Free No Longer Mine by Shiloh Walker Page A

accepted that,” she said, shrugging and looking away from him. “It wouldn’t do any good to rant and rave now.”
    Damn, I’m good. Nikki could almost believe it herself, almost convince herself her heart wasn’t bleeding inside. But the past seemed like it was just yesterday, the pain still every bit as true as it had been then.
    But convincing herself wasn’t what mattered. All she had to do was convince him. Make sure he didn’t know she hadn’t accepted or dealt with anything, at least not very well. Make sure he didn’t know she woke up crying at night for their son…and yes, very often for him.
    Frowning, Wade stared at her. With a heavy sigh, he looked away. “How have you been doing the past few years? Did you finish college?”
    “No.” How could she tell him that she’d never gone back, that her interest in it had been gone, that she’d been too depressed to care about a nursing career at that time? And later, when she had been interested, the doctor had strictly forbidden it. She hadn’t needed that stress then. After that, when she had Jason, she had been too happy, too satisfied to need anything else.
    And now…now she just didn’t care. About anything.
    “Why not?” Wade asked, another frown darkening his face. “I guess with as big as your books got, you didn’t need it, but it always seemed to be one of the most important things in your life. That and writing.”

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    Shiloh Walker
    “No,” she corrected. “ You were the most important thing. Writing is just a part of me. Nursing fell way below you.”
    Closing his eyes, Wade swore quietly under his breath. “Damn it, Nikki. You always did know how to twist the knife.”
    Nikki ignored him as she added, “Besides, nursing didn’t seem quite so important once things with the books took off. A writing career turned out to be a lot more demanding than I’d expected anyway.
    Writing turns out only to be half of what I end up doing. I didn’t need to juggle both, so I decided not to.” A half-truth. Nursing school fell by the wayside and she never made the attempt to pursue it as writing became her focus. But for a while even writing hadn’t mattered all that much.
    Writing had still been important, but it hadn’t been the all-consuming passion it had once been. It was important because it was a job, how she provided for her son.
    It wasn’t until Jason was suddenly gone that she started to cling to her writing like it was a lifesaver.
    During her pregnancy and while Jason had been alive, she had written only because she had been determined to make certain her son had a good life, better than her own childhood had been.
    Later, after she had come home to an empty house and stared at Jason’s empty room, the need for her stories had resurfaced. Like a drowning man clings to a life preserver, she wrapped herself in her make-believe worlds and tried to forget. And while she wrote, for a little while, she’d been able to.
    Without the stories she would have lost her mind. It was all she had left now…
    A feeling of despair was rising in her, her throat tightening, her eyes stinging. An empty house, a handful of books and an empty nursery.
    Damn it, if you get right down to it, I don’t really have much at all ,she thought bleakly.
    Determined to keep thoughts like that away, she said the one thing guaranteed to help her get back on track, to get refocused and to get him the hell off her mountain.
    “Your daughter looks just like you, Wade. I imagine you and Jamie are very proud of her.”
    “Jamie’s dead.”
    Just as she congratulated herself on the return of her composure, she felt her foundation crumple under her. Shaken to the core, she closed her eyes as his words echoed over in her mind.
    Jamie’s dead. So calmly, so flatly stated. Jamie’s dead.
    “What?” she whispered.
    “Jamie’s dead. She died three years ago, Nikki.”
    It was then that she finally noticed he wore no wedding