“Oh… is that some kind of rule?” I say in confusion, hoping I’m not about to get my head chopped off by the knife in her hand. I mean, you hear stories about pregnant women all the time.
“No,” she groans. “It’s just my rule.”
“Ok, well why don’t you just paint it yellow or one of those gender-neutral colors, or just find out the sex,” I say, trying to be helpful as I turn back to the chopping board and get back to peeling the carrots.
She lets out a low groan as she shakes her head at the chicken. “First off, my baby is not having a yellow room, and secondly, I want the sex to be a surprise,” she says. “Can you imagine how good it will be pushing it out and then being told if it’s a girl or a boy? It would be the biggest possible reward after going through all that pain,” she tells me with stars in her eyes.
I nod along, not really understanding it at all. I mean, maybe if it was my own child I’d get it, but it goes straight over my head, so I nod along and just go with it. “What do you think it is?” I question.
At that, the softest, dreamy expression crosses her face before she turns and looks at me. “I don’t know, but I have this feeling it’s a little girl.”
“Oh yeah,” I smile. “I can imagine Luke with a girl.”
“Me too, he’d have to buy a gun.”
“Fuck that,” I laugh. “I’ll be buying one too.”
She shakes her head and laughs with absolute joy in her eyes, making it clear that she loves the fact that her child will have all these protective men surrounding it, whether it’s a boy or a girl, this child will always have someone right there for it. No matter what.
I finish up with the carrots and am just about done with everything else when I look over to see Lexi completely doing a hack job on the chicken. “For fuck’s sake,” I groan as I place my hand over hers and take the knife away from her. “Go and sit your ass down before you destroy it.”
She gives up the knife without a fight and walks around the counter with a smug as fuck grin on her face before sitting down at the dining table to watch the show.
I get on with fixing the mess she’s just made when she pipes up. “I think we should do some potatoes too. He likes those little bastards.”
I let out a huff and resist telling her ‘your wish is my command’ as I know she’ll take it way too literally. I finish up with the chicken and get them in the pan before stopping by the fridge and pulling out the stupid potatoes. “Do you want them mashed, steamed, or roasted?”
She gives me a blank expression. “Um… mashed?” she says.
Fuck that. I’m roasting.
I put the spuds out on the chopping board and get started. Once the first one is out of the way, I look up at Lex and start ordering her around again. “Could you find a tray and then pre-heat the oven?”
She jumps up out of her spot and I grin to myself as she does the awkward pregnant walk. After searching through nearly every cupboard, she finally finds a tray and comes over to start putting the potatoes in.
I grab another potato and get back to work. The knife comes down as I pay attention to what Lex is doing when I misjudge and slice the knife straight through the palm of my hand. “Fuck,” I roar as the sharp stinging instantly begins to burn.
Blood spills out over my hand and the countertop. I slap my other hand over the top to try and stop some of the bleeding while Lex stares at my hand with wide eyes. “Holy shit,” she shrieks before getting into gear and racing around the kitchen. I make my way over to the sink as she finds some paper towel and thrusts it into my face. “How bad is it?” she questions as she turns on the tap.
I run my hand under the water and it instantly turns to a sea of blood. “Shit,” I groan as the sting continues. “I think it’s bad,” I say sucking air in through my teeth while not really wanting to raise my other hand off it. Though, I have no choice I need to see the damage done in order to fix it.
With a cringe, I slowly peel my hand off the cut and take a look while the water continues to wash away the stream of blood pouring from my hand. “Fuck,” Lex says with wide eyes. “That’s a good one. You’re going to need stitches.”
“Yep,” I agree.
“Hurry up and cover that shit up,” she says. “My stomach’s getting queasy.”
I do as she says and put my hand back over the top before applying pressure. “Don’t you have some weird blood disorder. Shouldn’t you be used to this shit?”
“I do, but I’m used to seeing my blood. Not other peoples,” she tells me before finding a first aid kit and pulling out a shit load of bandages and gauze. “Here,” she says as she grabs some more paper towel.
