Operation: Endurance (When the Mission Ends) (36 page)

As a result of the appointment, she felt much stronger than she had when she’d walked in the door a couple of hours before. When she came out of the office, Chris stood and she immediately went to give him a hug. “Thank you for waiting for me. I’m glad I came. Now let’s go see how Brian is doing, okay?”

Brian was the wounded person who belonged to all the extra blood at Pete’s. He’d arrived earlier in the day to confront Pete about what Colton and Chris had been told. Pete had panicked and shot him. Luckily, Pete shot him with intention to maim, not kill, so that Brian couldn’t interfere with the plans Pete had for Julie.

It was fortuitous for everyone that Julie and Toni arrived at the same time or else Pete probably would have gotten away with everything, including a murder/suicide for Julie and him. When he’d cuffed Toni, he took her to the room where Brian lay wounded and bleeding from a gunshot. It was actually Brian’s ankle pistol that Toni had used to kill Pete.

Chris had called the hospital this morning and they still had Brian listed in critical condition. He had surgery the day before to remove the bullet and his right kidney, which had been skimmed and damaged by the bullet.

When they arrived at the hospital, Julie was surprised to find Toni there, wearing the same clothes she had on the day before. Had she been here all night? Julie felt awful. She hadn’t even taken a moment to consider how traumatic the day before had been for Toni. She’d been dating Pete and had fired the bullet which killed him. Talk about mental trauma. Toni looked emotionally frazzled and exhausted sitting in Brian’s room. She glanced up at them from her chair next to Brian’s bedside where she watched him sleep.

They motioned her out of the room to the hall. Toni gave Julie a weak smile, but Julie pulled her into her arms for a hug. “Have you been here all night?”

Toni nodded and gestured toward the hospital room. “He doesn’t have any family or anyone else to sit here with him. I didn’t want to leave him alone. They weren’t sure if he would make it through the night. He lost a lot of blood. If he was going to die, I couldn’t let him die alone.” Toni’s eyes filled with tears that quickly flowed down her cheeks. She seemed so lost.

Chris pulled out his cell phone. “Toni, go home. We’ll stay with him. I promise you, we won’t leave him alone anymore. I’m so sorry we didn’t realize you were here. You should have called one of us.”

She was already shaking her head. “No, I don’t want to leave. I’ll stay.”

Chris and Julie exchanged a concerned look.

Julie laid a hand on Toni’s shoulder. “Have you eaten anything?”

“I’m fine, really.”

“Tell her to go home and sleep,” said a low, gravelly voice from within the room. All three of them turned to look in shock at Brian, who was lying in bed scowling at Toni.

“Ignore him. Being hurt makes him grumpy,” Toni said, but her worried glance toward Brian said a lot more than her words. She sighed and closed her eyes for a moment as she leaned against the wall.

Julie didn’t know how much of it was physical exhaustion and how much of it was mental exhaustion, but as someone who’d spent a lifetime controlling emotional upheaval, Julie could recognize the signs. Toni was on the edge of breaking and using Brian to take the focus off her own pain. As she glanced back over at Brian, she realized this could be perfect. Brian obviously needed someone in his life and Toni had taken it upon herself to fill that position. She needed him right now as a distraction, too. They just needed to make sure she didn’t get exhausted doing it.

Turning to Chris, she instructed, “Don’t call anyone. Go sit with Brian while I take Toni down to the cafeteria to get something to eat. We’ll be back in a little bit.”

Toni began to argue, but Julie didn’t give her a chance. She just pulled her along. Luckily, Julie had slept the night before so she could push the exhausted Toni around.

Julie stopped her once they were further down the hall. “You have two choices right now, although it really doesn’t matter which you choose, because you will be doing both before you’re allowed back into his room.”

Toni clenched her jaw, but didn’t argue, even though her eyes shot sparks. Julie figured that was a good sign the sassy girl was still in there, regardless of the awfulness of the day before.

“You need to shower and change your clothes, but you also need to eat. Which would you like to do first?”

