I can’t believe I was talking with a man about sex and smiling about it. Laughing even. How he has truly changed my life is staggering.
I twist the charm on my bracelet—for the first time not out of anxiousness, but in wonder. In hopes that she will one day find a man as incredible as Mason.
My attention is drawn back to the nightstand where his phone vibrates once, indicating a text. It’s done this several times since he left earlier.
I know he wanted to stay. I could see it written all over him. But he never asked. And for that I was grateful. I need time and he’s giving it to me. Not to mention we’re both pretty jet-lagged despite the early hour. After all, it’s well past midnight in Barcelona.
When he left, just before seven o’clock, he said he was going for a quick run at the gym before heading home. Then the plan is to meet at Mitchell’s NYC for Sunday brunch where he’ll bring me a new phone. How he’s going to manage purchasing a new one before noon on a Sunday is beyond me. I guess he has connections or something. Maybe this is all part of the stuff he said I would have to get used to if I’m going to be with a famous athlete.
When his cell hums once more, I resist the urge to turn it over and peek at the text. Instead, I head downstairs to get a snack before turning in for some much needed sleep.
On my way, I pass Aaron’s nursery. I flick the light on and let my eyes travel around the room. I take in the crib, decorated with muted tones of blue and green; the rocking chair that has a matching blanket carefully laid across the back; the changing table that has tiny outfits of all colors folded on the shelves beneath it. I stare at the collection of family pictures on the wall.
I make a decision right now to hold Aaron the next time I see him. To pick him up and study his little face; smell his sweet baby scent; touch his tiny hands.
Then maybe I can even work my way up to Jordan.
I look in the mirror over Aaron’s dresser and wonder, not for the first time since I’ve been back, if my baby looks like her. Like Jordan. After all, Baylor and I could sometimes pass for twins if not for our age and slight cosmetic differences. I touch the tiny piercing on my nose and glance at my black hair tips. Of course, Jordan is only eight months old and my daughter is more than five years old. But in my mind, she’ll always be the pink and perfect newborn I got to hold for those precious minutes before I gave her away.
I turn around and exit the room, switching off the light on my way out. I need to eat and sleep.
Tomorrow I can take care of the rest.
~ ~ ~
Incessant buzzing wakes me from sleep. Exhausted, I look at the clock, disappointed to see it’s half past eight and I’ve only been sleeping for a few minutes. Someone is calling Mason. I pull the pillow over my head and let it roll to voicemail, not daring to answer his phone.
Seconds later it dances across the bedside table with another call. This time, I pick it up and glance at the screen to see it’s not a number from his contacts. I have no idea who’s calling him. I put the phone down again and roll back over.
It vibrates again. I sigh, reaching over to shut it off. But I notice it’s the same number that has already called twice. Someone really wants to reach him. Maybe it’s Janice Greyson. I lazily smile thinking he might not have her saved as a contact.
Then I wonder if it’s not Mason who’s getting the call—but me. Maybe Mason is trying to call me from home. Does he even have a landline there?
With a pang of traitorous guilt, I swipe my finger across the screen to answer. “Hello?”
“Oh, thank God,” a young girl’s voice belts out nervously. “Is this Mason Lawrence’s phone?”
I sit up in bed, protective of my new boyfriend. Some fangirl has gotten his private number. “Who is this and how did you get this number?”
I hear tender cries and squeals of pain coming from her end of the phone. “I need Mr. Lawrence,” she begs. “There’s been an accident and I can’t get a hold of Ms. Whitmeyer.”
“Ms. Whitmeyer?” My mind cycles through an index of who I know. “Oh, you mean Cassidy?”
All at once everything clicks together.
Nervous teenager. Wails of a child in pain. Accident.
“What happened? Is Hailey okay? Where are you?” I belt out in panic-driven succession.
“She fell down the stairs. I’m only the sitter. I just got here. I didn’t even know the gate was open. I can’t reach her mom. Is he there? What do I do? Should I call 911? Can you help me—”
“Stop!” I yell through her frantic ramblings. “What’s your name?”
“A-Amanda,” she stutters.
