Chapter Twelve
Her hands were shaking. Still.
An hour after they’d arrived at the hospital, and Willow’s stomach was in knots, her muscles twitching with the aftermath of sheer terror. She didn’t think anyone noticed. Except, maybe, Jax. He was watching her as she fed Miracle, his expression neutral, everything about him still and quiet.
He’d been like that since they’d left the shop, and she thought it might have something to do with the look she’d seen in his eyes. She’d asked him about it on the way to the hospital.
“We both have our monsters.”
That’s what he’d said, and then he’d flicked on the radio and sped down the highway. Silent. Just like he was now.
Which, of course, had made her wonder about his family again. Killed because of his father. That’s what Jax had seemed to be implying. It matched with stories she’d heard when she was younger, whispers that had traveled farther than adults thought they had: police work. Gangs. Drugs. A hit on an entire family.
Everyone should have died.
But Jax had survived.
She’d figured all that out, but she hadn’t known enough to have her heart break over it.
Embarrassing now, but she’d been young and stupid.
Like Miracle’s mother.
She studied the baby’s face, her delicate earlobes and tiny nose. Her cheeks and lips were pink, her face filling out. She didn’t look gaunt like she had when Jax had lifted her from the box. She was making gains, and the surgeon had said that there should be no long-term impact on her health.
She was tiny, though. Fragile.
And the world was filled with things that could hurt her.
“Knock-knock,” someone called, and Alison walked into the room. She had coffee in one hand and a thick folder in the other. “The nurse told me you were here. If I’d known ahead of time, I’d have brought more coffee. Had to attend the most boring meeting in the world. An hour of information spread out over six. I am in desperate need of a little pick-me-up. I hope you two don’t mind me drinking in front of you.”
“Not at all,” Willow said.
Jax didn’t respond, just eyed the folder that she’d tossed on a table.
“Looks like you’ve been busy,” he finally said, gesturing to the thick sheaf of paper.
“That? Didn’t take me any time at all. I simply compiled the information from doctors and nurses, put together feeding charts and schedules, and included blank pages for journaling.”
“Journaling what?” Miracle had finished the bottle, and Willow patted her back, careful of the healing incision on her chest.
“Your feelings. Mothering is hard work, and you have no experience. All the classes in the world can’t prepare you. So, the journal? My way of checking in on you without daily phone calls. Just jot a few notes, scan them into your computer, and send them along. If anything pressing happens between my weekly visits, we’ll talk, but otherwise . . . I want to give you some space.”
“With my family around, there won’t be any of that happening,” she said dryly, and Alison smiled.
“The more the merrier when it comes to family. All your relatives passed their background checks, and your mother has already finished her certification course for respite care.”
“That was fast.” Very fast. Which might explain why she’d barely heard from Janelle the last few days.
“She was motivated. A great lady, your mom. We’re going out for lunch one day soon.” She took a careful sip of coffee, grimacing a little. “Bitter. I should have put more cream in it. How about we run down to the cafeteria? I can get cream, and maybe . . . a salad. Or, better yet, a doughnut.”
“I—” Don’t want to leave Miracle.
“You don’t mind staying with our princess, do you, Jax?” she asked, lifting the folder and heading to the door, acting like everyone was going to simply follow her instructions.
It seemed like they were, because Jax was reaching for the baby, his large hands sliding between Willow’s. She made the mistake of looking into his eyes.
There was something old and tired and sad there.
“Jax—” You don’t have to do this, she was going to say, but he already had the baby and was settling back into his chair, holding her like she was the most precious, most breakable thing in the world.
“Don’t worry,” Alison said. “She won’t break.”
“Right,” he muttered, his eyes never leaving Miracle’s face.
“And we won’t be long,” Willow assured him.
“We might be. I’m starving.” Alison walked out into the hall, and Willow should have followed. She seemed frozen there, though, her mind telling her to go, her heart telling her to stay.
“I don’t have to go,” she said, and his gaze shifted, his eyes settling on her.
“You don’t need to stay either. I’m fine.”
She didn’t think he was.
She thought that there might be tears in his eyes, but she couldn’t imagine a guy like him crying.
“You don’t look fine.”
“I had a sister. Did I ever tell you that?” he asked, his gaze dropping again, his hand shifting so that he was touching Miracle’s cheek, smoothing her downy curls.
“No.”
“She was six months old. Big blue eyes and chubby cheeks. Aside from our mother, I was her favorite person. She died in my arms.”
“My God,” she breathed.
“That’s the reason I can’t do the family thing. I think about how nice it might be to fill my house with people I love, and then I think about her.”
“Jax—”
She didn’t know what she wanted to say. She didn’t know what she could say.
