We all sat in the waiting room, in our disheveled party clothes, waiting for news about Cami’s condition. The only person missing was Anderson who had sent me a text letting me know he was taking care of the party, which was the least of my concerns. The only thing I could do besides wait was think about what happened between Nikki and me and how it had happened.
“I thought I was smart enough never to be fooled by a woman,” I said with a bitter laugh. “I can’t believe how stupid I was to let that happen.”
“You let your emotions cloud your judgment, Garrett,” my father said, his voice even and patient. He was not going to lecture me tonight; tonight, he was just my father. “You’ve always been that way.”
“I feel disgusting,” I confessed. “It makes me sick thinking about what she did. What kind of person does that to another human being?”
“A desperate one,” he replied wisely. “I’m sure once the truth comes out, you’ll understand her motives.”
“Will you help me?” I finally asked.
He closed his eyes and took a sip of wine. “What do you want me to do?”
“Buy Sorenson Cellars.” There was a collective gasp from everyone around us.
“No.” Before I could argue with him, plead with him, he help up a finger. “Sorenson Cellars belongs to you and Cami. You have an amazing vision for it, and I’m proud of everything you’ve accomplished.”
“Owning it hasn’t brought me much happiness,” I grumbled.
“Give it time, Garrett. You’ve been too busy reacting to enjoy the fact that you own your own vineyard.”
“What made you change your mind? When I first came to you after I bought the property from Uncle Charlie, you were ready to murder me. I didn’t think you would ever forgive me.”
My dad contemplated the question, his mouth tight but his eyes thoughtful. “Avery came to see me yesterday,” he finally said. This was a complete surprise. As far as I knew, Avery and my father never spoke. They had been at an impasse since my mother died.
“What did you two talk about?”
“Mostly you,” he said. “I know that, in a lot of ways, Avery has sometimes been the father I should have been, but now I have an opportunity to teach you and make up for lost time. He helped me see that.”
“Are you dying?” The question was odd and blunt, but honestly, I never thought my father would ever say anything close to what he’d just told me. He was always a hard man – hard to love and hard to please. I noticed him softening a bit when I was home before my last deployment, but he had never uttered phrases like “I’m proud of you” before.
My father chuckled. “No, Garrett. I’m just getting old, and maybe it’s time I started taking my own advice. I’ve spent too much time reacting too. Now, I just want to enjoy my life.”
A doctor in standard blue scrubs burst through a set of double doors. He looked briefly around the room before spotting us. He smiled as he approached. “You must be the family of Camille Sorenson? I’m Dr. Horton.”
I stood and approached the doctor. “I’m Garrett Hammond. Cami is my fiancée.”
The doctor walked over to a corner of the room, away from where everyone had gathered to wait with me. I glanced back at them to see them all staring eagerly at me.
“Well, then I need to congratulate you. Cami is pregnant.” I stumbled back a bit, stunned by Dr. Horton’s news. “She’s about seven weeks.”
I blinked rapidly. “Pregnant? Wow.” I blew out a heavy breath and ran my hands through my hair. I was going to be a father. “What’s wrong with her?”
“We’re treating her for hyperemesis gravidarum or acute morning sickness,” he explained. “She just recently started having the typical symptoms of morning sickness, but because of the severity, we’re going to keep her overnight. The biggest concern is dehydration. We tried to give her oral anti-nausea medication, but she was unable to keep it down, so we switched to an intravenous medication.”
For the second time that night, I blacked out.
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Cami
Pregnant. That one little word changed everything. I was pregnant. It was almost unbelievable, especially since I took my birth control religiously. But when the doctor said I was most likely seven or eight weeks along, I remembered the antibiotics I’d taken to treat a bladder infection and knew they could have affected the effectiveness of my birth control. Such an idiot!
“Your family is waiting, so I’m going to give them an update,” Dr. Horton said before leaving me alone in what could only be described as a cubicle.
I closed my eyes and replayed the night’s events. Avery was gentle as he carried me out to the car, but the sight of Garrett, watching me helplessly, pained me. I knew exactly what he was thinking: that should be me. Avery laid me across the back seat of his car and placed a small trash can on the floor next to me. I lost track of how many times I used it during the brief car ride.
The curtain to the cubicle fluttered open and my heart beat rapidly, expecting Garrett. It was Valerie instead.
“Where’s Garrett?”
“He … passed out,” Valerie informed me.
“What?” I gasped.
“I guess the news of his impending fatherhood was quite the shock,” she answered with a half-smile. She walked over to the bed and sat down on the edge. “How are you feeling?”
“Better.” The first medicine they gave me to help with the nausea came back up in a blaze of glory. The second medicine, which they administered through my IV, was now working its way through my system. I was tired and felt weak but grateful I was no longer hunched over a small kidney-shaped bowl heaving my guts out.
“Everyone is the waiting room. Do you want to see anybody else?”
I shook my head. “Just Garrett.”
“He’ll come back when he’s better,” she assured me. “You should rest.”
Dr. Horton said this anti-nausea medication would probably make me sleepy. Valerie patted my hand and then slipped behind the curtain. A moment later, my eyelids fluttered shut, and the chaos of the emergency room briefly drifted away.
