Page 37 of Justice for Aleta

All movement stopped and Jack stood there behind her on his knees, his length still buried inside her. He could hear her panting, and his breathing was just as labored. Without another thought, he drew back his hand and slapped her ass just to hear thesmack. She let out a tiny squeal, and he wanted to do it again, but he didn’t want to scare her. The handprint he left would fade in a few minutes, but his memory of the view would last until the next time he was buried in her and a new memory took its place.

Even though he didn’t want to, he pulled out of her and dropped to the mattress beside her, then pulled her down with him. She was almost lying on top of him, one leg sprawled across him and her arms around his neck. With one finger, he pressed her chin upward and kissed her lips softly, happy with the warm, sweet way she came after him, locking her lips to his and breathing into him. As soon as the kiss was broken, he wrapped both arms tightly around her and squeezed. “I love you, sugar.”

“I love you too, babe. Do you ever think about what it will be like when we don’t have to hide out anymore? When our lives are normal?”

“All the time, sweetie. All the time. We can have an amazing life together. I’m sure of it.”

She was quiet for a few seconds. Then, out of the blue, she asked, “Do you ever think about kids?”

He chuckled and repeated what he’d just said. “All the time, sweetie. All the time.” After he’d kissed the part in her hair, he asked, “You miss Jorie, don’t you?” Nodding against his chest, she began to cry. “Oh, baby. I’m so sorry. I know you miss him.” She’d never talked about him because Jack had never encouraged her to. Maybe she should. “Was he a good baby?”

“Uh-huh,” she answered, sobbing. In a couple of minutes, he heard her sniffling and waited while she calmed. “He wasn’t at first. He had colic something horrible. I warmed stuff to give him for his tummy, and I tried all kinds of old-fashioned home remedies. But eventually he just outgrew it. By the time he was three months old, it was over and he was sleeping through the night.”

“So he slept good?” Jack had heard his cousins talk about how their babies didn’t sleep, and he knew that could be a problem.

“Oh, yeah. He’d fall asleep at about ten and sleep until five or five thirty. I’d nurse him, and he’d go right back to sleep until about eight. He was such a good baby.” The pride in her voice was unmistakable, and Jack felt a pang of grief pierce his chest. He loved her, and that baby had been a part of her. He would’ve given anything to have a memory of holding him and smiling down into his face instead of the still, cold form lying in a pool of blood on the rocks below that bridge. “He started smiling when he was about five weeks old. The doctor said it wasn’t possible, but I swear he was laughing by the time he was four months. He was the jolliest baby ever, always grinning. I tried to make him stay in his crib some of the day. You know, so he could learn self-soothing and entertaining himself. But he was just so gosh-darn cute that it was impossible to just leave him lying there. I had to hold him. I’d never left him overnight with anybody before he… I never left him overnight. Never.”

“I know you were a good mom. You loved him and did everything you could for him.” Jack stroked her hair and listened to her sigh.

“But I let him slip out of my arms. How could I do that, Jack? How?”

So that was what had been bothering her. She blamed herself. “Honey, that van hit you and there was nothing you could do. It’s not like you just tossed him away. You lost your grip, even though you tried to hang on. It wasn’t your fault, Aleta. No way was it your fault.”

“If I’d just held on a little tighter…” And she began to cry again.

“Let’s change that. How about, ‘If that bad guy hadn’t been standing there with that gun, none of that would’ve ever happened.’ Did you ever think of that?”

“But it was ME!” she cried out, startling him. “He was my baby! I should’ve held him tighter! I should’ve had a better grip! I should’ve been able to hold onto him!” She was wailing and crying, and Jack wondered how long she’d been holding all that in. Probably the whole four months Jorie and Joshua had been dead. “I let my baby die.” The misery in her voice stabbed at his gut when she whispered again, “I let my baby die.”

Jack had never felt so helpless in his life. The woman in his arms had almost died trying to save her child. Her body had been mangled, bloodied, and bruised. He’d seen her. He knew. And yet she was in agony because she believed she could’ve done something different that would’ve altered the outcome of a horrible situation, a situation she hadn’t created.When we get out of this mess, I’ll find her a counselor, someone to talk to about this. She’s got to stop blaming herself because she’s not to blame.“Jack?”

“Um-hmmm, babe,” he answered, afraid of what was coming.

“Would you be afraid for me to be your child’s mother? I mean, am I such a lousy mother that you’d be afraid to have a child with me? That I’d let something happen to it? That it would die because?”

“Aleta, stop it. Just stop. You can think about this constantly, roll it around in your mind, make up different scenarios, but here’s the truth. You did nothing?nothing?wrong. You had a child you loved, and you took the best care of him that anyone could. And one freak accident took him from you. That wasin no way your fault. You’ve got to accept that. Here’s the truth. If you want to blame somebody, blame Joshua.” He felt her open her mouth to say something, but he stopped her. “No. Don’t say it. Joshua was the one who stopped on the shoulder of the parkway in very dangerous road conditions. He’s the one who told you to take Jorie out and move away from the van. I understand his rationale, but the truth is that the car seat was still in the van and it was untouched. I know, because I was there. If Jorie had stayed in that car seat, he would’ve been fine, or at the very least had a couple of bumps and bruises. And before you say a word, I’m not blaming him. He did what he thought was right. He was trying to protect you and his son. But it didn’t work out the way he thought it would, and that’s not his fault either. You have to accept it?for reasons we’ll never understand, it was Jorie’s day to die. It was his time. There was nothing you could do to stop it?nothing.”

He could hear the hopelessness and helplessness in her voice as she cried against him. “My baby. My baby is dead, and there was nothing I could do. Nothing. It was his day to die. Oh, God, why? Why was it his day to die?”

Tears rolled down Jack’s face. What a horrible, terrible realization that you’d given birth to a child, loved him and nurtured him, and he was only destined to live for five months. And all he could do for her was whisper, “I don’t know, angel. I really don’t know.”

* * *

Sunlight streamingthrough the window woke him, and he rubbed his eyes before he opened them. At some point during the night, Aleta had rolled away from him and to the edge of the bed, taking most of the covers with her. That made him smile. He tugged them a little to cover himself and she rolled toward him, then snuggled up against him and sighed.

The night before had been intense, more intense than anything had been for him in a long time. Crying was something Jack had only done a couple of times in his life, and yet he’d cried with her and for her. Her pain had become his pain, and it was almost unbearable. Her lips feathered a kiss onto his pec and he smiled. There were so many things about her to love, and he thought about her question. Would he consider her as a mother for his child? Of course. She was loving, giving, and nurturing. She’d make a wonderful mother. That was a thing he hadn’t let himself think about since Heather’s death, but on that morning with that beautiful woman in his arms, it seemed the most natural thing in the world to be occupying his mind.

“I love you,” he heard her mumble against his skin.

He kissed the top of her head. “I love you too. You hungry?” She nodded. “Okay. I’m going to fix us something to eat. You stay here and sleep.” Before he left the bed, he leaned back in and kissed her cheek just to watch her smile. On the way out of the room, he picked up his cell and carried it with him, wondering why somebody didn’t make boxer briefs with pockets. That would be super handy.

Jack got out four eggs and decided to scramble them. He’d just reached for a bowl when his phone rang, and the number was a Texas area code. With more than a little hesitation, he reached for it, hit ANSWER, and put it to his ear. “Fletcher.”

“Kentucky State TrooperJohn Henry Fletcher? Badge number twelve eight-five?”

“Yes. May I help you?”

“Jack. It’s CruzLivingston, FBI out of the SanAntonio office. How are you?”

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