Secrets of War: A Military Romance (3 page)

CHAPTER FOUR

T
here would be no getting out of it. Suzy would have to go to the Merrick barbeque. She’d gone through her entire repertoire of excuses, including she interaction she’d had with Sally at her store the week before and Izzy wasn’t having any of it.

“Come on. You know you’ll hate yourself if you miss this party. We’re having house full of people, mother won’t even notice you. Besides,
Lou
will be there,” Izzy told her sweetly.

Lou Cunningham was Jamie and Izzy’s second cousin. The sweetest man Suzy had ever known and he always managed to get her into some type of trouble when they were together. Izzy thought Lou liked her but was afraid of Jamie. Suzy knew it was just him being kind.

“That isn’t convincing Izzy, the last time we hung out with Lou, we ended up running from the sheriff for streaking.”

“God, that was fun!” Izzy laughed. “Well, he is a lot tamer than he used to be, but he still thinks the sun rises and sets on you. Besides, you haven’t seen him in years.”

She would love to see Lou and a few other people from town she hadn’t had a chance to see yet. “All right, I’ll go. But if I end up decking your brother, you can’t say you weren’t forewarned.”

“I won’t say a word.”

“Okay, I’ll see you Friday.”

“Don’t sound like that Suze! We are going to have a ball.”

“Yeah, sure we are.” When she hung up the phone, she was calling herself all kinds of names for being such a weakling. She’d told herself she would just lay low and stay out of the Brightwood social scene.

The thing was she had a hard time saying no to her longtime friend. She couldn’t think of a time when she needed Izzy and she wasn’t there. Besides, she knew if it wasn’t this party, it would be others. Despite Izzy’s assurances, she knew she was in for the fight of her life once she set foot on the Merrick Ranch.

It was two hours later and Suzy was just rushing out of her front door. She loved her little Rand Victorian home, just the simple elegance of a Victorian home.

Izzy had called and told her the old Stewardson house was on the market about five minutes after the realtor had put out the for sale sign. She knew Suzy had always loved that house as a kid. She’d cleaned for the two doctors who had owned it at the time. One had been a Pediatrician, and one had been an Anesthesiologist. She supposed this was where she’d first gotten her love of medicine.

The Stewardson home was the only Victorian in town, grand and magnificent. This design incorporated Victorian touches with the masterful use of a turret and a gazebo. With a wealth of windows, it never lacked natural light. Leaded glass front doors opened to a grand foyer, the living room featured a rounded sitting area and French doors to a side veranda. The kitchen overlooked the family room, centrally located with a fireplace with a built-in entertainment center on the left wall, and wet bar, were the more modern touches she’d added. The island kitchen featured an abundant counter space, and butler's pantry. A separate utility room housed the washer/dryer, fold-down ironing board, and sink.

The second floor held the lavish master suite with a vaulted sitting room and a luxurious bath with room for a sauna. Complete with a private sitting area and fireplace. Three additional family bedrooms sharing two full baths were also on the second floor.

She stopped short as she stepped off the wide verandah style porch and found Jamie waiting for her. He was like a force of nature which had to be accepted since it couldn’t be controlled. He also looked good enough to eat and with her stomach fluttering, she hated that fact as well. “What are you doing here?” she asked him, unmoving.

When she stopped in front of him, he looked down his nose into her wide eyes. “I was in town for a meeting and Izzy called to tell me you were definitely coming to the barbeque and could I please try and be nice to you. So I came to ask if you would like to go and have coffee with me, so we could talk.”

“I don’t need coffee or a talk.”

He gave her a speaking glance and turned, opening the door of his Jaguar S-type for her. “I’m blocking you into your drive way. So you can come with me or we can both spend the rest of the day in your driveway.” He didn’t smile as he said it.

Suzy knew he meant what he was saying. Jamie had a determined streak a mile wide, there was a saying around town, he would follow you to hell to get you if you crossed him. She just couldn’t figure what it was that she’d ever done to him.

