Carry Me Home (31 page)

“Suitcase,” he said, trying to stay businesslike at the sight of the bed with its covers twisted to the side, the shotgun against the wall. “And did you unload it?”

“Oh.” She looked blank. “No.”

“Never mind.” He picked it up, racked the slide, gathered the shells, opened her bedside table, and put them into the ammo box he’d installed there, then lifted the whole thing out. “Take this with you,” he advised. “Keep it in your car.”

“In my
car
?”

“Hell, yeah, in your car. You want to land in the ditch with him behind you without it?”

She flinched, straightened again, and said, “No. I don’t.”

He said, “Good,” and that was that.

He studied the neat pattern of holes drilled into her closet door as she opened it, hauled out a big suitcase, and tossed it onto the bed. “Good job,” he said. “Center mass. Just wish it had been
his
center mass.”

“I know,” she said, with another of the flashes of spirit she’d showed that night. “But would you quit
saying
that? I should have just shot him. I’ve wished and wished I had. Your saying it doesn’t help.”

“Sorry,” he said with surprise.

She sat on the bed with a thump. “I just . . . couldn’t. If he’d been coming at me, I could have. But I couldn’t stand there and shoot him.”

“Fairly hard, I imagine, to shoot somebody in cold blood,” Cal said. “Unless your brain tells you it’s him or you. We’re pretty wired not to kill, I’d say. Most of us.” He smiled a little, sat beside her, took her hand. “Hey. Here I am comforting you because you didn’t kill somebody. Not what anybody would have thought a few weeks ago, huh?”

She laughed, sounding better. “I guess I’ve changed.”

“I’d say you have.”

“Have . . . you, though?” she asked cautiously. “I mean . . . what you said before. Is that still . . . the same?”

He stood up again. “Yeah. It is. I’ll keep you safe. And I can’t promise not to care about you. But I can’t just put my heart right out there to get broken. Not again.”

“Okay. I understand.” She looked rattled, but she stood up again, went to her closet, and started to pull clothes out, because nobody had more guts than Zoe.

She carried an armful to the bed, tossed it down, began to strip items from their hangers, and stopped. “Oh, no. Oh,
no.
”

“What?” he asked in alarm, because she sounded truly distressed.

“I . . .” She picked it up. Her black jacket, punched neatly through in two places. Two round places. “I shot my suit.” And then she started to laugh.

He went for the skirt that lay under it. Another couple of holes. The blue blouse beneath. Also wrecked.

“Five yards away,” she said, her shoulders beginning to shake with it. “That means a pattern five inches across. I shot up my entire professional wardrobe. All five inches of it.”

She was flipping through one ugly item after another. Those black pants. Another blouse, a pair of khaki pants that had fully deserved to die. All of them ventilated now, and he was laughing with her, both of them overcome, sinking down onto the bed again, and she scooped everything up and flung it into the air, watched it land on the floor.

“Sayonara,” she said, gasping a little, wiping her eyes on the sheet. “You said you hated them over and over. And now I’ve shot them all, and the only thing they’re good for is a bonfire.”

“I can’t think of any clothes that deserve it more,” he said. “Death by firing squad. I told you that you were a natural shooter. Right through the closet door and everything.”

“I’m going to be wearing jeans to work,” she said.

“Oh, I don’t know.” He went to her closet again and pulled out the blue sweater dress, a short knit skirt, a white blouse with a V-neck. “I’d say some of your better investments survived.”

“Those are too feminine for work,” she said. “It’s better to look more . . .”

“No,” he said, pulling them off their hangers and beginning to fold as she stared at him and shook her head. Probably thinking he was bossy again, and too bad. “It’s not. You don’t look masculine, and you’re never going to, so you can just give it right up. You’re not a man, and nobody’s ever going to mistake you for one. So, look like a woman, get them off guard, because nothing messes a man up more than a good-looking woman. And then hit ’em with your smarts. One-two punch. My advice, and you don’t even have to pay for it. Ten Tips for Showing Them Who’s Boss.”