Except I’m sorry over and over again.
Meaningless words that changed nothing.
“What?” he asked, a hint of impatience in his voice. How many times had he heard the platitudes? How many times had he told the story and been given empty words in response?
“What was her name?” she asked, because it was important. Because she was important. That little baby who’d barely lived before she’d died.
“You’re the first person to ever ask me that,” he responded. He wasn’t smiling, but his expression had softened. “We called her Dot. Her name was Dorothy. After my mother’s favorite grandmother.”
“Dot,” she said, and she could picture the chubby cheeks and the blue eyes, and Jax holding her while she died.
Her chest hurt with the image. Her eyes burned. She could have cried for him and for his sister, but he was watching her, steadily, silently, and she knew he was waiting for something more.
“It’s a sweet name,” she finally managed to say, her voice thick with unshed tears.
“She was a sweet kid. She should have had the chance to grow up, but she didn’t. When I see stuff like this . . .” He touched Miracle’s cheek again. “It pisses me off. You don’t throw a life away. It doesn’t matter how scared you are. I understand your compassion for her mother, but I have more compassion for her. She did nothing to anyone, and she still had to suffer.”
Miracle? Or Dot?
She didn’t ask, because Alison peeked her head back in the room, her eyes wide, her cheeks pink. “There you are! I was halfway down the hall when I realized you weren’t with me. Not a big deal, except I was talking nonstop the whole way. No wonder the nurses were looking at me like I was crazy.” She grabbed Willow’s arm, nearly dragging her out of the room and closing the door.
Willow went. Mostly because she didn’t think Jax wanted her to stay. He’d said his piece. He’d explained his position succinctly and without emotion. He would never be a family man, because he would never lose his family again.
Straightforward truth, and Willow couldn’t argue with his logic. Flawed as it was, it made sense to him. Just like staying away from the shop had made sense to her. She’d been protecting herself. At least, that’s what she’d thought.
Really, all she’d done was cut herself off from the people she cared about the most.
That wasn’t a lesson you could teach. It was lesson a person had to learn on her own.
Or his own.
Maybe Jax would. Maybe he wouldn’t. But she wasn’t going to push him. She wasn’t going to keep falling into his arms, leaning on his strength, silently demanding all the things he didn’t feel capable of giving.
He was too good a guy, and she was too strong of a woman.
He knew her secret, but that didn’t mean he had to help carry the weight of it. She’d tell him that. Once they were alone again.
* * *
Apparently, getting coffee took a hell of a lot longer than Jax had imagined. He watched the clock, listening to its quiet tick as one minute passed into another.
Fifteen minutes.
Twenty.
They hadn’t returned, and he hadn’t moved.
He was still sitting in the chair, Miracle’s head in the crook of his elbow, her tiny body balanced on his forearm.
She didn’t look anything like Dot.
At least, not the Dot he remembered most—the giggly, wiggly six-month-old who’d reached for him every time he’d walked into the room. He’d been just old enough to pretend it didn’t matter to him, but being the brother she idolized, the one she wanted to giggle with, had made him feel ten feet tall.
Funny how he’d put that out of his mind, forgotten how his chest had swelled with pride when his mother had come to pick him up at school and all the kids had oohed and ahhed over his sister.
Dot had been his first experience with giving love. Real, true, unconditional love. He’d have done anything for her. He’d have given his life if it would have meant she lived. He’d failed her, because he’d been a kid, too weak to fight off the bastards who had murdered his family.
He’d made peace with that. It had taken him years, but he’d finally done it. Not through counseling or therapy or any of the other methods his aunt and uncle had encouraged him to try. No. He’d done it, because he’d seen himself in little kids he’d interviewed. Kids who’d tried to protect their mothers from abusers, their siblings from molesters, their friends from the drug dealers who hunted the streets of LA. He’d seen the helpless fury in their faces, and it had been a reflection of the kid he’d been.
He sighed, standing up and crossing the room, Miracle still in his arms. It wasn’t as difficult as he’d thought it would be to hold her and not remember his sister’s bloody, broken body.
Different kid.
Different place.
Different person standing in his shoes.
He was older, hopefully wiser, and more than capable of protecting Miracle if she needed it. He shifted, making sure the blanket covered her little arms and tiny toes.
She was sound asleep, content to dream whatever dreams babies had. He set her in the bassinet, pulled a little knit hat over her head.
“You’re a cute little thing,” he said, and he thought he heard someone sigh. Just a whisper of air in the quiet room.
Or maybe outside of the room.
He moved to the door. Silent. Slow. No hurry because there were security cameras all over the hospital, and if someone was standing outside the door, he’d know it whether he caught the person or not.
