Building a Surprise Family

by Anna J. Stewart

  “Yes, please,” Leah said.

  “Him, too?” Ozzy motioned to Lancelot, who lifted his head slightly.

  “Him, too.” She reached down and touched the dog’s head. “You got her here fast, Ozzy. It made all the difference. Believe me.”

  Ozzy could only nod as Cheyenne left them.

  “I’m going to call Paige,” Leah said. “Have her spread the word. Ozzy? You all right?”

  He stared down at Jo’s cell phone, torn between doing what was right and doing what was easy. “I’m fine. I’m going to stick around, walk up with her.”

  “All right. I’ll go to Jo’s and get her things. The less she has to worry or think about, the better. For all of us.”

  When he was alone, he walked to the swinging doors, touched his fingers to the glass as he watched Jo sleep. She was curled up on her side, her skin still pale, but not nearly as drawn as it had been when he’d brought her in. They had an oxygen mask on her face, her hair was beyond messy. He’d never seen a more beautiful sight in his life.

  Love, when it hit, landed with a devastating force and reshaped everything in its wake. Nothing, absolutely nothing would be the same.

  He loved her. Probably had loved her from the moment she’d dropped out of that truck on day one.

  He loved that baby, too. He couldn’t love that little life more if he’d been the father. He trailed his thumb over her cell phone, clicked open her contacts. He found what he’d expected, what he’d told himself he’d take as a sign. Under ICE, in case of emergency, was the name he needed.

  After an encouraging nod from Cheyenne letting him know Jo was all right, Ozzy moved off and made the call.

  * * *

  JO FELT AS if she were being dragged to the surface of a particularly murky lake. Her head hummed and her tongue felt thick. She tried to move her head but had to settle for prying open her eyes, and when she did, the sun had her closing them again.

  “Don’t you dare tell Mom or Dad about this.” The female voice had a familiar ring of frustration to it. “I mean it. Eat it up quick or we’ll both be in—”

  “What are you feeding my dog, Leah?” Jo lifted a hand to her face, but the skin on her arm tugged and kept her from moving very far. It took a moment for her to understand she had an IV. “Oh, wow.” She frowned, memories flashing in her mind like an old filmstrip. “I’m all tied up.”

  “Only for a few days.” Leah moved from her chair and perched on the edge of Jo’s bed. She slipped her hand in Jo’s and held on tight. “Hello, sunshine.”

  Jo laughed weakly, then sucked in a breath when she realized she shouldn’t be moving. She froze, waiting, thinking, wondering when the next cramp was going to hit.

  “How do you feel?” Leah tucked Jo’s hair behind her ear.

  “Thirsty. Hungry.” How could she be hungry? The fog in her brain dissipated and she gasped. “The baby?” She moved her other hand to her stomach and, feeling the familiar, strong flutter, let out a shuddering breath. “It’s okay?”

  Leah nodded. “You’ve been out for the past twenty-four hours. The bleeding’s stopped. Your blood pressure’s down. Looks like you both dodged it, Jo.”

  Lancelot poked his head up onto the mattress and rested his chin inches from Jo’s face. “Hey there, boy.” She reached out to scratch his head. “You really lived up to your name, didn’t you? I thought for sure whoever that was was going to barrel right through me.”

  “He almost did,” Leah said. “What on earth were you doing out there, anyway? You should have called—”

  “I thought Lancelot needed to pee.” She leaned in and sniffed. “Did you feed my dog peanut butter?”

  “Who, me?” Leah blinked wide innocent eyes at Jo. “I wouldn’t do that. But for future reference, he’s a snob about it and definitely likes the high end stuff.”

  “No more people food for you,” she chided the dog, who whimpered and returned to his makeshift bed in the corner of the room. “Ozzy’ll pitch a fit. Where is Ozzy, anyway?”

  “I sent him home to take a shower and change. And hopefully get a little sleep. He’s been here since he brought you in. His parents, too.”

  “His...parents?”

  “They were worried about you. And him,” Leah said.

  “Why would they be worried about me? They haven’t even met me.”

