Mark stood a few feet away, silent as the forest around him, hands shoved into the pockets of his jeans.
“If I’ve told you once, I’ve told you a hundred times,” she gasped, clutching her heart. “You’ve got to stop sneaking up on me like that.”
“Sorry.”
She narrowed her eyes at him. “What are you doing out here?”
“Looking for you.” The expression on his face was intense, but beyond that, she couldn’t read him.
“You found me. How?”
The corner of his mouth quirked. “You left an easy trail to follow.”
She glanced over her shoulder, seeing no such trail. “Right. So why did you stalk me out here in the woods?”
“Got a few things to say if you’re willing to listen.”
She stared at him for a moment, considering. She wasn’t angry any longer. Hurt, definitely. Disappointed, yes. Heartbroken,oh yeah. But she and Mark were part of the same circle of friends so if he wanted to clear the air between them to make things less awkward when they inevitably bumped into each other around town, then she was willing to give him that chance. She nodded, patting the blanket beside her.
He sat next to her, staring out over the stream as she’d done earlier. “Not sure where to start,” he said finally.
Something in his tone caught in her chest. He sounded uncertain, almost vulnerable. Totally out of character for Mark.
So she just sat next to him, taking in the view and waiting for him to sort himself out. For once, she’d be the listener and let him do the talking.
“My parents were only sixteen when my mom got pregnant with me,” he said finally, still watching the stream sparkling in the sunshine so far below them.
Her breath caught in her throat. Whatever she’d been expecting him to say, it definitely wasn’t this.
“I don’t know that much about them. I don’t know what it was like for them trying to raise me when they were just kids themselves, and being an interracial couple too. Can’t have been easy. I guess both of their families disowned them, but I don’t know for sure. I only know that I didn’t have any other family around, no grandparents or anyone else. When I was six, my dad died in a car accident.”
She reached out and rested a hand on his shoulder.
“After that, my mom had to raise me on her own, and she struggled with it. I went to school a lot without a lunch or missing my coat, things like that. Someone—probably my teacher—filed a report with social services. When my mom found out she was being investigated for neglect, she just…left. Dropped me at school and never came back. She left me a note. In my backpack.”
“A note?” Jessica could hardly draw breath. What would that be like for a six-year-old boy, being dropped off at school and never picked up?
“She said I’d be better off without her. She likes to leave notes when she’s ready to bail, I guess. Saves her from the tough conversations.”
She could hear the pain in his voice, raw and harsh, and it cracked her heart wide open. “Mark, I’m so sorry.”
“I waited for her,” he said quietly. “Took years for me to realize she wasn’t coming back. And somewhere along the way, I just turned into a bitter, angry kid who’d rather tell the world that both his parents died than deal with what really happened.”
“I don’t blame you.”
“She was dead to me. That’s the truth.” He turned to look at her then, and she saw all the hurt and anger of that abandoned little boy reflected in his eyes.
She wanted to fling her arms around him and hold him and try to make it okay. But she couldn’t. Those days were past. And besides, nothing could ever make this okay for him. “I hate that you had to go through that, Mark.”
“I know what it’s like to wait for someone, Jess, not knowing when or if they’re coming back. That’s why I had to make a clean break with you when I enlisted. I couldn’t do that to you. I couldn’t leave you here waiting for me.”
“What?” She drew back, reeling from all the information he was throwing at her.
“I should have told you then, but I didn’t know how. I was a stupid, messed-up kid, and all I knew was that I needed the Army to straighten me out before it was too late. Actually…” He paused, and a slight smile curved his lips. “I didn’t even know that much. Your dad gave me a rather strong nudge in the right direction.”
“My dad?” She pressed a hand to her forehead in confusion.
Mark nodded. “He wrote down the address for the recruiting center and told me to get my ass down there and let the Army make me a man.”