“Amanda, you need to calm down or you can’t help her. Where are you?”
“At Cassidy’s . . . uh, Ms. Whitmeyer’s apartment.” She rattles off the address of a building I’m familiar with. Skylar lived there when I came back for Baylor’s wedding last year. I stayed with her. It’s within blocks of a hospital.
I still hear Hailey’s cries so I know she’s conscious. “Is she bleeding?”
“There’s a cut on her head above her eye and she’s holding her arm.”
In my mind I try to calculate the time it might take for an ambulance to get there. I make a split-second decision. “Amanda, I’m Piper Mitchell, Mason’s girlfriend. He’s not here right now, but I want you to listen to me. You need to take her to Lenox Hill Hospital. It’s only two blocks from where you are. Hang up and take her to their emergency room right now. I’ll find Mason and meet you there. Do you understand?”
“O-Okay. I think I can do that,” she says tentatively.
“Amanda!” I command her attention. “You just take care of that little girl. I’ll find Mason and Cassidy.”
“Yes, ma’am,” she says, right before I disconnect the call.
I leap out of bed and pull on some clothes that are still neatly folded in my dresser, never having had a chance to pack them in my haste to leave New York. I put my messy hair into a ponytail and pick the phone up off the bed when unease strikes me.
Oh, God. Did I do the right thing? What if she has a neck injury and Amanda moving her is a terrible idea? I take a deep breath and call Baylor as I go downstairs.
“Shouldn’t you be otherwise occupied at this hour?” she asks, laughing through her greeting.
“Baylor, you have to go to Mason’s apartment and get him.” I grab my purse off the table and dart out the front door. I’m surprised to see the sun has just now set, the sky still a purplish hue of brilliant colors. I realize my body clock is still out of whack, having traveled to Spain and back in less than a week.
“Find him? God, Piper—you’ve been back together for one day and already you’re fighting?” She huffs an exasperated big-sister sigh into the phone.
“No, we’re fine. He left hours ago, but he left his phone with me. I have no way to contact him.” I run out of breath, talking too quickly while my feet propel me as fast as they can towards the subway. “It’s Hailey. There’s been an accident. She fell down the stairs and the sitter can’t reach Cassidy.”
Baylor draws in a sharp breath. “Oh my God. What can we do?”
“Go find Mason. He was going for a run at the gym but he should be home by now. Do you know the address?”
I hear her relaying information to others in the background. “Skylar does. We’ll call Gavin and leave right now. But, Piper, why aren’t you going to find him?”
“I’m going to Lenox Hill to meet Hailey and the sitter.”
“Good. Good,” she says, pride coming through in her voice. “I’ll call you when we find him. You’re doing the right thing, little sister. You can do this.”
It takes me twenty minutes to get to the hospital. Twenty minutes that feels like an eternity. She’s not even two years old yet. In fact, I’m pretty sure her birthday is next week. What if she’s badly injured? It will devastate Mason.
I call Cassidy from Mason’s phone. It rolls to voicemail. I don’t tell her who’s calling, but it won�
�t take a rocket scientist to figure it out. “Cassidy, get to Lenox Hill Hospital as soon as you get this. Hailey’s had a fall.” What else could I say? I don’t have any more information.
Running into the emergency room, I barrel past people waiting to register. “I need to find a little girl,” I say to the nurse behind the glass partition. “Hailey Lawrence. Is she here yet? Is she okay?”
The nurse, who is obviously overwhelmed by this Saturday-night influx of people, gives me an annoyed look.
“Are you Piper?” a voice calls from behind me. I turn around and gasp at what I see. A girl, who can’t be more than sixteen, has blood all over her shirt.
“Amanda?” In absolute horror, my wide eyes trace the smeared blood that spans her chest and stains her arm. My hand meets my chest, my heartbeat thundering against my palm. “Oh, God. I thought you said she just had a cut.”