“Did you read that?” she asked suspiciously, getting up and gathering more hangers full of clothes from the closet.

“Nope,” he said. “I made that up all by myself. Might even sell it to a magazine.”

SAFE HARBOR

Zoe couldn’t get into her car alone, when it came down to it. Everything that had happened tonight, everything she’d done, and she couldn’t do this. She couldn’t stand the thought of taking that snowy, lonely road by herself, even with Cal following behind. It was irrational, and it was stupid, and she still couldn’t do it.

He saw her hesitation. “Come on,” he said, throwing her suitcase into the bed of the pickup and opening the passenger door to an enthusiastically tail-wagging canine welcome from Junior. She rubbed the big dog’s ugly head while he grunted his satisfaction and politely refrained from licking her, and she felt better for it.

“Hop on up,” Cal said, “and Junior and I will take you home. Bring you out here again in the morning, follow you to the university in the daylight. With the shotgun right there in your car. As long as you’ve got the doors locked, you’ve got the time to load. If you need to practice that, my dad will help you out.”

“I don’t need help,” she said when he’d started the truck and was pulling out. “At least, I’ll be practicing some more, yes. But I practiced before. I practiced with Rochelle, with the dummy shells you gave me. I can load fast. And now I’ll be practicing taking it out of the backseat, grabbing the shells. Like you said. Training so I don’t have to think, because you were right. There’s no time to think. No space to think.”

“You did good,” he said. “In case I didn’t say.”

She steeled herself for it. “And because I didn’t say, either,” she said, “I need to say it now. I appreciate what you did, and what you’re doing. Tonight. I guess it doesn’t change anything between us, and I know you’d rather not have anything to do with me right now. And you’re still doing this.”

“Yep,” he said, and she could see the hard line of his jaw, his mouth. “I am. But no, it doesn’t change anything. So I won’t stick around, if you don’t mind. My folks can handle it. I can’t.”

“I used to wonder,” she plowed on, something inside her dying a little at how she had hurt him, at how much she was still hurting him, “if there was any man I could trust. If there was any man I believed was decent, all the way down. I want you to know, no matter how you feel about me, that you’re that guy. I know you are. I . . . I like you. And I admire you. So much.”
And I want you, and I need you, and I think I love you
, she didn’t say, because if she said it, if she even allowed herself to think it, those last fragile pieces of her will and her strength might just crumble away. And she had to hold on to those. They were all she had.

He’d picked up speed, was on the highway, and he didn’t answer for a minute, and she sat there, her heart beating hard, and waited.

“Doesn’t do me a whole lot of good,” he finally said. “But all right.”

“I want you so much.” There she was, letting herself say it, and it was just as bad as she’d feared. “But I want this, too,” she tried to explain, wishing he could understand, “and I can’t just suddenly . . . not want it. This is my dream, and it always has been. You had a dream, too. You must know.”

“I did,” he said. “And I found out there was more than one dream that worked. I found out that happiness wasn’t in just one thing.”

“Well, I guess I haven’t found that out yet. If I’m ever going to. I’ve worked for this all my life. I’ve planned for it. I want to be with you. I don’t want to break up.” If that was begging, too bad. She was begging. “But I can’t just give up my dream, can’t you see that?”

“So it’s all or nothing, is it? I don’t want to ask,” he said. “I don’t want to talk about it. But here I am asking anyway. It’s the whole enchilada, or that’s it, you’re a failure? Because if there’s one thing I’ve figured out during all that time down there at the bottom of the bottle, the bottom of my life, it’s that it isn’t the life you have. It’s what you do with the life you have.”

