The McRae Series 01 - Twelve Days Sam and Rachel

there.
    "I've never been any good at hanging on to the people I love," he said.
    "I am," she said, wrapping her arms around him. "I'm never going to walk away from you. I'm never going to leave you, and I'll never ask you to go."
    And maybe she wouldn't. After all, she never had. Despite all they'd been through. That should have told him something about her and about the two of them. She wasn't going to give up on him, and there was a new strength and determination to her these days. There were times when she seemed determined to have him back, the way things had been before.
    She was right here, too, and he was trying so hard to keep his hands off her. He'd been counting on it getting easier with each passing day, but the last few days, it had been anything but easy.
    "Rachel." He stepped back, trying not to look at the hurt on her face.
    He'd almost given up hope of her ever really wanting him again. But everything could change in a heartbeat. He could find the children's mother tomorrow, and then where would he and Rachel be? He couldn't go back to what they'd had before.
    So when she came toward him again, he blurted out the only thing he could think of to keep her away, the worst thing. "I had a brother once."
    "What?" she said.
    "A brother. Four years younger than I am. You asked me to tell you the worst of it. I had a brother. I told you I have a hard time hanging on to the people I love..."
    "What happened to him, Sam?"
    "I lost him," he said.
    "Lost? How?"
    "At one of the places we went to live. I think, the third place we went, after some time at our great aunt's and our other grandmother's. It was a couple having problems having a baby. They decided to take a chance on me and Robbie. He was only about a year old when our parents died, so he would have been about two and a half when we went to live in that house. I think right from the start, they wanted him. He was so much littler. He didn't have any memory of our parents. I think they liked that. I think they believed they could erase any memories he had of any other home but theirs, and I was the only thing standing in their way. I was... angry. I was so angry, Rachel. And Robbie... he was mine. I was supposed to take care of him. I was all he had left."
    "And he was all you had left," she said.
    Sam nodded. His heart hurt. It hurt so bad.
    "Anyway, they wanted him, and they didn't want me. And in the end, they got him. I got into trouble at school one too many times, and before long I was seeing a counselor and labeled a troublemaker. They told everyone all kinds of stuff about me, and I was so mad by then. I knew what they were after. They adopted Robbie, and they gave me to social services. To a foster home. I didn't care about anything then. Not after they took my brother from me."
    "You never saw him again?"
    "Not until right after you and I lost our baby."
    "You found him?"
    "I had to know what happened to him. Losing the baby... I just had to know."
    "And he was okay?"
    "Sure. Had a great life. Had no idea who I was."
    "Oh, Sam," she gasped.
    He shrugged his nothing-can-hurt-me shrug. What a crock.
    "You left it at that?" Rachel asked. "With him not knowing?"
    "He didn't even recognize me. He introduced himself to me using their last name and asked if he was supposed to know me." Sam winced at the way that hurt, even now. "What was there to say to him? I told him I thought I knew him, asked him about his family. He was happy, Rachel. They'd never even told him about me or our parents. He was only about four when they got rid of me. I guess it's not that surprising he wouldn't remember."
    "And you just let it go? You let him go?"
    "Think about it. He missed all the crap. Losing his parents and getting passed around from place to place. I wouldn't give that back to him for anything in this world. As far as he knew, he just had two parents who'd always loved him and wanted him. The truth was that his so-called parents had been lying to him his whole life and had neatly disposed of me. Do you think he would have thanked me for telling him that? It would have destroyed his whole life, and I know what that feels like. I wouldn't do it to him."
    "Oh, Sam," she said. It seemed that was all she could say.
    He finally looked at her, not wanting to think about what he'd see in her eyes but unable to stop himself from looking. Pity? He couldn't say. Horror? That part he was sure of. Shock? No surprise there. Anger? He loved her for that, for her outrage on