Текст книги "Bad Boy's Baby"

Автор книги: Sosie Frost

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Текущая страница: 27 (всего у книги 28 страниц)

Chapter Twenty – Zach

Fuck, my head hurt.

Throbbing pain.

I couldn’t think. I couldn’t see.

And Shay begged me to come to some goddamned dinner party for her and her friends.

I couldn’t fucking stand up without the world spinning. I’d puke before I made it downstairs. God fucking forbid I stain her Daddy’s precious rug. We weren’t living in a house. It was a shrine to her own damn insecurities—some place she didn’t feel at home and wanted nothing more than to forget.

My phone buzzed. The sound grated through my skull and burrowed just to detonate an explosive charge.

Gretchen.

I shoved the phone off my nightstand and ignored it for the fourth time. She wanted to know how the physical went. But she knew the prognosis. Reminded me of it every goddamned day. Christ, she even wrote the damn prescription that fucked everything up.

Gretchen could figure it out.

But Shay wondered about the physical went too.

Jesus fucking Christ.

I liked it when I was the only one worrying about my own goddamned future. I already let the squad down. The last thing I wanted was Shay’s pity. Or her getting pissed off because I lied. Or that she’d find yet another reason to deny what she felt for me.

I tried to stand. My legs buckled under me. I sat on the edge of the bed. The motion blinded me like a punch to the gut and kick to the head, and I didn’t know which was worse.

Why the hell was I at the mansion? I was goddamned lucky I didn’t kill anyone on the drive over. My hotel had black-out curtains and enough whiskey to dull every pain. But Shay called, and I came running, like a damned masochist who needed his balls smashed one last time.

What the hell did she want from me? She acted like she wanted me gone, so I left. Then she summoned me back to talk.

Nothing to talk about. She only had to answer one question.

Did she fucking want me or not?

Apparently, it was a harder question than I thought. Shay acted distant. She hid something, and it wasn’t that she desperately loved me.

If she didn’t trust me enough to reveal her secrets, then why would I tell her about my failed physical?

I blamed Shay for my misery, but it wasn’t her fault. In my fucking shame, I lied to her about the doctor’s verdict. I was too goddamned scared to tell her the truth, too scared she wouldn’t give me a reason to stick around. Shay guarded herself with an emotional mine-field. Stepping on an IED once was enough.

I could tell her I loved her. I could tell her I’d stay with her.

I could tell her my headache was so excruciating all I wanted was to lay in a darkened room in her arms and wait for the pain to finally kill me.

Who the hell know what she’d do then. If she’d care. Shay didn’t seem the family type unless she was obsessing over me being her step-brother.

Why even bother?

I grabbed a duffle bag and threw my clothes inside. My time in the service meant I packed light. Most of my real shit was in storage. Shay never asked. She assumed I looked for a free ride. The easy way out. A money-grab.

She even didn’t try to love me. She fought it with every beat of her heart and did her best to think the worst of me.

I thought pretty fucking low of myself too. Didn’t need her disappointment to double it.

I slung my duffle bag over my shoulder, pocketed my phone and keys, and headed out the back staircase.

Shay, of course, found me in the kitchen.

And, God, did she look stunning.

Either my vision blurred or Shay stood in a halo of gold. The black cocktail dress clung to her curves, and her rich, beautiful skin begged for a trail of kisses along the soft darkness. The neckline plunged low, just enough to tease the sweet swell of her breasts.

Breasts that looked plumper, more tempting than I remembered.

Fuck. The bounce of her chest reminded me of what I’d miss when I walked out the door. Her quick smile would make me regret leaving.

“I didn’t think you’d show,” she said.

“I got your text.”

For a split second, a burst of gratitude gentled her. It disappeared as she glanced over my jeans.

“You aren’t dressed!” Shay started to pace the kitchen. I assumed she hid from her guests. “We’re supposed to be all fancy.”

Her asshole friends tried to make amends by throwing her a formal dinner party—even if Shay paid for it all. They hired a party planner to organize cocktails, entertainment, menus, all the bullshit that came from the money Shay never wanted to acknowledge.

