Chapter Nineteen
Chance could feel exhaustion weighing him down by the time he got back to his parents’ house. It was well after midnight, so everyone was already in bed. Dad had kept him updated via text throughout the day just to reassure him everything was okay on the home front.
He was glad stuff was okay somewhere, because it surely hadn’t been in the office.
Weston had called in every favor he had left with the San Antonio PD to get a rushed lab report on the stalker’s letter, only for the report to come back with nothing. The letter was completely clean—not a single fingerprint or hair, nothing that could give them a clue. Even the stamp hadn’t been licked.
It was a complete dead end.
They’d pored over more footage. Ran faces and names through every program they had available to them. Dorian and his team had shown up to help too. Just because the stalker seemed to have moved on to Maci didn’t necessarily mean Stella was safe.
They all wanted to catch this bastard.
But he was still one step ahead of them, because once again, all their work had amounted to nothing.
Everyone had finally decided to call it a night. His brothers went home to the women who loved them. Chance went home to the woman who seemed only a half breath away from taking off in a dead sprint.
Chance scrubbed a hand over his face as he sat down in the kitchen. He didn’t know how to help Maci with whatever was going on in her mind any more than he knew how to stop this stalker.
Uselessness wasn’t a feeling he was accustomed to or liked.
Chance sat on a stool in the dark kitchen and thought about the past twenty-four hours. The doctor’s appointment, Maci’s silence, the note—he wasn’t sure the best way to handle any of it. He wanted to wrap Maci in bubble wrap, to insulate her and their daughter from the world, but that wasn’t his call.
Their daughter .
When they heard her heartbeat for the first time, he’d been overwhelmed by emotion. He could already see a little girl with Maci’s nose and his eyes. He was ecstatic.
The baby and Maci were every dream he’d never let himself have. He had no recollection of his own biological parents. And while he would lay the world at the feet of Sheila and Clinton, this baby would be the only biological relation Chance had ever really known.
But where he was full of joy, Maci was shutting down and shutting him out. Running. Again .
Why did she always run?
Even after all the passion between them. Even when they could hardly be in the same room with each other without touching one another—magnets drawn together in a way they couldn’t resist.
But still Maci refused to truly get close to him.
Chance wasn’t surprised when he heard his mother’s soft footsteps come down the stairs. Had he ever sat in this kitchen having a crisis without Mom somehow knowing and making her way here?
“Hey, Mom.” He stood to put some water on for tea. Maybe something warm with no caffeine would help him settle down.
“Hey, baby. You just getting home? Long hours for you.”
“I’ve been home for a little while, but yeah, long hours.”
“You’ve got a lot on your mind. And not just what’s going on with this case. I had a talk with Maci today.”
“You know about the baby.” He gave her a shrug and a smile. “I’m surprised she told you. But I shouldn’t be, I guess.”
“It was more that I put the pieces together than she actually told me, but yeah. Congratulations.”
She wrapped her arms around him and he let himself sink into his mother’s hug. Sheila Patterson had always been his safe space. From the moment he’d finally stopped fighting them, his parents had become his rocks, grounding and centering him when nothing else could. They’d earned his trust over and over again.
It was what he wanted to be for Maci, if she’d let him.
They finally broke apart when the kettle whistled. Sheila moved to put tea bags in the mugs.
“We found out we’re having a girl yesterday.”
“You excited about that?”
“I didn’t care either way, but yeah. To think about a little Maci running around, that makes my heart happy.”
He thought of Maci’s reaction and his smile faded.
“But?” Sheila prompted.
“Maci seemed fine and then she just shut down. I’m talking practically catatonic. She hid in the bedroom as soon as we got home.”
He stood, pacing the length of the kitchen as he tried to work out his thoughts. “I always seem to mess up with her, Mom. She runs away, and I don’t know how to make her understand I would do anything for her and the baby.”
His mom was silent as she watched him move, sipping her drink with that calmness that made it so easy to share his feelings. Finally, she set the cup down and folded her hands.
“You’ve been taking care of others since before you could take care of yourself. It’s your first instinct with the people who are important to you.”
Chance frowned. “Yeah.”
“I know you’ve been taking care of Maci, that’s what you do. But when’s the last time you listened to her or even asked what she wanted? Do you even know if she wants to be a mother?”
