by Jayne Frost
“Indeed,” Alecia replied, her gaze flicking to mine. “This is Sean Hudson. You can add him to the list of approved visitors.”
The nurse turned to me, and her jaw dropped open. “Um . . . sure. Sean Hudson, you said?”
Color sprang to her cheeks as she waited for confirmation of what she already knew.
I nodded, wearing the neutral expression I used in public when I didn’t want to be bothered.
The nurse handed me a yellow sticker. “You can go back with Mrs. Dresden, but no longer than fifteen minutes.” She smiled apologetically. “Immediate family only after visiting hours.”
Taking the sticker, I stared at the imprint, a protest on the tip of my tongue. I was Willow’s family. Her father.
Luckily, Alecia came to my rescue. “Sean is family. He’s Willow’s…” Flustered, she struggled to find a word for me, and when none came, she waved her hand. “Like I said, he’s family. Anna will call and straighten it out later.”
The nurse’s eyes volleyed back and forth between Alecia and me as she fiddled with the spool of green stickers. I’m guessing those bad boys were the keys to the emerald city, and at the moment, I’d trade anything in my possession for just one.
Before I embarrassed myself by resorting to bribery, the nurse peeled off a sticker and turned it over to Alecia. “I’ll give this to you,” she said, her tone just above a whisper. “I don’t want to get into any trouble with Mr. or Mrs. Kent.”
Alecia’s smile tightened. “Oh, is Dean here?”
The nurse shook her head. “No. I just meant if he comes by . . .” Her thought trailed, her dreamy gaze returning to my face.
I tried not to grimace, both from the look and the mention of the dude who was posing as my child’s father.
Alecia offered her thanks to the nurse, and coaxing me from the desk, she whispered out of the corner of her mouth. “You’d think we were trying to sneak into the Pentagon.” She sighed as we stepped through the double doors and onto the ward. “But then again, she’s only trying to protect your daughter, so I can’t fault her.”
My daughter.
The first time anyone said those words, and it wasn’t Anna. Questions piled up like stones, weighing me down as we walked to the end of the busy corridor.
Alecia came to an abrupt halt in front of Room 437.
“Before you go in, we need to talk.” As if it were a foregone conclusion, she dropped onto one of the god-awful plastic chairs lining the wall.
Every fiber in my being gravitated to the door and what was behind it, but since Alecia seemed to be my only ally, I took a seat beside her.
“I don’t know what happened between you and Anna and I gave up asking a long time ago,” Alecia said. I shifted my gaze her way, but her attention was elsewhere. Like she couldn’t look at me. “But Willow . . .”
The slight I felt at being labeled a deadbeat dad evaporated with those two words. Any way you sliced it, my choices had reduced Anna to a footnote in my life, and now our baby was a “but.”
I sighed heavily at the realization.
“I’m sorry I wasn’t around,” I roughed out, hanging my head. “I’m still trying to figure everything out, but If I would’ve known, I would’ve been here.”
My head snapped up when Alecia grabbed my arm. “What do you mean ‘if you would’ve known’?” Her blunt nails dug into my skin. “Are you telling me that you didn’t know about Willow?”
She stared at me, eyes narrowed in disbelief.
Resisting the urge to vent, I shook my head. “Not until about an hour ago.” Alecia shot to her feet, and reflexively, I caught her by the arm. “Where are you going?”
“To talk to Anna.”
“Don’t you think I should be the one to do that?”
Alecia pondered for a moment and then dropped back into her seat. “Oh, Sean . . . I just assumed.” She shook her head and cursed under her breath. “Anna refused to talk about you, except once, when her father wanted to find you and separate your head from your shoulders. I made Anna tell me why I shouldn’t let him.”
My gut twisted at the thought of Anna defending me.
“What did she say?”
She looked down at her hands. “That you outgrew her. And Austin. That you wanted a different kind of life. And I thought Anna wanted a different kind of life too. Different from me.” Glancing to the room where her granddaughter was secreted away, Alecia’s voice fell to a whisper. “That’s why I told Anna . . . why I suggested . . .” Frowning, she looked at me and sat straighter in her chair. “She had choices, Sean. And I wanted her to know it.”