“Are you saying I stink?” Toni discreetly checked her pits and the sides of Julie’s mouth quirked up.

She couldn’t keep the laugh from escaping. “No, but there’s a shower and I have a change of clothes down in the Physical Therapy department. You’ll feel better for it. It will help as much to fix your exhaustion as you can without actually going home and taking a nap, which I gathered you wouldn’t even consider. Right?”

“Right.”

“So which first, shower or food?”

Toni wilted, the fight going out of her.

Julie swallowed against the lump in her throat. It would take a while for this girl to get over the trauma from the day before, but Julie planned to be there to physically and mentally prop her up.

“Do you think we could get a cup of coffee on the way to the shower?”

“I think that could be arranged. Come on.” She steered Toni toward her office to pick up fresh clothes.

When Toni got out of the shower, they were chatting about inane things and ignoring the elephant in the room when something occurred to Julie. “Who’s taking care of Sam, your dog?”

“Jake and Cassie took him to their house. They were here yesterday when I decided to stay.”

“Okay, good.” Toni seemed so tired. She wouldn’t have even been there if it wasn’t for Julie pulling her into the house yesterday. “Listen, Toni, I’m so sorry that I drug you into that situation yesterday. You tried to leave and I probably should have let you, but I’m so glad that I didn’t. If I had, I would be dead now. You saved my life. Thank you for that.”

Toni nodded sharply, but didn’t say anything so Julie quietly asked, “Are you okay?”

“I’m fine. You know this just perfects my atrocious dating record. Not everyone can attract serial rapists and killers.”

“Hey, I knew him a lot longer than you did, and I had no idea. You couldn’t have known. He hid it incredibly well, even from himself. I talked with my therapist about it this morning and he said that it was an obvious psychotic break. I look at it as he had two personalities…the one we knew and the one that was broken by that awful murder of his girlfriend when he was too young to deal with it. Let me give you my doctor’s name. He’s very good and you need to talk about this with someone. It helps. I promise you.”

Toni studied Julie for a moment before agreeing to take Dr. Eckert’s number.

The next day, Chris awoke Julie with slow, passionate love-making. He was nervous about today. She’d been through so much; he wasn’t sure how much more she could take. Her emotions still seemed very close to the surface, but he didn’t want to hide anything from her any longer. Until they had complete honesty between them, he didn’t feel like he could plan for the future and their life together.

He glanced at the clock. Julie had fallen asleep again, but it was time to get going if they were going to make their appointment. She was asleep on her stomach and he spent a moment tracing the baby’s date on her butterfly tattoo. He had his own butterflies battering at the edges of his stomach. This had to work today.

He trailed a kiss across the wings of the butterfly and then slowly up her spine. Her muscles gradually awakened under his touch. She moaned into the pillow, “Feels so good.”

Chuckling low, he traced behind his lips. “It does, huh? Well, unfortunately, we have someplace we need to be, so you need to wake up, sleepyhead.”

She lifted her head and cocked an eyebrow at him. “It’s Saturday. Where do we need to go?”

“That, my dear, is a surprise.” He slapped her on her ass. “So up and at ‘
em. Go get in the shower and I’ll get the coffee started.”

* * *

As they walked into the tree-lined park, Chris glanced around nervously. The only way he could imagine this being any more nerve-racking was if he had an engagement ring in his pocket. Honestly, he probably should have done that, too. If she accepted this, it was a foregone conclusion, at least in his mind, that they would also get married. He knew that was what he planned, but one step at a time. He took a deep breath. Honesty first.

Julie looked at him with curiosity as he pulled them to a stop under a big old cottonwood tree. It seemed somehow appropriate. He spread the blanket out on the ground and asked her to sit down. He looked out toward the playground when he heard barking and smiled at the ball of fluff racing toward them.

He leaned down and it flew into his arms, licking and wagging his tail. “Hey, Brady,” he said to the puppy. “Calm down. I need you to meet a lady.” He glanced up at the rangy guy trailing behind the puppy. “Thanks, Mark. We’ve got it from here. I’ll call you tomorrow.”