I thrust my hand her way and she quickly dries it off before grabbing the gauze. “We’re going to have to do this quick,” she warns.
I cringe as the blood loss is starting to make me feel a little light headed. “Just do it,” I say.
“Alright,” she says. “On three. One. Two. Three.”
I rip my hand off the cut and she instantly replaces it with a shitload of gauze. It’s only been there a second and it’s already starting to soak through with blood. “Here,” she says, adding a little more and holding it down tightly while she reaches for the bandages.
I hold the gauze down while she starts to bandage up my hand and before we know it, our botch first aid job is complete. “Keep your hand in the air,” she tells me. “Let gravity do its thing. You won’t lose as much blood this way.”
I do as she says and watch as she grabs her keys off the dining table. I grab some more paper towel and try to clean away some of the blood spilled all over the bench. “Don’t worry about it,” Lex says. “I’ll clean it up when I get back. You need to get stitches first.”
I let out a sigh as I look at the mess in the kitchen. I don’t like leaving it this way, but I don’t think I have a choice. I walk over to the forgotten stove and turn it off before flicking the nobs on the oven as well. “Sorry,” I cringe. “I kind of ruined your dinner.”
“Don’t stress,” she says. “Shit happens.”
With that, we walk out the door and get up into her truck. The engine is running and she’s backing out of her spot in the blink of an eye. As she races towards the ER, I can’t help but think that I’ve ruined their night. I promise myself that I’ll make it up to them, I just don’t know how yet.
We get to the hospital and I walk in with Lexi pulling at my arm to hurry me up as though she thinks I’m about to die. Though I get it, if our roles were reversed right now, she’d have to go fast as her blood condition would have her completely bleeding out, but for me, the bandage is doing pretty good.
Lexi finds a seat in the waiting area as I go up to the nurse’s desk and give them my information. There are heaps of people here so it could be a bit of a wait, so with a sigh, I go back over to Lex and take a seat beside her, only to hear the end of the message she’s leaving for Luke.
“You have to hurry,” she says with urgency. “Jace got hurt. There was blood everywhere. We’re at the hospital.” With that, she hangs up the call and I stare at her blankly.
“You forget to tell him that I’m not dying,” I tell her. Her eyebrows furrow as she looks to me in confusion. “Your message,” I clarify. “You made it sound like an emergency. The poor guy will freak out when he gets that.”
Her mouth pops open. “Are you kidding?” she questions. “This is an emergency. You could have died in my house and I would have had to deal with it.”
“I wasn’t going to die. I cut my hand a bit.”
“A bit?” she gasps. “Any deeper and you would have severed your whole hand. My kitchen looks like a bloodbath.”
I roll my eyes at her dramatics and lean back in my chair to get comfortable for the long wait. “You don’t have to stay,” I tell her. “I’ll be fine if you wanted to salvage what’s left of your anniversary.”
“No thanks,” she says as she makes a show of getting comfortable. “I’m good here.”
Precisely an hour later, Luke comes storming through the doors of the Emergency Room and looks around in pure panic. His eyes come to a stop on me before traveling from my head, down to my toes, and back up again. “Oh,” Lexi murmurs beside me. “I see what you mean.”
“Yeah,” I grunt as Luke comes tearing across the waiting room.
“What the fuck is going on? What happened?” he questions as he looks between me and Lexi, probably wondering why the hell we’re together.
“Nothing, man,” I say, holding up my hand. “Just a little accident. I’m fine.”
“You’re not fine,” Lex demands before looking up at Luke. “He cut his hand really bad while trying to make our anniversary dinner. There’s blood all through the kitchen. You should have seen it.”
A softness that Luke only ever reserves for Lexi comes over his face before he grins down at her. “You had him cook dinner for our anniversary?”
“Well, I was trying to and then I was going to take all the credit for it,” she explains.