Choices?
If I thought I couldn’t feel worse, I was wrong. But what could I say? I’d given up the right to an opinion the minute I walked away from Anna.
Alecia sighed, then continued, “It backfired, though. Anna got it in her head that I didn’t want her to have Willow. So she up and married Dean, complicating things even more. She never loved him, you know, not the way a wife should love her husband.”
Alecia’s face contorted, caving under the weight of whatever she thought she’d done.
Which was nothing.
It all came back to me, to my ultimatum, and the night I wanted to forget but never would.
Looping my arm around Alecia’s shoulders, I brought her in for a hug. “It’s not your fault.”
She smiled, covering my hand with hers as she tipped her chin to the door. “We’ll talk later. I need to call Brian and tell him to keep the gun at home if he’s coming down here.”
I hadn’t given Brian a second thought until now.
“I’ll talk to him.”
Alecia cut me off with a snort. “You absolutely will not. Someday soon I suspect you’ll realize there is no reasoning with an angry father. I know my daughter, how willful she is, especially when it comes to you. But Brian?” She sucked air through her teeth. “He’s blind for Anna. From the first day they put her in his arms, she could do no wrong. It was hard enough for him to accept that Anna was pregnant since he’d convinced himself she wasn’t having sex.” She smiled at me. “And we both know that ship sailed on prom night.”
I’d had some uncomfortable conversations in my life, but this one took the cake.
My burning cheeks forced me to my feet. “I’m going to go in.”
Alecia pulled a book from her tote. “You do that, sweetheart. And another thing?” Her smile wavered. “Try not to be too hard on Anna, okay?”
Pleading underscored her light tone, so I nodded. “I’ll try.”
It was the most I could promise.
Blowing out a breath, I reached for the knob, but the door swung open, and I had to move out of the way to make room for the nurse to exit. When she stopped to scribble something on the dry erase board on the wall, I lingered, hoping to glean some information about Willow’s condition.
The nurse smiled at me and then walked away, leaving me to gape at the two words she’d scrawled in red marker.
Hearing Impaired.
I jerked my gaze to Alecia, engrossed in her book.
She looked up. “Anything wrong?”
From the corner of my eyes, the red letters loomed.
Hearing impaired.
“No . . . I’m good.”
But I wasn’t good. The light from good was a pinprick in the distance, so faint I could barely see it.
I stepped inside the room before Alecia could say anything more. This was one explanation that I wanted to come straight from Anna.
As the door whooshed closed behind me, I cringed at the bolt clicking into place. It sounded like a gunshot. In fact, everything sounded louder—the humming of the machines, the annoying J. Lo ringtone one wall away, the nurses’ shoes squeaking on the polished floors in the hallway. And Anna’s breath.
It left her body in a soft exhale as I took my place at her side, gazing down at the most beautiful thing I’d ever seen.
Willow dozed with no outward signs of distress, thick auburn l
ashes caressing her cherub cheeks. The bulky mask was gone, replaced by a tube attached to her button nose.
“I’m so fucking pissed at you, Anna,” I whispered through gritted teeth.
“I know.”
“How could you not tell me?”
I glared at her out of the corners of my eye, but her gaze never left Willow’s face.
“You don’t have to whisper, Sean.” A sad smile curved Anna’s lips as she adjusted the thin blue sheet around our daughter. “She can’t hear you.”
Hearing impaired.
“She’s completely deaf? I heard you talking to her . . .” I ducked my head, searching for Anna’s eyes. I had to see her face. To know everything was all right. “You were talking to her, right?”
Anna eased onto the bed, legs dangling over the side.
She took the longest moment of my life to compose herself and then began in a quiet tone, “She’s not completely deaf. But it’s hard to say what she can and can’t hear. The tests . . . they’re hard to perform on a baby. As far as the doctors can tell, Willow hears at about fifty percent with her hearing aids. But she’s only had them a few months. There was a long period of time when we didn’t know what the problem was.” She sighed wearily as if reliving the memory. “And once the doctors confirmed her hearing loss, we had to go slow. So yes, Willow does speak, but not very much.”
