Harlequin Intrigue June 2015 - Box Set 2 of 2: Navy SEAL Newlywed\The Guardian\Security Breach (41 page)

The dark shadow didn't move. She took a step backward as the nausea that had woken her hit her again. She felt hot and cold and terrified.

“Get out,” she said hoarsely, then filled her lungs and shrieked, “Get out! Get out now!” She ran out of breath too fast. Her heart was drumming against her chest wall now.
Boom-boom run! Boom-boom run! Boom-boom!

“Sandy,” a voice that could not possibly be speaking said.

She recoiled, her back slamming against the wall. Her throat closed up. Her lungs burned with the need for oxygen. Another scream built behind her throat, but when she opened her mouth all that escaped was a quiet squeak.

She pressed her hands flat against the wall behind her, as if she could make it move, and dug her heels into the hardwood floor, trying to get away from the thing that was hovering in front of her. “Oh, please,” she whispered desperately. “Come on, Sandy, wake up.
Stupid dream.
”

“San, you're not asleep,” the voice said gently. “Don't be afraid.”

She tried one more time to get air past her strictured throat into her lungs, but she couldn't. Her fingers curled at her constricted throat, then stars danced before her eyes and the next thing she knew, she was crumpled on the floor and the wet, haggard ghost from her nightmare was crouching above her, dripping water on her and calling her name.

“I'm asleep,” she muttered. “In bed, asleep.”

“You're not asleep,” a familiar voice said softly.

“No, no, not again,” she whispered, shaking her head back and forth. Then she felt a wet hand on her cheek and she squealed and propelled herself backward as fast and hard as she could, but she was already up against the wall.

“No!” she cried. “No, no. Get away.”

“Sandy, listen to me. I'm sorry. I'm so sorry. I didn't mean to scare you.”

She felt his hand and the soft whisper of his breath against her cheek. Water dripped down his pale, drawn face, just as it had in her dream.

She understood now that on the night of his funeral what she'd seen had been a dream. He'd hovered by the same window where Patrick Cho had peeped in on her. But unlike Patrick, Tristan had been insubstantial, a shimmering awful specter that had dissolved into nothing as she'd watched.

Tonight he was not dissolving. She touched his face. “Tristan?” she whispered. “You're real.” It wasn't a question.

The water dripping off his hair and clothes was wet on her skin. The face she was touching was sickly white, yes, but it was warm and fleshy and, most important, it was not fading before her eyes. She grabbed a handful of his hair and squeezed it. Her hand came away soaking wet. She looked at it and laughed, but the laugh turned into a sob.

His brown eyes turned darker. “I'm real,” he said, his mouth stretching into a wry smile as a dampness glistened in his eyes.

She sobbed again and put her hand over her mouth, hoping to stop the hiccuping sobs before they stole what little oxygen she had left in her lungs.

“It's okay, San. It's okay.”

“How—” She reached out to touch him, hesitated, then gingerly touched his shoulder. It was firm, strong, alive. Oh, dear God.

She met his gaze and found him watching her intently. He didn't try to pull her close or hug her, and she was fine with that.

He was here, and his hair was dripping with real water and his face was damp. But there was a part of her that was afraid to trust her own eyes and ears and fingers. She looked at her hand, then back at him.

“San? It's okay,” he said again. “It's me.”

The voice. The eyes. “It is you,” she said. “How? Shouldn't you be dead?”

“Almost was,” he muttered. “How're you doing? How's—”

“But where?” she broke in. “Where have you been? Where did you go? It's been two months!”

“Boudreau found me. He's been taking care of me.”

“Boudreau? You mean you've been right over there all this time?” She dug her heels into the hardwood floor to push away from him.

“We. Buried. You. We had a funeral. We cried. We mourned you. I thought I was going to die because I would never see you again. And you were
less than a mile
away the whole time?” She pushed at his chest and he almost toppled over. He caught himself with a hand to the floor just in time.

“Sandy, it's okay.”

“Okay?” She laughed hollowly. “You think so? I wake up in the middle of the night and find my dead husband sneaking into my home and looking cornered when I run into him. What the hell are you doing here?”

Suddenly, the floodgates opened in her mind. Thoughts and questions whirled around in her head so fast that she could barely speak. As soon as she started to demand one answer, another question pushed its way to the forefront, insisting on being asked. A still shot of memory flashed across her inner vision.

The casket at the open door of the DuChaud vault as Father Duffy deliberately turned her away from the sight and asked her a distracting question.