She had her hair, makeup, and nails done for the event. Her ebony curls fell over her shoulders and down her back. Her lips puffed, begging for a kiss. She was the most beautiful, stunning woman I never met, and I walked away from her. From happiness and pleasure and every chance I had at finding a life beyond the service.

What the hell was wrong with me?

Why didn’t she want me?

“I’m not staying.” My voice raged in my ears, too loud for me to handle. I shook my head. It didn’t help clear the ache or the ringing. “I’m out.”

Shay groaned. She leaned over the island in the kitchen, pushing away a platter of prosciutto wrapped melon that apparently disgusted her.

“Zach, I told them you’d be here. They wanted to meet you.”

She didn’t get what I said, but I couldn’t decipher what she wanted. Why the fuck was everything so loud? Clatters. Crashes. Laughter from the front room.

“You have to meet them,” she said. “It’ll look rude if you don’t.”

“Bullshit.” My voice rasped. “You want me here because you couldn’t deal with them alone in your big mansion where you fuck your step-brother.”

“Real classy, Zach. It isn’t about that.”

“Like hell.”

She eased away from the food. “What’s gotten into you?”

“You tell me.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” She crossed her arms, like it’d protect her or something. All it did was push those beautiful breasts higher. “Christ, you’ve been acting so weird. First you storm out of the house for a week with no contact, and now you come back to piss with me?”

“I’m just realizing a few shings.” Did I slur? What the hell? I cleared my throat. “Things. I’m figuring shit out.”

“Zach, is that your luggage?”

“Yeah.”

Her voice caught. “Are you…leaving?”

Like it mattered. Like it wasn’t what she already wanted.

“Where are you going?”

“Anywhere.”

I didn’t care where it was, so long as I got away from the bright lights and the echoing ring blasting through my ears. I rubbed my forehead. It didn’t help.

 “But…” She kicked the door closed as laugher from the parlor flooded in. It picked at my head—tiny needles imbedding in my skull and breaking off. Better than the usual vice that crushed me. “I know we’ve had a rough week—”

“A rough week? Shay, for Christ’s sake, we’ve never had a good week.”

“That’s not true.”

“I’m not dealing with this anymore. You never wanted me here. You never wanted me to have the money. You never wanted to fall in love with me. So that’s it.” I held her stare as the tears crossed her cheeks. Oh fuck. Each drop burnt through me. “I’m out. Done. Take the mansion. It’s yours. Take the inheritance. I’ll sign it over to you.”

“Zach—”

“All I wanted was a shot with you.” I rubbed my eyes. Nothing helped the pain and now my fucking heart broke on top of it. “I fucking love you, Shay. But if you need time or have to think about it, then I got my answer. Enjoy your house. Enjoy your money.”

“Zach, you don’t understand.”

I pushed away from the island. Mistake. The walls bent and the floor buckled. I stumbled. Shay rushed forward to steady me. I didn’t need her help. Just waited for the ear-piercing ringing to stop echoing in my goddamned brain.

I blinked. It didn’t clear my vision. Shay was a dark shadow against a burst of light.

Something was wrong.

She gripped my arm, her voice sounded hollow and distant.

“Zach, please. I’m scared. You have to hear me out.”

Too late. I tried to understand. She didn’t want to open up to me.

I pulled away. She didn’t let me go.

“I’m pregnant!”

Now the ground really did slip from under me. I grabbed the island again. My heart thumped too hard, too fast, too out of rhythm.

“You’re…”

“Oh, my God, Zach, your nose.”

Shay rushed to find a napkin. Blood immediately stained through the cloth.

“Are you okay?” Her voice trembled. “Talk to me, Zach. What’s wrong?”

Pregnant.

She was pregnant.

And I was leaving her.

Her exact fucking fear.

I had to right it. I had to tell her I was sorry. I had to hold her.

Pregnant.

I couldn’t talk. My body seized tight.

