Whisper My Name

Chapter 14

Charles Wright Cabin Outside Telluride, Colorado

I know the women round here

Recognize something good

Even try to take it if they could...

~ This Man is Mine ~ Heart ~

Marlena lay awake for quite awhile after John left her bedroom, trying to process and understand what he had told her. There had been true grief in his words. Dr. Marlena Evans understood exactly why John had pushed her away when she returned from the dead. His fear. His grief. His loss. All of it. Marlena, the woman, was still hurt. She understood why he did it, but because John had always allowed her the freedom to make her own choices, and he had generally supported those choices, she was surprised by it. Her heart was at war with her mind. When John had decided for both of them, and walked away from her in Mexico, he had taken away her autonomy. That was something she would expect from Roman. She would never expect it from John.

She tried to imagine John as one of her patients, separating herself from the personal side of it. A man with no past. A man who'd lost his wife, whom he loved dearly, twice. The night he'd slept with Isabella in Mexico, was the day he knew for certain that he was not Roman Brady. That must have been a crushing blow. Marlena couldn't imagine the sense of grief or loneliness he might have felt. He would have known that the Brady's weren't his family. The children weren't his children. Marlena's hand clapped over her mouth in a small gasping sob, as she realized he would have known at that point that he was going to lose his home...and his job. Of course, he felt it was inevitable that he would lose her, too. His wife. He would be consumed with grief thinking he was losing her for a third time. Even now, as she was angry with him for taking the decision away from her, she couldn't say definitively what her final decision would have been. But she did know that instead of losing her for a third time, John had severed the connection himself. It was a classic grief and trauma response. Push something away before it can hurt you, and John knew, he knew, that he was about to have the rug pulled out from under him. It didn't make what he did acceptable, but it made it understandable.

The problem was she'd been grieving him since she'd returned to Salem the previous August. All of her attempts to get him to open up had failed. She'd tried for months. Everytime she thought they had a breakthrough, or a moment where maybe they might connect, John would abruptly pull away, leaving her feeling cold and empty. When he'd kissed her on the beach in Miami, she'd thought they were finally making headway. When he'd held her close that night in San Cristobal, for the first time in five years, she'd felt as if the pieces were finally falling into place. When Roman had stumbled upon them in the jungle, John's world was upended once again.

The more she thought about that night, the more she started to suspect Isabella. John had been incredibly vulnerable that night. It certainly wouldn't have been the evening to be making life altering decisions. What part did Isabella play? Because Marlena was starting to believe it was much larger than she had anticipated.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Marlena and Roman Brady Residence

Isabella let herself in the back door of Roman and Marlena's house with the key she'd found buried in the side pocket of her purse. She hadn't touched it since Marlena returned to Salem back in August. That was the day she'd left her engagement ring on the coffee table in front of the couch. She and John were engaged, but officially, he hadn't put the ring back on her finger yet. They'd discussed it, but she knew he was trying to plan something special. She didn't even know where the ring was.