Redemption(43)

The morning of the trial, I met Jethro Neely at his office…I wore a somber suit with my hair pulled back loosely at the base of my neck. He’d warned me not to overdress, but not to show up in jeans, and nothing too severe that would make me appear heartless. I wasn’t sure what heartless clothing looked like, so I chose a white button up blouse with gray slacks and jacket. I wore the little pearl earrings my grandmother had left me, and the rosary wrapped around my wrist. I hadn’t bothered with makeup, just lip gloss. It was the best I could do given the circumstances, but fortunately, it met Jethro’s approval.

We rode to the courthouse in Austin together where the media crowded the front lawn and every available space within sight of the entrance. As we approached the building, I felt like I was walking the green mile.

It was time to meet my Maker.





14





Chapter Fourteen





Annie and Brett had done the retrieval and fertilization on their own. It seemed awkward to intrude, like it was the equivalent of watching them have sex in some distorted way. The days after were agonizingly slow. The two of us made a point of spending more time together, meeting daily for lunch, but today, the four of us were making the call to find out how many embryos we had to transfer. We all sat anxiously waiting for each other to finish eating, but no one touched their food, and we finally gave in to the call. I tried to concentrate on what the embryologist was telling us, but all I heard was the magic number.

Three.

That one little word, a simple number—in nine months, Annie and Brett would have a child, and I would have given back to the world what I’d taken. We’d prayed for three; we got three. The signs all pointed toward success.

Dan and Brett fired questions at the person on the other end of the call, but Annie caught my attention. Her eyes filled with tears that spilled down her cheeks and over her smile. Together, we’d broken our cycles. I was no longer the taker of life; I got the chance to be the giver.

After the embryo transplant, I’d been put on bed rest to give them the best chance at implanting. We didn’t have a confirmed pregnancy, but for some reason, Dan had morphed into a protective beast that needed to be chained. I loved the attention, reveled in his command, but he was driving Annie bonkers. She had taken off work to stay home with me after the transfer, and somehow Dan ended up at my house too. His allergies were out of control, but he refused to leave. He was popping Benadryl like an addict and resembled a bloated puffer fish.

He refused to let me do anything for myself, insisting bedrest meant never leaving the bed. I was surprised he wasn’t making me pee in a bottle. The idea was not to jostle the eggs so they would implant in the uterus, not to drive me insane.

“Dan, you can’t stay here with your allergies like that. Why don’t you just let Annie come back? Or we could go to your house. I can leave enough food and water out for Cosmo to be all right for a couple of days.”

“You’re not moving.”

“And when you can’t breathe, then what?”

“I’m fine, Lissa. I’m not leaving you alone.”

“You do know you can’t be with me one hundred percent of the time during this pregnancy, right?”

“Don’t remind me.”

I laughed when he groaned. It wouldn’t have been funny if he hadn’t been overreacting, but as it stood, I had been alone for a long time and done just fine.

“This would be a lot easier if we lived together. Then I’d know I was coming home to you, and you weren’t out in the country miles from medical help.”

Dan was loopy from the medication he’d been downing all day. Never once had he mentioned wanting to live together prior to this. Someone else’s pregnancy was not a reason to take that leap.

“So, you want to live like that,” I waved my hand around indicating his swollen face, “forever?”

“No. I made an appointment with an allergist to start getting shots. Hopefully, that will eliminate the problem.”

I shot straight up. “You did what?”

“It’s just shots, Lissa. It’s not a big deal. You love Cosmo, he secretly wants to kill me in my sleep, and somehow, we have to find a way to co-exist. This is my peace offering to the varmint.” He shot me a sheepish grin.

“At what point were you going to mention any of this? What if I don’t want to live with you?” The lilt in my voice gave me away. I enjoyed taunting him, but he knew I loved him. The only time marriage had come up he’d left me with two words. We’re good. I didn’t know what that meant then, and I don’t know what his getting allergy shots means now. I wasn’t interested in living with a man who didn’t have further intentions, and I wasn’t bringing that subject up again, either.

“You’ll change your mind.” His confidence was humorous. “Women adore me. Guys want to be me. And you can’t resist me.”

“You’ve lost your mind.” I flopped back down as though I were disinterested, but I was anything but. In some ways, Dan and I were doing everything backward. Before starting this process, there had been no mention of us taking our relationship to another level. Now, I couldn’t help but wonder if he were doing it because of what I was doing for his friends. I didn’t want to be with him because of what I’d offered Annie and Brett. I wanted him to want to be with me because he loved me. The only problem was, he loved the version of me I’d allowed him to know, not the truth behind who I actually was—or the shame of my past.