She stared at him in horror, her mouth turning dry with trepidation. “Who was in there?” She pressed a hand to her lips. “Who's in the vault? Who's...buried in—” she giggled a bit hysterically “—in Tristan's tomb?” She hiccuped.

Tristan stared at her for a brief moment. “My...tomb?” he echoed, as if the fact that a casket was placed in the DuChaud family tomb had never occurred to him. “I don't know,” he said, his eyes burning like dark fire.

Then he sat back, put his hands on the floor and maneuvered his left foot under him. She could barely see his face, which was in profile to her, but his jaw tensed and he bared his teeth as he used just his left foot and his hands to push himself to his feet.

She watched and realized why he'd almost toppled over when she'd pushed him.

“Oh, my God,” she whispered.

He finally got himself upright. He stood with his head bowed, his breaths sawing loudly in his throat. He flattened a palm against the wall to steady himself. In the dark, his pale face floated above his dark clothes like a disembodied head.

“What happened to you?” She was still sitting with her back to the wall. She pushed herself to her feet, murmuring to her little bean encouragingly as she stood.

“It's okay, bean. You're fine. I'm fine.” She looked up, realizing that her fear and panic had drained away and the only thing left inside her was anger, rising to the surface like a bubble in a lake.

“Tristan? Talk to me,” she said through gritted teeth.

He glanced at her sidelong. “Sorry, San. It's a long story.” He huffed. It could have been a chuckle, except that his expression didn't change. “A very long story,” he mumbled.

The bubble burst and fury washed over her like a red tide. This was Tristan, standing in front of her. He was real. And he'd been alive. All this time, he'd been alive. “A long story? That's your answer?”

She realized that the anger felt good. It didn't weigh on her like grief and sorrow. It invigorated her. She clenched her fingers into fists. Her husband was alive and she was pissed off.

He glanced at her for an instant, then looked away. “I didn't mean to wake you up. I should have been in and out of here in, like, two minutes.”

“In and out?” she echoed.

He spread his hands. “I don't know where to start. It's—”

“A long story. Yeah. I got that,” she said. “Not a problem,
sweetheart
. I've got all night.”

Chapter Four

Ten minutes later, Sandy sat at the kitchen table, clutching a rapidly cooling mug of decaf coffee that her husband, who was supposed to be dead, had made for her.

It was a cliché, but she really did feel as though she'd walked into a play where everyone knew their lines except her. In fact, she was reminded of a movie about a man whose entire life was a TV show, and he was the only one who thought it was his real life. She almost glanced around to see if she could spot hidden cameras.

Across from her, Tristan sat, staring into his mug. She studied him as long as she could, which was only a few seconds, then looked away. If she looked at him for longer, it did awful, painful things to her insides.

But his tortured expression wasn't the worst thing. Nor was the fact that he looked so tired and sick she couldn't believe he was upright. It wasn't even that she could feel his pain. No. The worst thing was that her heart and head and gut throbbed with anger at him.

“You said if I hadn't gotten up you'd have been in and out in a few minutes.”

Tristan glanced up. “I did?”

“You know you did. What were you doing here? Obviously you didn't come to tell me that you are still alive and doing fine.”

He looked down. “I had to get something,” he muttered.

“What? Tris, look at me.”

“I said I had to get something. San—”

“Don't San me. When exactly did you think you'd let me know that you didn't
die
?”

“Look, I'm sorry, but there are other things to consider here.”

“Other things?
Other things?
You mean than letting your wife know you're alive? Or coming home to your unborn child? If I had any sense I'd kill you myself, right now.”

His gaze flickered downward to her tummy and an expression of longing and sadness crossed his face. Sandy almost reached out to him, but then he looked away and muttered something she couldn't understand.

“Would you speak up? What did you just say?”

He waved a hand. “Nothing.” He went back to staring into his mug.

“I think I hate you,” she said, her voice as flat and cold as an iceberg. It made her shiver. She squeezed the mug more tightly, until her fingers ached.

Tristan nodded sagely. “Trust me, San, I know.” He lifted his mug to his lips, then frowned and set it down. “I kinda hate me, too.”

“Well, you should.” Sandy stood. She couldn't look at the changing expressions on his face. If she did she'd start feeling sorry for him and that would lead to feeling other things and she was not about to get sucked back into the evocative vortex of loving Tristan. She couldn't. Not now, when he'd proven that, even after a lifetime of love, he wasn't the trustworthy protector she'd always depended on.

She picked up his mug and took it to the sink along with hers. With her back to him, she blinked and looked up, trying to force the tears to flow backward, back to where they came from. But as usual, they were determined to fall. She rinsed the mugs and then splashed cold water onto her face.