“Baby.” A warm hand was on my forehead and a familiar voice whispered in my ear. “Baby, wake up.”
I breathed deeply and opened my eyes a fraction of an inch. Garrett was finally here. I looked up at him as he stroked my hair, letting the wild curls tangle in his fingers. A soft smile played at his lips. “You’re so beautiful,” he whispered. “I hope he or she has your hair.”
“I’m so sorry you found out like that,” I sobbed quietly as fresh tears streamed down my cheeks. Garrett wiped them away quickly. “That moment should have been special.”
“I know, and we’ll celebrate the news properly.” He breathed out a heavy sigh. “But fuck, baby, I’m glad you’re okay. I was so scared.”
I reached up to place my palm against his cheek. “I’m so sorry your night was ruined.”
“I don’t quite understand myself what happened. But I hope you’ll let me explain.”
“Of course I will. We’ve been through so much together, and I know you’d never hurt me. I was so shocked, seeing you on the floor with your pants undone and Nikki’s scent and lipstick all over you. My first reaction was to assume you—”
“Cheated,” he finished quietly. Garrett did his best to explain what he thought happened. As I listened to his version of events, it seemed almost too ridiculous to believe. What kind of psycho schemes to drug another person? Did Palmer really think I’d take one look at those pictures and go running right into his arms? Delusional didn’t quite describe him. He was living in an alternate universe at this point.
When he finished, Garrett looked at me expectantly. “Say something, Cami. Tell me what you’re thinking.”
“Do you think Tim and Lucinda know?”
Garrett shook his head. “I don’t think so.”
“They’ll be so heartbroken.”
“Is that all you’re worried about?”
Garrett had begun seeing a new counselor a few months after we moved. He was committed to getting help, and I was so proud of him, but I was concerned what being drugged would do to him. Would he be able to trust me the next time we were alone together?
Garrett gathered me against him. “I’m angry, Cami, so angry and I don’t know if what happened will trigger anything inside me. If it does, we’ll figure it out together.”
“So, what do we do now?”
“Well, that’s easy. We get married.”
I looked up at him with disbelief. “You want to get married?”
“Cami, I’ve wanted to marry you since the moment I laid eyes on you. I’m not wasting any more time.” He placed his hand just under my belly button, holding it there for a moment before his warm, golden brown eyes flicked up to meet mine. “You look tired.”
“I am,” I murmured, my eyes starting to feel heavy again.
Garrett stood and leaned over me to place a soft kiss on my forehead. “Do you want me to stay?”
“I never want you to leave.”
Dr. Horton made a reappearance to inform us they were going to admit me as a precaution. Garrett left briefly to tell everyone who was still in the waiting room before returning. It seemed like forever before someone came to wheel me up to my room. It was private and spacious, and there was a pull-out sofa underneath a window where Garrett could sleep.
I woke up in the middle of the night, nauseated. One glance up at my nearly empty bag of fluids and I knew that miracle drug that kept my queasiness at bay was running out. Garrett stirred awake from the pull-out couch when he heard me struggling to get up.
“What’s wrong?” he asked in hushed tones as he rushed over to me. I grabbed his arm and sat up, letting my feet dangle over the side of the bed.
“Bowl,” I croaked, pointing at the plastic basin on the bedside table. I wasn’t going to make it to the bathroom. He handed it to me, and immediately, I retched into it, filling it with nothing more than bile and water. Garrett sat next to me with arm protectively around my waist while I continued to heave into the bowl.
“I’m going to get a nurse,” he said softly.
A flash of light filled my darkened room when he opened the door to step out. Moments later, he returned to tell me that a nurse was coming.
“You can do this,” he crooned, stroking my hair. “You can make it through this.”
He coaxed me through the next few excruciating minutes while we waited for the nurse to come and replace the empty bag with a new one. She pulled a syringe from the front pocket of her scrub top and plunged the tip of it into one of the ports attached to my lead. She and Garrett helped me lie back on the bed before she left. Garrett pulled up a chair and held my hand while we both waited for the medicine to work.
In the morning, Dr. Horton stopped by to let me know they were going to keep me for a few more days. “It’s for your benefit really, and the baby’s too,” he said when I started to protest. I wanted to be home in my own bed, not in a hospital. “In a few days, we’ll see how long you’re able to tolerate things like broth and Jell-O. If you can keep them down, we’ll let you go home. Otherwise, you’re stuck with us.”
“I hate hospitals,” I grumbled.
“Just remember, Duchess Kate was in the hospital for six weeks when she was pregnant,” Dr. Horton reassured me.
“How long does this severe form of morning sickness last?” Garrett asked.
“It depends. For some mothers, it lasts their whole pregnancy. For others, it goes away after the first trimester.”
“Let’s hope for the latter,” I stated. I wasn’t particularly looking forward to spending the next nine months sick every day.
Dr. Horton left us with a warm smile. I flopped against the bed and blew out an exasperated breath.
“Do you mind if I leave for a couple of hours? I want to check in with Anderson and Avery,” Garrett asked.
