Chapter 7
Zoe paced the ER waiting room, crawling out of her skin. An hour since they’d arrived, and no word. They hadn’t let Zoe go back and be with Mama until they’d gotten her assessed and done with x-rays.
This was all her fault. She never should’ve gone out tonight. Between work and softball, she’d depended on Rosa and Gayle too much. They’d been her mother’s closest friends, but they weren’t family. Zoe was her daughter. She should’ve been taking care of her mom, not out having a drink with friends.
Selfish. She’d been damn selfish.
Mama had busted her ass Zoe’s whole life, sometimes working two jobs just to scrape by. She’d put her love life and everything else on hold to give Zoe a decent home and food in her belly. She’d attended every science fair and ballet recital and sporting event. She’d bought Zoe her first set of paints and had encouraged her whimsical side.
And where had Zoe been in an emergency? In the bar. She rubbed her forehead while she paced, her stomach aching and her throat tight.
Drake’s gaze tracked her every move from the chair he’d sunk into, but she couldn’t face him right now. She had enough on her plate without having to think about him. Still, it had hurt so damn much to learn from people at Shooters that he was ready to date again. Four years of grieving had been long enough, in her mind. It wasn’t his desire to move on that upset her, but rather how she hadn’t registered on his radar enough for him to inform her.
Worse, was the thought of having to watch him date other women. It had been hard enough to stand by while he’d fallen for Heather, and that had been a measly crush on her part back then. She’d gotten over it, over him, in the time since. But then Heather had died. If Zoe were being honest, a naive part of her had hoped one day he’d stop grieving and see…her.
Daydreams and fantasies. Guilt and shame.
Suddenly, she felt like that heartbroken teenager all over again who’d stupidly made a birthday wish. Her seventeenth had been the best and worst day. Mama had to work a double shift, but she’d left Zoe a ginormous cupcake on the kitchen counter.
That day, Zoe hadn’t seen her closest friends yet to get well-wishes. During lunch break at school, she’d been sitting outside on a grassy hill in the quad by herself. Homecoming was coming up, and she’d been dredging up the nerve to ask Drake to go to the dance with her. She’d told Heather she had a thing for someone, but not who. Heather had encouraged her to ask the guy to the dance, and she’d planned to later.
Drake plopped down beside her, and they’d laughed about crap she couldn’t remember. He’d given her a locket as a present, shaped like a rose. His form hadn’t filled out yet, not like he was now, but he’d been a handsome bastard, even then. Midnight hair cut just above his ears, chocolate eyes, and that damn dimple on his left cheek when he grinned. He’d played baseball, like his brothers, but also ran track, so his body had been tall and lean.
Zoe walked to the window in the waiting room, glancing past the rain-speckled glass to the dark parking lot half full with cars. It must’ve rained after they’d arrived. She bit her thumbnail, shoving aside memories that kept flooding.
After talking for a bit in the quad, Drake had picked a dandelion. White fluff clung to the stem and trembled in the cool breeze. “Candles are overrated. Wish on this instead. You have better odds of it coming true.”
Laughing, she’d taken it from him and made one wish—for him to say yes—before blowing the fluff. It scattered in the wind. Drifting. Wafting. Floating. Like her heart.
“Happy birthday.”
“Thank you.” She’d opened her mouth, ready to spit out the question super fast, but Heather had knelt beside them, looking frazzled.
“Oh, God. Kevin already has a date to homecoming. I was pinning my hopes on him.” Heather pushed her long, wavy blonde locks from her pretty face, her blue eyes focused on Drake. “Do you have a date yet? Maybe we could go together as friends?”
For a fractured beat, Drake had looked at Zoe like he was seeking permission. But then he shook his head and grinned at Heather. “Haven’t asked anyone. I’d love to.”
After idle chit-chat, the two of them rose and headed toward school, leaving Zoe shell-shocked.
Heather had turned her head and done a double-take. She’d stared at Zoe with confusion before awareness dawned in her eyes. Sending Drake on without her, she squatted beside Zoe. “It’s him, isn’t it? Drake’s the boy you’re interested in?” She bit her lip. “Oh, Zoe. I didn’t know. I can tell him never mind to the dance.”
Even back then, Zoe had known it wouldn’t have mattered. She’d never be a match against her best friend. Heather was gorgeous and smart and nice. The most popular girl in school. Everyone loved her, including Zoe. She, however, was just the good time to party with on weekends.
Dangerously close to tears, Zoe shrugged as if it hadn’t mattered. “Don’t be silly. We were just talking.”
And that, sadly, had been that. Zoe had spent the night of her birthday crying in her pillow. She’d gone to the dance with Cade—a freshman to her junior—as friends. A week after homecoming, Drake and Heather had started dating. Six years later, he’d proposed. A year after that, they’d married. And four years ago, they’d buried her on a rainy spring day shrouded in fog.
Zoe hated this hospital. It was where Heather had been diagnosed with ovarian cancer, where Drake’s father had been rushed after his heart attack, and where Zoe had gotten the jarring news her mother’s memory blips were early onset dementia. She’d never get better. Nothing ever got better.
Eyes burning, Zoe drew a slow breath and focused on the wet pavement outside the window and the way the raindrops reflected under the streetlights. Mama needed her. There was no sense dwelling on the past. Itchy and nervous, she paced again.
