days, she couldn't help but want so much more.

She jumped up from the bench.

Tucker caught her by the hand, and all she could do was stand there beside him. "Rebecca?"

Feeling ridiculous and miserable all at the same time, she looked up at the sky and hoped the tears wouldn't overflow.

He tugged at her hand until she turned to look into his worried face. He squeezed her hand and smiled up at her. "You look so sad, Rebecca Jane. Why don't you just tell me what's wrong?"

Rebecca Jane.
She almost smiled at that, almost. He used to tease her with that name. He used it to coax her into doing things she didn't want to do. Would she never learn? Would she ever escape from the power he had over her?

She sat down and pulled her hand out of his.

"It's—I can't explain this to you. You'd never understand."

"Try me."

"I'm just sad. That's all. I see Sammy growing up, and I think about what I thought my life would be like, what my family would be like—it's just not like what I'd hoped."

They were silent for a long time, lost in their own thoughts, and then he started to talk. He couldn't have surprised her more with what he said.

"So you feel a little lost."

"Yes," she admitted.

"A little empty, like there's a deep, dark space inside you that you'll never be able to fill."

"Yes."

"You feel sad, and then you realize you've felt that way forever, and the worst part is you don't see anything that's likely to change."

"Yes." That was it, exactly. "But how—"

He squeezed her hand gently, and she finally brought her eyes up to his. "Do you think you're the only one who's felt that way?"

She looked at him, really looked at him for the first time that day, and saw an understanding there that startled her.

Could he possibly know those feelings as well?

Years ago, mostly in anger and frustration, she would have sworn he didn't have any feelings, but she wasn't that bitter anymore. Still, she found it hard to believe he'd also hit that point in his life.

"Why do you think I'm here, Rebecca? Why do you think I had to find Sammy?"

"I—" She shook her head back and forth. "I don't know."

"For him. I saw the picture. I saw that awful sadness there, and I was worried about him. But I came for me, too."

He took her hand and pressed her palm against his chest. She felt his heart beating strongly and steadily, felt his warmth and his strength.

"There was nothing inside there, Rebecca. I thought I was so smart, that I knew exactly what I needed to fill up my life. I had the big house, the fancy clothes and that silly red toy I called a car. I couldn't have been more wrong. I finally got everything I thought I'd ever need, and then woke up one day and realized I didn't have anything. It didn't mean anything."

She let her hand stay right there, pressed against his heart, and she looked into his warm, brown eyes, looked into the face of the man she'd loved so long ago.

It was just as she remembered, and yet it wasn't. There was a sadness in him, too, a yearning. Maybe he did understand.

"It's the worst feeling in the world, right?"

"Yes," she said, and when he pulled her head down to his shoulder, she let him.

His hand stroked slowly through her hair, and she didn't move. She couldn't.

He kissed her softly on her forehead, and she stayed there for the longest time.

"Tell me what you want, Rebecca," he said finally.