Chapter 13

Tony slanted his wife a worried look. Seated next to him in the passenger seat of the rented Malibu, she'd spoken scarcely more than a word since he'd checked her out of the hospital on Monday morning. He'd driven her first to Bella Vista to collect their luggage and to say their farewells. His mother and Corinna had both been as subdued as Ruby was.

An hour outside of Philly, with hours to go before they reached Virginia Beach, Tony yearned for some color to come back to Ruby's cheeks, for the devil-may-care sparkle to return to her lackluster eyes. But she remained silent and subdued, almost…penitent, which wasn't a word that had ever applied to her before.

"You warm enough, Bella?" The slate-colored clouds were starting to dust I-95 with shimmering snowflakes. He had set the heat as high as he could stand it, but Ruby still looked like she was freezing with her peach-colored coat buttoned to her chin. She sat there hugging her injured arm like a bird with a broken wing, a look that didn't suit her one bit.

"I'm fine." She stared unseeing at the road before them.

Maybe she only needed reassurance. "Katz isn't going to get away with what he's done, if that's what's worrying you."

"It's not." Her distant voice did little to reassure him. "I could care less about Katz. Every bad thing he's ever done is going to haunt him soon enough."

The sad certainty in her voice made Tony shoot another worried look at her. "Bella, you gotta stop blamin' yourself for what happened. If the baby's gone, then it wasn't meant to be born yet. We'll have a family one day. Maybe now's just not the right time."

She didn't immediately reply, giving him hope that his words had comforted her. But then she said, "That's what I thought too, at first. I thought having a baby now would ruin my career. That's why I didn't tell you right away. I didn't want it to happen. Only later, when that man named Yordan kidnapped me, protecting my baby was all I could think about. I just…I can't believe how selfish I am…"

"Don't say that, Ruby. You risked your life to keep Katz from climbing any higher."

"Some other nut job will replace him. I could spend my whole life exposing criminals, but there's always more out there."

He laughed without humor. "Yeah. Now you know how I feel."

As she lapsed into silence again, Tony thought the discussion was over. The snow frosting the highway had turned into icy rain, forcing him to switch on his windshield wipers.

Ruby spoke up again, jarring his concentration with her words. "I'm going to stay with my sister for a few days."

What?The steering wheel wobbled in his grip. "Why?" A sick feeling rolled through him. Was this the beginning of something insurmountable between them?

"I just need…some time away from us."

Us?He had to tear his horrified gaze off her profile to keep from crashing into the guardrail. After stabbing on the hazard lights, Tony edged their rental off the highway and into the breakdown lane, where he turned in his seat to face her. "I don't understand. You gotta know I love you, no matter what. Ruby, I forgive you for not telling me about the baby. It's no big deal."

Oh, those were the wrong words.

Her eyes had turned into turquoise ponds that overflowed. Her chin quivered adorably. "I love you, too, Tony. But right now, I don't love myself. I kept you in the dark when I shouldn't have."

"Ruby."

"Just let me talk. I don't deserve you, Tony. I never have."

"Please, don't say that." His heart thudded with dread that she would end their marriage over this. He tried groping for her good hand, but she pulled it out of reach. "You're amazing, Bella."

She averted her gaze while shaking her head and staring at bare-limbed trees beside the highway. "I just need some time."

Tony put his hands back on the steering wheel and wrung it, his emotions swingingly wildly. "Fine. But you need to know I can't imagine my life without you. I don't even want to."

He watched her swallow, but she didn't even acknowledge his words.

Shocked into silence, Tony stared at the cars tearing past them. They had four more hours on the road before they got home. Something told him four hours wouldn't be enough time to change Ruby's mind. They'd stumbled upon a glitch in their bond as husband and wife, one that made him quail for how little he understood it.

Being a SEAL, his first impulse was to tackle the problem head-on, to unravel the knot, then smooth things out between them. But this was a matter between Ruby and her conscience. He couldn't fix it. All he could do was hope she came to her senses while spending time apart from him.

With his heart as heavy as a boulder, Tony merged back into traffic. God had brought them together. He wasn't going to let this incident tear them apart.

* * *

"Dat's a lickwish cawd," Ruby's not-yet-three-year-old nephew pointed a pudgy finger at the spot where Ruby's gingerbread man was about to land. "You skip."

"Are you sure?" Ruby reached for the licorice card and turned it over. "Huh, you have the cards memorized."

Ryan had trounced her at a memory game earlier that day, and she didn't even know how he played those games on his iPad. The precocious toddler reminded her of Tony for how smart he was. Loss wrung her heart. Their baby would have been the same way.

