“You okay?” Cole whispered in my ear, gently wiping a stray tear that had escaped from my eye.
“Yeah, just, you know…” I said stupidly, trying not to get too emotional. “You really told your dad I was the one?” He smiled before he wrapped his arms around me and pulled me against his shirt.
“Yeah, I knew you were the one,” he told me quietly. “That doesn’t mean there weren’t a few days that I struggled with that fact, but whatever happened, you had already stolen my heart.”
God, thank you. I don’t know what I did to deserve this man, but I will never stop being grateful that he loves me. Never.
Cole pulled me out to the dance floor, spinning me in a circle and smiling down at me before he slid his arm around my waist and drew me close to him. The band was playing a country song that I didn’t recognize, but when Cole started softly singing in my ear, I think it instantly became my favorite song of all time. I studied the curve of his neck beneath his shirt collar as I felt his cheek brush softly against my temple, and I could almost feel him smiling against my ear a couple of times. I couldn’t help but smile myself as I closed my eyes and took a deep breath.
“Okay, I have a request,” I finally said as the song neared an end. “Can we always do this? Every night, will you dance with me and sing to me, just like this? Forever and ever? Don’t say no.”
“Every night?”
“Every night.” He leaned back and looked into my eyes as he smiled.
“I think that’s a great idea.” He kissed me on the cheek and then we walked back toward the table with our arms around each other. I was vaguely aware that Liz and Rosalie were watching us, and as we sat down, they both smiled. Rachel wrinkled her nose from where she sat with Charlotte on her lap.
“You guys look so in love, it almost makes me sick,” Rachel sighed, folding her arms around Charlotte.
“Oh, hush!” Liz ordered her, gazing at Cole with a grin pasted on her face. “Rosalie and I want to talk to you both about something.”
“What, Mom?” Cole asked as he draped his arm across the back of my chair.
“Well, we were talking on the way over here with your dad, and we want to…” she hesitated, glancing over at me. “The thing is, we know that the bride’s family usually takes care of the wedding…”
“But we don’t want that,” Rosalie interjected. “I want to take care of the food, and the cake, and whatever else I can help with.”
“And your dad and I want to do the rest,” Liz directed to Cole, who stiffened in his seat a little before he looked at me with those dark chocolate-brown eyes. He stared at me in an expectant way that let me know this decision was up to me.
“You don’t have to do that,” I stated. “I know it might not seem like it, but I do okay for myself, and I can afford to…”
“I know we don’t have to,” Liz interrupted gently, “but we want to. If I’m going to be your mom, Camdyn, then I want to treat you like my daughter.”
I bit my lip to keep the tears from welling up again, and Cole squeezed my shoulder as I swallowed hard.
“Thanks, Mom,” he said, “and you too, Aunt Rosalie. I’m sure Camdyn will be fine with whatever you want to do, and she appreciates what you’re doing for her.” I nodded as I took a deep breath.
“What about me?” Charlotte piped up. “What do I get to do?” She walked over to me and placed her hand on my arm, and I swept her into my lap.
“You have the most important job,” I told her. “I need you to be my flower girl. Do you think you can do that?”
“I don’t know, what do I do?”
“Well, you have to dress up in a beautiful dress, and then you walk in front of me to your Uncle Cole.”
“I get a dress? Count. Me. In!” I giggled at the way she emphasized her words, right before Rachel told her she had been watching too much television.
“You’ll stand up with me, won’t you, Rachel?” I asked, staring at Cole’s lovely dark-haired sister.
“Me?” she asked doubtfully. “Don’t you want Trina to stand with you?”
“Well, yeah, of course I do, but she’s not going to be much help to me in planning anything right now once the baby comes… Oh, Cole, I didn’t even think about the baby. He’ll only be a couple weeks old. I can’t ask Trina to do that.”
“So, we need to push the date back…” he suggested. I looked deeply into his eyes and pondered how long I would have to wait – a month? Maybe two? A muscle twitched along his jaw and all the common sense melted from my brain.