“Of course! I’ll be fine for a while without you,” I answered, adding my best reassuring smile.
Garrett gave me a wary look before kissing the top of my head and then leaving.
I looked around the room and then burst into a round of hiccupping sobs. I hadn’t been in a hospital since my overdose, and even though Garrett was no longer a figment of my imagination, I feared that he wouldn’t return.
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Garrett
There was only one other person I could call to help me figure out Palmer’s motives – Jackson. Anderson didn’t know him that well, and Avery was only recently acquainted with him. I needed help understanding why Palmer would go to such extreme lengths to ruin my life. On my way back to the party, I dialed Jackson’s number.
“Garrett! Dude, I am so sorry I couldn’t make it to your swanky wine shindig,” Jackson said by way of greeting.
“Well, you missed one hell of a party,” I told him with a grimace.
“Do tell, brother. Do tell.”
And tell him I did. I replayed the events in my head again for what felt like the hundredth time as I told him everything that happened. Including the fact that Cami and I were expecting a baby.
“I need your help, Jackson,” I said with a bit of desperation. “You’re the only one who knows him like I do.”
“First of all, you’re going to be a dad! Congratulations!” The excitement and elation in his voice was infectious. It made me grin from ear to ear.
“Thank you, Jackson. I’m pretty damn happy,” I told him honestly. “I just need to get all of this shit with Palmer squared away first.”
“Okay, okay. Palmer. Hmm.” There was a brief pause before he said, “Oh shit. I know what it is.”
“You do? Tell me,” I urged him.
“Remember that time we came under really heavy fire in Afghanistan? We had no idea who was firing or where they were firing from. It was truly a cluster fuck of a day.”
That day popped into my mind. It was awful, not only because so many civilians were killed in the crossfire but because we lost several of our own. I’d lost sight of Palmer and Jackson amid the chaos, but when I was able to find Palmer, he was practically shell-shocked.
“What happened?” I yelled over the sound of gunfire. He was dazed so I grabbed his vest and shook him back to reality. “Palmer, are you hurt?”
“No,” he mouthed before turning his head in the direction of a body nearby. I let go of Palmer and crawled toward the body. He was one of ours. His name was Taggart, and he was fresh out of basic training.
I kept my head down and crawled back over to Palmer, who was leaning against a burned-out car. “Did you do that?” He nodded. “Tell me.”
“I couldn’t see a goddamn thing, Hammond. There was smoke everywhere, and I was just firing blindly. I couldn’t see a goddamn thing!”
When we made it back to base, I took him aside, and told him, “Listen, shit happens. Today was a shitty day. For everyone. Take some time and pull yourself together.”
Three days later, I found him alone in his barracks ready to swallow his pistol. I grabbed it before he could pull the trigger. “That is not the way we handle things, Grayson,” I said firmly.
“But I’m the one responsible, Garrett,” he sobbed. “That kid is dead because of me.”
“That kid is dead because we’re in a fucking hostile country. We lost more than just him on that day, Palmer. It was just one of those days where no matter you did, bad shit was going to happen.” I placed my hand firmly around his neck and trained my eyes on him. “Listen to me, Palmer. You did not kill Taggart. Got it? Repeat it.”
“I didn’t kill Taggart,” he said weakly.
“Again,” I commanded.
“I didn’t kill Taggart,” he said more forcefully.
I made him repeat it over and over until he seemed to believe it. But over the last month of our deployment, I could see Palmer slowly become unhin
ged. Finally, I took him aside after he unleashed a blistering torrent of insults at a private.
“You’re done,” I told him.
“What the fuck are you talking about, Hammond?” He was in my face, still intensely angry.
“This is it for you, Grayson. You’re done. This is your last deployment. Otherwise, I’m marching into the CO’s office and telling him about Taggart.”
“If you do that, then you’re ending your own career, Sergeant Hammond.”
“Maybe I want to get out just as badly as you do,” I hissed.
The memories faded away. “Fuck Jackson, do you think he resents me for pushing him out?”
“That has to be it,” Jackson insisted. “I can’t think of anything else.”
“That asshole should be thanking me for saving his ass. I saved him from a lifetime in military prison. I saved his parents from the heartache of seeing their son not only dishonorably discharged but imprisoned.”
“You don’t have to tell me that. Tell him.”
“I will, right after I beat the shit out of him.”
I returned home just as the truck with all the rented tables and chairs was pulling out of the driveway. The vineyard didn’t even look like there had been a celebration last night, and when I went to check on the tasting room, it was spotless and empty, like normal. Inside the house, Valerie and Anderson were seated at the dining room table, chatting comfortably. It was hard to mistake their body language. They were both angled toward one another, their heads bent almost together. Val and Anderson were clearly into each other
“Where’s your mom?” I asked Val, surprising her. She and Anderson jumped apart and smiled nervously.
“She just left to go see Cami.” I was relieved. I hated the thought of Cami being alone in the hospital until I returned.
“Good. Avery is on his way over to discuss … the situation with Palmer.” They both looked at me with expectant expressions. “I think I might know why he’s coming after me.”
Just Like Love (Just Like This Book 2) Page 17