Chapter 27

The last forty-eight hours had had some of the hardest moments of my life, but all of them had been worth it when I finally took Macy home from the hospital at around two in the morning on the night we'd gotten her back.

I'd hated every second that I hadn't been able to go into the room with Jim and his deputies, but since I was no longer an active-duty cop, I knew that it would not only be profoundly unethical—since it was my girl who'd been taken—but extremely illegal, and I didn't want there to be a single technicality that could lead to that piece of shit getting off.

Even with her face black and blue, she'd been the most beautiful thing I'd ever seen when she'd come out of that room with Jim. After that, every second we'd had to spend apart had been a wrench, from me having to get the money order for Jackie and Patrick to the time in the hospital when the doctor had made me leave the room as she'd been examining Macy.

The second we got back to the cabin, though, we waved goodbye to Hank—the guy had stood by us for the entire night and promised to come by with my truck the next day—and stood in the house on our own. She moved around gingerly, moving over to the island. I wondered what she was doing for a second before she reached over and ran her finger over the divot in the granite left by the bullet.

"I can't believe he almost killed you," she said, her voice soft and vengeful.

"He didn't get me, Macy," I said, walking over to her. "You don't ever need to worry about him. He's shit, and he'll be going where the shit goes."

She gave a funny little hiccoughing laugh before looking up to me, and I felt that now familiar pain in my belly at the sight of the tears on her face. "Now I see why you retired from police work. You just can't help sounding like a cheesy eighties cop stereotype, can you?"

I laughed with her but stopped when I saw that the laughing in her face dwindled to pure crying. I reached over to her, pulling her into my arms and letting her cry into my shirt with abandon, not saying a word as I pulled her over to the couch and sat her down with me. Without speaking, we found our usual position together, with her head on my chest and my arms around her.

It felt almost normal, but not the normal I'd gotten so used to over the last few years. This was the life I'd been missing, the thing that "normal" always should have been.

When her crying finally died down to soft sniffles, I tilted her head up so I was looking at her straight on and touched her cheek again. "What do you want to do right now, babe?"

I didn't exactly know where the shift was that had pushed me to start calling her by this pet name instead of by her real name, but I couldn't stop. It was like I needed her to know how much I considered her mine.

"It's a weird three-way tie; I feel like I want to eat, shower, and sleep, all at the same time, and I never want you to let me go for all of them."

My heart swelled at the sound of her words, and I pulled her face up to mine. "I could make you something to eat, but it would require me letting you go. Although you could go shower while I cook so that your food is ready when you get out—"

Her groan sent a vibration running through my body, and she buried her face in my chest. "The thought of just making a choice is making me dizzy." She looked up at me, resting her chin on her hand, which she rested on my belly. "Will you just take me to bed and not let me go tonight?"

It thrilled me that she'd asked me for something that was so easy for me to promise her. I moved gently, pulling her up with me so that she was cradled in my arms as I carried her down the hall.

As I made her breakfast and she sat on the bench outside, staring out at nothing as she sipped from a cup of coffee, I thought of the next thing I needed to do, that would probably be the most difficult yet. She still hadn't told me what it was that had driven her out of the cabin, leading Alex back to us, so I'd figured that the only way to get her to do it would be to be vulnerable enough for the both of us.

I slid her omelet onto the plate and took it outside, taking my seat next to her. She blinked a few times as she came back from wherever she'd been and smiled at me as she took her first bite.

"I need to tell you something," I said, breathing deeply as I started talking, "that I probably should've told you before."

"Okay," she said, dragging out the second syllable as she blinked up at me.

"You've asked me a few times now about why I left the force and why I keep everyone at arms' length—" I swallowed "—including you. Especially you."

I broke off our eye contact, unable to take in the widening of her blue eyes. "The truth is that it all comes back to the same story, from when I was in Nashville. Remember—remember when I told you about Patrick and how I would make him cookies? And ratatouille?"

She nodded, putting her hand down next to mine so that the tips of our fingers touched.