He leans forward and places both his hands on the armrest of her chair before bending down into her. “I fucking love you,” he tells her before kissing her.
“Ugh,” I groan. “Enough of that bullshit,” I tell them. “Remember we’re here because of me.”
With that, Luke straightens himself up and focuses on me. “You’re cleaning my kitchen,” he tells me in all seriousness.
I roll my eyes. I should have known that was coming. “Fine,” I say, “But only if they give me some painkillers. This is starting to hurt like a bitch.”
The second I mention a little bit of pain, Luke walks back over to the nurses’ desk and questions them on how long it’s going to be. Ever since Luke’s last tour where he was held captive, he hasn’t been able to handle seeing other people in pain, and it’s fair enough, the kinds of things he experienced in Iraq were shocking, hell, I still have trouble wrapping my head around it.
He comes back and lifts Lexi up out of her seat before taking her place and seating her on his lap in the busy waiting room. “She said there are still a few more people before you,” he tells me. “Maybe if you take the bandages off and let blood go everywhere, they’ll see you faster.”
“Hmm,” I grunt, wanting to get out of here. “Good plan.” I reach for the bandage only to have Lexi slap my hand away.
“Don’t be an idiot,” she tells me. “Both of you dickheads need to learn a little something about patience.”
Both Luke and I roll our eyes before he grins at me behind her back. He loves messing with his woman and I must admit, I quite enjoy it too.
After the longest half an hour wait, my name is finally called and I’m taken back into a room where a nurse named Gigi indicates for me to take a seat on the hospital bed.
“We’ll wait out here,” Luke tells me from the doorway as he pulls his phone out of his pocket and starts studying the screen.
“Thanks, man,” I say before he closes the door.
With that, I pay attention to Gigi as she starts unraveling the mess of bloodied bandages while we wait for the doctor to come in and stitch me up.
Chapter 19
Cami
It’s been another huge day at Style me Crazy. We’ve had shopper after shopper coming in and had to restock the shelves and put in new orders to the designers. It’s ridiculous. Since the store reopened two weeks, it’s been the local shopping hotspot and I absolutely love it.
I mean, don’t get me wrong, it was already a popular store, but the past two weeks have just been insane. I hope it remains that way, but then it could just be the excitement of the new store. It will fade a bit, but I kind of hope it doesn’t. Besides, the store is making a lot of profit at the moment and I’ve got three months of being out of business to make up for.
I say goodbye to the girls who are all exhausted after a huge day and I lock the doors behind them. Today is the day that I finally get to crack open my new sewing machine and finally start to build my collection.
I feel giddy and excited, like a kid going to big school for the first time. I have all my materials out in the back room and a massive desk set up so I can spread out. It’s going to be great.
Over the past few months while I waited for the store to be put back together, I went through all my designs and tweaked them to make them that much better, well, by better, I mean elegant. I was wanting my first line to be all about long lines and neutral colors. Very sophisticated. The second line which I’m hoping to bring out in spring next year will be the fun one, all about color and dresses. I can’t wait.
I leave the lights on in the store as the thought of having a repeat of last time still kind of haunts me. I mean, to experience all that smoke trying to suffocate me again… no thanks. I’ll pass.
I leave the music on and head to the back room. “Alright,” I say to the sewing machine and fabric. “Let’s make some magic.”
I get stuck straight into it and start measuring out the fabric which happened to cost a bomb. I reach for my scissors and am just about to make the first cut when my phone starts going nuts on the table beside me.
I put the scissors down as I look at the caller ID. Luke. Why the hell would Luke be calling me?
I grab the phone and press answer. “Hey, Luke. What’s up?”
“Cami,” he says in a tone filled with nothing but urgency. “It’s Jace. He’s been hurt. I’m at the hospital now, but you need to get down here.”
My heart sinks to the bottom of my stomach. “What?” I demand. “What happened? Is he ok?” Shit. Please tell me he’s ok.
