House Calls: Callaghan Brothers, Book 3 (21 page)

* * *

M
ichael had been waiting for it.  She’d been so strong, so capable, but he knew it was only a matter of time.  He had had plenty of opportunities to get used to the idea of death.  Had seen it many times.  Knew that with each mission he and his brothers accepted there was a chance he would not return.  But Maggie didn’t.  She wasn’t prepared for this.

He let her cry it out, doing the only thing he could – he held her until there was nothing left.

Eventually the tears stopped.  She clung to him a little less desperately, but she refused to let go.  That was okay with him.  He had no intention of letting her, ever again.

“D
on’t let him overdo it,” Maggie instructed Kieran when he came to pick up Michael.  Kieran managed a fitness and rehab center in town where Michael would be doing his rehab.

“Relax, Maggie.  We know the drill.” Kieran reassured her.  “This isn’t the first time one of us has been shot.”

It was the wrong thing to say.  Immediately her face paled and her lip began to tremble.  Michael shot Kieran a withering look. 

“It’s okay, Maggie,” he said, his voice softening.  She nodded, but it wasn’t okay, not really.  Now that Michael was home and recovering, she had to face the awful truth that if she stayed with him, this might happen again.  And next time, he might not come home at all.

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“H
ow do you do it?”  Maggie asked quietly.  After Michael left, she phoned Taryn.  Taryn picked up Lexi and they were at Maggie’s within the hour.

“It’s not easy, Maggie, but doing this is part of who they are.”  Taryn sipped her coffee, her violet eyes naturally intense.  “It’s one of the things that attracts us to them in the first place.  We crave their intensity, their sense of honor.  Regular men just won’t do it for women like us.”

Maggie wasn’t sure she agreed with that.  She fell in love with Michael when she thought he was just a doctor, and she relayed as much.

“Maybe you didn’t know up here,” Taryn said, pointing to her head, “but you knew here.”  She pointed to her heart.  “You can’t tell me you didn’t sense it, Maggie.  It reaches out to you, calls to you, and if you’re the one, you can’t help but respond to it.” 

Had she known?  If she was honest with herself she had to admit that she had been instantly drawn to Michael, feeling a connection she’d never felt with anyone else, even when her brain tried to convince her that she was imagining it, that such things didn’t really happen.  The power of her feelings for him defied all logic, all the rational expectations she’d ever had.  And because of that, she was terrified. 

If anything happened to Michael, it would destroy her.  The past few weeks had proven that beyond a shadow of a doubt.  The pain of missing him – but knowing he was safe and well – was nothing compared to what she would face if...  Her mind refused to complete the thought. 

“I just don’t think I can bear sitting around, waiting for that phone call or knock on the door,” she said without answering, wrapping her arms around herself.

“You’d be surprised at what you can do for the love of a man like that,” Lexi said with quiet strength.  “And you won’t be alone.  You have us.  We know what you’re going through, and we help each other through it.”

“Besides,” Taryn pointed out.  “Nothing in life is guaranteed, Maggie.  How many people die every day?  People who wake up one morning and never see it coming?” 

“True, but let’s face it, what they do is pushing the envelope a bit, don’t you think?”

“We know what we face, as do they.  They are good at what they do, Maggie.  The very best.  And they leave absolutely nothing to chance. ”

“All the more so if they have a reason to come home.” 

The words were left unspoken, but Maggie sensed the implication easily enough.  She’d heard enough of Jake and Ian’s quiet exchanges with the others to glean that Michael had taken chances he shouldn’t have.  Was it because of her?  Was it because he thought he had lost her forever?  Because Jake and Ian had wives and babies waiting for them, and he didn’t?

“Michael was
shot
,” Maggie said firmly, suddenly feeling restless again.  She got up and absently started collecting together the ingredients for a coffee cake.  Thinking better of it, she put everything away and pulled out items to make a sweet dough so she could knead some of her stress away.  Every time the image of him lying there came into her mind she felt like part of her was dying all over again.

“Have either of you had to look at your husband lying in a hospital bed, wondering if they were ever going to open their eyes again?”  She spoke the words not with accusation or sarcasm, but with a deeply-seated need for someone else to really understand what she was feeling.