"Neil, Patrick's dad, was my partner from the day I made detective. He was way ahead of me, but he always treated me like I was on his level. I met him right after he'd asked his wife Jackie to marry him, and by the time the wedding came around, we were so close that he actually asked me to be a groomsman. And when Pat was born, I got asked to be godfather."

I smiled at the memory, thinking of little blonde-haired, dark-eyed, solemn Patrick who took life so seriously. She smiled with me.

"Jackie became like a sister too, and she was always trying to set me up with people. She said she didn't want me to wind up alone. But the truth was that I was happy with my life; I'd go out on dates, but I had my family with Neil, Jackie, and Patrick."

I breathed deeper, knowing that I was coming up to the moment that would be hardest for me to discuss.

"Neil and I were on a complicated case involving a little girl who'd been kidnapped from her mom in a custody battle, and we'd tracked down the dad. He was a real piece of shit, so time wasn't on our side; we had to get in there and get her out. We didn't want to go in guns blazing in case he did something stupid, so we figured we'd get her out first while he was still sleeping and then go back in and arrest him. We were almost out of the house with her when her father had woken up.

He saw me holding his daughter as we were trying to get her out. He pointed a gun at me, and I heard it go off, but I got pushed out of the way, and I didn't really see what had happened. I put the little girl down and radioed in for backup, and Neil and I were able to get out of the house. But—" The words froze in my throat, and I swallowed them down. "The bullet had lodged in Neil's chest, and he died in surgery later that night."

The tears were now rolling freely down my face, and I didn't bother to wipe them away. She took my hand, and I held her fingers tightly.

"He pushed me out of the way, which put him right in line of fire, and after that I just… I froze. I could barely look at Jackie when she came to the hospital that night to see us. I couldn't go to the funeral. The guilt still has me frozen most of the time. I send Jackie money every month to support her and Patrick, but I haven't been able to talk to her or face her."

I looked up at her, and I saw her biting down on her lip, hard. The tears were running down her face, but I could tell she was about to say something.

"Dillon, I know you feel guilty, and I understand why. But what if that bullet had gone wide? What if that little girl had been the one who'd been hit, instead of you?" She shook her head, holding my hand tightly. "There's no reason why you need to feel guilty for him doing his job. You'd have done the same thing, I'm sure."

"None of that changes the fact that he's the one who's dead, and I'm the one who's still here," I said, pulling my hand away. I tried to shove down the feelings that were mounting and overwhelming me. I didn't want to say something that would hurt her or make her think that I was ungrateful for anything she'd said to me. I turned to look back at her, and her face looked clearly torn, as if she was wrestling with something. Whatever it was, I just hoped she'd be able to get it off her chest. I hoped she'd know that she could trust me enough—

"And I'm glad you're still here. Because, Dillon, I'm pregnant."

The bottom could've dropped out of the world and I wouldn't have noticed. Everything seemed to have slowed down and speed up simultaneously, and my hands felt like they'd started to sweat. I wasn't going to insult her by asking if it was mine; she'd been at my house for more than a month.

"What—Macy—" I leaned forward, putting my head into my hands. I took another few deep breaths before turning back to her. "Why did you keep this from me?"

She stood up, turning away from me, and I heard her voice thin out. "Because whatever I might feel for you, Dillon, and whatever you might've done for me, I don't know you that well. I don't know whether I can actually trust you. I knew Alex for years before we got engaged, and he never once abused me before that. I've known you for less than two months, and you might've been trying to protect me, but you were also being controlling at times."

I didn't know how to respond. I knew why she'd kept it from me.

"Now, I know that you wouldn't do that. I appreciate everything you've done for me, more than I can say. But the truth is that we still don't know each other, and now, we don't have to be in this situation. I'll go back to my apartment and see what I can recover, and maybe we can talk more as things go on."

I didn't say anything. She'd had so many choices taken from her and so many events dictated to her that I didn't know how to ask her to stay.

She went back into the house, leaving me on the porch in silence.