  Leah frowned. “Because they know Ozzy cares about you. All right, it wasn’t exactly your particular experience, Jo, but parents do tend to care when their children are hurting. However old they get.”

  “I guess it’ll just take some getting used to, is all.”

  “What? Being cared about? Kind of comes with the territory in this town.” Leah patted her arm. “It took a lot of persuading to get Ozzy to agree to go home.”

  “I have no doubt.” Jo’s sleepy smile was automatic. “Glad he listened to you, though.”

  “I also figured it would get him out of the line of fire.” Leah shifted on the mattress. “You were touch and go for quite a while, Jo. We weren’t sure what might happen, and Ozzy...”

  “Ozzy what? Leah, what are you talking about?” Dread pooled in her chest. “Oh, no. He didn’t call my mother, did he?”

  “No, I did that. Don’t worry!” Leah added quickly when Jo groaned. “She’s not coming out here.” She hesitated. “Ozzy called Greg.”

  Jo heard the words. She understood the words, or at least their basic meaning, but she couldn’t quite comprehend the implication. Just in case she’d misheard, she only had one question. “Greg who?”

  “You know which Greg. For the record, I didn’t agree with Ozzy, but he only told me after the fact and, well, Greg got here about an hour ago.”

  “He’s really here?” Jo shifted slightly, then remembered she didn’t want to move. “I don’t want to see him. Or talk to him.”

  “I know you don’t,” Leah said quietly. “But clearly Ozzy thinks—”

  “I’m not particularly interested in what Ozzy thinks.” What was it with the man that he thought he knew the best thing for her or this situation? “He had no right calling Greg.”

  “He was listed as your emergency contact,” Leah explained.

  “Because I hadn’t gotten around to updating my phone. Who’s your contact, might I ask?”

  Leah’s spine stiffened. “Well, that’s something I’ll be fixing this evening, obviously. But that’s beside the point. Greg’s here now and you need to talk to him. He looks stressed, Jo. Like he’s worried about you. Maybe you misjudged him?”

  “Maybe he’s realized he made a mistake by walking out on me and our baby?” Jo considered it. Was it possible? And if so, how did she feel about it? Was Ozzy telling her she should give the man another chance? Or giving her the opportunity to finally close the door forever?

  “Can I tell him to come in?” Leah asked.

  “Okay.” She tugged her hand free and covered her face. “You’d better take the dog with you,” she added when Leah stood up. “Better safe than sorry.”

  Leah retrieved Lancelot’s leash and clicked it on, then nudged the animal with her as she headed out. She stopped at the door, said something and then, like moving in slow motion, Greg Chambers strode in.

  He hadn’t changed in the months since she’d last seen him. He was still tall, still blond, wearing that Ken-doll haircut that made him look like a Robert Redford screen double. The fact that he was wearing one of his expensive tailor-made suits and it was wrinkled possibly beyond pressing had her thinking perhaps he’d had a change of heart after all.

  “Hey, Jo.” He offered her his trademark smile, the one that had charmed her but never thrilled her. Not the way Ozzy’s smile did every time she saw him. “How are you doing?”

  “Better than I was a little while ago.” She refused to move, didn’t want to budge and risk bringing the pain back. It was as
if she’d turned into petrified stone in this bed, curled on one side, her knees drawn in. She didn’t plan to go anywhere for a long while. “You didn’t have to come.”

  “I know.” He drew the chair Leah had vacated earlier closer to Jo and kicked the makeshift dog bed out of the way as if it were nothing more than huddled blankets, which, of course, it was. “That Ozzy guy was pretty insistent that I be here considering...” He started to reach out, to take her hand, then changed his mind. “Jo, I’m so sorry.”

  “You are?” Jo blinked. It wasn’t what she’d expected to hear. Was it possible... Had Ozzy been right? Had she misjudged Greg, and all he’d needed was time to get used to the idea of becoming a father?