Trina’s a trooper. She’ll be fine.
You are also a jerk, Camdyn.
Look at him though. Wow, he’s just so…
Yeah, definitely not pushing the date back.
“No, I don’t want to do that,” I told him, feeling a little guilty and incredibly selfish. He nodded silently, the corners of his mouth turned up slightly.
“So, Rachel, will you do it?” I asked her again.
“Are you kidding? Of course I will! Oh, Camdyn, this is so exciting. We should go dress shopping this week. I just know you’re going to be the most beautiful bride I’ve ever seen. Mama and Aunt Rosalie should go with us.” I looked across the table to Rosalie and Liz, who were looking at me expectantly.
“Absolutely,” I said with a laugh. “It wouldn’t be any fun without all of you.”
-§-
I was dozing soundly later that night when I suddenly awoke, sitting up partway in bed. It really felt like something or someone had woken me, but I blinked my eyes in the darkness, made sure nothing was there, and plopped back down on my pillow. A second later I heard a tapping sound at my window, and I sat up straight beneath the covers, hair rising up on the back of my neck. I carefully stepped out of bed and tiptoed to the frame, pressing myself against the wall and peeling back the curtain just enough to get a view with one eye, peering out into the moonlight. I saw a shadow, and when the figure moved just a little, I realized it was Cole. Hurriedly pushing open the clasp that held the window closed, I pushed the glass up a few inches.
“Cole?” I hissed. “What time is it? What in the world are you doing out there?”
“It’s two, and I just got off the phone with Charlie.”
“Charlie?” I felt a little groggy and nothing was making sense.
“Trina’s in labor,” he stated.
Oh, Trina’s in labor, I thought with a yawn.
Wait, Trina’s in labor?!
“Oh, wow, I need to get dressed, find my keys…” I mumbled, shaking my head in an attempt to clear the cobwebs. “Will you tell Rosalie that I had to go?”
“Camdyn Taylor, if you think I am letting you step one foot out of this county without me, you’re crazy. Just get whatever you need, and I’ll be out here waiting.”
Lowering the window to latch it once more, I pulled on a pair of yoga pants and grabbed a change of clothes. I hastily brushed my teeth before I penned a note to Rosalie, leaving it on the refrigerator where she would be certain to see it first thing. Then, I snuck out the back door and locked it behind me. Coming around the corner, I found Cole standing there expectantly.
“Sleeping in my t-shirt again?” he asked with a smile, reaching out to tug on the bottom of the Poison t-shirt I was wearing.
“My t-shirt,” I corrected. “I won it fair and square.”
He ushered me into his truck and we started off down the road. Gazing out the window into the darkness, I saw only what was illuminated by the headlights. After a few miles, I looked over at Cole and smiled.
“I’m going to be an aunt,” I said. Then I leaned my head against the seat and promptly fell asleep.
Chapter Four
I managed to rouse myself and rubbed at a kink in my neck, and then glanced over at Cole, who raised his eyebrows and gave me a slight smile in the darkness.
“Sleeping Beauty awakens?” he teased, turning to look back out the windshield of the truck as I yawned and rubbed my eyes.
“I’m
sorry,” I told him seriously. “You must be exhausted. Do you want me to drive for a while?"
"No, I’m good. Besides, I like watching you sleep.”
I like watching you sleep. He is so darn cute.
I stared out the window, gazing at the first glimpse of dawn coming over the horizon. I was going to be an aunt today, if I wasn’t already. Charlie was going to be a father. Mind-blowing. It wasn’t as though he was too young to be a father – he would be thirty before too long – but he was Charlie, with the fanatical baseball obsession and the propensity to pull my hair every time he saw an opportunity.
