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“I can figure out some of it,” Seth said, pulling back his arm.
“I didn’t even know she was pregnant,” I said. “She didn’t tell me. Do you think I’d have let her come back sick if I’d known?”
Seth gritted his teeth as he spoke. “I honestly don’t know. I know the family man you were with Priscilla, but even I can Google up your reputation lately. Maybe you did hear about her and sent her here. Maybe a sick mistress wasn’t what you wanted.”
“No,” I said, turning my focus to Rachel. If I had any odds of making one of them understand, then it was going to be her. “I love her. I’m one hundred percent, earth-shatteringly serious. I love your daughter, and I didn’t mean to fall for her, but I did. I will tear the world apart looking for the best doctors to take care of her. I will do anything to make sure she and the baby stay safe. Do you understand?”
Rachel nodded although her lips were set for a minute in a firm line. “I’m angry that you betrayed our trust, but I can see you now. I can see your eyes, and you can’t fake that kind of worry or care. I get that. So, please, come and see Iris and give her some strength and hope. She’ll need every ounce she can get to last the next five months.” Rachel threaded her arm through mine and led me down the hallway.
The guards and entire crowd disbursed, and I didn’t look back to see what Seth had done. Maybe he’d gone for a snack or to find where their son David had snuck off to. Maybe he was going to sneak outside for a smoke, since he still did that when he was upset, no matter what he told Rachel.
Oh Rachel.
I’d known her almost thirty years, and I felt like a right pillock and bastard for violating her trust this way.
“I’m sorry.”
Rachel shook her head. “No, you’re not. But I honestly don’t care right now. Iris is stable, but she’s in pain, and she’s very scared. If you being by her side every day is the difference between her being dead or alive, between losing my grandchild and saving it, then that’s what matters.”
“I really fucked things up, didn’t I?”
She stopped at the edge of the hospital room and patted my shoulders. “You did, but now you have a chance to fix it. Please, start doing that, Callum. Reward what faith I have left in you.” Rachel didn’t leave me time to answer before hurrying down the hall and back to the rest of her family I assumed.
Slowly, I walked into the room. Iris lay on the bed under several thin hospital blankets. They were stacked on top of each other to try and keep her warm in this ice-cold place with too much A.C., and she looked small and vulnerable underneath them. I wanted to let her rest, to give her time to be at peace after all the pain, but maybe she could sense me. Maybe my shoes made too much noise on the linoleum. Either way, she stirred and gaped when she saw me.
“Am I dreaming again?”
Despite everything, I had to smirk at that. “So, you’ve had dreams about me before, luv. Wish you’d admitted it back then.”
She shook her head. “You can’t be here. How did you even know? Did Allison tell you? I…what’s going on?”
I circled the bed and came to stand at its foot. As much as I wanted to scoop her into my arms and hold both her and the baby close, I needed to get everything off my chest. She’d hurt me, lied to me, and disappeared. I wanted to understand what the fuck was going on and where we were going from here.
No, fucking scratch that.
She was my vixen, my girl, and as long as she was alive, I’d fight for her. Even if Iris couldn’t see that, I’d keep reminding her. Our family was owed
that much.
“I’d like to know that too.” Crossing my arms over my chest, I stared down at her. “Why didn’t you tell me?”
“About the baby?” she asked sheepishly, her brown eyes darting around the room in some desperate effort to look anywhere but at me.
“Yes. Your dad called. Seth was asking around for some unlucky millennial in the office who’d sullied you and left you sick. Imagine my shock when I found out that the woman I loved was half a planet away bleeding out and possibly losing our child.”
She blinked. “Say that again.”
“I was scared for both of you. I love you both, the baby since the moment I bloody well heard, and I have to hear about all of this in a panicked hospital phone call.”
“You love me?” she asked, her lower lip trembling as if she were a scared little rabbit twitching her nose before me.
That broke me then, that she could have any doubt in her mind.
Rushing forward, I made my way around her bed and kissed her. She was cold to my touch, and I hated that. As soon as the doctors gave us permission, I was taking her to the best hotel suite in the city, and she’d be stuck there on bed rest with me watching her every minute. Anything she needed and was allowed to have would be at her beck and call within a moment. But all of that pampering, all of that cautious care had to start with getting her to understand that she meant the world to me.
Without her and our child, things would be so dark. I couldn’t go through a loss so big ever again.
It would crush me.