Deciding she was in no mood to fight with him, she climbed into the car and fastened her seat belt as he closed her door and ran around to the driver side of the car and climbed in.

She averted her gaze to the window, folding her arms over her breasts defensively. She crossed her leg under her full skirt and concentrated on the road, praying he would just drive and drop this topic. “I don’t get why you felt it was necessary for you to come and pick me up. I could meet you somewhere, maybe.”

His black eyes narrowed on her. “To keep you from committing suicide, being that disaster falls every time you are behind the wheel,” he murmured.

“I can drive just fine!”

“Suzy you totaled two cars, your grandmother had to bail you out of jail after the last one.”

“Well, the idiot deserved to be hit. He was driving like his name was Mr. Magoo. Let alone, the names he was calling me on the side of the road. Anyway, it was seventeen years ago and I’ve only had three accidents in that time and none of them were my fault.”

Jamie shook his head and looked like he held back a smile as he accelerated around a slow moving car and the powerful Jaguar growled like the big cat it was named for.

She glanced his way and saw the pure joy of the car’s performance on his face as he slid effortlessly back into the lane ahead of the slow car.

Silence reigned for a few more minutes.

However, it wasn’t long before Jamie threw down the gauntlet, “So how is your boyfriend taking your relocation?”

“I don’t have a boyfriend,” she snapped.

“No. You do want a boyfriend, do you? Or is there another side of you I don’t know anything about?” he asked sarcastically.

“I haven’t had the best luck with men. They’re all liars and don’t know the meaning of commitment,” she explained referring to both Jamie and her ex-fiancé. Suzy was diagnosed with HIV a little over two years ago. She’d contracted it from her longtime boyfriend and fiancé D.J. Gamble. Who she found out later had been cheating on her for years and using her money to frequent male prostitutes, having unprotected sex and using drugs.

She’d gotten a flu she couldn’t shake for months and had barely been able to make it through the day. Then one day, when she was on the way to the ER, because one of her patients had been in a severe car accident where his parents had been killed. She’d passed out at the wheel of her car and crashed herself.

When she’d awoken in the hospital with six broken ribs, a skull fracture and a broken leg, another doctor and colleague had explained she didn’t have the flu. She was showing the early stages of HIV.

She’d been devastated. She’d loved DJ with all her heart. She only ever had one other boyfriend in her life and that had been Jamie. Even with the evidence in his face, D.J. had denied everything until he himself had very rapidly gotten sick and passed away within months of his diagnoses.

The pain and humiliation of her diagnoses, had forced her to close her practice and notify all the parents of her patients.

Suzy had been sued by dozens of parents who’d said she should have known her HIV status, but the court had thrown out the case, saying she hadn’t purposely put anyone in danger and had followed the law to the letter.

She’d sunk into a deep depression for a while, not leaving her bedroom for three straight months, not taking her HIV meds, until one day her grandmother had burst into her room and yelled at her
, “I have lost my husband and I have lost my daughter. Now you are going to give up? NO! You will get your ass out of that bed and keep moving forward! I am too old to watch you die too!”

Suzy never heard her grandmother curse or cry until that day. She decided to get up and fight, if not for her, then for her sister and her grandmother, the people she loved the most in the world.

Being in Jamie’s car in such close proximity to a man she realized was still THE MAN for her, reminded her of how she could never date again, or get involved with anyone. Especially, with this man. Who’d dumped her cruelly when she was but a teen. Now, he insisted on seeing her? Why did she even agree to this supposed coffee and a so called
talk
? He was already being rude and disagreeable.

Jamie slowed the Jag down and stopped at a red light in town.

Taking a deep breath, Suzy decided to bail. She just couldn’t stay in such close confines with this sexy man, she still had feelings for. OR, allow him to be so rude, after what he’d done to her in the past. She opened the car door.

Jamie snapped his head over to her. “What are you—?”