Still, I knew Charlie would be a terrific dad. I could almost picture him standing in the backyard we ran around as kids, throwing a whiffle ball to a little blonde-haired tyke with a yellow plastic bat that was too big for his tiny hands. They would play catch back there, too – the little guy would have a glove in Cardinals red, of course, and Charlie would probably call him “Sport” or some other cutesy nickname. They would work on homework together at the old oak dining room table that still sat in Grandma’s kitchen – er, I guess I should say Charlie’s kitchen. I would probably never get used to saying that.
Did Charlie remember doing that stuff with Dad? I had only been four at the time of the accident, but Charlie was six. Of course at that time we wouldn’t have been in Grandma’s back yard, because we didn’t move in with her until after Dad passed away. Did we even have a yard like that, before Grandma? I honestly didn’t know.
Charlie never really had anyone to throw the ball around with him, except for the few boys who lived on the same street as us. He had me, of course, but I was never quite up to the level he thought necessary, and besides, I was just a girl. He never was much of a ball player, anyway – he much preferred watching a game to playing one. I think he liked the strategy, the statistics…and probably the cushy couch and lack of shoes, to be completely truthful.
Now the little guy would be here, finally. Little Peanut – that’s what Trina and Charlie had taken to calling him when they couldn’t agree on a name. I quite liked it, and I figured I would probably call him that all of his life just out of orneriness. (Aunties are allowed to do things like that, right?)
Just what would they name him, anyway? The last time I had questioned Trina on the subject, they were still undecided.
“What are you thinking about?” Cole’s voice dragged me out of Grandma’s back yard and back into the passenger seat of his truck.
“Just thinking about Charlie being a dad,” I said with a sigh, “and wondering what they would name the baby.”
“They’re not naming him Charlie, Jr.?” Cole asked with a smirk, at which I laughed and told him I didn’t know. “Well, what do you think they’ll name him?”
“Hmm…” I stalled, thinking it over for a minute. “I would almost bet it will have something to do with baseball.”
“Baseball, really?” he continued with a slight laugh. “Trina would let that happen?”
“If she doesn’t, he’ll figure out some way to do it on the sly,” I suggested.
“So after some famous ball player, then?”
“Maybe not – something simpler, like Catcher, Fielder…”
“Too conspicuous – Trina would notice those.” He laughed again and the sunlight was just peeking over the horizon, spreading a flicker of light across his dark eyes. I suddenly felt a little self-conscious in the broadening daylight, knowing that I had just rolled out of bed and thrown my hair in a ponytail.
“You’re right,” I agreed. “Too obvious.”
“Oh, I’ve got it,” he stated, sitting a little straighter in his seat. “He will name him Camden and say that he wants to name him after his beautiful aunt, but really he’ll be naming him after Camden Yards.” I let his statement roll around in my mind for a moment before I answered.
“Nice try, but there are two flaws to your theory.” I turned slightly and adjusted my position to pull my leg up onto the seat as I looked at Cole. “Number one, he would never name a son that he hoped to one day see have a successful baseball career after his frightfully clumsy aunt. Number two, to name him after a ballpark for any sports team other than the Cardinals would be sacrilegious, and Charlie would never stoop that low.”
Cole laughed at my thorough rebuttal and then went back to driving in silence as I gazed out the windshield. He was right about one thing – I didn’t think Trina would allow Charlie to name his son anything too baseball-oriented. She would definitely want a say in the name, too.
Trina had always planned out her personal life meticulously. We had been the opposites in that regard when we met in college. I was fastidious about anything to do with my studies, wanting to be the best at absolutely everything. Trina, on the other hand… I couldn’t remember all the times I had to say, “Shouldn’t you be doing your homework?” She took such an easygoing, laid-back approach to her education, and spent way more time figuring out what outfit to wear to class than she did pondering the Pythagorean Theorem or the reasons for the French revolution.
