of hope. But why did hearing a simple video of Timothy make her feel this way? What had happened to her? Or was she just unhinged for some other reason?
“Laura,” he said, and then stopped. What was he going to ask her? Are you okay?
She turned then, eyes brimming with tears, and he knew with a certainty that whatever had triggered this grief was still fresh. Before he could say any more, she dropped the cooler and sprinted away from him.
He felt a sudden urge to go after her, but then what? Maybe she wasn’t grieving. Maybe she was just a crazy person. Maybe he was projecting his own feelings on her. What did he know?
Still, he felt guilty. Guilty because somehow he’d made her cry. And guilty because he knew she suffered in some deep, damaged way that only someone who’d lost something truly dear to them would know. It didn’t sit right with him. He felt the need to make it up to her.
“Well, damn,” he muttered beneath his breath as he swiped up the cooler she’d dropped. “Now I’m going to have to do something nice.”
It went against his gruff, no-nonsense, let’s-not-spend-time-talking-about-our-feelings self. He’d never been a touchy-feely guy, but he couldn’t just let her suffer alone. He knew what that felt like.
* * *
LAURA FLED TO her condo and flung herself on the bed, angrily swiping the tears from her face. She hated that she’d become so weak, so completely unstable that a simple video of a baby and some bronzed baby shoes could so undo her in the moment.
It wasn’t right. She should be getting better, and yet, she just seemed to be getting worse. She was a walking sponge, just oozing tears all the time. She just wanted it to stop, all of it. St. Anthony’s was supposed to be the place where she got away from all the things that hurt her, where she could finally heal. After all, the island was named for the patron saint of lost things. And she’d never felt more lost in her whole life.
Why did this happen to her? Why had God seen fit to take her baby away before he could even be born? Why was she the only one mourning him?
But then again, she knew why. She’d been wrong, so very wrong, to be in love with Dean. This was God punishing her, she felt, for the mistake she made: falling in love with a married man.
She squeezed her eyes shut. Dean was a mistake. She knew that. But, the baby wasn’t. No matter what anybody said.
Her sister had told her that she’d have other babies. But Laura didn’t want another baby. She wanted the baby she lost. She glanced down at her flat belly, hidden beneath her flowing cover-up. Now it might never be full.
She wished she could talk to her mother. Get some measure of comfort, but her mother had died years ago.
Feeling lost and alone, her willpower crumbling, she grabbed her phone and dialed Dean’s work cell.
He answered on the second ring. “Hello?” he sounded harried, his voice low.
“Dean?” She hated how angry he sounded that she’d called, how disappointed. He used to always sound happy when he heard her voice. Now he always sounded like she was calling to deliver bad news.
“What are you doing calling me?” he whispered, his voice a furious, low buzz. Then, she realized that he must be at his house. The house he still shared with his wife.
“Dean. I’m sorry... I’m just...” Lost. Alone. Hurting. Wishing that you still loved me...or that you’d ever loved me at all. She hated all the desperate feelings that bubbled up, determined to break the surface. Dean sure had been happy to hear about the miscarriage. Ecstatic, even. Why did she think he’d comfort her now?
Dean sighed, a sound full of patronizing pity, and she felt even worse. “Look,” he said, voice softer. “I’ll try to call you when I get into work, okay?”
She heard shuffling in the background, and then a voice. His wife’s? She felt her stomach tighten with jealousy.
“I’ve got to go. I have to take my wife to the doctor,” he said, louder this time, in a voice that sounded too businesslike, and she knew that Angela was in the room. He was pretending to talk to someone at work.
“Is she all right?” Laura asked, cautious. After all, she wasn’t heartless.
“Well, we were going to tell everyone at the office this week, but she’s sixteen weeks pregnant.”
The words hit Laura like a ton of bricks. She felt all the wind knocked out of her lungs. Pregnant? His wife was...pregnant? Laura was speechless. Words failed her.
“Oh, yes, thanks,” Dean prattled on in a pretend conversation with a coworker who didn’t exist. Completely oblivious or not caring that he’d shattered what was left of her world. “I’ll check in with you when I’m back in the office. Thanks. Bye.”
And then he hung up, the line dead as she clutched her phone in her numb hand. Dean’s wife was pregnant. She was going to have a baby.
Sixteen weeks along?
She’d been twelve weeks along just a month ago when she’d lost her baby. That meant...
That meant that he had to have known that his wife was pregnant at the same time Laura was. That also meant that he had been having sex with Laura at the same time he had sex with his wife. The wife he claimed he hadn’t touched in two years, the wife who apparently hated sex. But she didn’t hate it enough to get pregnant apparently, Laura thought bitterly.
She knew Dean had lied, but this...this was a whole other level.
No wonder he’d been so relieved when she’d lost the baby. There was no way he’d leave his pregnant wife. Besides, there was no reason he’d leave his wife, period, not if Angela was actually a loving partner rather than the cold, distant monster he’d described.
Suddenly, she felt a searing rush of rage. She ought to pick up that phone and call his home landline to try to talk to his wife. Or message her on Facebook. Shouldn’t she know she was married to the worst kind of liar?
But then the rage drained out of her and all she felt was pain. She’d been so incredibly stupid. Why had she ever believed a word he said?
And when, oh, when would God stop punishing her? She knew she’d made a mistake, but when would she be forgiven? She’d asked so many times, in church, on the plane here and once again now. Please. I’m sorry. I was wrong.
She didn’t know how long she lay there, but eventually the daylight faded outside and dark shadows covered the length of the condo. She ought to try to get up, find something to eat for dinner, but she couldn’t muster the strength or the will to do it. Why bother?
She heard a soft knock on her door distantly and wondered if she’d imagined it. She lay quietly, listening.
Another knock sounded, followed by silence.
Nope, definitely someone at the door. But she couldn’t muster the energy to get to her feet. She didn’t think she’d ever be able to leave the bed again. She lay motionless, anticipating another knock, but it never came.
Good, she thought. Whoever it was went away.
She felt a sudden urge to move, to get out of the condo. She hated wallowing in self-pity. It just wasn’t her. Maybe going to the beach would clear her head? After all, she’d traveled all this way, paid to be here. What was the use of being on an amazing tropical island if she was just going to stay cooped up inside?
She sniffed, pulled on a pair of jean cutoffs over her bathing suit and stuffed a wad of tissues in her pocket. Then she flung open the front door and found her cooler waiting for her there. The cooler she’d dropped downstairs at Mark’s workshop.
She reached down to pick it up and found it heavier than an empty cooler should be. Laura set it down once more and lifted the hinged lid. Inside, she found her Cokes and four bottles of beer. Along with that was a hastily scribbled note that read:
Sorry