A woman.
He could hear her more clearly now, soft little breaths that were more sob than sigh. He almost didn’t open the door, because he knew whom he’d see, and he didn’t want to deal with tears from a person who’d left her baby in a cold alley.
Then again, he did want to prove that Phoebe was Miracle’s mother, close the case, move on.
He opened the door, and Phoebe stumbled backward, her hair a tangled mess, her eyes red-rimmed, tears streaming down her face. She looked like death warmed over, her dress wrinkled, her knuckles raw and red. She had a splotch of something on the front of her dress. It took him a second to realize what it was. Breast milk. Had she been pumping milk? Maybe hoping to nurse her daughter again?
She crossed her arms over her chest in a protective gesture that made Jax feel like the lowest kind of scum.
He met her eyes.
She wasn’t saying anything, wasn’t trying to leave. Was just standing there looking like she expected to be slapped.
Damn!
He wanted to despise the kid for what she’d done, but all he could do was see her for what she was: a terrified girl who’d somehow managed to slip past nurses and make it to her baby’s hospital room.
“You need to sit down,” he said, because it was obvious that she did.
He couldn’t let her in the room, though. Not until CPS had been notified and approved it. They probably wouldn’t, but he wasn’t going to tell her that.
“I just want to see her. Then I’ll leave.”
“You know that I can’t let you do that.”
“She’s mine. I have every right to see her.” She tried to duck past him, but he blocked her path. Not touching her. Just standing between her and the open doorway.
“You gave up your rights when you left her in the alley.” It was a statement. No judgment in it, but she ducked her head, her hair falling over her face.
“I love her,” she moaned. “I just wanted her to get better.”
“Jax?!” Willow called. “What’s going on?”
He looked up, saw her running toward him, her red hair flying behind her, her pretty dress hiked up around her thighs. She skidded to a stop beside him, her gaze on Phoebe.
“Is everything okay?” she asked as Alison jogged up behind her.
Wheezing, gasping for breath, she still managed to cling to her coffee and whatever food she’d bought.
“Who’s this? How’d she get past the nurses?” she demanded.
“This is Phoebe Tanner,” he responded. “Miracle’s mother.”
“Are you sure?” Alison reached over, lifted the heavy fall of Phoebe’s hair, looked into her face, then down at her dress and that telltale stain spreading across the gray fabric.
“Geez,” she whispered. “She’s not more than a baby herself. I’m getting a nurse. You keep her here.”
She hurried away, and Willow took Phoebe’s arm, urged her to sit on the floor, then knelt beside her.
“It’s going to be okay,” she said, and Phoebe shook her head.
“No. It’s not. I sinned, and this is my punishment.”
“You’re not being punished. You made a mistake. There are consequences to that, but—”
“You don’t understand. I was pregnant before I got married. That’s why she was sick. God took her from me, because she should never have been mine in the first place.”
“That’s not the way God works,” Willow said, pressing her palm against Phoebe’s forehead. “She’s got a fever.”
“I’m fine. I just wanted to see her. Then I was going to the police station.” She shot a look in Jax’s direction, then lowered her eyes again. “I really was. I just . . . I knew I was going to jail, and I figured I’d never see her again. I just wanted to hold her one more time.” She pulled her legs up to her chest, her long dress billowing around her feet as she sobbed.
Homespun fabric?
Handmade dress. That was for sure. Jax could see the tiny white stitches against the gray. Neat, but not perfect.
For some reason, that made him feel worse.
He crouched beside Willow, waited until Phoebe met his eyes. “You’re not going to jail. Not tonight. I can’t promise you anything else, but I can promise you that.”
“Can I see her?”
“I’m afraid not.” He took out his cell phone and texted Kane. They needed to get a uniformed officer here, because they were going to have to make an arrest. It sucked, but the wheels of justice had already been turning before Phoebe showed up at the hospital. There was no way to stop them now.
“That’s all I wanted, was to see her,” she sobbed. “I hitchhiked all the way here, so I could look at her face one more time.”
“You hitchhiked?” In the state known for its serial killers? He didn’t add the last part. She’d made it. Hopefully, she’d never repeat the mistake.
“Elias is at work. He has the car.”
“You could have waited for him,” Willow said gently, smoothing hair away from Phoebe’s face.
“He wouldn’t have brought me. He said it was God’s will. We sinned. God was taking our baby from us. We’ll have other babies,” she spat the words out. “I’m so sick of hearing that. I don’t want other babies. I want Eden. She was my new beginning. I was going to be the mom my mother never was. And then she was born, and she was so tiny and perfect, and I was sure . . . but, she wouldn’t eat, and her lips were blue. I wanted to take her to the doctor, but Elias said—”
“Let me guess,” Willow said, “It was God’s will.”