Panic seared through Chance. He wanted his baby, but he wanted her with Maci. He wanted them to be a family. The idea that Maci might not want it too was almost too much to take.
His mom reached out and grabbed his hand. “Do you want to know what I see when I look at Maci? I see someone who’s scared.”
Chance shook his head. “Maci’s the strongest person I know. She’s not scared of anything.”
But there was something in the back of his mind that was screaming at him, that maybe his mother was right.
Sheila shrugged. “That could be exactly what she wants people to think. I think maybe her past is haunting her, and with a baby representing such an important future, it’s scary for her.”
He rubbed his eyes. “Why doesn’t she just tell me this?”
“I think our Maci’s been alone for a long time. She might not know how to.”
She didn’t know how to say what she needed to say, so she ran instead. Put walls up.
“There’s nothing she could tell me about her past that’s going to change how I feel about her.”
His mother smiled gently. “In this house, we’ve always believed in second chances. We’ve always believed that the past didn’t dictate the future. I think you’re going to have to introduce her to those concepts.”
“Yeah, I think you’re right.”
“I’m going back to bed. I hope you’ll get some sleep too.” She stood up. “And, Chance, when you talk to Maci, really listen to her. Take off your I’ll-fix-everything hat, and just really listen. I think that’s what she needs most of all.”
J UST AFTER DAWN , Chance woke, rubbing grit out of his eyes as he stumbled into the kitchen. He’d gone to bed right after his talk with his mother and gotten a few hours of sleep, but what she’d said still kept playing in his mind.
He needed to listen to Maci. Not do. Not fix. Listen .
He found a note from his mother on the counter.
Dad and I are out for the day. Be home by dinner. Make your girl some breakfast and talk. Love, Mom
Chance hunted down the pots, pans and food he’d need to make a great pancake breakfast, something he knew how to do, since he and his brothers had been in charge of breakfast on the weekends. Maci shuffled into the kitchen just as he was finishing.
“Perfect timing,” he said with a smile.
She stopped in the doorway. “I thought you would be Sheila.”
“Mom and Dad went out for the day, but I was instructed to make you breakfast. I made pancakes, home fries, toast and even some eggs if your stomach is up for them. There’s some cut fruit in the fridge too.”
“Wow. That’s quite the spread. What’s the occasion?”
Chance shrugged. “You need to eat and we need to talk. Might as well kill two birds.”
“Talk?”
“Talk,” Chance said firmly. “Well, you need to talk and I need to listen.”
She sat down at the kitchen island, and he pushed some food toward her to get her to eat. She took each bite slowly, as if each mouthful brought her closer to a firing squad.
He sat down next to her with his own plate. “Before we start, I wanted to say I’m sorry.”
She looked over at him, still chewing. “What do you have to be sorry for?”
“This whole time, I’ve been more concerned about myself and my feelings than yours. I didn’t even ask the most basic question.”
“Which is?”
“Do you want to be a mom?”
“You did ask me. You asked me in the hospital if I was keeping the baby.”
He nodded. “I know. But that’s not the same thing. What I’m asking you now is if you want to be a mom.”
She swallowed, setting her fork down. “I do, but...” She trailed off to silence.
“But what? Whatever it is, speak it.”
“My mom is pretty unstable. She was addicted— is addicted—to drugs.” Maci stared down at her plate, moving a piece of pancake around in circles. “When I was younger it was mostly booze like my dad, but by the time I was a teenager she’d moved on to harder stuff. The type of drugs you don’t get away from without professional help. Not that she’s ever wanted help.”
His heart ached for Maci already. “That’s really hard. I had no idea.”
“Studies show that addiction can be genetic.” She stared down at her plate. “That was true in my case.”
Chance’s stomach dropped, but he forced himself not to say anything. He needed to listen .
“I started dabbling in middle school. Pot first, then harder stuff as I got older. By the time I was seventeen, I dropped out of school to be my dealer’s live-in girlfriend. If I wanted a fix, all I had to do was ask. And do whatever he wanted, of course.”
The implications of what she was saying made Chance want to throw up.
She looked up at him. “Whatever you’re thinking to put that expression on your face, you’re right. I did it all. Prostituted myself for drugs. I’m not the type of person who should be raising a child. Especially not yours.”
