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He paused as though waiting for her to comment, but, when she didn’t, he continued. “But the way it turned out really was for the best. If she hadn’t miscarried, and we’d gotten married, it wouldn’t have changed the outcome, except that there would be another kid in the world growing up without a live-in daddy. Because eventually Marianne would have gotten sick of me and run me off, or I’d have left.
“Hank accused me of not caring about anything except myself and what’s eating me. I know that’s how it looks. To him. To everybody. But he’s wrong. I cared enough about Marianne to leave her. I knew if I didn’t, I’d make her miserable, and she deserved better.”
He inhaled deeply. “Sometimes I think about the baby we lost. Wonder if it was a boy or girl, if it would’ve looked like me. It haunts me some. But I believe it worked out the way it was supposed to. I’m not glad it happened. God, no, nothing like that. And I’m not rationalizing, I swear. I’m—”
“I know,” Kerra said, interrupting him. “I know you regret the temporary unhappiness you caused her. But you were right to leave. Marianne knew it was right, too.”
“How do you figure?”
“If she had believed you belonged together, she wouldn’t have let you leave. Did she go after you, ever reach out, try to contact you?”
He shook his head.
“If she’d really wanted you, you, warts and all, she would have fought like hell to keep you.”
She could tell by his expression that he’d never thought of it that way before. Relief flickered in his eyes. Then, in typical Trapper fashion, he dodged the seriousness of the subject with a quip. “I don’t have any warts.”
Kerra didn’t let him get away with it this time. “Come here.” She clasped his head between her hands and pulled it to her chest, then wrapped her arms around it. His arm closed around her waist and hugged tightly. Though his cheek rested on her breast, it was with intimacy of a different sort.
She studied the growth pattern of his hair on the crown of his head and kissed it. “Did The Major ever know about the miscarriage?”
“No.” He worked free of her embrace, making her wish she hadn’t asked. Back on his own pillow, he said, “My ‘skipping out on Marianne,’ as he put it, was one of the hot spots of our quarrel. The miscarriage would have confirmed his belief that I was throwing my life away on a fantasy. And not the erotic kind.”
“Have you checked on him today?”
“He’s been moved to a private room. I stopped by the hospital after I went to the house.”
She shook her head in confusion. “The Major’s house? Catch me up. Is that where you went after dumping me at the café?”
“I didn’t dump you. And, anyway, it was for your own good.”
“Well, I decided against it.”
“Yeah, and look where it landed you.”
She shifted her legs to rub against his.
“Not that I’m complaining,” he growled. Then he turned serious again. “The Major asked about you. I told him you were safely back in Dallas, which at the time I thought you were. He accused me of driving you away. As usual, we got into it.”
“I hate that you got into it over me.”
“Wasn’t over you.” He smiled without humor. “He started out by telling me he thought my conspiracy theory had legs and that he admired my integrity.”
She leaned up, at attention. “That’s good.”
“For a few minutes there, I thought so. I’d been waiting a long time to hear him say he thought I was right about something. Anything. Any fucking thing. The weather forecast. So you can imagine my astonishment when he commended me for having integrity. But then he told me I should let go of my obsession, drop it, and get a life.”
“That’s contradictory.”
“Damn sure is.”
She waited for him to add whatever it was that had caused his brows to pull together in a frown, but he didn’t. She rolled onto her stomach and came up on her elbows so they could talk face-to-face.
“Was there anyone in your division of the ATF, or an FBI agent, anyone who believed in you and your suspicions about Wilcox?”
“There were a handful who didn’t laugh out loud.”
“You could take what you have on that flash drive, plus the cell phone recordin
