by Stacey Lynn
Grace must have heard me because she turned, looking down at us.
“Sean!” she shouted, and he dragged listless eyes to hers.
“My chest,” he rasped, barely able to breathe, “hurts.”
His body began shaking and I stood paralyzed before I realized what was happening.
“Call nine-one-one!” I began screaming. “Call nine-one-one!” I flashed terrified, panicked eyes to Grace and realized hers matched mine. “I think he’s having a heart attack.”
“Fine,” he gasped again.
Melissa’s hand wrapped around my shoulder. “I’ll do it,” she said. “Get him inside and lying down on his left side.”
She took off then, running toward a phone at the wall of the box suite for emergency uses.
“Come on,” I said to Grace. “Let’s get him inside.”
“He has to be okay,” she chanted repeatedly. “My Sean.”
His hand reached up and held hers, but I could tell it was taking everything in him. “Love you, honey. All the love in the world.”
“Stop it,” she hissed, and tears began falling down my cheeks. “You’ll be fine.”
We moved him inside, his weight difficult for us. When we had him on the floor, resting on his side, Grace dug into her purse again and popped out an aspirin. “Swallow this, Sean. Now.”
He did, working his throat like he was swallowing shards of glass, and I stepped back while they whispered to each other, things I couldn’t hear.
It was minutes that felt like hours before the stadium’s paramedics rushed through the door. We could do nothing except stand there and watch. Waiting.
Hoping.
A loud cheer in the distance and the vibration of the stadium shaking with applause pulled my eyes to the field. “Oliver.” I snapped my head to Grace. “We have to tell Oliver.”
She shook her head. “After the game. We’ll get word to him.”
“Should I wait for him?”
“No. Come with us. He’ll meet us there. The driver will be quicker anyway.”
***
We were at the hospital sitting in waiting room seats much too uncomfortable for anyone scared out of their mind.
I’d spent much of the time pacing, unable to sit still while we waited for word from the doctor.
Grace and Melissa had sat down, Grace the epitome of calmness with hope in her eyes while she sat there, hands clasped together and stared out the windows. Melissa looked as scared as I was, and I didn’t know if it was because of what we had seen, or what we were afraid the result would be.
Damn it. Oliver had been right—Sean had looked too tired this morning. Too worn down. And the way Oliver had looked at me, so concerned about his dad and asking me to keep an eye on him, promising him I wouldn’t let his dad get too excited.
I’d failed him. I hadn’t listened. I’d trusted Sean and Grace when he’d waved off the earlier pains in his chest.
I couldn’t close my eyes, I couldn’t blink. Every time I did I saw Sean’s large frame, almost as tall as Oliver’s, lying there on the floor, motionless and pale as the paramedics worked him over before rushing him out to an ambulance.
It was a memory forever ingrained in my brain.
Movement coming from the double doors caught my attention and I whispered Grace’s name.
Two doctors hustled through the doors, stopping only at the nurses’ station before looking at us when she gestured in our direction.
“Sean Powell’s family?” one of the doctors asked.
“I’m his wife, Grace.” She stood and held out her hand, smiling as if she wasn’t terrified out of her mind. There was something in her eyes, something that hit me after I’d watched all of this play out. She had been calm. Too calm and it didn’t feel right. She was either a chunk of granite in the face of horror, or she knew something she hadn’t shared. “How is he?”
The doctor smiled, tugging down his mask so it bent beneath his chin. “Sean’s going to be fine, Mrs. Powell. But he shouldn’t have been traveling—not so soon after his last heart attack.”
I gasped. Heart attack? Oliver had never said anything.
He shot her a look full of recrimination, and she rolled back her shoulders. “You try telling that man not to be there for his son’s games.”
I choked on a laugh, equal parts shocked and amused at the tone she’d just taken with the doctor when he sighed. “He’s still sleeping, but we can show you back. You know what this means, though, right? Did your doctors in Savannah explain it?”
“Surgery…stints…” Her voice trailed off as she flicked out her hand. “I’ll make sure he listens this time.”
“See that you do.” His voice went soft and kind and he reached out, squeezing Grace’s hand. “The next time he won’t be lucky. He won’t get a third chance, Mrs. Powell. There’s too much damage to his arteries.”
She turned to us then and fear flickered in her eyes as well as her remorse. “We didn’t want Oliver to know,” she said as she met my eyes. “He would have told us not to come, and Sean—well, Sean said if he didn’t have much time, he needed to see one last game.”
“I understand.” I didn’t. Oliver was going to be furious and it was warranted. I nodded toward the doctor. “You should go see him. I’ll send Oliver back when he gets here.”
“Thank you,” she whispered, reaching out and squeezing my hand. “Thank you for being so kind and loving my boy.”
I smiled with tears in my eyes. “It’s my pleasure.”
As soon as she’d disappeared behind the double doors and Melissa had her arms around me, I was quickly pulled away and my shoulders gripped by strong, firm hands. “What in the hell happened, Shannon?”
Oliver’s grip was so strong, so fierce, my head snapped back and my eyes flared.
“Oliver…” Melissa started as I winced from another hard shake. “Calm down.”
