So why couldn’t he have that, too?
It was the first time he’d really let himself consider the possibility, and it didn’t sit well because it meant he’d been functioning about fifty points shy of the average IQ. Jenna had tried to tell him that all along, tried to convince him he could be a good husband, a good father, and a good cop.
He hadn’t believed her. Hadn’t trusted her-or himself-enough to believe they could have everything. He still wasn’t entirely confident of the feelings roiling around inside him, but he was coming around. He was starting to think maybe, just… maybe.
Which was why he’d wanted to see her tonight.
And why he was ready to admit he’d fucked things up royally.
“Oh, yeah?” Dylan responded. “What did you do this time?”
“I think I screwed up with Jenna.”
Zack, who was prickly as a cactus these days and had been drinking at a slightly faster clip than his friends, made a sound deep in his throat. “Ha! Join the club.”
“You screwed up with Jenna, too?” Dylan asked in an attempt to lighten the mood around the laminated table. He got a hairy eyeball for his trouble.
“You can’t please ’em,” Zack continued in a slightly louder voice than normal.
His words were becoming just slurred enough that Gage knew they’d have to take his keys and see that he got home some other way. “You buy ’em gifts, you give ’em a big ring, and you don’t cheat on them, redargless”-which Gage took to mean regardless-“of what they might think. But do they believe you? No! ’Course not. They see one naked woman in your bed and aumotatically assume you banged her.”
Slamming his beer down against the table, he nearly bellowed, “Well, I didn’t!”
Dylan cringed, and several heads turned in their direction, but Zack didn’t seem to notice… or care.
“We know that,” Gage reassured him.
When he’d first heard about Grace’s discovery of another woman in Zack’s hotel room on the road, he’d figured Grace had every right to be upset and break off their engagement. Gage was kind of a stickler for fidelity in a marriage and loyalty in all other aspects of life. Friend or no friend, he could never back a cheater.
Once Zack had told them his side of the story, however, Gage’s opinion had changed. He believed Zack when he said he hadn’t invited that woman into his room-or his bed.
It wasn’t Zack’s ranting and raving and the accuracy of the details each time he recounted what had happened that convinced Gage of his innocence, but the obvious anguish in his friend’s voice and demeanor. He was genuinely broken up about losing Grace; he loved her and had been faithful to her, no matter what she thought.
According to Zack, he’d been in the shower when both the strange woman and Grace had arrived at his hotel room. He’d answered the door when Grace knocked, but didn’t know how the other girl had gotten in. A stolen key card, a bribed member of the housekeeping staff… determined puck bunnies seemed to constantly come up with new ways to get close to the players.
It had been a cruel twist of Fate that brought Grace to the door at that very moment. If she’d been five minutes later, Zack had told them more than once, the woman would have been gone because he would have kicked her and her already discarded clothes out into the hall the minute he found her in his bed.
It was something Gage knew Grace needed to know-whether she chose to believe it or not-but wasn’t ready to hear just yet.
“Yeah,” Dylan agreed. “And once Grace has a chance to calm down and really listen to you, she’ll believe it, too. You just have to give her some time.”
Zack let out another snort, then turned his attention back to the bottle in front of him.
“So what did you do to land in the doghouse?” Dylan asked, getting back to Gage’s original comment.
Gage shook his head, running his thumb back and forth distractedly over the label on his Rolling Rock. “I’m starting to think I’ve been wrong about this whole ‘no kids’ thing.”
“Whoa.” Dylan’s eyes went wide and he rocked back an inch or two in his chair. Even Zack dragged himself away from his wallowing long enough to stare dumbly.
Gage felt his face heat at such close scrutiny.
“That’s quite an about-face. What changed your mind?” Dylan asked.
“I don’t know exactly,” Gage admitted, avoiding his friends’ intense gazes by keeping his own eyes slanted down at the tabletop. “I was so sure it was a bad idea. That refusing to have children and letting Jenna go was the right thing to do, the best way to keep everyone safe.”
He drew in a deep breath and threw himself back against his chair. “But I miss her. Being with her again reminded me of how things used to be and how lousy I’ve felt this past year and a half without her. Then I went in to work and started to notice how many of the other guys have kids and happy marriages. Other UCs, detectives, beat cops, the members of SWAT.”
Lifting his head, he met Dylan’s gaze, then Zack’s. “So if they can do it and aren’t afraid something awful will happen to their families, what am I so worried about?”
Dylan leaned in, resting his elbows on the table. “That’s what we’ve always wondered. We tried to tell you that just because bad things happen, it doesn’t mean they’ll necessarily happen to you. Or Jenna or any kids you have.”
Gage’s mouth curled into a self-deprecating grin. “Yeah, I’m getting that. I don’t think I wanted to hear it before, though.”
“You don’t think?” Zack countered. “You were like the Great Wall of China any time the topic came up. I always thought you were afraid something would happen to you and you’d end up leaving Jenna alone to raise whatever children you’d had, but I didn’t think it was worth ruining your marriage over.”
He paused to take a swig of his drink, shrugging a shoulder as he lowered the bottle back to the table before continuing. “I figure it’s better to be with the person you love for as long as you can than be without them forever.” Swiveling his head from Dylan to Gage and back again, his eyes crossed and he said, “That made sense, right?”
Zack might be well on his way to fall-down drunk, but a few of his brain cells were still functioning.
“Yeah,” Gage mumbled. “It does.”
He didn’t want anything to happen to him, to leave Jenna-or any children they might have-alone. And he sure as hell didn’t want anything to happen to them. But being apart was clearly making them both miserable.
What was the point? Why should they be divorced and miserable when they could be married and happy for as long as they were blessed to be together?
They-he-had already wasted too much time, idiot that he was; he didn’t want to waste any more.
Pushing to his feet, he dug out his wallet and tossed a couple bills to the table. “Can you get him home?” he asked Dylan.
Dylan looked surprised, but said, “Sure. Where are you going?”
“I have to find Jenna. I’ve got a couple years’ worth of stupidity to make up for.”
As far as plans went, it could have used a bit more… planning.
He’d stalked out of The Penalty Box full of gusto and determination. It wasn’t until he’d reached his bike and was strapping on his helmet that he realized he didn’t have a clue where Jenna was.
Thank God no one had been in the parking lot to see him remove his helmet, climb back off the bike, and walk back into the bar two seconds after he’d walked out.
To their credit, his friends hadn’t laughed at him-at least not until after he’d left again. Well, Zack had, but Zack was three sheets to the wind and would have laughed at his own shadow at that point.
After asking Dylan if he had any idea where Jenna might be or where the girls might have gone after their knitting meeting since they hadn’t shown up at the Box, his friend had pulled out his cell phone and called Ronnie.