Maybe I was the one with the hearing problem, because I couldn’t process a damn thing Anna’d just told me.
I dropped into the plaid chair with a thud, my focus on Willow. “I don’t understand.”
Anna squeezed my hand, which I just realized was tangled with hers in a death grip. “Willow’s only had the hearing aids for a few months. We’re turning the volume up a little at a time, so we don’t overload her system. She might hear better than we think. Or worse. She’s going in for another hearing test soon.”
I rubbed my brow, willing away the headache thudding at my temples. “Does she need anything? Special classes? Education?” I offered helplessly. Stupidly. “Just tell me, baby. Whatever I need to do, I’ll do it.”
Anna looked down at our joined hands. “Willow’s hearing loss—it’s most likely temporary. She’ll have surgery when she’s about five. Right now, she sees a speech therapist. But she’s going to pre-school.” Anna looked me in the eyes, resolute. “A regular school. She’s not deficient in any way. She’s very smart.”
Deficient?
Even under the harsh lights with their aged covers tinting everything a sickly yellow, Willow looked perfect.
I scrubbed a hand down my face, hoping the right words would find their way to my thick tongue. “I’m just trying to find my way here, Anna. So cut me some slack, all right?” I pressed a kiss to her palm. “I’m still really fucking mad at you.”
Anna cupped my cheek, and just like that, she silenced the riot in my head. Leaning into her touch, I closed my eyes. We drifted like that for a moment, until the monitor above Willow’s bed let out a shrill beep. The other machines followed suit.
Every cell in my body jumped to life when Willow rasped, “Ma?”
Cataloging the tone and the pitch, I added it to the symphony of sounds seared into my brain. And I knew without a doubt that in a sea of voices, I’d always hear hers.
Anna was on her feet, fishing something from her pocket, so I stood too. She leaned over the little angel and popped an earbud into Willow’s ear.
“There you are.” Anna’s tone was a few decibels above conversational, but gentle, soothing. “Are you feeling better, Willow-baby?”
Willow-baby.
I watched my little girl’s lips curve into a sleepy smile. Adoration sparked in her azure gaze as she cupped her mother’s cheeks with tiny hands.
Inching so close that my chest fused to Anna’s back, I whispered, “Is she okay? Can you tell?”
Willow’s eyes found mine, curious.
“She’s fine,” Anna said. “But you’re going to have to speak up. She can’t hear what you’re saying.”
Making space for me directly in front of our daughter, Anna said to Willow, “This is Sean, he came to visit you.”
Hearing Anna refer to me by my given name drowned me in so much regret, I had to fight to keep my smile cemented in place. “Hi, Willow.”
“Sean’s worried about you,” Anna continued in her soft but loud tone. “Can you give him a thumbs up and let him know you’re okay?”
I’d never had my breath taken away, not by a crowd of ten thousand, but Willow did it just by raising her little thumb.
And when she smiled my whole world flipped upside down.
Chapter Nineteen
Anna
I heard my name over the faint whirring of the machines, and in a flash, I was fully awake and hyper aware.
“What?” The word scraped my dry throat as my heavy lids fluttered open.
I blinked down at Willow, pressed to my side with her thumb in her mouth and her eyes fused shut.
Jennifer, the day nurse, touched my arm, and I nearly jumped out of my skin.
“Sorry to disturb you, Mrs. Kent.” She smiled a little wide to be apologetic. Beaming was a better description. “The doctor will be in here in about an hour. He’ll probably have your discharge papers ready.”
Rolling Willow onto her side so I could sit up, I winced at the crick in my neck. My back decided to join the party and sent pain shooting down my leg. Apparently, lying in the same position with a small human draped over me like a shawl wasn’t optimal for sleeping. But I insisted on it when Willow was sick. Chest-to-chest so I could feel any rattles.
I scrubbed a hand over my face. “Yeah, okay.”