“That sounds good,” she said. “That sounds right, but it doesn’t
feel
right. It wasn’t for you before, and it isn’t for me. To get to the top in the hard sciences or engineering, whether it’s in research or academia? Yes, it’s all or nothing, because it’s almost all men. It’s all about your career, or it’s not. You don’t make it all about that, you’re second best. You’re not at the top, and you’ll never be at the top.”

“Ah,” he said. “None of those men have families?”

“Sure they do. And they all have wives. Wives who take care of absolutely everything else, so they can be a hundred and ten percent.”

“I’d point out that women can have husbands, too,” he said. “Grandparents to help with the kids. Nannies. Whatever. But no matter what, that sounds like too high a price to pay. For a man
or
a woman.”

“It might be,” she said, “but it’s the price. It feels too high.” She drew a ragged breath. “Right now, it feels way too high. But it’s the price.”

“Then,” he said, “I guess it depends whether you’re willing to pay it. I guess it depends what you want on your tombstone.”

“On my—no. I can’t think about dying. Not tonight. Please.”

“Maybe tonight’s the right time,” he said, taking the curves in the dark without slowing, like he knew them by heart, because he did. “Sometimes you don’t know what matters most until you’re staring down the barrel of a gun. Or until you’re on the wrong side of one too many shoulder surgeries, wondering if that’s all your life was. If you’re anybody at all now that you’re not somebody. And I never heard of anyone whose tombstone said, ‘NFL quarterback.’ Mostly they tend to say, ‘Beloved husband.’ ‘Beloved father.’ ‘Beloved wife and mother.’ Maybe there’s a reason for that.”

“Women shouldn’t have to choose. But they do.” She dropped her eyes to Junior, lying between them, because looking at Cal’s profile was too hard. Because she wanted to scoot over and sit close, to feel the strength of his body, and she couldn’t. She wanted him to hold her and tell her it would be all right, and he couldn’t, because it wasn’t all right. Because nothing was all right.

“And there’s no other choice,” he said.

“It’s my dream,” she said again. There was nothing else to say. “It’s always been my dream.”

“Then,” he said, “I guess you have to go after your dream. But you’ll pardon me if I step out of the way while you do it. I’ll drive you in tomorrow. I’ll keep on pushing to find out who’s doing this. I’ll do everything I can to keep you safe. But I’ll do it from a distance. I won’t come around while you’re at my folks’ place. Don’t ask me to. It’s too much to ask.”

“I know. And I appreciate that.” Her voice came out small. She was so tired, so beaten, and all she wanted to do was cry. “I’m grateful.”

“Yeah,” he said. “I’ve heard that one, too.”

He pulled off the highway, through Fulton, and up into the driveway of the tidy brick ranch house. This would make the second time he’d dumped her on his parents without warning, and she wondered what kind of welcome she’d get this time. Now that she’d hurt their son.

He grabbed her bag of files from the floor, hopped out and pulled her suitcase out of the truck bed, and left her to come along after him across the snowy drive, Junior trotting along behind. Cal opened the door, flipped the light switch.

“What time is it?” Zoe asked quietly.

“Five. Somewhere around there.” He set her things down, started peeling out of his outdoor clothes while she did the same, her arms leaden, because it all just seemed way too hard.

The male voice made her jump, booming out from the back of the house. “Who’s there?”

“Cal,” he yelled back. “And Zoe.”

A pause, and Stan came around the corner, still shrugging into a flannel button-down, his gray hair sticking up from his head, and a bristle of whiskers covering the hard planes of his jaw. He looked them over. “I’m sure there’s a reason,” he said.

“There is,” Cal said, and now Raylene was hustling out, still tying the sash of a fleece robe. A robe that actually was almost a twin of her own, just as Cal had said. Zoe had an absurd urge to giggle, born of exhaustion and nerves.

“What?” Raylene asked in alarm. “What’s happened? Cal?”

“Zoe’s coming to live with you for a while,” he said. “Sheets on the bed?”

“Of course,” his mother said automatically. “And of course Zoe’s welcome. But . . .”