  “More than I can say,” Greg told her. His silver-blue eyes narrowed in concern. “I can’t imagine how hard this must be for you, but as soon as he told me you were in the hospital and that they weren’t sure about the baby, I took it as a sign.” Now he did take her hand and held it between his. His skin felt clammy, nowhere near the comforting, gentle, pulse-pounding assurance Ozzy’s provided.

  “A sign of what?” She swallowed, difficult to do with such a dry mouth.

  “A sign for us to get back to where we were. Jo, you know we make sense. My family, my coworkers and bosses love you. Heck, they ask about you more than they ask about me. They were really disappointed when I told them we’d broken things off.”

  “We didn’t break things off, Greg. That was all you.”

  “I guess it was.” He shrugged. “But none of that matters now. We can move past this. Together. We can make a new start and—”

  “So you’ve changed your mind.” Jo cut him off. At his blank stare she felt her temper catch. “About the baby. You’ve changed your mind about being a father?”

  “No. No way.” Greg looked baffled. “I’m sure you’re no doubt devastated, but obviously this wasn’t meant to be. Just like we thought from the beginning. We have a clean slate now, Jo. We can—”

  A shivering coldness draped her from head to toe. “You don’t know.” The whispered realization landed like a weight on her heart. “How is it you don’t know? Didn’t Ozzy—”

  “He told me there had been an accident and that you were in the hospital. He said I should be here to help with any decisions that might have to be made. I’ve been trying to get here ever since. Changed flights, hopped all over the place. I only recharged my cell phone—”

  “And when you got here? Who did you speak with?”

  “No one. Just Leah. Ozzy wasn’t around and...” He stopped himself, as if putting the pieces of the puzzle together. “You’re still pregnant.”

  “Yes.” She choked the word out. How could she ever, ever have had feelings for this man? A man who looked devastated all over again—not to hear she’d lost the baby, but to hear she hadn’t. “I think,” she said, clearing her throat, determined to get the words out. “I think this time we can agree that we’re done. Consider yourself absolved from any responsibility for this baby. I’ll make sure my attorney draws up the necessary paperwork that ends your parental rights. You don’t have to worry about ever being known as this child’s father.”

  “Jo, I’m sorry, I—” The befuddlement returned. “I’m just not cut out to be one. I...” He hesitated. “I don’t want to be one.”

  “Glad we’ve cleared that up once and for all,” Jo told him, and breaking her promise to herself to stay put, she rolled onto her other side and closed her eyes. “Goodbye, Greg.”

  She could hear the squeak of his shoes as he left the room, heard the muffled voices and the questions in the air. When someone knocked on the open door, she couldn’t stop herself.

  “I hocked the ring, Greg. Live with it.”

  “Jo?”

  Ozzy.

  She squeezed her eyes shut until she saw stars.

  “I’m so sorry.”

  She could feel his presence, even from several feet away. But she couldn’t look at him. Not right now. “You shouldn’t have called him. I didn’t want you to.”

  When Ozzy didn’t answer, she opened her eyes and looked down to the foot of the bed. He had a ridiculous stuffed panda tucked under his arm and a small “get well” balloon sticking out of an anemic vase of flowers.

  “He had a right to know, Jo.”

  “It wasn’t your place.” Anger continued to bubble around the disappointment and pain that resurfaced at the second rejection, not of her, but of her baby. She touched her stomach, wishing she could hold this infant in her arms and promise it everything was going to be all right. “He doesn’t want this baby. He doesn’t care if it lives or dies. It was devastating enough to hear it the first time, Ozzy. I didn’t need to hear it again.” The words, the detachment, the coolness in Greg’s eyes—how had she ever thought she loved him?

  Because she hadn’t known, she told herself. She hadn’t known what it was like to truly love someone before Ozzy. And she did love him. More than she thought possible.

  And far more than she wanted to.

  “What did he say to you? I’m sorry, I should have been here. I meant to be,” Ozzy continued. “Jo, what did he—”

  “He thought I’d lost the baby.” She closed her eyes again because she couldn’t stand to look at him. She’d never thought Greg could inflict another round of pain, but he had. “He came here thinking we could get back together because the baby was gone.”