One hell of a way to react when I was told I’d be a father. First the scariest and greatest fucking words I’d ever heard in my life, and then the reaper decided to take what he forgot to grab in Iraq.

The crippling pain stole my vision, speech, tightened and ruined every muscle in my body.

“Zach!” Shay grabbed me as I fell. “Zach, what’s wrong—”

Then the world turned dark, and I was lost in the peace after the IED once again.

Only this time, I wasn’t alone.

Shay was there.

And in her?  A baby. My baby.

I hoped I lived to see him.

Chapter Twenty One – Shay

I hoped I wouldn’t step foot in a hospital for nine months.

Hell, I only just allowed myself to imagine what it’d be like to even have a baby.

I finally let myself think of holding her. Nursing her. Nudging Zach in the middle of the night when it was his turn to soothe her as she started to cry. I wanted nothing more than to see my powerful SEAL loaded with tattoos cradle a tiny bundle in his thick arms.

The thought put a lump in my throat and a curl in my toes.

If it could come true.

A week passed since I realized I was pregnant. Seven days since I argued with Zach. Five days since I worked up the courage to look through pictures my father left. Four days since I tried to contact him.

And two hours since he collapsed in the kitchen.

I never meant to keep the baby a secret from him.

The fantasy of Zach earning his baby’s smile was replaced with a new fear. Skyping with him whenever he was at liberty to call home. Going into labor alone. Dreading any knock at the door that might be the news any army family feared.

I could buy a lot of things for my child. The best clothing, education, opportunity.

But a father was priceless.

All the more reason my heart shattered in the waiting room.

Zach fell limp in my arms. Seizured. Bled so much from his nose, Azariah forced me to change before driving me behind the ambulance to the hospital. I wore Zach’s shirt and a pair of sweat pants with formal heels. Azariah promised to get me something to eat from a restaurant across the street.

I couldn’t think of hiding anything now. I managed a classy and dignified I’m pregnant, I want ice-cream between sniffles.

Azariah didn’t question it. She brought me ginger ale, a hot fudge sundae, and bitched out the nurse who claimed she was on break when she refused to find information on Zach.

I didn’t even know what happened to him?

He was fine one minute…and then…

Two hours in the hospital with no news drove me crazy. Between the nerves, morning sickness, and ill-fated citrus bruschetta hors d’oeuvres, I should have waited for the doctor while sitting on the floor in the nearest bathroom stall.

It was a strange thing for my worst fear to come to life.

I wasn’t ready for this. Getting pregnant should have been my biggest shock for the week. It was supposed to be a woman’s most crazy revelation. Instead, life threw me for a loop then, mid-way through the ride, crashed my ass down.

Azariah forced me to sit instead of pacing, but I couldn’t handle her hovering. Now wasn’t the time to piece together just how, where, why I ended up pregnant. She was a big girl. She’d figure it out. I sent her back to the house to clean up, glad for the quiet.

Another hour passed and nothing from the nurses or doctors. I bumbled through my purse for change before discovering the vending machine took credit cards. Halloween came early.

…Until the machine stuck and I hulk-raged to dislodge the candy bar and scared a passing orderly. Was it too soon to get an epidural?

I returned to my perch with a Kit-Kat I purchased and a Milky Way that dropped in its own terror. I didn’t open either. I sipped my ginger ale but regretted giving up coffee because the internet said it might be dangerous for the baby.

Were mocha frappachinos bad too? I mean, the baby needed to get used to it sooner rather than later. Her first words would probably be double pump.

No.

Her first word would be Dada.

I wouldn’t let it happen any other way.

“Shay?”

I bolted to my feet, punting the ginger ale into an unfortunate plant. I turned, candy bars in hand. Gretchen met me with a cautious smile.

“Hey,” she said. “How is he?”

Oh, guilt tasted about as good as morning sickness. I hated how I’d acted around Zach’s pretty blonde doctor, but she didn’t hold a grudge. She hugged me.

“I haven’t heard anything yet,” I swallowed. “He didn’t look...”

“What happened?”