He frowned. “Especially not mine? What does that mean?”
“It means, look at your life!” She waved her hand around. “You have this great, tight-knit family who would do anything for you. You’re the best person I’ve ever met, and you’ll be an even better father. Why do you deserve to be saddled with my baggage forever?”
“Stop.” He’d promised his mother he’d listen, but he wasn’t going to let Maci tear herself apart like this. “The past only defines us as much as we let it.”
She rolled her eyes. “Tell that to a greeting card company, Chance. This is real life. Our choices always come back to haunt us.”
“Maybe they do, maybe they don’t, but that doesn’t matter. You’re clean now, right? Been sober for at least as long as I’ve known you.”
There was no way she could’ve run the office with such efficiency if she had a drug problem. She was never late, rarely called in sick and was way too sharp to be intoxicated. They would’ve noticed.
“Yes, I finally got sober a little after my twentieth birthday. My boyfriend got violent one night and I ended up in the hospital. A nurse helped get me into a program and I got clean.”
“You got your life together.”
She shrugged. “The program helped me. Helped me get clean, helped me get my GED, helped me get some work-training classes under my belt.”
For the first time, she’d had a support network, and look at what she’d done once she had it—dragged herself completely out of the pit. “You accepted the help that was offered and changed your life. Everybody would call that admirable.”
“Did you not hear the part where I spent years basically selling myself so I could get high? It’s amazing I didn’t end up dead or with some disease.”
He reached over and grabbed her hand. “Yes, I hate to think of you living like that. It absolutely guts me.”
“And yet that’s what the mother of your child is. A person with addiction who did sex work for drugs.”
“The mother of my child is recovering from addiction, who survived and got out of a situation that would’ve destroyed many others. The mother of my child is strong and courageous and capable.”
She shook her head, so sadly it broke his heart. “My mother has promised to get sober and fallen off the wagon so many times. What if I’m the same? Addiction runs in my family and I’m passing it along to our daughter. How could you want to be involved with someone like that?”
He had to make her understand something he’d thought about for years. “What about my family and what’s passed down?”
Her brows pulled together. “What do you mean?”
“I don’t know who either of my biological parents are. There’s no info on them. The only thing we know for sure is that they both abandoned me, so they’re obviously not the most upstanding of people. Who knows what sort of genetic mess I might be passing down.”
“I—”
He put a finger gently over her lips. “Neither of us can stop what we pass down genetically to our children. But both of us can be there to show that any deficiencies we start with don’t have to be what defines us. To help them navigate the rough waters.”
“I’m afraid I’ll be a horrible mom,” she whispered.
“There may be patterns from our childhood that both of us have to undo. But, sweetheart, you did so much already with just a little help from the program. Think of all you can do with the full support of all the Pattersons behind you.”
She gave him the tiniest smile. “That’s a pretty great support network.”
For the first time, he had a ray of hope. “You think Tessa or Claire or Kayleigh are going to let you be anything less than the best mother possible? You would do anything for them. They’ll do anything for you too.”
“I know,” she whispered. “I love them. I love your whole family.”
“And they love you too. We don’t have to tell them all the details, but if you open up to them, you know they’ll support you in whatever way they can. I will too.”
“Really?”
He pulled her into his arms and rested his forehead against hers. “Yes. And not just because of the baby. You mean the world to me, Maci Ford. We can’t change the past and it doesn’t matter anyway. I didn’t know that Maci, and although I wish I could’ve helped her, she’s gone.”
He kissed her gently. “But I know this Maci and she’s amazing. All that matters is the future. Our future. Do you understand?”
“No.”
He chuckled, pressing his face into her neck so his next words were spoken into her skin. He wanted to imprint them there so she’d never forget. “It means, I’m all in with you, Maci. You and our daughter are my family and I choose the both of you.”
He wanted to tell her he loved her, but that could wait. Baby steps.
She sighed and burrowed into his chest. Chance wished he could spend the whole day holding her like this.
“I’m glad you told me everything,” he whispered into her hair. “No more running. If you start to feel overwhelmed, we work through it together. Deal?”
“Deal.”
Now all he had to do was stop the stalker after her.