Picking up a dish towel, she turned around and leaned back against the counter. Water she'd splashed onto the countertop seeped into her pajamas, wetting her lower back and sending a chill through her.

“So, wh-where have you been?” she stammered. It was the first question she wanted to ask and the last answer she wanted to hear.

She was dying to know, but she knew when he told her it was going to break her heart.

At the same time, a sickening dread told her she didn't have to wait to find out. She already knew what he was going to say. All this time, while she mourned him and ached for him and lay in her lonely bed, he was less than a mile away, at Boudreau's.

She waited for him to tell her that, but he didn't answer. He stood and limped over to stare out the French doors.

Sandy tried not to compare him with the man she'd last seen three months ago when he'd left for his monthlong work shift on the
Pleiades Seagull
. That man had been irritating, grouchy and depressed, but he'd been healthy and handsome and sun-browned despite the sunscreen she tucked into his duffel bag every time he headed back out to the oil rig. His hair had been streaked with golden-blond highlights put there by the sun, his shoulders had been broad and he, for all his faults, had been the man she knew and loved better than anyone in the world. The man she'd always known she could trust.

This person, although he sported Tristan's blazing dark brown eyes, straight nose and wide mouth, was not him. When that thought hit her, she sobbed. It was a small hiccup that barely made a sound, but Tristan's head turned toward her.

She put a hand over her mouth. That stiff, strong back, the lines of pain that scored his face from his nose to his chin, told a story of horror that she had not been a part of nor could ever understand. And that horror, those two long months of suffering, had changed him. His dark eyes were wide and too bright above sunken cheeks and pinched nostrils. His hair was too long, mousy brown and lifeless.

His back was ramrod straight, with a desperate dignity she'd never seen in him before. He'd lost at least fifteen pounds, maybe more, from a frame that had always been lean.

Her gaze traveled down his straight back and she pressed her hand hard against her lips and teeth, swallowing another sob. The pants he wore were too big, held up by a belt that had been tightened to the very last hole. The material was cotton and soaking wet, so it clung revealingly to his thighs and calves. She could see exactly what had happened to his right leg. Beneath the material, the right calf was no more than half the size of his left.

She remembered what Zach had told her about the strip of calf muscle that had been recovered from the water and identified as coming from Tristan's body. Just one of the several things that had convinced the authorities that Tristan could not have survived.

Sudden nausea, hot and sour and insistent, swept over her. She barely had time to turn to the sink before she threw up. It took forever for her stomach to stop heaving and spasming.

When she was done and had rinsed her mouth with a handful of water, she reached for the dish towel. With a shuddering moan, she dried her face and held the towel against it until she was certain that the spasms were dying down and she wouldn't gag anymore.

When she turned around and lowered the towel, Tristan was facing her. His face wasn't just ghostly—it had turned a sickly shade of green.

“Are you okay?” he asked.

She nodded.

His gaze dropped to her swollen belly. “You still have morning sickness?”

She shook her head.

“But—” he gestured vaguely.

“That? Oh, I don't know. Maybe a combination of no dinner, finding an intruder in my house and seeing my dead husband.”

“How's—” His hand reached out, but stopped in midair. He stared at her baby bump, looking slightly bewildered.

“The baby?” she said, irritation rising and pushing the nausea away. “The baby is fine.”

“San? I didn't mean for this to happen. I wasn't— I couldn't—” He stopped. Moving awkwardly, he stepped close to her. He lifted a hand and brushed her hair away from her forehead.

His hand was surprisingly warm, given his drenched state. Her head inclined naturally toward it. “Oh, Tris, I missed you so,” she whispered.

He bent his head and pressed his forehead against hers. “I'm so sorry,” he said, then pulled back. “Is it okay if I touch you?”

“You want to feel the baby?” she asked. “He kicks all the time these days.”

Tristan gingerly laid his palm against her swollen tummy. Again, she was surprised at how warm it was.

He stood there, his hand caressing her belly, for a long time. “I can't believe it's been two months,” he murmured.

Immediately, her anger swelled again. She pushed his hand away. “Two months in which I mourned you and thought I'd have to live the rest of my life without you. And if you'd had your way, I'd still think you were dead. I can't believe you came here and expected to leave without waking me.”

She drew a shaky breath. “I don't understand why you didn't want to see me. To tell me you were alive. My husband would have crawled here if he couldn't walk, to let me see him and know that I had not lost the love of my life. My husband would not have made me grieve and mourn and hurt for two months.”

