Her Soldier's Baby

So Eliza lay back down. She closed her eyes and willed her breathing to an even cadence.

And she sent every ounce of love she possessed across the mattress to her husband.

She’d caused this.

It had been either the show, or the talk of children, or both. But there was no doubt in her mind that she’d done this.

Nothing else had changed in their lives. The show. And the kid.

And she didn’t think the show had sent him back to hell. He didn’t like her to be away on her own, but he’d known about the show for weeks. And had slept great the first night she’d been back. For that matter, he’d said he hadn’t had even a bad dream while she’d been gone.

But tonight, when she’d tried to open up the idea of adoptive children to him, he’d started to blip on her. Give her that blank stare that she’d grown to hate. The one that said he was off someplace in his mind where she couldn’t go.

Why had even the mention of him as a father set him off like this?

She’d promised herself that she’d tell Pierce they’d had a son before her flight back to Palm Desert on Friday. Telling him had been her primary goal for the week. She wasn’t going back if she didn’t tell him.

As she lay there, listening to her husband grieve, she made another decision. She wasn’t going to tell Pierce about their son until she knew why talk of kids had elicited such a strongly negative response.

Which meant that she also couldn’t call Mrs. Carpenter with the okay to release her information to her son in the event that he came looking for her again.

And that opened the door to another possibility...that after a second try, if there even was one, the boy would lose interest in her. There was a good chance he wouldn’t come back a third time.

And, based on the papers she’d signed, there was no chance at all that she could ever find him if he didn’t.

Pierce quieted. Sometimes his nightmares woke him. Sometimes they didn’t. Sometimes they haunted him for days or even weeks. Sometimes he didn’t even remember having them.

She’d tell him about the episode. Knowing what was going on inside him was all a part of his accountability to his own health. She wouldn’t rob him of that right.

But she needed time to herself first. To figure out what she was going to do with the mess she’d made of her life.

Pierce had paid too high a price already for doing nothing more than serving his country. He’d already lost so much. He wasn’t going to lose her, too.

It was a promise she’d made to him. And one she’d made to herself. She’d failed her baby. She wasn’t going to fail his father.

By the time Pierce’s sobs quieted, Eliza’s cheeks were wet with tears.

Family Secrets, being a chef, glitz, glamour, awards and the bright lights of television were so far distant, she wasn’t sure the whole thing hadn’t just been a dream.

Well, she was sure. It wasn’t just a dream. She could feel the win pushing at her. Needing her as badly as she needed it. But maybe a dream was all it would be. All it could ever be. As her eyes closed and she finally drifted back to sleep, it was with the thought that she’d call Natasha Stevens in the morning and withdraw herself from the competition. From the show.

She cried about that, too. With sobs that shook her body.

But she didn’t change her mind.

The family secrets she’d already kept were more than she could handle.

* * *

PIERCE KNEW, AS soon as his gaze met Eliza’s in their bathroom mirror as they brushed their teeth Tuesday morning, that the fog in which he’d awoken hadn’t been because of a deep sleep.

He swore. She nodded.

He’d had another nightmare. After going almost a year without them.

Her look of compassion practically brought him to his knees. He didn’t deserve her. And had to find a way to tell her so. To talk of things he’d sworn never to mention. And hadn’t. Not to the multitude of professionals who’d helped him over the years. Not to his superior officers. Not even to those who’d made the pact with him.

He’d tell her. But not that day. Probably not any day soon. Someday, though.

After her television stint was through.

She deserved this chance. Deserved whatever came of it. And if it took her from him...she needed to never know the truth about the man she’d loved so purely.

His need to get to work, and hers to serve their guests’ breakfast, precluded any conversation that morning. But Pierce came home Tuesday night prepared to do a better job of communicating with his wife before he laid his head down to sleep again. He had to be responsible about the nightmares, stay diligent. To protect her.

And he knew exactly from whence this one had come.

They’d had a third check-in to the inn that day. A woman who was writing a piece of fiction that would feature the B and B. In exchange, Eliza had given her free room and board. She’d been so excited about the opportunity when the author had first contacted her.

Seemed like ages ago now. More than a month before she’d auditioned for, and won, her spot on Family Secrets.

If nothing else, the television show was giving her more publicity than she could ever have hoped. The inn was already booked through the summer but was starting to fill up through the fall and into Christmas.

“I just got my first booking for next summer,” Eliza told him as she met him at the back kitchen door when he came in from work on Tuesday. She was grinning.

He could feel her joy.

And see the sadness lurking in her eyes, too.

“Can we talk?” he asked, setting in stone the decision he’d made that morning. Several times throughout the day. And again that evening on his way home. “Tonight? After we’re through out there?” He nodded toward the door that led into the portion of their home that was open to the public.

He didn’t like the way she studied him, eye to eye, but he withstood it.

“Of course,” she said. And then she kissed him. Obliterating the world for just a moment in the way only she could. Giving him a different kind of mental blip. One that he could gladly succumb to for the rest of his life.

Life with Eliza required much from him. He’d give everything and more to be with her.

So he socialized with their guests, thankful to be able to look across the room and see her beautiful smile. He carried a box of the author’s files up to her room for her. Cleared empty dishes and ran the vacuum in the parlor after the crowd had dissipated. He even stopped by the library to chat with one of the businessmen who liked to spend an hour or two in the evenings sitting in one of the antique leather wing chairs, reading from the collection Eliza’s grandmother had amassed.

And when the house had settled, he joined his wife in the kitchen. Eliza was putting finishing touches on breakfast and preparing hors d’oeuvres for the two nights she’d be gone over the upcoming weekend. She’d given Margie a couple of days off to make up for working all weekend, and had spent her day cleaning and refreshing.

“Can I help?”

He couldn’t blame her for the surprised look on her face. Pierce’s kitchen skills were nil. Boiling water was debatable.

“I can chop,” he told her, meeting her gaze head-on. She’d barely slept the night before. He could tell by the shadows under her eyes.

And so, with her careful instruction, he took up knife and onion and set to work, slicing it into precise cubes. And then celery.