“She did. She does.” She stares down at her clothes as if just now realizing how bad it looks. “Hailey was scared. She was crying and rubbing her head on my shirt as I carried her here. I think it looks worse than it is. At least I hope so.” Her eyes fall to the floor. “I had just arrived at Ms. Whitmeyer’s place. I was only there for five minutes. It’s my first time sitting for her. I swear I didn’t even know there was a gate, or that it was open. I went to put my books down and she walked away for a second. One second.”
I pat her back. “It’s not your fault, Amanda. The gate should have been closed and you should have known about it. Is Hailey okay? Where did they take her and why aren’t you with her?”
“They took her back a few minutes ago. They wouldn’t let me go with her. Plus, I don’t think it would have helped. She doesn’t know me. She kept screaming for her Mama and Dada.”
I turn around and ask the perturbed nurse at the desk, “Can I please get some information about Hailey Lawrence?”
She shuffles around a few clipboards before turning her attention to me. “That’s not my job, Miss. Somebody should be out shortly. But unless you’re family, it won’t matter anyway. Are you family?”
I ignore her question and point behind me. “I’ll be right over here. Please have them come get me.”
Nurse Ratched doesn’t acknowledge me, going back to handing out forms to the increasingly large line of people before her.
Amanda and I find an empty bench, parking ourselves as close to the front counter as we can get. “We should call Hailey’s grandmother,” I say, remembering Cassidy once said she would stay with her on occasion. “Do you have her number?”
Amanda gives me a deer-in-headlights look. She shakes her head. “I’m locked out now. All of the emergency numbers were on the refrigerator. Mr. Lawrence was the next one down after Ms. Whitmeyer’s number. But the front door locks when you shut it. I forgot about that when we left. All my stuff is still there.” She fidgets with the seam on her jeans. “Do you think I’ll be in trouble?”
I look at her and see how scared she is. I almost forgot she’s just a kid herself. “How old are you, Amanda?”
“I turned fifteen last week.”
I remember fifteen. Fifteen was good. Carefree. Fun. And I was babysitting Maddox a lot of the time, who was about as old as Hailey is now. I put a reassuring hand on her knee. “No, you won’t be in trouble. It was an accident.”
She takes a deep breath, swallowing her relief. Then she narrows her eyes at me. “Don’t you have Hailey’s grandmother’s number? I mean if you’re Mr. Lawrence’s girlfriend and all.”
“Yeah, well that’s a fairly new designation.” I look down at my phone. Mason’s phone. I scroll through the contacts hoping to find another Whitmeyer. No luck.
“I’m looking for the family of Hailey Lawrence.”
I spring to my feet at the words, looking over to see they came from an older male doctor. He’s got longish hair, like he’s not had time for a decent cut lately. Lines that reveal his age dent his forehead, and his white doctor coat sits over a wrinkled t-shirt of a sixties band. Not very professional if you ask me. Maybe he was called in on his night off.
He’s not smiling.
Shit.
I almost trample a few people in the waiting area on my way over to him. Amanda follows closely behind me.
“Me,” I say, trying to look like I belong here. “I’m with Hailey Lawrence.”
He eyeballs me, taking in my nose piercing, my messy ponytail and my clothing that I didn’t bother to color-coordinate in my haste to leave the townhouse. “And you are?” he asks with a raised brow.
“Piper Mitchell,” I say, leaving it at that.
“Your relationship to the patient?”
I sigh, glancing over at Nurse Ratched. “Um . . . I’m her father’s girlfriend.”
“Girlfriend,” he says flatly. “I’m sorry, young lady. I can’t discuss a patient with anyone but family.”
I look at the phone in my hand, willing it to ring with news that Mason is on the way—Cassidy even. “I have her dad’s phone,” I say blindly, as if that somehow qualifies me as family.
He gives me a hard, unwavering stare.
“He gave it to me because I lost mine,” I explain desperately. “And now he doesn’t have one and I’m trying to find him. I mean, I have sisters who are out looking for him. And Cassidy, uh, Hailey’s mom, is out and also can’t be reached.” I gesture to Amanda, who is still standing behind me. “Hailey’s babysitter brought her in. Please, can you tell us if she’s okay?”
He shakes his head and pulls a business card from his coat pocket. “I’m sorry, Piper, is it?” He hands me the card. “Have her mom or dad track me down when they arrive.”