“San, listen to me,” Tristan said. “I was unconscious—”

“That is no excuse. What about Boudreau? Why didn't he come and tell me? A true friend of my husband would have let me know.” She sucked in a harsh breath.

“Don't blame Boudreau.”

“So, that is where you've been all this time? Right across the dock at Boudreau's cabin, less than a mile away? Oh, get out! Get out of here!” she cried, knowing as the words left her mouth that she didn't mean them.

Tristan stepped backward, away from her. He stared at her for a moment, then nodded to himself as if he'd made a decision or come to a realization.

He smiled, but that wasn't aimed at her, either. It was the subtlest, saddest smile she'd ever seen. It made her want to cry, to go to him and take him in her arms and promise him that everything was going to be fine, even though she knew it wasn't.

Just about the time she'd decided he was too sick and wounded and in too much pain to be sent out to make his way back to Boudreau's, he turned and twisted the knob on the French doors and opened them.

“Tristan?” she said hoarsely. “Where are you going?”

He turned to look at her. “Back to Boudreau's,” he said.

“Fine. Go. Stay there.”

Awkwardly, he bent over and picked up a carved walking stick that she hadn't noticed on the floor beside the doors.

Once he had the stick and was leaning on it, he raised his gaze to her. “You said he.”

“What?”

“You said
he
kicks all the time. The baby's a boy?”

His face was suddenly so filled with hope and longing that she thought her heart would shatter. “That's what the doctor said.”

“A boy,” he repeated, his voice tight. He turned back toward the door.

“You're still going?” she asked, surprised.

He didn't answer. He just stepped through the French doors and headed toward the overgrown path.

* * *

H
E
'
D
WALKED
OUT
. Now if he could just keep going. He hadn't wanted to leave. What he'd wanted to do was hold his wife, breathe in the sweet, familiar scent of her hair and touch her petal-soft skin.

He wanted her to wrap her arms around him and welcome him back. But even more than that, he'd wanted to lay his palms on her tummy and feel their baby—their son.

But she'd been so angry and hurt. He could not, would not, force himself back into her life.

He walked slowly and awkwardly across the patio and onto the slippery wet grass in the yard, hoping he could make it out of her sight before he collapsed from pain and fatigue.

There was no way he could make it over to Boudreau's cabin.

He heard Sandy's voice behind him.

“Could you come back in here, please?” she asked harshly. “You can't get up that hill tonight. Not with your leg in that condition. And even if you could, it's pitch-dark out there. You're liable to slip and end up drowning in gumbo mud. I don't want to be responsible for you
really
dying this time.”

“You're not responsible for me,” he yelled. “So don't worry about it.”

“Not re—” She laughed bitterly. “What about those vows? Did they mean nothing? Of course I'm responsible for you. You're my husband. I—”

Tristan knew what she'd been about to say.
I love you.
But she hadn't been able to force out the words. That disturbed him. She'd never been shy about saying it. She'd sung it in the middle of church one Sunday when they were around ten years old. She'd written it on the chalkboards in their classes several times every school year. And she'd had it printed on a huge banner that hung suspended over the pulpit on the day of their wedding.

So it was ominous that she couldn't bring herself to say it on the night that her dead husband reappeared, alive and well—or almost well.

“Okay, then,” she said, apparently taking his silence for agreement. “Get in here and let's get you settled in. Maybe you'd be comfortable in the guest room,” Sandy said. “That way—”

“Wait a minute. I didn't say I'd stay.” He couldn't spend the night anywhere close to her. Just a few whiffs of her hair had nearly driven him crazy.

His calf muscle cramped and the leg nearly gave way, a not-so-gentle reminder that no matter what he wanted, how much he longed to be close to her, no matter what seeing her did to him, the simple truth was that in his current condition, even if he wanted to make love with her, even if she invited him to, he couldn't. He was still weak, and his leg couldn't take the workout involved.

He shook his head and opened his mouth to tell her that he was fine and that walking through the overgrown paths that led to Boudreau's house wasn't a problem, but at that instant it began to rain hard. He grimaced.

“Well, you can't go now,” she said ungraciously. “The ground will be even more slippery.”

“I've got to get back. I need—” He stopped himself. He'd almost told her he needed the concoction that Boudreau had brewed up. It was a mixture of natural herbs and substances. According to Boudreau it had a natural painkiller, natural immune-system boosters and something to help him sleep. Without realizing on a conscious level that he'd moved, he found himself walking back across the patio and through the French doors.

Sandy handed him a towel. He took it while continuing to protest.