  She heard him swallow, then the panic rose in his voice. “Jo, I had no idea. I was afraid... I was worried that if a decision had to be made, that as the baby’s father he should know what was happening.”

  “You were wrong.” She swiped the tears off her cheek. “I’m tired, Ozzy. Please just let me sleep.”

  “Jo, I don’t want to leave you like this. I—”

  “I’m not giving you a choice,” Jo whispered. “You did the one thing I didn’t want done. And you did the one thing I knew you would. You disappointed me, Ozzy. I didn’t call Greg when I was in trouble up at the site. I called you. That should have told you everything you needed to know.”

  “Maybe it should have,” he said. He set the bear and the vase on the table beside her bed. “And I’m sorry I’ve disappointed you. I guess you finally got what you’ve been waiting for.”

  She glared at him. What was that supposed to mean?

  “If you’re going to go through life just waiting for people to let you down, you really will be alone. Calling Greg was the rational thing to do.”

  “For you, maybe.”

  “For all of us. I wanted us to be a family, Jo. Greg or not, I wanted to make this work because I love you. And I love that life you’re carrying around inside of you. But I guess maybe that isn’t enough for you, is it? You expect perfection, and believe me, I am far, far away from that.” He reached out his hand, stroked a finger down her cheek.

  Before he turned and walked out of her life.

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  “OZZY, YOUR MOM and I weren’t expecting you tonight.” His dad stood up from weeding around his rosebushes as Ozzy climbed out of his car. Ozzy felt as if he’d gone ten rounds with a heavyweight champ, and as he’d already run five miles on the beach and didn’t feel like answering a million questions from his friends, this seemed the best place to escape to. “Is everything all right?” his father asked.

  “Rough day.” Rather than heading into the house like he normally did, he leaned back against the hood of the car.

  “We heard about the excitement up at the construction site the other night,” Lyle said, pushing up the brim of his baseball cap. “Your mother’s been baking up a storm since we got home from the hospital. She’s looking forward to you bringing Jo to dinner. How’s she doing?”

  “Better,” Ozzy choked out. “Baby’s just fine, too.”

  “Wild times we’re living in these days, that’s for sure. Your quick thi
nking probably saved them both.”

  Ozzy shrugged.

  “Can’t believe someone would have attacked her like that.” Lyle paused, then looked at Ozzy. “Something on your mind?”

  Heart-to-hearts had never been on the list of father-and-son things for them to do. They’d never quite understood each other, not from the beginning. Maybe that was why Ozzy had let himself get so attached to Jo and her baby. Because he wanted that kind of connection with someone. No. There was no maybe about it. He wanted a family of his own.

  He loved Jo and her baby.

  “I did something, Dad. Something I knew in my gut was the right thing to do.” He shoved his hands into his pockets and shook his head. “Turns out, it wasn’t.” Doing the right thing had cost him everything.

  “You could always be counted on for that, Oswald—doing the right thing, even when you took it upon yourself to rescue your friend Jonah’s frog when you all were kids.” Lyle obviously thought he was making a joke, but it didn’t land. When he realized that, he set his tools down and approached his son. “Would you do it again? This, whatever it is you’ve done?”

  “Yes.” That he knew that made it worse. He short-storied it for his father, leaving out most of the personal details. “She blames me for hurting her again. If I hadn’t called him, we’d have kept moving forward, right in the direction I was hoping for. Now?” He shrugged. “How do I get through to someone who’s afraid of being happy?”

  “Do you know what I’ve always admired about you, Ozzy?”

  Ozzy’s eyebrows shot up. His father had admired him? Since when?

  “Whenever you set your mind to something, you got it done. Half the stuff you were interested in I didn’t understand, could barely fathom, but that determination you had?” Lyle nodded in what looked like amazement. “You were the most tenacious kid, maybe person, in this town. Look at when you decided to take control of your health and lost all the weight. It wasn’t you losing weight that made me proud of you, Ozzy. It was that you made a decision and kept going in the face of daunting odds.” He gestured to the house where Ozzy’s mother was baking and cooking up a storm. “Do you love her?”