Worth the Wait (McKinney/Walker #1)
Page 19
She stood on shaky legs. “Hi.”
“Hey. I was with Stephen when Hannah called. Stephen needed a ride,” he added, as Hannah and Stephen joined them.
Hannah hugged her brother then went back to Stephen’s arms. “Wait. Why did you need a ride?”
“I’ll tell you about it later.” Stephen pressed a kiss to the top of her head.
Nick gave a short laugh. “He’ll tell you he was a dipshit and parked illegally and got his tire locked.”
Before Stephen could fire back, Matt came into the waiting room, and a hush fell over the twenty-five plus.
“They’ve given her something to stop the contractions and she’s resting,” he said, fighting for control with each word. He pressed his lips together. “It’s way too early.”
She heard the word kids and parents, and at the mention of his other children, Matt’s face broke. That was enough to break everyone. Was he thinking his other children might never see their mother again? But then he shored himself up, took all the quick hugs and promised prayers, and went back to his wife.
Stephen and Hannah walked over to join his brothers, and Nick stepped away to answer a call. Mia looked around, unsure what to do. She wasn’t family. Abby was her friend, and she was worried, but it didn’t seem like her place. And here was Nick, standing close enough to make it hard to breathe. So strange, they were seeing each other in a hospital again.
She walked over to Hannah, waiting for a break in the conversation. “Hey. Do you need anything? Is there anything I can do?”
“No. Thank you.” Hannah hugged her, held on tight. “Thank God you were there.”
She wasn’t sure she’d helped. “I think I’m going to go.”
“Okay.” Hannah pulled back. “Wait, what about your car?”
She’d driven them all in Sarah’s car. It had been the closest. “I’ll call a cab.”
“No, don’t do that. One of us can drive you back.”
“Absolutely not. I’ll be fine.”
“I’ll drive you,” Nick said.
She turned and met his eyes. He was so beautiful. So strong and steadfast. She’d missed him to the point of pain over the past months. “Okay.”
They didn’t speak the entire way through the hospital halls, the elevator, more halls, but he took her hand.
When they got outside and the cold air hit her face, she took her first deep breath in over an hour. When they stopped at the passenger side, Nick opened his arms, and she walked right into them. Not crying, not hot with lust or crazy need. Just breathing and being grateful for the way her cheek rested so perfectly right on his chest. The way the top of her head fit under his chin.
She squeezed her eyes shut and he wrapped her up like she’d always wanted, and she let him, sank right into him. She could stay here and stop time, but time didn’t stop, and eventually he’d let go and she’d have to wonder if he’d always be there. She started to pull back. “I’m okay.”
“I’m not.” His wide palm cradled the back of her head. “Just…give me a second.”
She gave him a second and a few for herself too. She closed her eyes again and let herself be comforted by the steady beat of Nick’s heart under her cheek. They stood there together, had a moment to think about what they’d lost. Lost before they’d ever really had it.
When he finally released her, their eyes met. He stared at her so long she thought he would kiss her. She shouldn’t want him to so badly. He looked at her a minute longer, brushed the back of his hand down her cheek, then opened the door and made sure she was in and buckled before closing it.
They rode in silence until they were out of the parking lot and the traffic thinned. The car was full of him, his scent, his size. Her heart was so full of him it ached. She’d thought she remembered, but she hadn’t, not all the way. How Nick filled her up and smoothed her out.
The mere idea that they could have that kind of love again shook her. But did she fill him up? Could he really be happy? Would he let her in? And if he did, could she take a chance that she’d be locked out again?
Christmas lights looped along storefronts. Wreaths hung at the top of lampposts. They passed a tree lot set up with signs, ready for the first batch of trees that would come well before Thanksgiving. She thought of all the Christmas trees they’d decorated over the years and the nights spent lying under the tree together, looking up at the lights. “Remember how long it always took to get Hannah to sleep on Christmas Eve?”