Why Jennifer felt the need to deliver this news in person, at 7:00 a.m., was a mystery. The pediatrician on duty had already come by a few hours ago, and after checking Willow’s vitals, he removed her oxygen tube and told me we could go home after morning rounds.
My confusion cleared up when Jennifer let out a sigh. I quit rubbing my shoulder mid squeeze and turned my attention to the nurse who was now staring dreamily at Sean. He was asleep in the tweed chair that he’d dragged to the window. With his long legs stretched out in front of him and his head lolling to the side, he should’ve been uncomfortable. But he didn’t look it.
“Gah, he’s gorgeous.” Jennifer’s guilty gaze snapped to mine, and her cheeks bloomed with color. “Did I say that out loud?”
“Yeah.”
I smiled, letting her off the hook because Sean was gorgeous. Even drooling, with all his hair tied up in one of my pink hair bands, the guy was smoking hot.
Jennifer cocked her head, surveying Sean like he was some kind of exhibit in a museum. “You know, I’ve never liked those man bun things. But . . . wow . . . he wears it well.” She tapped a finger against her lip, narrowing her eyes at me. “I’ve read his bio, and he’s an only child. Are y’all cousins or something?”
“Eww . . . no.” I shook my head, laughing. “We’re not related.”
The second the words left my lips, I kicked myself.
Jennifer’s gaze shifted pointedly to the green sticker on Sean’s chest, the little badge that clearly stated that we were family. Immediate family. Which meant Sean was either related to me or related to Dean.
Since I’d managed to confuse the hell out of the situation without meaning to, I sealed my lips, and Jennifer returned to her ogling.
After a moment, she huffed and then grabbed Willow’s chart. “I wanted to meet him. I guess he’s a heavy sleeper.”
I watched Jennifer sashay out of the room, blowing out a breath when the door slid closed behind her.
“Is she gone?” came a raspy voice.
I jerked, my heart leaping into my throat. “Dammit, Sean.” My hand flew to my throat. “Have you been awake this whole time?”
He sat up, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. Then he gave me a devilish smile. “Not the whole time. But I cracked an eye open and caught Jenny’s creepy stalker vibe,
so I figured I’d play dead.”
Not exactly the most comforting words to say in a hospital. But Sean was always funny about death. He either made jokes, or he didn’t speak about it at all.
“Good plan,” I agreed, hopping to my feet.
Folding my arms over my chest, I scrutinized Willow’s monitors, relieved that all the indicators fell into the normal range.
Sean came up behind me, and I froze. Last night’s anger was still there, I could feel traces of it in his touch, but he was doing a damn fine job of hiding it.
Sean slipped his arms around my waist, and when his chin landed on my shoulder, his scruffy beard tickled me through my threadbare T-shirt and my nipples hardened.
I’d resolved not to blur the lines. One of us had to be rational, and since Sean was bound to have feelings for Willow that didn’t extend to me, I couldn’t take anything he did seriously.
But then he nuzzled closer, his voice a sexy rumble in my ear. “Morning, Anna-baby.”
Caffeine. Surely Sean’s ability to light up every cell in my body had more to do with lack of coffee than his charm.
I was about to suggest that he make a Starbuck’s run when his lips grazed my temple.
“Do you know what all this means?” he asked, indicating the monitors. “Can you tell if she’s okay?”
His bright blue eyes clouded with apprehension as he looked down at me, waiting for an answer.
I touched his cheek. “She’s fine.”
“You’re sure?” The worry etching his brow deepened when he looked past me to where Willow slept peacefully. “She hasn’t moved.”
I bit down a smile because soon he wouldn’t have to worry about that.
“They gave her something to sleep around 2:00 a.m.” He blinked, biting his lip furiously. “Don’t worry. It was just some Benadryl. Anyway, let me explain what all this means.” Sean reluctantly tore his gaze from our daughter and then focused on the monitors. “That’s her oxygen level. The saturation looks good.”
Sean pressed a feather light kiss to my shoulder. “Okay. What else?”
