Wishing and Hoping

by Susan Meier

  As rain beat against his back, he patted his shirt pocket for his cell phone but it wasn’t there. Reaching over Tia, he grabbed her purse and found her cell.

  He quickly dialed Ben’s number and when Elizabeth answered, he said, “Call an ambulance.” The wind picked up. Rain pounded around him. To be heard above the noise, he shouted, “Tia wrecked her car. She’s in a ditch right off the main road in front of my lane. Hurry.”

  With that, he disconnected the call and bent inside her car again. “Tia?” He wasn’t sure if it was right or wrong to wake her. He only remembered advice about not letting people with a concussion sleep and he reached in and shook her shoulder slightly. “Tia. Wake up.”

  She didn’t move, and fear gripped Drew. He pressed two fingers against her neck and found a pulse but it was weak. She was bleeding so fast he didn’t have a clue how to stop it and what she had of a pulse slowed under his fingers.

  He unexpectedly remembered what Mrs. Hernandez had said the week before about not wasting time and he realized that was all he had done. Waste time. He’d found somebody he liked. Somebody who liked him, and instead of rejoicing he’d been an idiot. Bossing her. Mistrusting her. Almost accusing her of trying to trick him when she’d first told him she was pregnant. Then kicking her out of his life for good.

  And now she might die. And their baby might die. And everything he’d almost had would slip through his fingers again. Only this time, he would deserve it.

  He pulled out of the car and lifted his face to the rain, screaming his frustration into the wind. Why couldn’t he trust? Why couldn’ t he get beyond the fear of being hurt?

  He patted down his shirt pocket again and this time found what he was looking for. The sonogram picture. His hope for a future. He’d stared at this a hundred times, memorized the shadowy lines, sometimes hoping it really was a girl, other times hoping he would have a son. In the two weeks since he’d forced Tia away, he had clung to this picture as a lifeline because he believed one child would be enough. Now, he suddenly knew one child wasn’t enough to build a life. He wanted the baby’s mother. He wanted her. He wanted to love her and take care of her and argue with her and just plain have fun with her.

  She couldn’t die. Their baby couldn’t die. He wouldn’t let them.

  He reached into the car again. At the same time he heard the wail of the ambulance siren as it pierced through the noise of the storm.

  “Tia. Wake up.”

  Her breathing shifted and he hoped that meant she had heard him, but she didn’t stir, didn’t awaken and he feared the shift in her breathing might not have been good. Listening more closely, he recognized she was now gasping for breath.

  “Tia! You have to wake up!” Panic gripped him so hard his heart actually hurt. He couldn’t believe she was going to die, that he was going to lose her for good. But he was.

  Tears swelled painfully in his eyes. He dropped his forehead to her chest. “Tia. Tia,” he whispered. “Don’t die. Please, don’t die.”

  “Drew?” She said his name slowly, her voice coming thick and sluggish and on a wheeze of breath.

  “Yes!” He straightened away from her and his gaze jumped to her face. “It’s me. I’m here.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  “You have nothing to be sorry for,” he said, studying her. Her eyes hadn’t opened. She could barely move her mouth. And there wasn’t a damned thing he could do to help her. All he could do was wait. He pushed her bangs away from her wound.

  “Don’t want to bother you. Don’t want to make you mad.”

  “You’re not a bother,” he said, but her words hit him like an arrow in the heart. She was the best thing that had ever happened to him and he’d made her feel that she was a bother.

  “Tried to make it to my mother’s. A tree fell.”

  “It’s okay,” he said softly as the ambulance crew began running the short distance from the road where they’d parked.

  “It’s okay,” he repeated, trailing his fingers across her forehead, again nudging her hair away from her cut.

  “No. It’s not okay. You like your privacy. I won’t ever bother you again.”

  This time a new feeling skittered through Drew. He wasn’t even sure what to name it. She’d debated stopping at his house to get out of the storm, but she’d changed her mind because she knew he didn’t want to be bothered.

  Had he done the ultimate damage? Had he pushed her so far that she no longer saw any good in him? Had she come to her senses the way he’d been directing her to, and now she wanted nothing to do with him?

  Aaron Felix shoved him out of the way. “Move, Drew!” he said, yelling to be heard above the rain.

  Drew stepped back. A few seconds later Ben’s truck skidded to a stop behind the ambulance. Elizabeth and Ben jumped out. They didn’t even approach Drew. And why should they? By now, Tia had probably told them he’d asked for a divorce. By now they knew he’d hurt Tia. It was more proof that he’d blown it. Totally. There would be no second chance for him.

  Ben and Elizabeth ran to Aaron. “Is she okay?” Ben yelled.

  Aaron answered, but Drew didn’t hear. Edging away, he took an additional step back. Then another. Then another. All this time he’d blamed Sandy for ruining his ability to trust, but he now knew the choice had been his. And he’d chosen wrong. If Tia wanted nothing to do with him, he deserved it.

