by Lori Ryan
“At this point we need to wait and see how he responds to the medications. I think, since he’s a young, healthy dog and we got to him within the thirty-minute window, he should be fine. I’d like to keep Rev here overnight so we can monitor him and then, if he responds well, you can pick him up tomorrow. You’ll need to see your regular veterinarian about getting him on a medication regimen to prevent this from happening again.”
“Can we stay with him for a bit?” Jill asked but then winced as she thought that Andrew probably had no interest in staying with her. She should probably offer to take him home, but he nodded at her when she glanced at him.
“Yes. The Phenobarbital is going to keep him under for a while. I had to give him a fairly high dosage so it will have an anesthetic effect for a couple of hours. You can sit with him while we get an overnight suite set up for him. You can come back and visit him early in the morning if you want to but I’d prefer not to release him until tomorrow evening. I want at least twenty-four hours to monitor him.”
The doctor and technicians left the room and Jill and Andrew were left alone. She didn’t know what to say to Andrew so she pulled a chair closer to where Rev slept and rested her head on him, listening to him breathe.
After what seemed like a very long time, she whispered, “Thank you,” to Andrew but couldn’t bring herself to look at him.
She wanted to ask how he had been. If he was hurting as much as she’d been hurting for the last two weeks. If he missed her as much as she missed him. If breathing and getting through the day from one minute to the next was as hard for him as it was for her.
He stiffened when she spoke and she held her breath, waiting for a response. She would give anything to be with him, but she couldn’t be with him knowing he didn’t love her the way she loved him.
“I’ll wait outside. Take your time, I have phone calls to make.” He stood and walked out of the exam room and Jill wept into Rev’s coat.
The fear she had felt during Rev’s seizure, combined with the torment of being so close to Andrew but not being able to reach out and have him hold her was more than Jill could handle.
When the vet tech came back twenty minutes later, she had gotten herself somewhat under control but it must have been obvious she’d been crying.
The poor woman tried to assure Jill that Rev was going to be okay now, but that made Jill start crying again. She was relieved Rev would be okay, but Jill knew it would be a long time before she would recover from her broken heart.
Chapter Thirty-Seven
Andrew stepped out into the lobby and looked down at his phone. He had said he had phone calls to make but that wasn’t true. He just couldn’t be in the same room with Jill without pulling her into his arms and holding her.
He knew if he did that, he might break down. His anger at her was slipping away and in its place was a pain so great, he thought it would swallow him whole.
As the anger subsided, he had to admit what he’d known under the surface all along: Jill was nothing like Blair and she would never hurt him the way Blair had.
When Jill left him, she hadn’t been motivated by greed or malice. She was just frightened and he couldn’t be angry with her for that any longer. It had just been easier for Andrew to hold onto hate and anger instead of feeling the sorrow he felt at losing the woman he loved.
He dropped into a chair in the lobby, his forearms resting on his thighs and his head hanging down. Being close to Jill again was harder than he ever would have imagined.
He wanted to shake her and tell her they belonged together. He imagined if he could tell Jill he loved her, it would all be better. They could go back to the way things should be.
But he knew he couldn’t. Not when he knew she couldn’t love him back – that she didn’t even believe in love. That she wouldn’t want to hear those words.
Thirty minutes later, she came down the hall. “I just have to pay the bill and then we can go. They got him moved into the overnight area.” She sounded so quiet and sad, it tore at Andrew’s heart.
“Okay,” was all he could think to say. He clenched his hands by his side to keep from pulling her into his arms and kept himself planted firmly in the seat to keep from going to her.
Twenty minutes later, they were pulling up in front of her front door. He handed her the keys then turned woodenly to walk back to his grandmother’s house.
“Andrew.”
He took a deep breath to steel himself, then slowly turned to face Jill.
“I need to tell you why I can’t marry you. I owe you that much.” She looked so sad and alone standing on her front steps. Her arms wrapped around her waist, clinging to herself as if trying to hold herself together.
He watched her, waiting, but didn’t say anything. He couldn’t breathe. Couldn’t move as his senses went on high alert.
She seemed to struggle for a minute before she spoke. “After Jake left, I realized how one-sided things were. How much I had loved Jake… But I honestly don’t think he ever loved me. He said he did but it wasn’t there. I know that now.”
Andrew watched Jill as she blinked back tears and held herself tighter as she talked. He knew every word was costing her. Every word caused her pain and as much as he wanted to hate her, he couldn’t. Her pain gutted him.
“I thought I would be okay with the penalty clause, that I would feel secure and know you wouldn’t…” Her voice broke and the tears streamed down her face but she continued.
It tore at his heart to see her in such pain… His arms ached to hold her, but he was frozen to the spot. Watching, waiting.
“I fell in love with you, Andrew,” she said quietly, tears flowing freely now. “I didn’t mean to, but I did and then I realized if we went ahead with the marriage, I would be right back where I started. I would be in a marriage where only one of us was in love and the other was staying for the wrong reasons. I couldn’t be with you, knowing you would only be there to avoid losing your money. And I couldn’t be married to you knowing you weren’t as in love with me as I am with you. I didn’t mean to lead you on or make you mad or anything. I’m so sorry. I just… I didn’t mean for this to happen.”