“Stay out of this,” he clipped, his hazel eyes flaring with fury. “What the hell happened? And why didn’t you call me? They could have gotten me during the game. I should have known what was going on. How could you let me go out on the field, knowing what happened and you knew how worried I was about him?” He scrubbed his hand through his hair and shouted at me. “I told you to watch him!”
I stumbled backward, rubbing my arms where he’d gripped them so hard they might bruise. Tears dripped down my cheeks and I swiped them away. “I did watch him, and your mom told me not to call you. He said it was heartburn.” I inhaled a long breath before exhaling. “He’s fine, though, Oliver. The doctors just came out and talked to us. He had a heart attack, but he’s fine. Sleeping. Your mom just went back there.”
“Damn it.” He swiped a hand through his still-wet hair and cursed again. “I knew it. I knew something wasn’t right. How in the fuck could this have happened?”
I shook my head, unable to comprehend the vitriol he was shouting at me. He was scared and hurt. Probably terrified. I’d take his anger for him if it helped him.
“I tried, honey,” I whispered, reaching out for him.
He jerked away from my touch and scrubbed his face with his hands again and then tugged on his hair. “Not well enough,” he barked. “I’m going to go see him.”
“Do you want us to wait?”
“No,” he said. Any emotion he had for me this morning was now gone in his cold, angry eyes. “I think you’ve done enough. Just go.”
I gasped, my fingers flying to my mouth when he turned and hurried away. He talked to a nurse before she opened the double doors for him, smiling at him with stars in her eyes while he rushed down the hall and disappeared.
“He didn’t mean it,” Melissa said, pulling me into her arms and squeezing tight. “He didn’t mean it. He’s just angry and scared. You’ll see.”
I’d seen Oliver lose his temper and say shit he didn’t mean often. He was usually quick to apologize.
I reminded myself of that, focused on the truth Melissa spoke, and hoped like hell
I was right.
He’d realize that in his anger he’d just been an asshole to the woman he loved, and he’d make it right.
Chapter TWENTY-FIVE
SHANNON
Melissa looked down at me, her pretty little nose all crinkled. “You smell.”
“I’ll shower later.” I rolled my eyes at her before staring back at the television set.
ESPN was now the only way I was getting any updates on Oliver or Sean other than the texts Beaux got from the team manager’s updating the team on Sean’s condition. He was getting released from the hospital that night.
It had been two days and I hadn’t heard anything from Oliver. I hadn’t received a single text message, not a phone call. And after I sent one message the day before, asking him how his dad was doing when I’d heard he made it out of surgery via Beaux, I hadn’t gotten a response.
Was it possible for a heart to actually break? I understood he was busy. I understood he needed to be with his dad, and I had originally believed Melissa: he’d freaked out on me because he was scared and angry that he hadn’t known about it as soon as it happened.
Two days later, and radio silence from him, and I no longer believed her.
My chest hurt. After we’d left the hospital, Melissa and I had gone to Beaux’s house. I didn’t want to be alone in my apartment.
He freaked out and shouted when Melissa had relayed what happened and then he’d stalked off to be with the team at the hospital. Visions of him giving Oliver a black eye for being a dick to me popped into my mind, but I pushed them away. Beaux wouldn’t do that to him…not yet, anyway. But if I knew my brother and his protective instinct, it’d come at some point.
Melissa bent down and picked up the remote. She clicked the button and the television screen faded to black immediately. “We have to go out. And you have to get back to work tomorrow.”
I should have been working for the past two days. There was too much to do and not enough time for any of it.
“I will. Tomorrow.”
“Fine. Then tonight we go out. Beaux said the team’s finally celebrating their win and he wants us there.”
I pushed off the couch and fixed my messy bun. I cringed at the feel of it. I really did need to get cleaned up.
“I’m not going out with them. Not now.” Before she could protest, I smiled at her. “But I will go shower, we’ll go to Stamped so I can check the mail, and then we’ll get drunk here.”
She pouted for a moment before her blue eyes shone when she smiled. “Deal. Now go, before I hose you down.”
“I’m not that bad,” I shouted as I walked away.
Melissa’s fake gagging sound was the only response I got.
I showered quickly, throwing on minimal makeup and comfortable lounge clothes while I got ready. And while I did, I hatched my own plan. I had stayed in a crappy relationship once, knowing it was going downhill but too afraid to stand up and ask for answers then. I wouldn’t be that woman again, and I wouldn’t wait around, eating my weight in food and drowning my sorrows, waiting for him to come to me.
I refused to believe that only shortly after telling me he was falling in love with me, Oliver truly meant the things he’d said.
“Let’s go,” I said to Melissa when I returned to the living room.
She was dressed just as casually as I was, both of us in tanks and short yoga shorts, our hair pulled up and off our necks.
She turned to me and must have seen the determination that had set in my eyes because her glossy lips spread wide. “Well, that shower seemed to have worked.”
I laughed and walked toward the door, digging my keys out of my purse. “Yup. And tomorrow, I get the rest of my shit together.”
I’d give Oliver the day, one more day to help his dad and be there for his parents, but I knew from Beaux that he was staying at the hotel in Raleigh while his dad was in the hospital.