“He just…fell. He slurred his words, and he kept rubbing his head. Then, boom. He went down. I tried to protect him when he…he…seizured. I don’t know anything else.”

Gretchen nodded. “I did my residency here. I’ll find someone who still owes me a favor and ask about Zach.”

“Thank you.”

“Don’t worry,” she said. “He’s a fighter. He’ll pull through.”

Pull through what? What the hell could completely level a six foot four, two hundred and fifty pound beast of pure muscle?

Gretchen snuck through the nurses’ station and ducked though the double doors. She disappeared into the mess of swirling white coats and dashing nurses.

It took her a half an hour to return, and I was proud that I only got sick once. Somehow she knew. She offered me a package of saltines and some apple juice.

“Did you find him?” I asked.

She sighed before sitting. “Yeah, I did. The doctor will be out to talk with us.”

“And?” I didn’t like her delay. My throat closed. “Gretchen?”

“He had some lasting effects from the head trauma he sustained in combat. An un-ruptured aneurysm. He’s heading in for surgery now.”

“And that’s…going to fix him, right?”

Gretchen nodded, pulling her hair back into a ponytail from a scrunchie over her wrist. “They caught it before any serious damage, they think. We’ll know more once he’s in recovery.”

“Oh.”

Gretchen’s sigh was a polite frustration. “I told him to get checked out. I didn’t like the headaches. But Zach was too stubborn. Didn’t want anything to prevent him from getting back into the SEALs.” She grunted. “I’m surprised the damn thing didn’t rupture when the doctor denied him the waiver.”

My hand crunched the crackers into dust. I stared at Gretchen. “He was denied?”

She scrunched her nose. “Oh, he…hadn’t told you?”

“He told you?”

“I guessed when I hadn’t heard from him after he returned from D.C.”

“So…he’s not re-enlisting in the SEALs?”

“Nope. And he’s probably pissed.”

No, he was probably heartbroken. Crushed.

I rubbed my belly. He didn’t tell me, but I should have known. He returned from D.C. and rolled with me over every square inch of the library. He took me so aggressively, just to prove his masculinity to himself, as an outlet for the aggression and frustration building in him.

And I never asked. I only argued. I only made it harder on him.

“How far along are you?”

I pulled my hand away from my tummy. Gretchen smiled.

“Sorry,” she said. “I saw the candy and the salty snacks. I assumed it wasn’t stress.”

“You assumed right.”

Gretchen leaned closer. “When did you find out?”

I shrugged. “Only a little bit ago, I’m still wrapping my head around it.”

“Does Zach know?”

I grimaced. “I told him just before he went down. Thinking that wasn’t the best time.”

“Men are so melodramatic.”

I felt bad laughing. Gretchen took my hand.

“How…” The nausea flared. I stuffed crackers in my mouth until I convinced my body I was a chipmunk instead of an expectant mother.

Gretchen understood. “Zach and my brother served together. But Robby died in the same attack that almost killed Zach. He said that Robby was the reason he had a chance to live, so he vowed to take care of me.” She shrugged. “When he got his trust, he gave me the money to open my own practice. Said it was the least he could do.”

Of course he did. It was never about the money. Not with him.

Gretchen looked nervous, twisting her fingers in her lap. “I promised to keep an eye on him after his injury. I should have done a better job.”

“You didn’t know.”

“Those headaches…”

“He hid them. He wouldn’t have told anyone.”

Not even me. Or was I not listening?

Gretchen looked up. “Do you love him?”

The lump formed in my throat. It didn’t feel right to say it if he wasn’t there.

“He invaded every aspect of my life. Now I can’t imagine one without him.”

“Hold onto that. It’ll get him through this.”

I ran a hand through my hair. “Is the surgery dangerous?”

“Doctor Milbower will do the procedure. He’s very good.”

That wasn’t my question, and her answer scared the hell out of me. “I don’t want good. I want the best.”

Gretchen’s eyebrow rose. I met her gaze.

