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He turned his head away. “Yeah, okay.” He was speaking in a clipped voice, lightly slapping his palms against the outsides of his thighs, anxious to be away. “I would stay, except—”
“No, you must go. Actually, I’d prefer to be alone right now.”
“Sure. Understandable.” He plowed his fingers through his hair and walked in a tight circle, then whipped the bedspread back. “Lie down. Sleep.”
“I will. Be careful.”
“Yeah.”
He turned abruptly and left the room, pulling the door closed, not loudly but soundly. She heard the door connecting the hallway to the living room being opened, then shut.
Knowing she was finally alone, she sagged under the weight of her heartache. She lay down on the bed, turned onto her side, and drew herself into a tight ball. Then, burying her face in the pillow, she opened the floodgate that had been tenuously holding back her emotions.
Her sobs were so intense, they shook her whole body. So when the mattress dipped, she didn’t trust herself to believe that he had come back. She didn’t let herself accept it until she felt his hand stroking her shoulder and heard his whispered “Shh, shh.”
He’d made it as far as the back door. He’d even taken hold of the doorknob. His future, possibly his life, depended on finding Manuelo Ruiz before Rodarte did. It was in his best interest to leave now, drive as fast as he could to that dot on the map, and rout out the only individual in the world who could save him from being convicted of murdering Foster Speakman.
Besides that, Laura had rejected his help. She’d practically pushed him out the door. No mystery there. It was his fault that she’d lost the baby. Earlier tonight, when she told him it was for real, that she was pregnant, he’d thought: Finally. For the first time in his life, he’d done something right and good.
He should have known that it wouldn’t last, that he would somehow mess it up. Anyway, it was over. The baby was lost, and there was nothing he could do about it now.
Go! Go! Turn the freaking doorknob.
He was moving back through the living room before he fully realized he’d made an about-face. He heard her sobs when he opened the door into the hallway. The sight of her huddled inside the pink robe, weeping into the pillow, made his heart feel like something had pinched it, hard.
He lay down behind her and touched her shoulder. “Shh, shh.”
“You need to go,” she moaned.
“No, I need to be here with you. I want to be.” Placing his arm across her waist, he scooped her back against him.
“You can’t let Rodarte—”
“I can’t leave you. I won’t.” He pressed his face into the nape of her neck. “I’m sorry, Laura. God, I’m so sorry.”
“Please stop saying that, Griff. Stop thinking it. This wasn’t your fault. It wasn’t anyone’s fault. It was nature’s way of saying something wasn’t right. I was only seven weeks pregnant. It wasn’t even a baby yet.”
“It was to me.”
She raised her head. Her swimming eyes found his. Then with a long, mournful sound, she turned toward him and pressed her face against his chest. His arms went around her, drawing her to him, holding her close, tucking her head beneath his chin. He sank his fingers into her hair and massaged her scalp.
She wept and he let her. It was a female thing, a maternal thing. The tears were essential, cleansing, as necessary for healing as the bleeding. He didn’t know how in hell he knew that. He just did. Maybe in times of crisis, you were graced with superior insight like that.
When her crying finally subsided, she tilted her head back against his biceps. “Thank you for coming back.”
“I couldn’t leave.”
“I didn’t want you to.”
“You pushed me away.”
“To keep myself from begging you to stay.”
“Honestly?”
“Honestly.”
He looked deeply into her eyes. “They’re pretty.”