“No,” Taryn admitted.  “But each of them has had to sit beside our hospital beds, wondering the same thing of us.”

Maggie stilled for a moment then turned slowly. 

“It’s true,” Lexi admitted.  “And I thank God every day that Ian didn’t walk away because of it.”

“Me, too,” agreed Taryn.  “Jake was there for me every step of the way.  And Michael was there for you, Maggie.”

“But that’s different,” Maggie insisted defensively.  “I didn’t purposely place myself in danger.”

“Didn’t you?”  Taryn asked quietly. 

Maggie froze.  Did she?  By ignoring her symptoms, by refusing to listen to Michael’s pleas to be checked out, hadn’t she been doing just that?  Michael had never given up.  Hadn’t he stuck by her, even though, she realized now, he had been worried about her, his doctor’s instincts telling him that something was terribly wrong despite her stubborn insistence otherwise?

“You’re a strong-willed woman, Maggie.  What if, when you left the hospital, Michael decided he couldn’t handle the possibility that something like that would happen again and left you forever?”  Lexi offered gently.

Maggie sank down in the nearest chair as the bitter truth dawned on her.  “Oh my God,” she whispered.

“And your baby?” Taryn said.  “Could you look into your child’s eyes, knowing that your love is what brought him into this world?”

“Our baby,” Maggie repeated softly.  “Michael doesn’t even know about our baby.”

“You haven’t told him yet?” Lexi asked.  “Why not, Maggie?”

“I’m so scared,” Maggie said, losing the battle to stay strong before them as tears began to fall unchecked from her eyes.  “What if there’s something wrong?”

“Because of the surgery?”

“I had all those drugs.  What if they hurt the baby?”

Lexi nodded.  “I know exactly how you feel.  I had the same problem.  I was terrified something was wrong with Patrick.  I put off telling Ian until I knew everything was okay.”

There was tremendous comfort, Maggie had to admit, in having someone who understood exactly what she was going through.

“So we’ll take you for tests,” Taryn said, reasonably.  “Not here, though.  The boys will find out before we even have a chance to get there.”

But Maggie shook her head.  “I can’t.”

“Why not?”

Maggie exhaled.  “No insurance.  And I can’t afford to pay cash.”

Taryn and Lexi exchanged a look.  “And before you even think of suggesting it, I will not accept charity.”

“Tell her,” Taryn prodded Lexi.  “Tell her what you were telling me on the way over.”

“Tell me what?”

“Well, a couple of months ago Michael brought me some of your home-canned stuff.  I loved it – so much so that I gave some to my partner, Aidan, and he loved it, too.  We’ve had such a difficult time getting quality organic products for our menus, he wanted to talk to you about a possible business agreement.”

“What kind of agreement?”

“We contract with you for organic produce and ask you to oversee the harvesting and canning processes.  It would be a term type thing, so if after a year or two you feel it’s not in your best interests you can opt out.  Aidan is extremely flexible and fair-minded about that kind of thing.”

“My land?” Maggie asked warily.

“Stays yours.  There will be occasional inspections and whatnot, required by federal regulations, of course.  Although I’m sure that Aidan will ask that you provide exclusively for the Celtic Goddess and not any other restaurants.”

Maggie was stunned.  “But I couldn’t possibly do all that.”

“You will have a staff, equipment, whatever you need.  Delegate as much or as little as you want.”

Maggie sank into a chair.  It was too good to be true.

“The added benefit of all this is that you will be required to have meetings with Aidan and myself.  Quite a few of them initially.  Some of those will undoubtedly be at our corporate offices down in Benton, Georgia.”  Lexi paused.  “I know some great, really discreet specialists down there, Maggie.  No one else would ever have to know, not unless you wanted them to.”

Maggie couldn’t help it.  She started to cry.  “Why would you do all this for me?” she asked tearfully.

“Because, Maggie, like it or not, you’re one of us now,” Taryn said with a smile.  “And we take care of our own.”

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“E
xplain to me again why you think I shouldn’t go with you,” Michael pouted as Maggie packed a small overnight bag.  If she hadn’t been so nervous, it might have been funny.  But she was nervous, afraid that she would give something away.  So far she hadn’t had to lie to him.  Everything she’d told him was one hundred percent true, even if it wasn’t one hundred percent complete.