“I should have called,” Cal said. He laughed a little, and Zoe realized that he was almost as shaken up as she was. “Sorry. The . . . the guy. He broke into Zoe’s apartment tonight and went for her. She let off that shotgun I loaned her.”

“Oh, my,” Raylene said faintly. “Did you hit him?” she asked Zoe.

“No,” she said. “I was just trying to stop him.”

“Should’ve hit him,” Stan said.

“Yes,” she sighed. “So I hear.”

“And he got away,” Cal plowed on. “So she needs a safe place. And we broke up,” he added baldly. “So I thought here.”

Stan was looking at Raylene, who didn’t miss a beat. “Of course,” she said. “Don’t just stand there, Cal. Put Zoe’s things in the bedroom.”

“I’m going to leave Junior here, too,” Cal said, and the dog, sitting at Cal’s side as always, pricked his ears at the mention of his name. “At night, anyway. Dad, you got that shotgun handy?”

“In the bedroom closet,” he said. “It can be by the bed instead. Can be there right now.”

“I’d say that’s the place for it,” Cal said. “Come on, Zoe. Let’s get you squared away.”

No “princess.” No “professor.” And definitely no “darlin’.” She was just “Zoe,” and it hurt. And all the same, here she was with his parents and his dog and his dad’s shotgun, all to keep her safe. Because that was Cal.

She followed him into the guest bedroom. “You aren’t going in to work today, I figure,” he said as he heaved her laden suitcase up onto the top of the low dresser.

“I have to. I have classes.”

“Can’t you cancel?”

Her chin went up at that. “No. Then he wins.”

He looked at her, frowning, measuring, then nodded. “Okay. When do you have to get there?”

“Uh . . .” She ran her hand through her hair. “What day is it?”

His face softened. “Tuesday. You sure this is a good idea?”

“It feels like I have to.” She didn’t know why. She was too tired to tell. “I have to keep going. And I’m prepared. It’s just . . .” She tried to think. Tuesday. “My advanced-topics seminar and a lab. And I’m not in class until ten. So . . . nine thirty.”

“Pick you up at nine, then,” he suggested. “To get your car.”

“Okay.” She sat on the bed, because she needed to. Because standing up was way too hard.

“Why don’t you get some sleep?” he asked. “My mom will feed you when you wake up, and you’ll feel a whole lot better.”

“I’m not sure I could. Sleep.”

“How about with Junior right by your bed?” he suggested. “After this, he’ll stay out in the living room. One eye on the back door, one eye on the front door, and his ears all over the place. But for right now, this rug right here looks like a real good spot. Nobody’s getting at you, not with my dad in the house and Junior in your bedroom.” His hand went out to smooth her hair back from her face, and his touch was pure comfort. “You’re nothing but safe, baby,” he said gently. “I promise.”

She nodded jerkily, tried not to cry. Tried hard, because that wasn’t fair to him. “Okay.” She got up so he couldn’t look at her, unzipped her suitcase, and pulled out her pajamas. “I will. Good idea.”

“Right here. Down. Stay,” Cal told Junior, who’d been sitting near the door. The dog walked over and lay down exactly where Cal had pointed, sat poised like a sphinx and looked up at him, ears cocked. Down, but every inch alert.

“Guard Zoe,” Cal said, and the dog’s tail thumped once and was still.

“Get some sleep,” Cal told Zoe again, and then he was leaving the room, closing the door behind him, and her hands were still holding her pajamas. And shaking.

Junior helped. So did exhaustion, a late night, a few hours of broken sleep, and the most frightening experience of her life. But what made the treacherous tears leak from her eyes, lying in the sanctuary of the dark before she finally, gratefully, escaped into sleep . . .

It was Cal. Not having Cal’s big arm over her chest, Cal’s solid body enfolding her so she could relax. Knowing it was her own fault that she didn’t. And knowing that there was nothing she could do about it. It was done. It was over.