  Eventually, he turned and headed to his house. Nobody even noticed he had gone.

  Two days later Tia was sitting up in her hospital bed laughing with Marian and Lily. The fifty-something divorcée and twenty-two-year-old graphic artist had little in common, but for some reason or another it didn’t matter. Marian mothered Lily and Lily—with her vast experience of six months on an ad team—mentored Marian. The pair simply made Tia laugh.

  “So, Lou decides the best thing to do with Mr. Barrington is to use humor,” Marian said.

  When she paused, Lily eagerly picked up the story. “And he goes to his mother’s house and borrows one of her suits. It was an old brown one that actually looks a lot like a really ugly one you wear when you’re trying to look older. Anyway, then he buys a dark brown wig and dresses like you for the presentation.”

  “Are you kidding?” Tia said, then she gasped. “He didn’t!”

  “He did,” Marian continued as Lily leaned out the door, Tia suspected, to make sure a nurse wasn’t on her way to tell them to keep down the noise. “He walked in, big as life, wearing that suit and wig, without shaving his moustache or legs, and he said, ‘Good morning, I’m Tia Capriotti and I’m here to give my presentation on the Barrington Cereal account.”

  “What did Mr. Holden say?” Tia said, through gasping laughs as she pictured Lou in his mother’s brown suit, wearing a wig.

  “He said, ‘Sit down, Lou.’And Lou said, ‘No. Today, I’m not Lou. Today I’m Tia because most of this campaign is her idea and she deserves the credit.’”

  Tia stopped laughing. “Are you kidding?”

  Marian smiled. “No. He wanted you to get credit.”

  “That’s so sweet.”

  “Speaking of sweet,” Lily said, “your husband is walking down the hall.”

  Tia grabbed Marian’s hand. Working late one night, Tia had admitted to Marian that her marriage wasn’t just over, it was a sham. Marian had offered her the good advice of accepting Drew’s decision to divorce and move on. Tia hadn’t exactly felt better, but at least she knew she was doing the right thing. But she hadn’t expected to ever have to speak with him again.

  “Oh, no.”

  “Hey,” Marian said. “You can do this.”

  Tia shook her head. “I don’t think so. The guy hates me and instead of staying the heck away from him, I wrecked my car in his front yard.”

  “You’ll be fine,” Lily said before she bent down and hugged Tia. “We’ll see you later.”

  Tia shot an imploring glance at Marian, who shook her head no and slipped out of the room ten seconds before Drew w
alked in.

  Tia pretended great interest in her TV, then glanced over as if only noticing him. Wanting to get this visit over with as quickly as possible, she casually said, “Hey. Hi, Drew.” She didn’t want him to think she was pining. She most definitely didn’t want him to think she needed him. She wanted him gone, so she could get over loving a man whom she had done nothing but annoy for the past several weeks.

  “Hi.” He thrust the roses at her. “I brought you these.”

  “Thanks,” she said, trying to sound casual, but feeling her voice weakening. Not only did he look wonderful, but he’d also brought her flowers. Of course, he probably felt compelled since she was the mother of his child. Nine chances out of ten he was here to make sure everything was fine with the baby. She needed to remember that.

  “There’s a water pitcher around here somewhere…” She turned on her side and began to edge out of the bed, but Drew stopped her by grabbing her upper arm.

  “Don’t.”

  Not able to look at him when he was this close and touching her, she shifted away, waving her free hand in dismissal. “I can walk. I’m fine. A little concussion. The doctor said I should be out of here tomorrow.”

  Still holding her arm, Drew gently eased her back to the bed. “I know. I called.”

  But he hadn’t come. He hadn’t even come to the emergency room. That was when she’d had to explain the truth about her marriage to her parents.

  He busied himself with finding the water pitcher, but when he did it was too small for the flowers.

  Tia said, “Don’t worry about them. I’ll have my mother bring a vase.”

  “That would be great.”

  “Yeah.” She fiddled with the covers. “So, since you called, you also know everything’s fine with the baby.”

  He nodded.

  “All rightie, then,” she said, smiling up at him, trying to force a happiness she didn’t feel because she just wanted him out of her room. He didn’t love her. She was a fool to love him. She wanted to get on with the rest of her life.

  “So, we’re great. Everything’s great. And your responsibility here is done. You can go.”

  He swallowed, but otherwise didn’t move.

  “Really,” she said, smiling again. “You can go.”

  “Are you saying that because you’re trying to make my life easier, or are you saying that because you really want me to go?”

  Tia almost sighed. Nothing was ever simple with this guy. “A little bit of both, I guess.”

  “And I know I deserve that.”

  This time Tia did sigh. “You don’t deserve anything, Drew. We made a mistake. We tried to fix it by getting married. It worked fine to save my dad from being over-stressed and not so well from other perspectives. But there’s no need for a debriefing. Let’s just move on.”