As strange as I thought her study habits were, she was always likewise fascinated by my hesitance to plan out my future, content to go where the wind took me. Trina knew what kind of man she wanted to marry when she was only a child – he would be in the medical field, and they would have two children, and they would live in the suburbs. I only knew that I wanted to be free to see things and explore, with nothing holding me back. Now Trina was married to a pharmacist, living in that house in the suburbs, and child number one was on his way right that instant. As for me? Well, up until a few days before, I was just taking whatever life threw at me, moving from town to town as the whim surfaced. Then, Cole…
I glanced over at him again in the driver’s seat, profile illuminated by the sun that was beginning to filter through the window. He still looked more clean-shaven than normal, but the color of his usual five o’clock shadow was beginning to show against his jawline. A ball cap was pulled down over his dark hair, but I could see a section feathering out beneath the bill. He leaned toward me a bit and his eyes regarded me suspiciously.
“Are you always going to do this?” he asked, his voice interrupting the silence, almost making me jump in surprise.
“Do what?” I twisted nervously in my seat.
“You know, the staring thing.” He flashed one of those unbelievably perfect smiles, and I knew instantly that I would most definitely always be doing the staring thing.
I laughed without answering him, and he took my hand while I turned back to let my attention drift to the passing scenery.
-§-
We stopped when we reached St. Louis to grab a breakfast sandwich and a cup of coffee before heading to the hospital. Cole was holding up fairly well considering that he only had a few hours of sleep, but his eyes looked tired. We wondered aloud whether Trina would have had the baby yet, but neither of us had any further messages from Charlie, so we guessed that she hadn’t.
We made our way to the hospital and spent several minutes locating the labor and delivery wing. I couldn’t help thinking as we walked down a long white hallway that hospitals just made me feel generally gross, like I was about to catch some rare and deadly disease simply by breathing the air. When we reached the waiting room, we decided it was best to try to get in touch with Charlie rather than bother the nurses. I sent him a text, and then we sat down on a brown love seat in front of a row of brightly colored toys. There were magazines on the table, but I could practically feel the germs spreading into my clothes from the seat we were on, so I dared not touch anything.
“Do I look okay?” I suddenly thought to ask, not that it mattered. There was nothing I could do at that point.
“You’re beautiful,” Cole told me, gently placing his arm around my shoulders.
I know you’re lying, but I’ll take it.
The phone buzzed against my leg, and I looked down to see that Charlie told me to come on back – room 307. Cole and I walked over to
the nurses’ station and waited to be buzzed through, and soon we were walking down the short hall to the room Charlie indicated. I hesitated for a second before I knocked on the wooden door and then pushed it open a crack.
“Charlie?” I questioned, but almost instantly I saw his face past the doorway, and I moved into the room.
“Thank God you’re here,” he whispered into my hair as he slid his arms around me in a hug. “I feel like I’m on an emotional rollercoaster.”
It can’t be that bad, I thought, but when I rounded the corner, it was clear to see that Trina had been crying.
“How is the little patient?” I asked as I neared the bed, and her face brightened up with a smile.
“Oh, Cammie, I’m so glad you’re here. Charlie is trying to help me, but he just doesn’t understand, you know? I was worried about you. Did you drive all night?” Trina seemed bright and bubbly now, but judging by her puffy eyes, I thought Charlie must be right about the up and down emotions.
“No, I was asleep, mostly,” I told her. “Cole did the driving.”
“Cole’s here?” she said expectantly, craning her neck to see around the corner as he stepped into the small room.
“Hey, Trina,” he stated calmly. “How are you feeling?”
“Oh, I feel fine.” Trina pushed down at her blanket as though she was straightening the bed, and then slid her brown hair neatly behind her ears. “I feel much better knowing that someone is taking care of Cammie.”
“Really, Trina, I can take care of myself, you know!” I chuckled with just a hint of exasperation.
“Can you?” she wanted to know. “You look terrible, like you rolled out of bed and got dressed in the dark.” I laughed out loud and glanced over at Cole, who was trying to hide his own laughter.
“Well, I did roll out of bed and get dressed in the dark,” I explained, lowering myself to sit beside her on the bed. “I half expected Little Peanut to be here by now.”
A Reason to Be Alone (The Camdyn Series Book 2) Page 4