The Fall of Shane MacKade (The MacKade Brothers 4)

Because Shane was terribly pale, Devin took pity on him. “Have another beer, pal. You can bunk in the back room and sleep it off.”

It seemed like an excellent suggestion.

She didn’t sleep. It wasn’t only because Shane wasn’t there and the house seemed to come alive around her. It was the wait for morning, through the longest night of her life.

She worked. It had always helped her through crises, small and large. She packed. The systematic removal of her clothing, the neat folding of it into suitcases, was a sign that she was ready to go on with the rest of her life.

If she had a worry, it was that she and Shane would part on uneasy terms. That she didn’t want. When he came back, she told herself, she would try to put things back into perspective and achieve some kind of balance.

But he didn’t come back, and the hours passed slowly to dawn.

When the sun had just begun to rise, and the gray mist hung over the land, swallowing the barn, she stepped outside.

It was impossible for her to believe, at that moment, that anyone wouldn’t feel what she felt. The fear, the anticipation, the rage and the sorrow.

It took so little imagination for her to see the infantry marching through that soft curtain of fog, bodies and bayonets tearing it so that it swirled back and reformed. The muffled sound of boots on earth, the dull glint of brass and steel.

That first burst from the cannons, those first cries.

Then there would be hell.

“What are you doing out here?”

Rebecca jolted, stared. It was Shane, stepping through that river of mist. He looked pale, gritty-eyed, and angry enough that she resisted the need to rush forward and hold him.

“I didn’t hear you come home.”

“Just got here.” She hadn’t slept. He could see the fatigue in her eyes, the shadows under them, and detested the stab of guilt. “You’re shivering. You’re barefoot, for God’s sake. Go back inside. Go to bed.”

“You look tired,” she said, knowing her voice was more brittle than cool.

“I’m hung over,” he said flatly. “Some of us humans get that way when we drink too much. Aren’t you going to ask me where I’ve been, who I’ve been with?”

She lifted a hand, rubbed it gently over her heart. It still beat, she thought vaguely, even when it was shattered. “Are you trying to hurt me?”

“Maybe I am. Maybe I’m trying to see if I can.”

She nodded and turned back toward the house. “You can.”

“Rebecca—” But she was already closing the door behind her, leaving him feeling like something slimy that had crawled from under a rock. Cursing her, he headed toward the milking parlor.

They stayed out of each other’s way through the morning. Rather than work in the kitchen, she closed herself in the guest room and focused fiercely on the job at hand. So they would part at odds, she thought. Perhaps that was best. It might be easier, in the long run, to hide behind resentment and anger.

From the window in her room, she saw him. He didn’t seem to be working. Marking time, she decided, until she cleared out. Well, he would have to wait a little longer. She wasn’t leaving until the day was over.

“Where are you, Sarah?” she murmured, pacing the room, which was beginning to feel like a cell. “You wanted me here. I know you wanted me here. For what?”

As she passed the window, she looked out again. He was walking across the yard now, past the kitchen garden, where he had late tomatoes, greens, squash. He stopped, checked something. For ripeness, she supposed.

It was painful to look at him. Yet too painful to contemplate looking away. Had she really believed she could take the experience of love and loss as some sort of adventure—or, worse, as an experiment on the human condition? That she could examine it, analyze, perhaps write about it?

No, she would never, never get over him.

When he straightened from the little garden and walked toward one of the stone outbuildings, she turned away. No, she wouldn’t wait until the end of the day after all. That was too cruel. She would speak to him again, one last time, and then she would go.

She’d send for the equipment, she told herself as she went downstairs. She would make her exit with dignity, albeit with dispatch. To Regan’s, she told herself, breathing carefully. To run back to New York just now would look cowardly. It was pointless to make him feel bad, to let him know he’d had her heart and broken it.

Let him think that it had simply been an experience, one that was over now, one they could both remember fondly.