“Yeah.” He laughed softly, and it filled the space with warmth. “She was so excited, and so determined to see Santa. So were you. Excited, I mean. I think you knew about Santa. I still remember how your eyes shined as bright as the Christmas lights.”
A teasing smile tugged at his lips. It also tugged deep inside her.
“Hannah asked me to be her maid of honor,” she said.
He nodded. “She told me she was going to. It’s coming up soon.”
“Yeah. Hannah mentioned you hadn’t killed the groom, and she thought that was very generous of you.”
“God, I’m not that bad.”
She glanced over, smiled at his almost pouty expression.
“Okay. I can be. I’m trying not to be.”
“Which reminds me—why were you out with Stephen tonight?”
“Just having a guy talk. You know.”
“Putting the fear of God into the man?”
“Me? Why would you think that? Just having a friendly drink. Luke and Zach were there, too.”
“Hmm.” She didn’t quite believe him, but she let it go. They passed more lights, and he told her about his work, the case and how much longer he expected it would take to wrap it up. It was nice talking to him like this. Even if her stomach was fluttering just from being near him like it had at seventeen. Maybe he was right about it being the same. At least some parts.
“I’ve been thinking about getting a dog,” she said after a quiet moment.
“Really? I’d like a dog. Not in town enough, though. What kind?”
“I don’t know. It doesn’t really matter. My secretary’s sister works with a rescue group. If that doesn’t work out, I’ll go to the animal shelter.”
“Lot of good dogs at the shelter.”
“Yeah.”
“Hannah’s been making noise about getting me a dog.”
“She worries about you. Maybe as much as you worry about her.” She knew he didn’t know what to do with a comment like that, so he said nothing, and they rode another few minutes in silence.
He looked over when they stopped at a light. “Was it bad for you? Being there with Abby? Stupid question.” He shook his head and stared straight ahead. “Of course it was bad.” Without looking at her, he reached over and took her hand, twined his fingers through hers. “She was lucky you were there.”
“I don’t know how much help I was,” she said as her pulse kicked up with the simple contact. His touch set her on fire at the same time it made her feel safe. She stared at their joined hands and thought, Dear God, I’m in love with his hands.
“I’m sure you were a huge help.” He looked back at the street in front of him. “You were a great doctor.”
“Thanks.”
“Do you miss it?”
“Not really.” She looked out her window. “Maybe sometimes. I could have used the distraction after we…” Whatever they’d done. Broke up. Ended. Imploded.
“I really could have used it this past year.” She half laughed, though there was absolutely no humor in it. With their fingers still joined, she leaned away from him and rested her head against the glass. “The emergencies, the decisions, so consuming it’s almost impossible to think of anything outside of what you’re doing. I love what I do now. I still feel like I make a difference, but it doesn’t consume the mind quite like the ER. There’s not the opportunity to work twenty-four seven if that’s what you need.”
“Is it what you need?”
She stared out the window. “Sometime
s.”
He tugged her back over and brought their joined hands to his lips. The warmth spread through her. “What can I do to help you?”
“I don’t know.” That was the truth.
“I can try to get you some information if you want.”
“I’m not even sure I want it. I’m not sure it will help. I don’t know what I’d do with it.” She sighed and rolled her forehead against the cool glass. “I don’t know what to do or what I feel.” She’d spent the past weeks trying to get a handle on herself. She couldn’t be afraid Nick wasn’t moving forward when she wasn’t, either.
They reached the lot where she’d parked her car, and he pulled up beside it. They sat there for a minute, neither speaking. There were words and there were silences. They’d had both. Good and bad. This was one of the good ones.
She got out, and he came around, effectively capturing her between his body and her car. Downtown was quiet. The shops were all closed for the night. Only a hip restaurant was still open, and the faint sound of live music floated out every time the door opened.