  “Is that what you want?”

  She sighed again, but this time she looked at him. “What difference does it make?”

  “It makes a lot of difference.”

  “Why? So you can get all righteously indignant with me and tell me again how you can’t trust?”

  “No, because I do trust you. And, the other day, when I was waiting for the ambulance I realized that Mrs. Hernandez was right.”

  She stared at him. “Mrs. Hernandez?”

  “Yeah.”

  “You never think she’s right.”

  He shrugged. “Usually she isn’t, but she left me, too.”

  Tia gaped at him. “You ran off your housekeeper?”

  “No, she left me to get married. While she was caring for her sister, she met a man. Apparently, it was love at first sight. She was going to work out a notice, but somehow or another I talked her into realizing life was short and she needed to have every minute she could get with this guy…Nolan.”

  Tia took a second to digest what he’d said, then she laughed her first real laugh in weeks. “Well, isn’t that great!”

  “I got a postcard. She’s very happy.”

  Tia shook her head in wonder. “Wow.”

  “But before she left, she yelled at me.”

  “She was always yelling at you.”

  “This time she told me I was an idiot and I agreed.”

  Not quite sure how to reply to that, Tia said nothing.

  “When I cautioned her about marrying a guy she’d just met, she countered that I was an idiot who never took advantage of good things when I had them.” He paused and met her gaze. “I realized how right she was when I stood there helplessly, watching you out cold in your car, not sure how injured you were.”

  “I’m fine,” Tia whispered.

  He drew a long breath. “I know. That’s kind of why I’m here. I don’t want to waste any more time.”

  Holding her breath, Tia didn’t reply. She knew this was hard for him, but if he was taking them to the point she thought he might be taking them, he had to say it. All of it. Every darned word. She wasn’t assuming anything anymore.

  “I would like to be married for real.”

  She wanted to leap into his arms. Instead, she forced herself not to speak because he still hadn’t said what she needed to hear.

  He pulled in a breath. “No comment on that?”

  “I’m not a hundred percent sure what you’re saying.”

  “I’m saying I want to be married to you…forever.” He caught her gaze. “For real.”

  She shook her head. “It’s not enough.”

  He gaped at her. “Not enough? What do you want from a guy who fell in love with you in four weeks of weekends?”

  Tia flopped back against her pillow. That was what she wanted to hear. She took a breath, then another, then she said, “Say it again.”

  “What?”

  “Don’t play stupid cowboy with me. Say it again.”

  “I love you.”

  “Again.”

  His lips twitched. “I love you.”

  “Again.”

  He burst out laughing. “No! Damn it! I said it. I meant it. Just like you said, it’s time to move on.”

  For that, Tia scrambled up in bed and all but flung herself into his arms. “That’s the guy I love.”

  “You like me grouchy?”

  “I like you as the real you. Deep down inside you’re good. And you know what? I’m keeping you.”

  “You damned well better,” he said, then kissed her soundly. “Because I got the estimate on your car. It’s totaled. If we’re staying married, I’ll buy you another.”

  Tia melted against him, holding on to him tightly, afraid she was dreaming, even though she knew she wasn’t. “I already said I was keeping you.”

  “Then you’ve got yourself another red sports car.”

  “All right! And since you’re willing to buy me a car, I’ll compromise, too.”

  He frowned. “What have you got to barter?”

  “My job.”

  “You can’t give up your job.”

  Tia smiled. “No, but I could begin working from home. We’ll try it in the last few months of my pregnancy and see if it works out.” Unable to resist, she kissed him again.

  But when she attempted to pull away, this time it was Drew who clung to her. “I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean to hurt you. I didn’t want to be afraid.”

  Tia shifted out of his embrace. “Hey, cowboys don’t get scared. You weren’t scared, you were cautious.”

  He burst out laughing. “Right.”

  “And that’s the story we’ll tell our kids when they’re old enough to hear.”

  At the mention of their kids, he flattened his hand on her stomach, then looked into her eyes. “Are you sure you’re okay?”

  “Positive.”

  How could she not be okay? She was married to the man of her dreams, had a baby on the way and was about to get a new sports car.

  Life did not get any better than this, and just as she’d thought the day she’d run into him at the party, this really was her lucky year.

  ISBN: 978-1-4603-55
11-4

  WISHING AND HOPING

  Copyright © 2006 by Linda Susan Meier

  All rights reserved. Except for use in any review, the reproduction or utilization of this work in whole or in part in any form by any electronic, mechanical or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including xerography, photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, is forbidden without the written permission of the editorial office, Silhouette Books, 233 Broadway, New York, NY 10279 U.S.A.

  All characters in this book have no existence outside the imagination of the author and have no relation whatsoever to anyone bearing the same name or names. They are not even distantly inspired by any individual known or unknown to the author, and all incidents are pure invention.

  This edition published by arrangement with Harlequin Books S.A.

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