She bent at the waist, sobbing, as though she couldn’t breathe from the pain.
He couldn’t move as he processed what Jill said. What it meant for them.
Then he crossed the space to her in two long strides and swept her into his arms. He needed to stop this pain for her. For both of them.
He held on for dear life, holding her tight, understanding then, why he had almost lost her.
“I love you, Jill,” he said into her neck. “I’ve loved you almost since the moment I set eyes on you again. Hell, I don’t think I ever stopped loving you as a teenager. I don’t know. I just thought if I told you, you’d run like hell. So, I gave you the penalty clause instead.”
Andrew felt Jill collapse in his arms and heard her sobs. He pulled back to see her face.
“Don’t cry, sweetheart. Why are you still crying?” He wiped the tears from her cheeks with his thumbs and kissed her lips softly.
“I can’t help it. I thought...I just…I can’t stop crying.” She half laughed, half sobbed as she swiped at her tears and smiled a wet smile at him.
“I can fix that,” he said. He scooped her up in his arms and carried her in through her front door.
“Say it again,” she said.
“I love you. With all my heart. With everything I am. I love you, Jillie Walsh,” he whispered and laid kisses on her wet cheeks.
Then her carried her upstairs and showed her how much he loved her again and again, over and over throughout the night. He held her when she slept, spent, in his arms in the early morning light.
Chapter Thirty-Eight
Jill and Andrew brought Rev home from the hospital the next night and by the following day, he was back to normal. His regular vet put him on a regimen of daily Phenobarbital and they went back to the usual wait-and-see routine with his epilepsy.
<
br /> As Andrew lay in bed Tuesday morning with Jill snuggled against him, he almost laughed at himself for all the worry he’d held inside.
Telling her he loved her hadn’t caused her to turn on him the way it had with Blair. It had set him free. He had never felt more free, more right, more whole at any other time in his life.
She stirred in his arms and he brushed a kiss on her temple.
“Good morning, sweet Jill,” he whispered. His gut clenched when she turned her beautiful golden eyes to his.
“Morning, handsome.” She stretched her body out, long and lean against his, contorting like a contented cat.
His body instantly came to life and he let his hands trail over her soft, warm skin. Heat flashed between them as Jill turned into his embrace and began the small moaning gasps he loved.
“I love the way your hands feel on me,” she said. “The way they make me feel. I don’t think I’ll ever get tired of the feel of your hands on me.”
Andrew’s lips quirked into a smile. “I’ll have to keep my hands on you forever, then, sweet Jill. Forever and ever and ever,” he said as he added his mouth to his hands.
He still wore that smile when he walked into his office an hour and a half later.
Theresa caught the look Andrew gave her as he walked past her desk. He said a quick ‘hello’ to her that was designed to look like a casual, friendly encounter between two people who worked together to anyone who might be watching, but Theresa knew better.
His lips had quirked at the corners and the look in his eye told her they were more than friends. Or, at least, he wanted them to be more.
On the outside, Andrew looked happy once again now that he and the whore were back together. But Theresa didn’t miss the longing looks he snuck her sometimes.
In fact, he’d been watching her more and more lately. She felt his gaze on her whenever he walked down the hall past her desk.
Theresa had been straightening Andrew’s office for him one evening and found the prenuptial agreement the whore had forced him to sign. That was all the proof she needed to know he was in trouble.
She didn’t know yet what hold this woman had on him but it must be strong if she had manipulated Andrew into signing away all of his wealth to her.
Maybe his little tramp had something she was holding over him.
That wouldn’t last long. Theresa would find out what the hell was going on and fix it for Andrew. And, when he finally got out from under the bitch’s spell, she would be there for him. To help him pick up the pieces. To answer those silent pleas he’d had been sending Theresa all this time.
Chapter Thirty-Nine
Jill was surprised to hear the doorbell ring. She rarely had visitors at the house and wasn’t expecting anyone. Andrew would be home soon, but he never rang the bell.
Jake. Great. Just great. Jill stepped away from the window and opened the front door.
“What can I do for you, Jake?” It wasn’t a stretch for her to add a touch of annoyance to her voice and she hoped it would eventually discourage his surprise visits.
He smiled and pulled a bouquet of carnations from behind his back.
Really? Carnations? Is there any cheesier flower than that?
He seemed to be waiting for a response. She had no intention of inviting him inside so she stepped out onto the front porch, taking the carnations as she walked. She leaned against the porch railing and set the flowers next to her.
“Jake, what’s this about? Why do you keep doing this?” She tilted her head and studied the man she had once loved. The man who’d walked away from her.
“I miss you, Jill. I’ve been thinking and I think I made a big mistake. I want us to try again.”
“What!” she sputtered. “I... That’s insane… I don’t even know what to say to that.”
He took her hand but she pulled it back from him.
“Please, Jill. Say you’ll give us another try. I broke things off with Missy. I know I was wrong, but I can do this. I can make this work. I know I can.” He sounded earnest, but there were an awful lot of ‘I’s in what he’d said.
