Hidden. Tara Quinn Taylor
had to do was open her mouth. She could do it. And then…
No. She wasn’t going to revisit that ground. She’d been all over it. Too many times. Some things just had to be put to rest or she’d be incapable of going on. Taylor needed a sane parent.
“Not quite the hero anymore, huh?”
He’d turned his head, studying her.
“I don’t believe in fairy tales.”
The CD player changed discs, the clicking loud in the room. Intrusive. Tricia went to check on Taylor. She adjusted the covers at her son’s waist and double-checked the latch on the side of the crib, ensuring that her small son was secure. Running a hand lightly over his fine dark curls, she sucked in a long, shuddering breath. Her integrity depended solely on being the best mother she could be.
Scott didn’t need her, or her protection. Taylor did.
“I will keep you safe,” she whispered. “Whatever it takes.”
Calm as she returned to the living room, clear in her resolve, she settled on the cushion next to Scott. She didn’t think he’d moved at all.
“You are, right now, the same man I’ve loved and cared about for almost two years.” The words came softly, without conscious thought.
That statement was the only honesty she could give him.
He covered one of her hands with his. And started to talk. About the help his family tried to give him. The support from Alicia’s parents. Sitting there with him, listening, Tricia could easily imagine the days he described. Four years of college, trying not to feel, and always feeling too much. She understood completely the despair he described, the sense that life would never again contain moments of pure joy. At the same time there was the undeniable urge to press on, simply because one breathed.
And she understood the social pressures, the parents who just wouldn’t give up their need to make everything at least appear okay, regardless of whether or not things would ever be okay again.
He held her hand during the telling. At some point, as the minutes passed, her fingers stole up his arm, tangling lightly in the hair at the back of his neck, caressing him.
“I graduated from college with a dual degree in fire science and business, went to work for my father and hated the sight of the years stretching endlessly ahead,” he said, as though narrating rehearsed lines.
“I was so tired of fighting it all—my memories, my guilt, my family.”
Her fingers stilled along the back of his neck. “So what did you do?” Had he fallen into the same depths that had almost consumed her? Scott seemed far too strong….
“For one thing, I gave in. They’d been trying for a couple of years to fix me up, and when they introduced me to Diana Grove of the New England banking Groves, I went along with everyone’s not-so-gentle pushing. Diana was sweet, beautiful, had a great sense of humor…”
A paragon of virtues. Tricia would bet she’d been honest in every way, too.
Nothing like herself. A jeans-wearing alterations specialist for a local dry cleaner, who was paid in cash only. There was nothing upper-crust about her. Not her plain brown unstyled hair. Not her drugstore makeup or homemade purse. Certainly not her non-existent bank account—or the made-up social security number on file at the free health clinic where she took Taylor.
And not the facts she hid from the world, either.
“And for the other thing?” He’d said giving in was one thing he’d done. She rubbed the too-tight cords of his neck, taking comfort from the contact, the heat of his smooth skin, even though she knew that in loving him too much lay a danger that could kill her. Or Taylor. She couldn’t let herself need Scott. Couldn’t let a sense of security tempt her to trade away the freedom she’d bought at such a high price.
“What?” he asked, turning his head to look at her. In their closeness she could see the reflections of light in his eyes, the warmth and compassion that was never missing for long, shining from deep inside.
“You said ‘for one thing’ you gave in. I just wondered what the other thing was.”
He took her free hand, held it between both of his, stroking her palm with his thumb. It was so damn hard to keep her resistance up when he did that—when all she wanted to do was concentrate on that simple touch until it was her only reality.
“I made the decision to take control where I could. I was never again going to be in a position where I had to sit, helpless and incompetent, as I watched someone’s life slip away. It wasn’t enough that I had the degree in fire science. I was determined to get paramedic training, as well.”
“What did your family—and Diana—think about that?”
“She was understanding. Encouraged me to do what I needed to do.”
As any well-trained socially prominent wife would do with the man she hoped to marry.
“And your family?”
He shrugged, turning her hand as his thumb moved from her palm to her wrist. “They humored me.”
“Expecting you to get over it.”
“Something like that.”
“You didn’t.”
“Nope.” Sitting back, Scott put an arm around her shoulders, still holding her hand. “Diana didn’t believe me at first when I told her I was going to spend my life using that training.”
“And when she did?”
“She went along with it for a while.”
“Until?” Let me guess. Until he actually had to help some homeless or otherwise socially insignificant person and came home with low-class blood on his clothes.
That reaction wasn’t like her. It was probably true—but still, not the way she would’ve thought two years ago. She’d always been more of a glass half-full kind of person.
“She walked when I told her I didn’t intend to live in the mansion my parents planned to give us for a wedding present.”
So they’d gone as far as to get engaged. Something she’d never have the honor of doing with Scott.
“Why didn’t you want the house?”
“Somehow, living a life of luxury didn’t seem conducive to the job I had to do. It always comes down to those split-second decisions. I couldn’t risk getting too comfortable, losing my edge.” He threaded his fingers through hers. She loved the feel of silk against the back of her hand.
Moving her fingers against his, Tricia fell in love with the man all over again. If she’d met him a few years before, knew that men with character really did exist, she might still believe in fairy tales.
Scott leaned forward, grabbing his beer, which had to be pretty warm by then, and took a long sip. He held on to the bottle. “I’m never again going to be that soft boy sitting beside his mangled Porsche by the side of the road, waiting to be waited on.”
“No, you aren’t.” But not just because he’d given up a luxurious house.
He took another sip of beer. The CD changed, filling the room with Enya’s evocative tones. Tricia laid her head against his shoulder.
“I’m curious about something.” Petrified, more like it, but pretending to herself that she wasn’t.
Bottom line, she was on her own. Always would be. She could handle anything. Hadn’t she already proved that to herself?
“What?”
“Why did you choose today to tell me all this? Your parents coming for a visit or something?”
His hand on her shoulder stilled. He didn’t pull away, yet Tricia felt his withdrawal as completely as if he had.