Now, he lowered himself to the lumpy old mattress of the twin-size bed and let the idea settle in and take root.
The rabbit died and Jenna was, indeed, expecting his child. The woman he used to love, the woman he’d vowed to honor and cherish till death did they part.
Yeah, that had worked out well, hadn’t it?
But still, he’d once had feelings for Jenna. Hell, he still had feelings for her. He was man enough to admit that, and to admit that if she hadn’t been the one to call it quits and walk out, they would probably still be married.
He’d been happy with her. Maybe not bounce-off-the-walls, every-day-is-a-parade delirious, but content.
Could things have been better between them?
Sure. He’d pulled the rug out from under her with that whole not-wanting-kids thing. He realized that. And he could have opened up more, explained himself, shared things about his job that might have helped her understand his change of heart.
He could have, but he also couldn’t. He’d loved her too much to unload on her about some of the things he’d seen and done as an undercover cop, working some of the ugliest cases in some of the seediest parts of the city.
In many ways, Jenna was an innocent. She walked around wearing rose-colored glasses, always smiling, always looking on the bright side, always thinking the best of everyone.
How could he share the gory details of what it was like to spend weeks living in a crack den? Or how it felt to sell drugs to school kids to keep up his cover. Or admit that even though it was against department policy, he’d taken the occasional hit of meth, cocaine, weed, and heroin to convince those around him that he was an addict or dealer, and to avoid having his brains blown out his ear.
And he could just imagine her reaction if he filled her in on the number of dead bodies he encountered on a regular basis. There were images in his own head-a bloated corpse pulled from the lake… a teenage overdose with the needle still stuck in her arm… a newborn baby tossed in a Dumpster in the dead of winter like just another piece of garbage.
It was enough to give anyone nightmares, and he’d be damned if he’d dump that on Jenna’s shoulders, expecting her to process the events of his job like he was some pencil-necked accountant with nothing more life-altering to report than a mathematical error in the books.
Gage sighed, letting his shoulders slope and his chin fall to his chest. He ran splayed fingers over his short hair that was just beginning to grow in after his last round of shaving it off.
What if she’d thought differently of him after he told her? he wondered.
As much as he hadn’t wanted to burden her with the knowledge of what his job truly entailed, he sometimes thought that was the real reason he’d closed down and refused to talk to her about anything more substantial than whose turn it was to do the dishes.
Better for her to pull away and feel neglected than to start thinking of him as a thug, a drug user, a man with questionable moral principles… someone other than the man she’d married.
And the part about not wanting kids…
If she knew what he’d seen, what he’d done, some of the situations he’d found himself in, it was possible she’d have reconsidered her feelings on that particular topic, too.
He knew Jenna, and he knew she wouldn’t have been able to handle some of the shit he’d seen or some of the possibilities of what could happen to a child in the cold, cruel environment in which they lived. Drugs. Alcohol. Mental, physical, and sexual abuse. Kidnapping. Rape. Murder.
There was a laundry list of horrible things children were exposed to these days, and he’d be damned if he’d bring one of his own into this world. It would be like tossing a guppy into a tank full of piranha and expecting it not only to survive, but to thrive.
But it doesn’t have to be that way, she would say. Gage could hear her voice as though she were standing right beside him, speaking into his ear. We’ll love our child. We’ll protect him from anything bad. Keep our baby safe from every ugly, nasty thing that might hurt him.
He gave a snort. Like that was possible. Unless they trapped their kids in a bubble and never let them out of their sight, there was no way a child could go through life without coming in contact with outside influences.
Bullying started as early as preschool. Drugs could creep in soon after. Molestation could happen anywhere, at any age. Peer pressure, petty larceny, low self-esteem that led to anorexia, bulimia, cutting…
It was enough to make a man willingly castrate himself. And how any woman could want to bear a child with those odds stacked against her, he had no idea. The shock was that Jenna and the rest of society didn’t see it that way.
But then, they hadn’t seen what he’d seen, had they?
No, he was right and he knew it. Which meant that if Jenna really did turn out to be pregnant, he was up shit creek without the proverbial paddle.
He would be forced to deal with impending fatherhood, deal with raising a baby in an environment no child should be subjected to. There was always house arrest and armed guards, he supposed. Maybe a tracking device embedded in the back of his or her neck.
Not a bad idea, and he knew where he could get one.
But he didn’t need to resort to CIA tactics right away, he thought, straightening on the bed. Pushing to his feet, he took a deep breath and made a conscious decision not to borrow trouble just yet.
He had time to figure out what to do if one of those tester sticks turned positive. And with any luck, it wouldn’t.
With a little luck-and maybe a few fervent prayers-this would turn out to be just a minor blip on his radar, and a lesson learned about accepting a cold beer late at night from an ex-wife with ulterior motives.
Knit 9
“Come on, pick up. Pick up.”
As soon as Jenna had escaped from her dead-end argument with Gage, she’d headed downstairs and straight to the phone. If anyone could rescue her from her ex-husband’s heavy-handed caveman routine, it would be Grace and Ronnie. After all, they’d led the charge to get her into this, they could certainly help get her out.
It took six rings, but finally Ronnie answered her cell phone with a muted, “Hello?”
“Help,” Jenna said frantically, “I’m being held hostage by a raving lunatic who doesn’t want a baby, but doesn’t want me to have one, either.”
“What happened? Are you all right?” Ronnie asked. She continued to whisper as though she didn’t want anyone else to overhear her conversation.
“I’m fine, at least for now. But Gage got loose right after we talked this morning and threw a fit. No less than I expected, I guess,” she admitted in a somewhat deflated tone. “Then he left, and I thought the worst was over, but he’s back. He’s back, Ronnie, and he’s moving in. He says he’s not leaving until I take one of the home pregnancy tests he brought with him and he knows for sure whether or not I’m knocked up. Of course, if I am, he may never leave. I may be stuck with him for the rest of my natural life!”
She made it sound like a fate worse than death, but deep down, a tiny voice was asking if that would be so bad. Would it really be so horrible to be stuck with Gage, possibly married again, raising a child together?
And the long and the short of it was no, it wouldn’t be so bad. It might even be nice. That hadn’t been her reason for jumping on board Grace’s “baby, oh, baby” plan, but it might be a nice side benefit. After all, if Gage hadn’t changed horses in midstream by declaring he no longer wanted to have children with her, they would probably still be married and she’d be bouncing baby number two or three on her hip by now.
But somehow this felt more disappointing than she’d expected. It wasn’t the thrill and excitement of a couple wanting a child and celebrating its conception together. What had she been thinking trying to rope him into a life she wanted, but he definitely didn’t? Oh, yeah, now she remembered. She hadn’t been thinking; the tequila had.