She stared at the ground, at the toes of Nick’s boots, which were incredibly sexy with his khakis and dress shirt. Nick was sexy in anything, always. He was a beautiful man, but sexy, she thought, had more to do with the way a man carried himself, the vibe he gave off. Nick vibrated with it. He always had.
She looked up to meet his eyes. They were lethal and staring hard into her own.
“Do you blame me? For the baby? Our baby?”
“What? No.” She shook her head. “Nick.” She cupped his lightly stubbled cheeks in her hands. “I don’t. I’m sad. I was sad, but no.”
“I wasn’t there for you. If you think that would happen again, if that’s what you’re afraid of… I wasn’t the man you needed then—”
“Stop. Nick. Don’t.” She held his face like he so often did hers, making him see her. “Don’t. We have to stop looking back.”
He covered her hands with his and closed his eyes for a moment. “You asked me if there had been something else before Hannah was taken.”
He paused and looked at her so long her heart sank. There had been something else. When he smoothed one hand down her hair so gently, she almost cried out. Almost told him not to tell her.
“I had the ring.”
“What?”
“I had the ring. I bought it that very day.”
“Oh, my God,” she whispered, trying to absorb the meaning of his words.
“Yeah. Does that answer your question?”
“You were going to ask me to marry you, and I was going to tell you I was pregnant.” She closed her eyes, locked her knees because she felt them want to give. “I don’t know if that makes it better or worse.” She fell against his chest, once again feeling the harsh winds of fate that had battered them. “We were so close, weren’t we? So, so close.”
She rested there against him, neither of them in a hurry to let go. “It shook me when everything I thought we had disappeared. We were what I believed in more than anything. In all the years, the distance, the obstacles, we were the only real certainty. Then it was over with and gone as if it had never been.” With his arms still tight around her, she looked up to meet his eyes, needing him to understand. “It still shakes me that something so enormous as our love could be erased so simply.”
“Was it really so simple?”
“No.” She dropped her gaze to his chest. “Not for me.”
“Not for me, either. It wasn’t at all simple for me. Look at me. I loved you, Mia. There was nothing else, no one else. Even after Hannah… I loved you. I just couldn’t get to you.” He took her face in his hands with a desperation. “I ruined us. I know I did. You tried to love me, and I pushed you away. But please tell me there’s a chance. Tell me I haven’t lost you. Not again.”
“Nick—
“No, listen. I lived a lot of years, too many without you, because I couldn’t reach out. I couldn’t say what needed to be said. Like I’m sorry and I was wrong and I love you. All those things that were so hard to say, they don’t seem so hard now.”
“You’ve already apologized. You don’t have to say it again.”
“Maybe not, but I think I will. I’ll also say this, and it’s not easy to say. Forgiving myself for letting someone I love be hurt that way, that may be the hardest thing I’ve ever done. But if it means having you back, getting us back, I’ll have to do it. I’ll find a way to do it.”
She stared at him, her heart hammering as he said the words she’d dreamed of hearing for so long.
“Don’t say no. I know it seems like I went on without you, without a thought, but I didn’t.” He laid a hand over his heart, his eyes pleading. “I love you, Mia. You’re the only woman I’ve ever loved. I’ll keep showing you until you feel it, until you know it.”
He kissed her forehead. “We’ll do this slowly, as slow as you need, but I won’t accept never. You were right before. I did let you go. I won’t watch you walk away again. I can’t.”
This was a new side of Nick. More raw, more revealing. She squeezed her eyes shut against his pain, her pain.
“Look at me, Mia.” He waited until her eyes met his. “You still love me. I know you do. I feel it.”
Her heart trembled with fear or love—or both.
“Tell me. Give me that much.”
The truth rolled through her. And because it was true, she couldn’t keep it from him. “I still love you.”
The breath he let out, the relief in his eyes, told her more than anything.
Slowly, he dipped his head, put his lips to hers. It was a soft, slow kiss, deep enough to touch her heart. His fingers slid through her hair, his tongue circled hers, telling her, reminding her. She could no more hold herself back from Nick than she could keep from loving him. And that was dangerous. But being with him like this, she didn’t want safe. She let herself go, fell deeper, until he lifted his head.
