I feel him lean back, pull away. I hold perfectly still.

“I’m twenty-nine years old and you changed everything for me.  You made me want to laugh and love and live again.  You made me feel when I didn’t think I could feel anything anymore.  I just wish I could’ve been whole when we met. I wish I could’ve said the right things and done the right things. I wish I could be the type of man you deserve.  I wish I could be the kind of man you could love.”

I hear him shift and then I feel the feather-light brush of his lips on my forehead, the tip of my nose, the curve of my cheek.

“I know you’re awake.  And I love you,” he says quietly, his mouth near my ear.

I open my eyes and meet his.  They’re dark and fathomless in the shadowy night. I say nothing. He says nothing. We just stare at one another, memorizing lines and shapes, angles and planes.

And then he stands and walks away.

My heart doesn’t start beating again until he closes and locks the door behind him.

TWENTY-SEVEN

Cole

I’M ON THE beach before daylight.  I couldn’t sleep after I left Eden’s.  I didn’t want to be in the house when Brooke got up.  So I came here.  This is the one place that’s brought me whatever comfort I’ve been able to find for the last three years.

Until Sunday.

I push back the snow until I see sand.  I start this castle like I’ve started them all–building up the ground, laying the foundation.  I bring up the mental image of Charity, picturing her face with so much clarity my chest hurts. I see every tiny detail–every freckle on her nose, every gold speck in her green eyes.  I listen for her laugh.

Only it never comes.

I work a pile of sand into a tall turreted structure, right in the center of the mound and I wait for my daughter to arrive.  I watch and I listen, glancing around the empty beach over and over again, but still there’s no Charity.

I sit back on my haunches, the snow no longer cold to my numb knees and hands, and I close my eyes, trying harder to see and hear my daughter. I mentally flip through a hundred different memories, losing myself in them.  But the moment I open my eyes, she’s gone.

With a primal growl that the wind carries away, I destroy the castle tower with one brutal swipe of my hands, guilt and pain spewing from my gut like a volcanic eruption, burning in my chest, laying waste to everything it touches.

“Charity!” I yell, glancing up and down the beach in the last-ditch hope that I’ll see her, that I can make this right again.

But I don’t.  I don’t see my little girl when my eyes are open. I don’t hear her voice when I’m not listening inside my head.

I flatten the cold, wet sand and I try again, smoothing the ground, building the mound, shaping the base of the tower again.  I think harder of Charity, of my little girl, and I wait.  And I wait.  But still, she’s nowhere to be found.

Again.

I destroy the structure for the second time before I get to my feet and spin away from the ruins. I head for the hard-packed sand near the surf and I take off at a run parallel to the shoreline.  As fast as I can, until my lungs burn and my legs ache, I run.  Until I can no longer see or hear or think, I run.  And when I can go no farther, I stop and hit my knees, closing my stinging eyes.

That’s when I see her. That’s when I hear her.  That’s the only time I can see or hear her now–when I shut out the world around me and exist only inside my head. With her.

She’s holding out her arms for me to pick her up, which I do.  She lays her head on my shoulder, something she used to do all the time when she was tired.

“Are you sleepy, baby?” I ask her in my mind.

“Yeah,” she murmurs heavily.  “I think it’s time to take my pocketful of sand home, Daddy.”

“Don’t you want to build a castle today?”

“No, I think I’ve built enough.”

My heart slams to a stop.  “But that’s your favorite.”

“But the other little girl needs you to build one with her.”

Oh, Jesus God!  What is she saying?

I feel like what’s left of my world is collapsing, falling in on top of me. Drowning out sight and sound and air.  I can’t breathe.

I can’t lose my daughter again. I can’t let her go again.

“I’ll always be with you, Daddy.  You don’t have to look for me anymore.  And you don’t have to be sorry. I promise.”

One cold tear slips from the corner of my eye to inch its way down my cheek.  “But you’re the most important thing in the world to me, baby.”

“I know, Daddy.”

“Do you?  Do you really know that?”

She lifts her head and fixes me with her sweet green eyes.  “I do.  You told me that all the time, remember?”

And I did. When I was with my daughter, I was really with her.  She had my heart, my attention, my love.  Always.  I can only hope she knew how much I loved her. How much I’ll always love her.

“Yeah. I remember.”

“I didn’t forget.”

“I didn’t forget either.”  I won’t. I can’t.

“But you’re sad when you remember.  And you don’t have to be. I don’t want you to be.”

“I can’t help it, honey.”

“Yes, you can.  You have to try.”

“But that’s not fair to you.”

“You’ve stayed with me long enough. I’m happy, Daddy.  Now you just have to be.”

“I don’t want to be happy without you. It’s…”  It’s not right, I was going to say. Because it’s not.

“You won’t be happy without me. You’ll be happy with me, too.  You don’t have to be alone to be with me.”

With a smile that lights up her whole face, she winds her arms around my neck and lays her head back on my shoulder.

And then she’s gone.

TWENTY-EIGHT

Eden

AS PAINFUL AS the days are, I can tolerate them better than the nights.  The nights are the worst.  In the quiet, after Emmy has gone to bed, the loneliness sets in.  The ache I feel for Cole is as visceral as it is emotional.  For three nights, I tossed and turned, reliving every moment we spent together.  Every smile we shared, every touch we exchanged.  And the pain of loss seems only to be getting worse.

It doesn’t help that every night I’ve heard a soft knock at the front door. It’s always later, after Emmy has been asleep for a while. It melts my heart that he considers her in this small way.  He never knocks loudly or more than once. It’s as though he’s giving me every chance to forgive him.  Yet I don’t.

I can’t.  At least not enough to let him back into my life.  Emmy doesn’t need the kind of heartache a man like that could bring. I’d have seen that sooner if I’d known he was married.

But today is another day.  And I’m hoping with it will come some peace.  Finally some peace.

“Do you like it here, Emmy?” I ask as she sits sprawled in front of her bookcase, deciding which book she wants to read to me later this evening.

“Uh-huh,” she mumbles with a nod. She’s distracted.

“Would you be happy if we stayed here?”

I don’t know what I want her to say.  Either answer will hurt, but a “no” might make it easier on me in the long run. I can look back and know that leaving was what I did for my daughter’s happiness and wellbeing, that getting away from Cole wasn’t an act of cowardice, but a byproduct of doing what’s best for my child.

“Yeah. Would you?” She turns to look at me, her eyes finding mine. She’s definitely not distracted now.

“I’m happy when you’re happy.”

“You always say that, but you’re happy when Mr. Danzer’s around, too.”  Her lips spread into a mischievous grin that brings out her dimples.  “I can tell.”

“You can?  And just how do you think you can tell, Smartypants?”