“I’m sorry. I just can’t…” Suzy got out and slammed the car door shut. Her insides felt like jelly and she knew she was being a total coward as she took off along the sidewalk heading to her store. Luckily, it was just two blocks up.

CHAPTER FIVE

I
t was eight o’clock before Suzy got home to her grand Victorian that night. She and Izzy had worked on inventory after the store closed and she was physically and emotional drained. Especially after arguing the entire time with Izzy about her not going to the barbeque. As she pulled into her driveway, she marveled again at how great this old house was.

“I’m home!” she said as she walked in the front door.

“Hey, Baby Girl!” Geraldine greeted coming out of the kitchen and wiping her hands on her apron. “How was your day? Are you okay, baby?”

“Yeah, Momma. I’m fine, why do you ask?” Suzy put her bag on the hall table and hung her coat on the hook.

“Because you look awful, frankly.” Her grandmother, Geraldine had never been a woman to hold back what she was thinking or to use tact when she was expressing it.

“Well, thank you Momma that is
so sweet
of you to say!” Suzy hugged her grandmother. Geraldine Stephenson had the best hugs of anyone she’d ever known. She would wrap her warm arms around you and squeeze, making all the bad things of the day go away.

A stout, portly woman, who always said God hadn’t given her a size eight figure because she was meant to mother people and that’s what she did. Only she’d been unable to have more than one child. So, she’d mothered all the children of the town. Everyone called Geraldine
Momma
, if you tried to call her Mrs. Stephenson, or ma’am she would just fed you pie until you gave in.

“I’m serious, Suzy!” she said touching the back of her hand to her forehead. “Did you check your T-cell count today?”

“Momma, please don’t start,” she said pushing past her and going into the kitchen to see what was for dinner.

“No, don’t you start! Have you been taking your meds? I know you aren’t getting enough rest. Did you eat today?” her grandmother asked touching her forehead again.

“I am fine! I had to do inventory today, I volunteered at the hospital, and I had two days straight of a run ins with two members of the Merrick family! I’m fine Momma, I’m just tired.”

“Wait, back up. Two members of the Merrick family? And what do you mean by run ins?” she asked her sitting down at the table.

Suzanne grabbed a bowl out of the cabinet and started to scoop some of her grandmother’s world famous Texas chili. “Well yesterday, it was Jamie. He is in my music therapy class over at the hospital. He stayed after to ask me out on a date, and when I told him no…He got pissed and asked if I didn’t like him now, because he had a peg leg.”

“Why did you say no?” Geraldine asked one eyebrow raised.

“MOMMA! You know me better than that! You know his injuries doesn’t matter to me. My status matters to me, and I never want anyone in this town to know it. Besides, I can’t get involved with anyone now.”

“I know you didn’t just say that to me,” Geraldine replied laughing. “Goodness gracious, girl the man asked you to dinner, not to bear his children. You think you can’t sit at a table and have a decent meal with a man without telling him you have HIV, then I think we need to work on your conversation skills baby!”

She winced knowing she had bailed on Jamie yet a second time today as well. Nope, no dating him. She couldn’t sit down at a table with him or in a car, apparently and she certainly wasn’t going to any dammed barbeque at his parent’s house! “Oh, Momma. You know what I mean. There is history there, I mean a long time ago—I thought I would be Mrs. Jamie Merrick by now. I just don’t want to open that back up. I mean I have HIV. I can’t be anyone’s wife. I won’t do that to anyone, especially Jamie.”

“Oh, sweetie. So at thirty-four years old, you have resigned yourself to being alone the rest of your life? No baby, you are too beautiful of a spirit for that. The doctors told you over and over, there are safe ways for you to have an intimate, satisfying sex life.”

“I can’t believe you and granny are talking about sex
again
. Don’t you guys think about anything else?” Jade asked as she walked into the kitchen to get a glass of water.

“Hey, Jade. How was school today?” Suzy asked her sister, ignoring her usual sarcasm. “Did you do your homework?”

