“I need to see—” Dane clamped his jaws together and stared toward the entrance as though debating whether to ignore her advice or do as she had requested and give Blake some space.
“Please, Dane. I realize this is hard on you.”
“Hard! I nearly died in that plane crash. If the Xingas hadn’t found me and taken me in, I wouldn’t be here. The first few months after the crash I was—” He snapped his mouth closed, gulped, then continued in a stilted voice, “I want to see my son, hold him.” He buried his face in Tara’s blond curls and breathed deeply while his daughter played with the buttons on his shirt between knuckling her eyes.
“So family is important to you now,” Zoey said without thinking. She hadn’t meant to add to his pain, but she had lived through Blake’s silent suffering, through the years of watching Dane go off on one assignment after another, leaving her and the children alone to cope with his prolonged absences. But the worst was never knowing what was really going on with her husband.
Dane flinched. “Ouch. You’re certainly blunt.”
“Something I’ve learned to be over the last few years. A lot about me has changed.”
“And a lot about me has changed.”
“Then we aren’t the same two people who married fourteen years ago?”
“No, and being strangers isn’t a good foundation for a marriage.”
“I agree. We have three children and we made a vow before God fourteen years ago that I intend to keep.” Her emotions had gone through a roller-coaster ride tonight, as she was sure Dane’s had as well, and she was too tired to get into a discussion about their future at this moment. She was glad when she heard Mandy pounding down the stairs.
Zoey’s mother followed Mandy into the living room and took Tara from Dane. “Dane, I’m glad you’re home safe. I’ll get her ready for bed while you spend some time with Mandy.”
“Thanks, Mom. She’s starting to rub her eyes. Never a good sign.” At Dane’s questioning look, Zoey added, “When that happens, we have about half an hour to get Tara to bed before she falls apart. You don’t want that. She can scream the roof off when she’s tired enough.”
With her treasure box clasped in her hands and a wide smile on her face, Mandy plopped down on the couch next to Dane and carefully opened the old pink-and-white gift box she’d received her last birthday. “See the rock I got when we went hikin’. And look at this coin Jesse and Nick gave me. That’s when they went to—” Mandy peered at Zoey, her brow furrowed.
“To England.”
“Yeah. Isn’t it neat?” Mandy held the coin out in the palm of her hand for Dane to inspect.
“I loved different coins when I was a little boy. I had a collection.”
Zoey blinked, surprised at what Dane had said. She hadn’t known that. When she thought about it, Zoey realized she really didn’t know a lot about Dane’s childhood. Both his parents were dead, his mother from an illness. He had cared for his younger brother for a while, but he’d died when Dane was twenty-one. He’d refused to discuss his past, just as he’d refused to discuss his job. After years of asking, wanting to share his pain and help him, she had given up.
“Where’s the coins?”
Dane cocked his head to the side and thought for a moment. “You know, Mandy, I’m not sure. I guess I lost them.”
Mandy hugged the English coin. “I’ll never lose my treasures.”
Zoey listened to her daughter as she went through all her other prize possessions, cupping them in her small palm to show Dane, then letting him pick them up and examine them. Zoey knew in that moment it wouldn’t take long for Dane to win Mandy over.
Ten minutes later Mandy finished her presentation with a big yawn. “What’cha think of my treasures?”
“I can see why you take such good care of them.”
“And it’s time for bed, young lady. In fact, it’s past your bedtime,” Zoey said, a tightness in her throat from watching the exchange between Dane and Mandy.
“But, Mommy, I want to stay up and talk to Daddy.”
“If you hurry, I’ll tuck you in and read you your favorite story,” Dane said, his words sounding thick, forced. He put the last treasure back in the box and closed its lid, his face averted.
Mandy leaped to her feet and without a backward glance rushed from the room. Dane still didn’t look up.
Zoey chuckled, needing to ease the tension in the room. “Home less than an hour and she’ll do anything you say. Of course, she loves for someone to read her favorite book to her. That’s the only way I can get her into bed without an argument.”
Finally Dane’s shuttered gaze met hers. “What’s her favorite book?”
“This month it’s Henrietta’s Cat. After she can recite it to you, her favorite book changes.”
“I remember how Blake loved to be read to when he was her age.”
The wistful tone in Dane’s voice tugged at Zoey’s heart. She wanted to comfort him, and yet a barrier stood between them that had slowly grown since he’d first arrived, a barrier that had been firmly in place the day he had left on his last assignment. It was as if they both began to remember the past and the problems still unsolved. An awkward silence fell between them. All Zoey heard was the ticking of the grandfather clock in the corner.
Dane cleared his throat, running his hand through his hair several times. “Well, I guess—” He rose, uncertainty in his expression.
“It’ll take Mandy a few minutes to get ready. In the meantime, let me get some bedding for you.” She started for the stairs. “I’m sure you’re tired.”
“Zoey, Carl said something about you being a counselor at Sweetwater High School.”
“Yes, I had to do something to support the children. Our savings wasn’t much, and you weren’t legally declared dead yet, so I couldn’t get the insurance. I love counseling the students and using my education. Now, I’d better get that bedding.”
Zoey hurried up the stairs, leaving Dane alone with his turbulent thoughts. Zoey was a high school counselor. She had a whole other life without him. Her life had moved on while his had come to a screeching halt over two years ago. Memories bombarded him. He felt the heat of the fire. He heard the sounds of crunching metal. He squeezed his eyes closed and massaged his temples, trying to erase those aching memories, always just out of reach, never quite clear enough for him to piece the whole picture together.
A sound from the hallway drew his attention away from the past. He glimpsed Blake peering around the corner. He stepped toward his son. Blake darted past him and flew up the stairs. Dane wanted to go after him and pull him into his embrace, but the look on his son’s face kept Dane rooted to the floor. The anger in Blake’s expression made him realize Zoey was right. His son wasn’t ready to accept him back into his life. Pain clawed at Dane’s chest, constricting each breath as he inhaled deeply. Why had he thought it would be simple? That he would waltz right back into his old life and pick up where he’d left off? Did he even want that old life back? What did he want?
Dane scanned the living room and remembered a few pieces of furniture from when they’d lived in Dallas. But so much was different—the house, the town, his wife, his family. He’d desperately needed it to be the same, so he could completely reconstruct his life, fill in the few remaining holes in his memory. He felt the walls closing in on him.
He strode from the living room, fleeing out onto the porch as quickly as Blake had gone upstairs. Taking deep breaths of the crisp, spring air, Dane listened to the night silence around him. Somewhere in the distance a car started. A dog barked. The constriction in his chest eased.
He