“I mean the best,” I said. “Find out who he or she is. I’ll pay for their airfare, for their lodging, and for whatever they’d charge to do this surgery.”

“Shay, it doesn’t work this way.”

She wasn’t the first person to underestimate my bank account. “For me it does. Price is no option. I want Zach healed, better than he was before. Can you help me?”

Gretchen smiled. “You really do love him, don’t you?”

“I’m not going to miss my chance to tell him.”

Chapter Twenty Two – Zach

Most men didn’t survive getting their heads nearly blown off. I wasn’t most men.

I once considered myself fortunate for surviving the IED. After waking up in the hospital the second time, I decided I was the luckiest son of a bitch still barely breathing.

The miracles kept on coming. My eyes focused on the chair next to my bed. Shay curled in the cushions, softly sleeping.

I had enough opiates pumping through me to clear out a whole poppy field in Afghanistan, but I trusted my blurry vision.

Shay was the most beautiful woman on the planet. A woman I almost let slip through my fingers. Someone challenging and courageous and so damn vulnerable it hurt my own heart.

She had to be mine. I wasn’t giving her up.

That was a shit-ton to take in while a half dozen tubes pricked me in a variety of uncomfortable locations. I smelled antiseptic. I tasted dry chemicals. I was pretty sure my head cracked open again.

But there she was. Sleeping by my side in a hospital room.

Like she cared.

Like she loved me.

And it only took a brush with death to get her to admit it.

I shifted. I couldn’t remember a damn thing besides getting upset. I yelled at her. I threatened to leave for some bullshit reason. I might have given her my half of the estate.

But she trumped me. Had I not crashed against the ground, her revelation would have laid me out flat.

She was pregnant.

My heart monitor beeped too fast. It woke her. Shay’s gasp warned me, but I didn’t have time to adjust the tubes pouring every type of liquid from me. She collapsed at my side.

I welcomed the soft brush of her lips against mine, the herald to her chastisement.

“Don’t you ever scare me like that again, Zach Harden. You had me pacing for five hours while they knocked out your skull and put it back together.”

“Sorry about that.” The words rasped. I managed a smile instead. “I’ll be more considerate next time.”

“Hell no. There is no next time. This is it, Zach. You’re done. No more scrambling inside your brain, you hear me?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Glad we have that straight.”

Shay brushed my cheek. If I weren’t so hopped up on pain-killers, I might have felt it. But having her close was just as good.

“What the fuck am I doing here?” I asked.

She smirked, but I saw through it. She took my hand.

“Your head tried to explode,” she said.

“That the technical term?”

“You had an un-ruptured aneurysm. Something that formed after the trauma from your injury. It was…bad.”

“Shit.”

“Yeah.”

I wiggled my toes, fingers, and flexed the most important part of me. All in working condition.

“How am I alive?”

Shay looked damn proud of herself. “I pulled some strings.”

“What kind of strings?”

“I flew in the best neurosurgeon in the country. Private plane even. Got him from Pittsburgh within two hours. He was more than happy to help once I offered my checkbook.”

“Wow.” I snorted. “Look at you. Using that trust fund.”

“I’d have spent every last cent if it kept you…” She looked away. “If it healed you.”

It wasn’t what she wanted to say, but I was glad that fear left her. I squeezed her hand.

“Gretchen?”

“She knows. She was here. She went to her office this morning, but she’s stopping in to check on you. She helped get the neurosurgeon. I dropped her name, said that you were a war vet, and I added an extra zero to his cost estimate. He came running.”

I shifted. The drugs, surgery, and bed held me damn firm, but I extended my arm. Shay helped to place my hand on her belly. She smiled—a hopeful, gentle smile.

So I had to be an ass.

I tugged on the shirt. “You’re wearing my shirt again.”

“Oh, stop it.”

I pressed against her. She was warm, but I couldn’t tell anything else. No bump. No swell. No indication anywhere that she had a little baby inside of her.

I thought we were being careful? Apparently, I was a damn miracle machine. My first injury, a baby even with contraception, and now an aneurysm?  I used up my nine lives and created more.