“You’re supposed to be recovering, remember?  It’s only for a day or two,” Maggie said, keeping her voice light.  “And Ian’s not going either.”

“I’m not sure I like this, Maggie.”

“I know, Michael, and I’m sorry about that.  I am going to miss you terribly, but I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t looking forward to a little girl time with Lexi.  I haven’t done anything like that in a long time.”

Michael shifted uncomfortably, his eyes watching her every move.

“You trust Lexi, don’t you?”  She refrained from asking him if he trusted
her
, because either way she didn’t want to hear the answer.  An affirmative would rack her with guilt, a negative would crush her.

* * *

“O
f course I do.”  To a point, that was.  Lexi would never do anything to intentionally cause harm to anyone, ever.  She was quite possibly the gentlest soul he’d ever met.  Yet there was nothing Lexi would not do to help someone else she cared about, either.  If she believed she was helping Maggie in some way, even if it was something she knew he would not agree with, she would not hesitate.

And he was pleased by the fact that Maggie was growing so close to Taryn and Lexi.  The more she became of part of his family the better as far as he was concerned.  And he certainly wouldn’t begrudge her a little ‘girl time’ as she called it.  But there was something else there, something unspoken, something vague and undefined, that was making him uneasy.

“Lexi told me about this great spa down there – said she would take me if we have enough time.”  Maggie let the genuine excitement creep into her voice.  “I’ve never been to a real spa before.”

Yeah, Michael had heard about that place from Ian.  Lexi hit it every time she travelled down that way.  Said she came back smoother and softer than silk.  Just thinking about Maggie returning to him all buffed and waxed had him hardening painfully. 

Maybe he was being paranoid.  Maybe this trip really was only about meeting with the board of the Celtic Goddess Corporation with some feminine pampering on the side.  He took one look at those big, pleading green eyes and shook his head. 

“Come here,” he commanded, using that deep, low voice that she said made her tingle in all the right places.  She obeyed him without hesitation.  His suspicion immediately rose up again.

“That was too easy,” he said when she straddled his lap, locking his arms around her.  “What are you up to?”

“I’m going to be gone for almost two days,” she said, licking beneath his jaw, burying her hands in his hair.  “I need a little extra to hold me over.” 

Oh.  Well, that made perfect sense.  Michael gave her a warning growl as his hands found their way beneath her shirt, skimming along her waist.  He kept his hands there, gently needing the soft flesh.  She sucked in a breath, her hands freezing momentarily.

“I love how you’re filling out again,” he breathed against her ear, before all thoughts but one fled his mind.

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“T
hey’re up to something, Ian,” Michael said for the tenth time.  “I’m sure of it.” 

Now that Maggie was physically gone, it all seemed much clearer to him.  Whether it was a sixth sense or subtle changes in her behavior – or possibly both, Michael was convinced that Maggie wasn’t telling him everything about her trip down to Benton with Lexi.  The more he thought about it, the more certain he was.  It was the same kind of feeling he’d had when she’d been experiencing all of those warning signs after her fall and hadn’t wanted him to know.  After that experience, Michael swore he would never ignore that feeling again.

She’d seemed preoccupied and distracted that morning.  Maggie had tried to pass it off as a fear of flying.  Since her first experience in a plane had been with his adrenalin-junkie brother Sean, that seemed believable enough, but Michael had been with her on the much gentler trip back and she hadn’t seemed bothered in the least.  Maybe she was just too worried about him at the time to give it much thought, but he wasn’t entirely convinced.

And she’d picked at her breakfast.  No big surprise there if she was truly nervous about the meeting, but he kept catching her absently placing her hand over her stomach while she appeared to be a million miles away.  It was her reaction when he asked her about it that had the warning bells sounding in his head.  She’d looked almost afraid, like she’d been caught doing something wrong, and from that point on had made an obvious effort to keep both hands on the table.

At the time he’d thought she was self-conscious about gaining a few pounds.  It was why he’d made sure he told her how much that pleased him.  But now, he wasn’t so sure that was it at all.