Jade and Suzy had been so close when their mother was alive, they spent almost every minute together. After their mother died and Suzy became her guardian, she now wasn’t just her cool older sister but the person who needed to ground her when she did something wrong, hound her about her grades, act as her mother.

It was more change shoved down Jade’s throat than she’d been ready for. She grew to resent Suzy. She’d thought raising her twelve-year-old sister would be easy until the years went by and twelve turned into sixteen with long black hair and the eyes to match the deepest ocean. Add in legs that went on for days, along with the curves that wouldn’t quit. Suzy went from being big sister to parole officer.

“Yes,
warden
. I just got done with my homework,” Jade retorted taking a sip of her water and leaning against the sink. “I went straight to cheer practice from school and from there, I came straight home and hit the books. Not like there’s anything else to do in this backwoods country town.”

“I want you to watch how you speak to your sister! Can’t you see she isn’t looking good?” Geraldine countered.

“Thanks Momma,” Suzy whispered.

Jade stared at her sister silent for a long while before she put her glass down and knelt next to her. “Are you okay?” she asked her with a look of complete and total fear of history repeating itself.

Suzy knew Jade was terrified of losing anyone else she loved. That her bad attitude and miss-steps in California were just a show of fear and pain.  “Yes J. I’m fine, I promise. I’m just tired from doing inventory today,” she promised her sister rubbing her cheek. She didn’t say it could also be from her emotional run ins with a certain well known family in town.

“Okay. You will tell me if—well, you know.”

“Scouts Honor.”

Jade stood up and grabbed her glass of water. “Okay! OH! I have a babysitting gig tomorrow at five. So, I’m gonna head over there after I get out of practice,” she told them, heading out of the kitchen.

“Wait, Wait! Who are you babysitting for?” Suzy didn’t think Jade knew anyone well enough to be asked to babysit yet.

“One of the girls on the cheer squad fell doing a double back flip twist out, during practice a couple of days ago and broke her leg in like four places. She has to get pins put in and everything. Anyway, normally she watches this kid every Thursday night, so his dad can go and ride bulls or something. So, the entire team agreed to chip in and watch the kid and let her have the money while she is out of commission. Tomorrow is my day.”

“Lord, that was a long story and we still don’t know who you’re babysitting for,” Geraldine concluded looking at Suzy out the corner of her eye.

“That’s because we just moved here and I don’t know these people. It’s out on the Merrick ranch watching some guy named Jamie’s five-year-old son, Tuck.” Jade looked irritated she was being accused of lying.

“JAMIE!” Suzy exclaimed in shock. “Jamie has kids?”

“I don’t know. I guess. Who’s Jamie?” She shrugged.

Jamie has a son?
Had she misunderstood his intentions this afternoon? Maybe that was why his mother had shown up at her store. To pee on his wife’s territory for her.

Great, now I have to apologize.

“Okay, don’t answer,” Jade said rolling her eyes and storming out of the kitchen.

“So, I take it the other Merrick you ran into today was his wife?” Geraldine asked her.

“No. It was his mother. I had no idea he was married or had a child until Jade just told us,” she said getting up to put her bowl in the sink. For some reason, she wasn’t hungry anymore.

“Well, now you know his invitation was strictly platonic.” Geri was eyeing her granddaughter to gauge her reaction to the news. Contrary to what came out of her mouth, she knew Suzy didn’t want to spend the rest of her life alone, and especially while the man of her dreams was living just outside of town.

“Yeah! Which is really a complete relief,” she replied trying to act like she was okay with this news. “You know what granny, I think you’re right. I am completely bushed, so I am gonna head up to bed.” She hated lying to her grandmother but she knew this conversation was headed somewhere she didn’t want it to go.

“Hmmm…mmm. Well, you head on up to bed baby. But before you go, can I ask you a quick question?”

Suzy paused in her hasty retreat toward the kitchen door, but kept her back to her grandmother.

“If you’re so relieved, why do you look like you did when buster was hit by that milk truck?”