Still, I hated myself for not knowing she was pregnant. I should have hauled ass to get her ice-cream, not pissed around with my own impatience while waiting for her to come to her senses and fucking love me.

“I’m sorry,” I said.

“You never say that.”

“I probably should say it more. Maybe it might have helped.”

Shay swallowed. “I didn’t tell you.”

I didn’t want to take my hand away. How the hell did something so small affect me so much? “Why?”

“I was just…scared.”

“Of what?” I drew my gaze to hers. Those almond eyes were pure elegance.

“Of losing you. Raising a baby alone. That you’d deploy and we’d never see you again.” She rubbed my hand, pressing me harder against her belly. “I was afraid of telling you because I didn’t understand how I felt.”

“Do you understand it now?”

“Yes.”

 I didn’t know if it was the brain surgery, pain meds, or the lingering effects of the anesthesia, but Shay went quiet.

“You didn’t tell me you weren’t permitted to re-enlist,” she whispered.

“You didn’t tell me you were pregnant.”

“Yeah, but I already told you why I was afraid.”

“I wasn’t afraid.” The drugs made it hard to lie. “I didn’t want you to think less of me. I didn’t want me to think less of me. I spent my entire life training to serve in the military. Suddenly I couldn’t do it. I didn’t know what to do. What I had left.” She sat too far away from me, but I couldn’t pull her any closer. “Now I know exactly what I have.”

Shay stilled. “What’s that?”

“You. If you let me in.” I managed a grin. “If you let me stay.”

“That’s what you want?”

“Shay, I’m so goddamned in love with you, if I weren’t tethered to this fucking bed, I’d get on my knee and chase you around until you promised to stay with me forever.”

“Forever is a long time.”

“Forever will never be enough time with you.”

“Zach—”

“I don’t know how to prove my love to you,” I said. “I wouldn’t even know how to begin. But you have to know that you are the reason I’m staying. Not because some doctor rejected me or my head scrambled. I love you, Shay. I want a life with you.”

Her eyes welled with tears—terrified but overjoyed. She couldn’t help but touch her belly. I had a feeling we’d be doing a lot of that.

If she let me.

Christ, I hope she’d let me.

“Say it,” I said. “Don’t fight me anymore. Forget our parents’ marriage. Forget the money. Forget the house. Just look at me.”

Shay shook her head. “I can’t forget those things, Zach. They’re what led me to you.”

“Will they keep you from me?”

Her smile warmed me. “No. Not anymore.”

“You’re sure?”

“More certain than I’ve ever been.”

I nestled into my pillows. Shay wasn’t the only one who avoided commitment. I never heard anyone say it to me. I wondered if it’d be just as sweet as I imagined.

“Zach, I’m in love with you.”

Nope. I was wrong. It was far sweeter. Beautiful. Perfect.

Nothing better in the world, and I was attached to a line of morphine.

She leaned in again for a simple kiss, but there was nothing simple about it, not after speaking those words. Not after nearly dying in her arms. Not after learning our passion created the life tucked secret within her belly.

I thought my life fell apart without my job. Instead, I was given a chance for a happiness I didn’t know if I fucking deserved, but I sure as hell wasn’t blowing.

I brushed her hair behind her ear and kissed her again.

“You and me,” I whispered. “We’re gonna start a family. We’re going to love each other. And we’re going to be good to each other. That’s the way it’ll happen.”

“You think so?”

“I know so. The instant I get out of this bed, I’m proving it to you.”

She smiled. “You just had surgery. You need to rest. Really rest.”

“I’ll have plenty of time while I’m taking care of you and the baby.”

“I’m supposed to be the one reassuring you.”

“Me?” I shrugged. It hurt. I reminded myself not to do that again. “I’m still in one piece. Much better than my last stay in the hospital. This recovery will be easy.”

“Why?”

“Because I have you.” I pulled her close again. “I love you.”

Finally the walls came down. No hesitations. No excuses. Just me and her and absolute honesty.

“I love you too.”