“Yes, but I didn’t believe that. I didn’t believe God would want my beautiful baby to die. So, I—”
“Tell you what,” Jax cut in. “How about you think about how much you really want to tell us? Because what you did was a criminal offense, and anything you say can be used against you.” He needed to read the kid her Miranda rights. He knew it. Willow knew it. It seemed like the wrong time, though. Kane would be there soon enough. He’d be in uniform and on the clock. He could read her rights and make the arrest. For now, it was enough to have her there and to know she’d confessed.
Willow got to her feet. “Did you contact Kane?” she asked quietly.
“Yes. He’ll be here soon.”
“She needs a doctor before you book her.”
“She’ll get one.”
“I know you see a criminal,” she continued, her gaze on Phoebe. The girl had dropped her head to her knees, her long hair puddling on the floor around her hips. “I see a tragedy.”
“I see both. It’s a shame, Willow, but I can’t change what she did. I can’t reverse time and counsel her into a different decision.”
“I know.” She frowned. “I just wish . . .”
“What?”
“That you could?” She smiled, but he could see the sadness in her eyes.
“Me too.” He tugged her closer, let his arm wrap around her waist. She leaned into him. Just for a second. Just long enough for both of them to feel how perfectly they fit.
There was a commotion at the end of the hall, a woman yelling. Feet pounding, and Willow jumped back, turning toward the sound. He turned, too, saw a small woman with blond hair and a long black skirt ducking past a nurse who was trying to block her way.
He knew her, had met her at the Bradshaws’ place.
Clementine Warren.
And she was hopping mad, her face red, her eyes flashing.
“What the hell is going on here?” she demanded, ducking past Willow and crouching next to Phoebe.
“Language,” Phoebe said, but she didn’t lift her head, and the word sounded listless, her voice hollow.
“Right. Sorry, kid. I’m a little upset. Jeb Winthrop called and told me that he’d given you a ride here. He said you looked sick as a dog.” She glared at Jax as she said it. “Well? Are you going to answer the question? What’s going on?”
“I think you probably know.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?” She shrugged out of a multicolored wool coat and tucked it around Phoebe’s shoulders.
“Just that I find it hard to believe you had a pregnant teenager in the house and didn’t know it.”
“And?”
“I asked if you knew anyone who’d given birth recently. You said no.”
“Of course I did. I don’t squeal on family.”
“Even when they’ve broken the law?”
“What law? She was trying to get Eden help. She made a mistake in judgment. If she’d told me what she was going to do . . .” She shook her head, dark green eyes flashing with irritation and anger. “It doesn’t matter. She didn’t tell me, and that bonehead husband of hers—”
“Clementine! Please!” Phoebe got to her feet, her movements slow, her face pale.
“He’s an idiot,” Clementine said, and then her expression softened, some of the fire leaving her eyes. “He means well, but he is.”
“So all of you knew about the baby.” It wasn’t really a question. He already knew the answer.
“Sim and I delivered her.” She flipped one of her long blond braids over her shoulder, the gesture somehow defiant. “And we offered to take her to the doctor as soon as we realized there was a heart problem. Elias insisted that God was going to heal that kid. I insisted that Elias had his head up his—”
“Stop.” Phoebe swayed, and Clementine wrapped an arm around her.
“Okay. Fine. I’ll stop. But this is a mess. A big one, and your husband is responsible.”
“Where is her husband?” Jax asked.
“Supposedly at work, but when I went to find him, he’d left for the day.”
“He’s probably at home,” Phoebe said, her voice faint.
She looked like hell.
Worse, she looked like she was about to fall over.
“We need that nurse,” he said, and Willow nodded.
“I’ll go find one,” she said, but Alison was hurrying toward them, a tall blond woman pushing a wheelchair beside her.
“Sorry that took so long,” she called, her gaze cutting to Clementine and then to Phoebe. “This is Dr. Whitney. She’s going to make sure you’re okay, Phoebe.”
“I’m fine.”
“You don’t look fine.” Dr. Whitney lifted her wrist and checked her pulse. “Fast. And you feel warm. Have you been running a fever?”
“I don’t know.”
“How about we find out?”
“I really just want to go home.”
“Honey,” the doctor said gently, “going home isn’t going to solve your problems. Let’s see what’s going on with you, okay? And then we’ll work everything else out.” She helped Phoebe into the wheelchair and rolled her through the hall.
Jax followed, Willow and Clementine beside him.
They didn’t speak. There wasn’t a whole lot to say. Miracle’s mother had been found, and she was a sick young girl who needed a mother almost as much as her baby did.