***
The elevator bell dinged, jarring me. Wiping my palms down the sides of my skirt, I inhaled a breath as I stepped out of the elevator car and onto Oliver’s floor. I was surprised when the doorman at the hotel had given me permission to go straight up, but took it as a good sign. I hadn’t yet been removed from visitors allowed to head to Oliver’s place without a phone call first.
It was mid-morning. The night before, after getting done at Stamped, Melissa and I had sat around Beaux’s condo drinking and talking about everything and anything that didn’t involve Oliver Powell. Instead, we’d talked about her job as a freelance graphic designer while she continued to tell me how she loved the Raleigh area. Despite the heat that was going to take me years to get used to—but much less time to get used to in the winter, since I’d get to avoid Iowa’s bone-chilling windchill temperatures—I agreed with her.
Raleigh was beautiful. Not too large of a city that it was intimidating, and it had everything I could possibly want.
The bonus was definitely that my online sales of Stamped were still going strong. Soon, I’d be able to start paying Beaux back for everything he’d done for me.
Hopefully sooner than that, Oliver would apologize for being a complete prick and we could move past this small hitch in the road. All couples had problems. All couples fought. All couples said things out of anger, and he had to have been beside himself with worry.
I was counting on all of those things when I found my nerve to exit the elevator and turned toward his door.
I was three steps away when his door flung open and a woman—a beautiful woman—flew out, laughing as she did, her waist-length blond hair flying out behind her. “I’ll see you later, then!”
She turned around and froze, just as I did.
“Oh! Hello!” The beautiful woman—shiny pink lips, glassy-eyed—was looking directly at me, and she instantly looked familiar, although I couldn’t place her. Gorgeous.
She had to be one of the most beautiful women I’d ever seen. Curvy, blond, so beautiful and sweet-looking my teeth almost ached. Or they would have…if I could have felt anything.
Everything went numb as I gasped.
What she must have caught on my face wiped the smile right off hers.
My heart froze inside my chest.
No. He wouldn’t…
Then her eyes went wide and she looked down following my gaze. She was wearing nothing. Not nothing nothing, but all I could see of her was a pale pink, silky robe, wrapped and tied tight at her waist.
I took a step back.
I couldn’t breathe.
She looked back at me and followed my movement, coming closer while I backed away.
“You must be Shannon,” she said, walking toward me.
Without looking, I pounded on the elevator button with the palm of my hand. It had to open. It couldn’t have left yet.
He did. He wouldn’t, though…would he? Oliver had always promised he wasn’t a cheater.
And how did she know my name? I opened my mouth and closed it like a fish, unable to speak to her. I couldn’t draw air into my lungs to breathe.
Behind me, the elevator door opened.
Her hands went up. “This isn’t what it looks like, I swear to you.”
I said nothing. What could I say?
As I stepped back into the elevator, I heard Oliver’s voice.
I hit the button to close the door. “Bethany…you forgot…” He stopped as he saw me.
He had on pajama pants. Nothing else. Dark blond hair a shaggy mess that told me he’d just woken up. A woman’s purse in his hand at his side.
I made a choking sound and began slamming the button to close the elevator door.
I was standing there dressed in a super-cute tank and skirt and sky-high heels, looking my absolute best, and this woman—who looked so vaguely familiar, but I couldn’t place her—was dressed in just a robe and ohmygod so much more beautiful than me without any makeup on at all.
“Shannon…” His voice trailed off as he looked at me and then at Bethany.
His eyes
went hard.
My heart dropped to the floor beneath my feet.
The doors shut right as he dragged his hands through his hair.
It was the last thing I saw and tears flew down my cheeks, unbidden, before I could stop them. Before I realized I was crying, my vision blurred and sobs wracked my shoulders.
I flew out of the hotel, only thankful I’d managed to park on the street and not valet.
That look in his eyes when he’d seen me.
I cried when I got to my car, my hands shaking so badly that I couldn’t control myself, couldn’t get my key in the ignition.
Everything about that moment.
It hurt more than when I’d seen Patrick. Then, I’d been angry.
This wasn’t anger rolling through me so hard it seemed to take forever for me to stop crying enough that I could drive away.
Never, in all of that, did he come to look for me. He didn’t call. He didn’t text or explain.
He had just stood there, looking at me like I was nothing to him.
Chapter TWENTY-SIX
OLIVER
Fuck. Fuck fuck fuck.
“Well, you totally screwed that up.”
I dropped my hands to my sides and glared at Bethany. Bethany who was in only a damn robe and had just come over to drag my ass out of bed because the night before I’d gotten so fucking drunk in the hotel bar that she’d had to practically carry me to my room.
She’d only come over that morning to make sure I was still alive and bring me coffee.
“What the fuck?” I asked. My mind was moving too slow—the result of too much tequila. It barely registered that Shannon was inside that elevator before it closed.
“If it helps, I told her it wasn’t what it looked like.” Her nose scrunched and she looked at the elevator doors. “I don’t think she believed me.”
A harsh laugh escaped me. “You think? Damn it.” My hands went to my face again and I tried to scrub away the remainder of the hangover pounding at my temples.
I’d been a dick to her.