She shook her head. “I’m not some project for you to keep working at.”
“I know, Jill. But we’re good together. We had such a good life, together, you know?”
“No. I don’t know. I’ve realized a lot of things over the past several months. Our marriage wasn’t right, Jake. I thought I was happy, but I didn’t see how much I was giving up. I’m sorry, but I don’t love you anymore.” Jill tried to be calm and firm, wondering if maybe this time he’d listen to her. For once, would he just listen?
“But Jill,” he began.
“No. Stop.” She sighed. “Look, Jake. I’m sorry, but I’m not going to give us another try. I’m in love with someone else. I’m getting married to a man I love with all my heart. And the best part is, he loves me just as much. He respects me. He would never treat me the way you treated me.”
His face grew hard and his hands gripped her arms tightly. Too tightly.
“You can’t. You can’t marry someone else. You’re supposed to love me, Jill.” Jake's eyes were hard and flashed with anger.
She didn’t know if she was more stunned that he had grabbed her or that he still didn’t care about her feelings. How had she not seen him for who he truly was over the time they’d been together?
She didn’t have much time to respond to him because Jake was lifted off the ground and tossed down the porch stairs.
“Oh, God, Andrew. Don’t hurt him!” Jill grabbed Andrew’s arm and tried to pull him back.
She’d have better luck stopping a freight train, but it only took Andrew a few seconds to get himself under control.
“Leave. Now,” he bit out through clenched teeth.
Jake scrambled backwards in the driveway as Andrew stalked him.
When his feet finally found purchase, Jake scurried to his car and quickly drove away while Jill pulled Andrew back to the porch.
Her arms tingled as Andrew ran his hands gently over them, scowling at the red blotches that were blossoming on her arm where Jake had grabbed her. He let out a deep roar and turned back toward his car, presumably to go after Jake, but she grabbed his arm and pulled him back to the porch.
“It’s not important, Andrew. Let him go.”
“Did he hurt you?” His voice rippled with anger. He was controlling it, but only just.
“I’m okay. He wouldn’t have really hurt me,” she answered.
She slipped her hands around Andrew’s back and brushed her hands up and down in long strokes, soothing away the tension.
“What did he want?”
“Nothing. It’s not important.” She turned and opened the door to let out a frantic Rev. “It’s all right. Mommy’s fine.” Jill knelt down to scratch Rev and reassure him. When she stood back up, she ran into the brick wall of Andrew’s chest.
His arms came back up to her shoulders, pinning her firmly, but gently. His eyes pierced hers in a steady gaze.
“What did he want, Jill?” He said every word slowly, carefully.
“It was silly. It’s nothing.” She shrugged a shoulder. “He’s apparently tired of Missy and wants to get back together with me. Obviously I told him that wasn’t going to happen and he didn’t like that answer.”
Andrew was still for a minute and then bent to look into Jill’s eyes. His voice was soft and quiet when he finally spoke. “Do you want that, Jill? You were with him a long time. Are you sure you don’t need to see where that might go?”
She took a step back and studied Andrew’s face to be sure he was serious. He looked deadly serious and the realization made her a little sick.
“How could you even think that?” She shook her head at him. “How could that even cross your mind? There isn’t anything Jake could say or do to make me want to be back with him.” She studied his face again to see if he understood. “You. You’re my world, Andrew. What you and I have together is so different, so much more tha
n anything Jake and I ever shared. I wouldn’t give up what you and I have – for Jake or anyone else.”
His smile was slow, sexy, the kind of smile that burned through Jill and heated her from the inside out. With that one smile, he changed the air between them. Suddenly there was a crackling heat that charged between their bodies. He called Rev inside and pulled Jill into the house behind him.
Her arms wound their way around his neck and her body pressed into his as if it had a mind of its own. Every fiber of her wanted to be closer to Andrew, wanted to feel him pressed against her.
His hands went around her bottom and he scooped her up, pulling her tight to him as his mouth devoured hers with a heated kiss.
She wrapped her legs around his waist and matched the heat in his kiss with passion of her own. She felt her nipples pebble against his chest and let the friction of their joined bodies thrill through her.
“Dining room,” Jill said, her lips still on his.
A small chuckle came from deep in his chest as he lay her on the dining room table and began to work the button on her jeans.
Jill tugged at Andrew’s shirt, trying to pull it free of his jeans, wanting to touch his muscled chest. He paused and pulled his shirt over his head with one arm and then made quick work of the rest of their clothes.
“God, what you do to me,” he murmured to her as he entered her slowly, plunging deep and then staying as still as he could as if trying to gain some semblance of control.
She laughed but it was thready and needy and her nails dug into his hips, urging him to move within her. Regaining control, he moved slowly, drawing a tortured moan from her.
“Mine.” Andrew’s voice was raspy, husky with desire and possession as he brought Jill closer and closer to orgasm.
“Only yours,” Jill whispered.
Slowly, deeply, he plunged harder, drawing gasp after gasp from her until she shattered beneath him, spinning blissfully out of control.