I fly out of my chair and grab my car keys off the table. Before I know it, I’m running through my store with hundreds of images of Jace going through my mind. Please. Please be ok.
“Just get here,” Luke says before the line goes dead.
Fuck.
I launch myself into my car and screech out of the parking lot. Shit. My Jace. What the hell happened?
I can barely think in a straight line as I get to the hospital in record time. As I abandon my car and run through the doors of the emergency room, tears are streaming down my face.
I look around but don’t recognize anyone before running up to the nurses' desk. “Jace King,” I tell her.
The nurse looks at her computer screen but my name coming from the opposite side of the room has me dashing away. I turn to find Luke standing by the door that leads down to the hospital rooms. “Hurry,” he tells me.
I pick up my pace and run to him while trying to wipe the tears off my face. “What happened?” I ask. “Is he ok?”
Luke doesn’t respond just rushes down the hallway. I see Lexi sitting by a door with an apology in her eyes but I don’t have time to dwell on it. I need to get to Jace.
We come to the closed door and Luke stops me as he reaches for the door handle. “I’m really, really sorry, Cami,” he tells me. “Please forgive me.”
With that, he pulls the door open, practically throws me inside the room, and slams it closed behind me.
What the hell?
I look into the room to find Jace sitting up in a hospital bed, gawking at me in confusion as some doctor works on his hand. “Cami?” he grunts. “What the fuck are you doing here?” he questions in confusion before taking his half-stitched hand from the doctor and jumping down from the bed. He hurries over and runs his thumb on his good hand across my cheek, wiping away the tears. “Why are you crying? What’s wrong?”
“W-what?” I say as I study his face, still checking that he’s ok. My eyes travel down his body and take in the blood covering his shirt. I reach for it and pull it up to check the wounds beneath. Only, there’s isn’t any. His skin is as perfect as I’ve always remembered. “What happened?” I ask.
He pushes the hair back off my face and wipes the new tears away. “I’m fine, babe,” he says, pulling me into him. “What are you doing here?”
“Luke… Luke called. He said you were hurt. He said I had to hurry.”
“Shit,” Jace groans as he looks up at the door to see Luke staring into the room. “What the fuck, man?”
“I’m sorry,” Luke calls through the door. “I had to get you two in the same room. She wouldn’t have come if it wasn’t an emergency.”
“Fuck,” Jace grunts as his hands rub across my back and I do my best to wipe the wetness on my face off onto his blood-stained shirt. “What were you thinking?”
He just grins back at us. “I was thinking that you two need to sort out your shit,” he tells us. “And don’t even think about leaving. I’m not opening this door until you two can kiss and make up. Nobody in. Nobody out.”
“Ahh…,” the doctor says. “Can I at least finish stitching his hand first?”
“Oh… um, yeah,” Luke says with a chuckle.
With that, Jace takes me by the hand and walks back over to the bed before getting back on and giving his hand back to the doctor. I watch as the doctor continues working on his stitches, and I must say, I’m absolutely horrified.
This shit makes me feel sick. I mean, it’s a needle going in and out of his skin for fuck’s sake. Either way, I’m just happy he’s not on his deathbed. But as soon as I walk out of here, Luke will be on my shit list. I don’t know how and I don’t know when, but I vow to myself that I will get him back for this.
The second the doctor finishes with the stitches, I release Jace’s hand and step back. Jace watches me as I go but turns back to the doctor when he starts wrapping his hand in bandages and goes over the care instructions.
Before I know it, the doctor is walking to the door and waiting for Luke to let him out.
The second the door closes behind him, I find myself lost. I don’t know what to say and I don’t know where to look, so I take another step back and drop down into a chair, all the while Jace hasn’t taken his eyes off me.
“I’m sorry Luke scared you like that,” he tells me.
I press my lips together and nod my head. “He’s a shit head. It sucked.”
“I bet,” he says. “I would have knocked him out by now if it was the other way around.”
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