Her eyes flittered open to find his looking down at her softly. He pulled his fingers from her hair, trailed one finger down her cheek. “I’ll follow you home.”
It took her a second to respond. Her head still swam with his words and the kiss that had followed. “You don’t need to.”
“I know. I want to. Just to make sure you get home okay. I won’t even get out of the car.”
“Just like you used to.” They shared a smile, remembering all the times he’d followed her back to the dorm with the same promise, then snuck in behind her.
She drove with Nick following, thinking of a painting she’d always loved in Nick’s parents’ home. It was the sea and sky, but what was special was the way the artist captured the essence of where the two met. Magical and inevitable.
She and Nick had always met and melded together. She'd thought she’d been the only one to suffer the loss, that she’d been the only one that tried to save them. That wasn’t exactly fair. She’d been devastated by what happened to Hannah, but Nick, the strongest man she knew, had been broken. Now it felt like the Nick she’d fallen in love with was back. Back and wanting her.
She wondered if they could meet now. If she could risk reaching over the edge for him, give him the power to take that piece of her again. Another piece of her. But what good were the pieces of her heart if she wasn’t with Nick?
He pulled in the driveway behind her. If he asked to come in, could she say no?
They’d come together the first time in a blast of heat and need with the past hot on their tails. Then she’d given in to the comfort he could provide, loving him, maybe pretending, maybe dreaming of what might be. If they went to bed for a third time, in a quiet moment of decision, it would be more, and deeper for both of them.
When, or if, she made love to Nick Walker again, she wanted to know that it wouldn’t be the last time. She wanted to be sure it would be the first of many, that it was forever.
Without opening his door, he put his window down and waved as she pulled into the garage. It took her a se
cond, but she finally pressed the automatic opener to lower the door behind her. As the metal came down between them, she wondered how much more it could possibly hurt to be with Nick than it hurt to stay away from him.
Chapter 23
A BOTTLE OF CHAMPAGNE opened with a pop, and glasses tied with gauzy white bows were passed around the bridal room. There were cheers and toasts and nervous giggles from the bride. Five little girls in navy velvet dresses that hung almost to their ankles danced and spun like winter fairies with their shiny black shoes and white flowers in their hair.
Hannah sat on a backless stool, her dress billowing around her so it didn’t get bunched. Mia laid a white towel over Hannah’s lap and held out a plate of finger sandwiches, cheese, and fruit. “If you’re going to be drinking that, you need to eat. You need to eat anyway.”
Hannah took a triangle of bread covered with cream cheese mixture and grinned up at her. “I’m so happy, Mia. I didn’t even know it was possible to be this happy.”
Mia took in Hannah’s flushed face, her dancing eyes. “Really? I couldn’t tell.” She touched her cheek softly. “Eat that, and maybe one more, then we’ll redo the lips.”
Lizzie McKinney slipped into the bridal room from her checking/spying on the guys. “Look what I got!” She waved a three-quarters-full bottle of Crown Royal over her head. “I stole it from the boys. I don’t trust them.”
“Are they being nice to Stephen?”
“He’s still alive. I’m kidding. He’s fine. They were just toasting when I came in.” She turned to Abby. “Matt looks almost as nervous as Stephen and wants to know how you’re feeling and if you’re sitting down. I’m starting to feel like a damn carrier pigeon. Can’t you text the man?”
“I am texting him. I’ll send him a picture.”
Abby hadn’t had contractions since the incident at the bridal shop, and now, at nearly eight months, she was more than ready to meet her babies. Mia watched her take a selfie, then one of just her enormous stomach, and she quickly looked away. Her mind and heart had been so consumed with Savannah she hadn’t thought about being pregnant in a very long time. Now Nick was back in her life, or trying to be, wanting to be.