For the fifth time that day, she caught herself wanting to text her husband. Separation put a perpetual ache in her chest, but distance gave her the perspective she needed. Was she really the right person for Tony, or was she the weak link in their marriage?

One thing she'd realized that she wanted Tony to know: She was actually good with her nephew. Monty had pointed out that she had a special way with kids—though come to think of it, that might have been Monty's idea of a joke about Tony's age relative to hers.

No, she was good with Ryan. If she wasn't, he wouldn't want to play with her all day instead of going to day care. Could God be trying to tell Ruby something?

As the afternoon wore on, Ryan yawned. Time for his nap. They went up to his dinosaur-themed bedroom where Ruby stayed by his railed bed until he fell asleep. Then she nipped downstairs, hoping to watch an episode of some reality TV show—anything to distract her from missing Tony. As she dropped onto the couch, reaching for the remote control, the door from the garage door opened, and Opal entered the mudroom, visible from where Ruby sat.

She blinked at her big sister. "Oh, you're home. I didn't hear the garage door open."

"I finished early today. Is Ryan napping?"

"Yep, just put him down."

"Oh, good. I was hoping for the chance to talk to you." Opal shook off her outer coat, military issue, and hung it on the hall tree in the mudroom, along with her purse. A physical therapist at the Portsmouth Naval Medical Center, she always went to work in uniform.

Ruby mentally reviewed the past few days. What might she have done wrong?

"So." Opal sank onto the opposite end of the couch, kicked off her pumps, and propped her stockinged feet on the coffee table. "I have an observation. Correct me if I'm wrong, but you seem to be…punishing yourself for your miscarriage."

Ruby gulped down the guilt that immediately clogged her throat. "I mean, it's basically my fault for putting my work first. For not telling Tony."

Opal sent her a commiserating smile. "I can tell you feel bad about that. You've told him as much?"

"Yes?"

"And have you," Opal kept her tone light, "asked God's forgiveness?"

"Oh yes." Ruby had shed copious tears in the process.

Opal's copper hair, straight as a pin, shifted as she cocked her head. "But you're still beating yourself up."

Ruby tucked her chin to her chest, not answering.

Silence hung between the sisters before Opal broke it. "Honey, I know exactly what you're going through. Don't forget, I accidentally killed Admiral Jenkins's hitman while trying to escape from him."

"That's different. You didn't mean to do it, plus he'd have killed you."

"But I still felt guilty. I felt like I had to do something good after that to exonerate myself. Only later did I realize, while volunteering for duty overseas, that I was already forgiven."

Ruby averted her gaze. "You deserved to be forgiven."

Her sister sighed. "Honey, what was the point of Christ's suffering on the cross if you're not going to honor His sacrifice?"

Ruby kept quiet.

"I mean, can you imagine the agony He must have felt, hanging with all His weight on the spikes driven into His hands and feet? Hours and hours of slow suffocation, not to mention a stab wound that probably punctured a lung. He could have walked away from all that. He had the power to walk away. Instead, He put Himself through unbelievable torture, so we don't have to torture ourselves. What He did was a gift for all of mankind. Rejecting that gift is like saying it wasn't good enough."

Ruby envisioned the scene as Opal described it. She watched Mel Gibson's movie The Passion of the Christ with absolute horror. "I never thought of it that way."

"I know. And I don't mean to preach to you. I'm just saying you don't have to beat yourself up anymore. If you asked God for forgiveness, then it's over. It's done. The slate has been wiped clean."

The words were slow to sink in.

"For what it's worth, I think you should text Tony or, better yet, call him and put him out of his misery. He's been blowing up my phone with all his texts."

"He's been texting you?" This was news to Ruby. Her heavy heart buoyed with gratitude for his continued love and forgiveness.

"Every hour on the hour. That man is completely invested in you, Ruby." Opal lowered her feet back into her shoes and stood. "I'm going to go change and take a walk with Ryan when he wakes up."

It was clear Opal wasn't expecting Ruby to join them.

She sat a moment, keeping the television off, thinking. Far be it from her to behave like Jesus's sacrifice wasn't good enough. What more of Himself could He have given? Maybe Opal was right. Honestly, when had her big sister ever been wrong? Both of them had snuffed out a life without intending to. Neither act was done intentionally. Ruby was certain God had forgiven Opal. Maybe it was time to accept that she'd been forgiven, too.

So why was she sitting here still beating herself up?

With a spark of relief, Ruby snatched up her cell phone and texted Tony, as she'd been longing to do for days now. Hey, what do you feel like for dinner tonight?

Less than five seconds later, he responded. Just your smile.

That pulled a smile right out of her. Tony always said the sweetest things. You got it. She sent him three taco emojis. I'll stop at Pepe's on my way home.