Someone comes through the double doors behind him and I hear a child screaming. It’s the same gut-wrenching, high-pitched shriek I heard through the phone. I point to where the awful sound is coming from. “That’s Hailey,” I tell him. “She’s back there all alone. Can’t you hear her crying?”
“She’s not alone,” he says coldly. “There’s an aide with her.”
“An aide? You mean a stranger.” I raise my voice at him, causing more than a few heads to turn. “She’s not even two years old yet and you’ve got her surrounded by strangers. She’s obviously hurt.” I motion to Amanda’s blood-stained shirt. “She’s probably scared to death with all the medical equipment and unfamiliar faces. You have to let me see her.”
The doctor holds up a hand as if he knows I’m about to charge past him. “Those are the rules. If her parents don’t show up soon, a social worker will be called.”
“A social worker?” I shout. “But that would just be another stranger. She must be terrified. Please let me see her.”
The door behind him swings open again and Hailey’s piercing screams echo through the waiting room. He looks behind him. “I have patients to attend to.” He nods at the card in my hand. “Have them find me.” Then he walks off through the double doors that require a special badge to open from the outside.
I stand stunned; unable to move. I feel the wetness run down my cheeks as I think of a little helpless girl alone and scared. Does she feel abandoned?
Did my daughter feel that way when I gave her away?
My heart sinks into the pit of my stomach as my back hits the wall and my body slowly slides to the unforgiving concrete floor.
A gentle hand touches my shoulder. I look up to see a nurse who’s wearing scrubs with teddy bears on them. Her eyes echo everything I’m feeling. She holds her hand out to help me up. Then she leans in close and whispers, “Come on, honey, some of us know when to break the rules.”
My hopeful eyes snap to hers.
“But only one of you,” she says, peering around me to Amanda.
“Will you be okay out here?” I ask Amanda.
“Yeah, my mom is on her way. I called her before you got here.”
“Good. Thanks, Amanda. You’re a good babysitter. You did everything right.”
She gives me an apologetic nod as the nurse swipes her card, sneaking m
e through into the back.
With each step, the traumatic cries become louder. I hear the dull drone of the old doctor talking behind a curtain, and we quickly move past it. The compassionate nurse pulls me through an open door into an actual room with walls. She dismisses the aide who is trying to calm a scared and vulnerable Hailey.
I didn’t know what to expect if and when I actually got to her, but when she sees me, her reaction melts me. Her expression changes instantly, as if my walking into the room is the best thing that has ever happened in her entire two years on this earth. “Pie-pie!” she belts out somewhere between a cry and a prayer.
She holds up an arm, the one that’s not splinted to her body, rendering it incapable of movement. A bandage spans her forehead, gauze wrapping around her thin tangles of curls to the back of her head. Big, thick balls of tears catch on her lashes before spilling over to her cheeks. She hiccups between her cries, revealing just how long she’s been at it.
I try not to gasp as fear grips my throat, overpowering me. Instead, I paste a calming smile on my face and walk over to the hospital bed, that’s really more like a crib. “Can I?” I look at the nurse, gesturing to the broken little girl on the bed.
The nurse smiles. “Of course.”
Hailey starts climbing over the railing with her good arm to get to me. When I pick her up, she clings to me so hard we practically become the same person. My face falls to the top of her platinum curls and I inhale her sweet angelic scent.
“It’s okay, sweet pea,” I breathe into her hair, using her father’s endearment to help calm her.
“Hailey boo-boo,” she whimpers into my shirt.
I nod into her hair, holding back more of my own tears while being careful not to touch the side of her head with the bandage. “Yes. Hailey has a big boo-boo. The doctors will fix you, sweetie. Maybe you’ll get a big Band-Aid with a princess on it. Or maybe a pretty pink cast we can decorate with markers and stickers.”
I’m not sure how much she understands through her continued tears. But she’s not screaming anymore, and for that I’m grateful. I cover her ear with a gentle hand and ask, “They will fix her, right?”
Black Roses (A Mitchell Sisters Novel) Page 27
