Page 106 of Our Little Secret

She’d been careless, reckless, and stupid.

Now she and her family were paying the price.

But at least Marilee was home and safe. Brooke took heart with that, even though recriminations followed her as she took off through the neighborhood, searching for Shep, looking down streets, in alleys and across yards as she drove to Northeast Seattle, far enough away from her neighborhood that she wouldn’t chance running into anyone she knew. She located a strip mall she’d seen in passing and parked at an unfamiliar pharmacy. Once inside she bought a pregnancy test, then crossed the lot to a mom-and-pop grocery for milk, bagels, cream cheese, and eggs.

So far, so good.

Yet anxiety fired her blood.

Her next stop was for gas and then a coffee shop still far enough away from her house to guarantee it was unlikely she would run into friends or acquaintances.

After ordering a latte from a girl with tricolored hair and a nose ring she left her cup at a booth next to the bathroom and went inside. Hands shaking, she promptly took the pregnancy test and waited while she heard someone come and go in the next stall.

Please, no, she silently prayed, not even contemplating what a baby would mean. The irony of it didn’t evade her. How long had she and Neal tried for a second child? Five years? Six? There were two miscarriages early in the pregnancies, one when Marilee was three and another a year later. Since then, nothing. Over the years it had become a nonissue. Brooke had thanked her lucky stars that she’d gotten pregnant young and become a mother and had never expected to have life growing within her again.

She heard the other woman wash her hands and tear off a couple of towels, just as two more women entered—friends, from the sound of it—chatting and laughing as if neither had a care in the world.

The door to her stall rattled. “Oops, sorry,” a young voice said through the door, then to her friend, “That one’s occupied.”

Brooke closed her eyes. Ignored the continuing conversation about their toddlers and kids in elementary school, though she did hear the fear in their voices when they spoke of “that teenager who’s missing.”

“Probably a runaway,” the voice in the stall said.

“Then what about the other one? From the same school. She’s been gone over a year.”

“If you ask me, she’s dead,” came the horrible conclusion from the woman flushing the toilet.

“Don’t say that! She’s just a kid.”

“A kid who should’ve had parents paying attention.”

They traded places, the stall door opening and closing.

“Those parents have to be devastated.”

“Good. Then if they have any other kids, they’ll be more careful.”

“Not everyone can be a helicopter parent,” said the woman now in the stall.

“These days everyone should be.”

Brooke bit her tongue. Parents of toddlers and kids in primary grades had no idea what the challenges of trying to control, protect, and mete out independence to teenagers entailed. She hadn’t. She’d been as cavalier as these women. And just last night she’d thought she’d lost her daughter.

The toilet flushed, the taps turned on, the electric hand dryer roared, and the women left, door clicking shut behind them. And Brooke waited, trying and failing to keep her thoughts from racing to their inevitable conclusions and the despair that came with them.

She knew there was a chance the baby, if there were one growing within her, was Neal’s. A slim chance. She’d been careful with Gideon, as had he, though not always . . .

With Neal, the results of a positive test provided some promise. They could reconcile, make things work, deal with Marilee’s horror of becoming a big sister at fifteen, find the joy and anticipation that comes with pregnancy.

With Gideon . . . oh Lord. She foresaw the end of her marriage, the loss of her daughter. And the child would forever hold her to a man she didn’t love, didn’t want, and couldn’t trust. She knew nothing about him. Nothing. And she’d been an utter fool. She’d thrown away everything for a few hours in his bed.

She faced the threat of him grasping onto her forever. Threatening her. Terrorizing her.

It had to stop.

One way or another.

Ithadto stop.