The guy smiled and waved and offered Julie a small little smile before he loped off.

The golden retriever puppy bounded all over both him and Julie. He quickly snagged the loop of the leash around his wrist so it didn’t get away from them.

Julie giggled as she rolled on the blanket with the puppy. “And who is this?”

“Julie, this is Brady, a seven-week old golden retriever puppy.” He turned to the puppy and scratched it behind his ears. “Brady, this is your new mommy.”

She stilled and gazed at him with wide eyes. Her mouth dropped open. “He’s mine?” Her voice was breathy and hopeful and the rolling in Chris’s stomach began to settle.

“Yeah, he’s yours, if you want him.”

She leapt for Chris and gave him an open-mouthed scorching kiss. “I definitely do. Oh my God, I can’t believe you got me a puppy. Thank you.” Her smile was blinding and so filled with genuine joy as she watched the puppy bound around on the blanket, nipping at the slight folds and wrinkles of it.

He responded with a wide smile. They spent the next forty-five minutes playing in the park with the puppy, before it finally collapsed on the blanket with exhaustion.

Julie continued to pet through his fluffy, downy fur as she turned to Chris. “This is absolutely the best gift ever. Thank you.”

“Julie,” he began as he reached for her hand. “I love you. I want to give you a lifetime of gifts like this, but there’s something I need to tell you first. Something I probably should have told you before now.” He took a deep breath. “You know when you told me you can’t have babies?”

She nodded hesitantly and then whispered brokenly, “Oh God, you’ve decided you can’t live with that, haven’t you? Are you giving me the puppy as some sort of consolation?” She began to get up and the puppy lifted his head and whined, sensing her distress.

He grabbed hold of her thigh and held tight. “No, Butterfly. That’s not what I’m saying at all. In fact, it’s just the opposite. I’ve done some research. You’ve seen the scarring. I have fertility issues of my own from my torture. In fact, my doctor told me the chances of ever having intercourse again were almost non-existent.”

Julie gasped as she reached for him. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

“It wasn’t something I wanted spread around, but as you know, that miracle happened. Over and over again, thanks to you.” He gave her body a sexy glance, thinking about this morning. “Other miracles can happen, too. From my research, our odds aren’t great, but I don’t think either one of us is completely infertile. After the last year, I believe in miracles.” He pulled her closer to him, trying to gauge her reaction to what he was telling her. “Miracles have already happened for us. And you know what, if it doesn’t happen, that’s okay too. You have such a capacity for love. Do you look at Brady and think that you’ll love him any less because you didn’t give birth to him?”

She gave a little giggle. “Let’s hope I’m not giving birth to puppies. My body’s messed up, but I don’t think it’s that bad.”

He smiled softly. They were going to be okay. God, he loved her. She was so perfect for him in every way. “Hey, I’m trying here. Work with me and go with my bad analogy.”

“Okay, yes, I will love him even though I didn’t give birth to him.”

That was all he needed. “I love you, Butterfly. I have for the past year. I dreamed of you constantly through those awful six months. You kept me alive, nothing else. You’re everything I want now and in the future. I think we’d be great parents. And if that doesn’t happen naturally, I think we should look at adopting. My grandfather took all three of us in when we were little. He never knew us before that, but he didn’t love us any less because of it. We can do that, too. We can adopt. But regardless of what happens, I can guarantee you I would be happy the rest of my life as long as I have you there in the morning with me when I wake up. I love you. You are my life.”

“Oh, Chris.” She reached up and cupped his cheek. “I love you so much. Waking up to your face for the rest of my life sounds like Heaven on Earth. If anyone has earned that kind of happiness, I think it’s us. I have seen your scarring, but it never even occurred to me that you could have a sterility issue. I’m so sorry, but that seems like it’s one more part of fate proving to me that we truly belong together. Forever. I love you.”