Her gaze landed on Gayle, hunched in a chair beside Drake. She’d been like a second mom to Zoe growing up, and guilt had to be eating the woman alive. Guilt was something Zoe knew intimately.
She dropped into a chair on Gayle’s other side. “Mama’s gotten much worse this past year. I’ve had to safety-proof the house. What happened tonight is not your fault.”
Gayle wiped her cheeks with a balled-up tissue. “I thought she was asleep.”
Drake closed his eyes with a weary sigh, rubbing a soothing hand over his mom’s back. Zoe was reminded of their conversation in the car on the way here.
“It was an accident.” Zoe grabbed Gayle’s hand and held it while they waited. “Just an accident,” she repeated, slumping in her seat.
A doctor came in ten minutes later. If memory served, it was the same middle-aged man who’d informed them Drake’s father had died. Flynn had been the unfortunate son to have found his dad’s body at home nine years ago, but the hospital had confirmed he was gone.
“I’m Dr. Crest. Nice to meet you.” He held out his hand, and Zoe shook it. “Your mom’s back from x-ray. Instead of bringing her to the ER, I had them take her upstairs right away. She had a dislocated left hip, but we reset it. There shouldn’t be any long-term damage. However, she’s fractured her femur.” He tapped his thigh, pointing out the correct bone. “It was a clean break. No surgery is needed. It’s in a cast now. With this type of injury, I’m a little concerned about possible clots, so we’re going to start a blood thinner as a precaution. We’ll keep her here a couple days to monitor her. Due to her mental state, she’s going to require at least six weeks, maybe more, in a rehab facility.”
Crap. Zoe rubbed her forehead. “Is that necessary? She’s never been away from home and, with her confusion, I don’t think she’d be cooperative.”
Understanding in his eyes, he nodded. “She requires around the clock care while the leg heals. She can’t walk on it or stress the fracture. It’s going to be painful, no doubt. A facility can monitor pain meds, watch her vitals, and ensure she uses a wheelchair.”
Her shoulders slumped. Damn. Taking Mama away from home would probably frighten her even more. She wouldn’t recognize anything or anyone.
Dr. Crest patted her arm. “She’s going to be okay. We’ve got her sedated so she can rest. You can go up and see her now. A caseworker will pop by in the morning to discuss placement options.”
“Thank you.”
Gayle held her hand in the elevator ride to the correct floor, while Drake stared straight ahead, his jaw ticking. If possible, his shoulders seemed more tense than Zoe’s.
An hour later, Zoe sat in a chair beside her mom’s bed, Gayle on the other side, and Drake in the corner on a loveseat. Mama hadn’t woken up, aside from a brief fluttering of her eyelashes, but her vitals were good according to the nurse. She was so still, so quiet, that Zoe found it hard to relax.
“I remember when she found out she was pregnant with you.” Gayle breathed a laugh. “I was a couple months shy of delivering Drake. We were so excited to be expecting at the same time. We talked about raising you together, and how you’d be the best of friends, like we were growing up. We even joked about how, if you were a girl, you two would fall in love and get married. Fate, she called it.”
Zoe swallowed hard and tentatively glanced over her shoulder at Drake. His unreadable gaze was pinned on her and not one muscle twitched. Half in shadow, he seemed more broody and contemplative than normal. She got the sinking suspicion he was trying to gauge her reaction to his mom’s statement.
“Well, anyway.” Gayle waved her hand in dismissal. “You didn’t follow our crazy plan, did you? But I’m so glad you guys are close, that you stayed friends. You’ve always been like my own, Zoe-bug.”
Unexpected tears threatened at Mama’s old nickname for her. It had been years since anyone had used it. “Mama’s been saying the name Jimmy a lot. Is that my father?”
Gayle hummed a confirmation. “He was a fisherman passing through town. He left the day after she told him she was pregnant. I promised her I’d never let you dwell on it if you ever asked me about him.” Her gaze drifted from Mama to Zoe, her face so like Flynn’s and her eyes like Cade’s, it was jarring. When she smiled, though, her dimples were all Drake. “You are one-hundred percent your mom. Smart, strong, driven, and strikingly pretty. I think the only thing you inherited from him was your artistic eye. He didn’t have half your talent.”
Zoe never really wondered much about her father, nor had she felt his absence in her life. Mama had always been enough. Regardless, she was happy to have the information.
Silence stretched and another thirty minutes passed.
She glanced at Drake. “You guys can head home. It’s really late. I’m okay here alone.”
His fingers tapped a stiff beat on his thigh. “Not a chance.”
She was about to argue, but the nurse strode back in. “You’ve got some visitors in the waiting room asking for you.”
Gayle smiled. “I called Flynn and Cade to tell them what happened. Go ahead. I’ll sit with Catherine for a bit.”
“Are you sure?”
Drake rose from the corner loveseat, scowl in place. “She’s sure. Come, Zoe.”
They walked out of the room and she looked at him while they passed the nurse’s station. “You’re bossy when you’re tired.”
“I’m not tired. I’m worried about you.”
She halted and faced him in the middle of the hallway. “I’m not the one in a hospital bed.”
His gaze raked over her face as if dissecting her expression. Thing about Drake was, he was a fixer. Always had been. And it appeared he wanted to fix her—a feat that couldn’t be conquered, not even by him. He didn’t offer any explanations or elaborate on his statement. He just stood there, hands at his sides, staring.
She turned and started walking again. “I’m fine, Drake. I’m made of stronger stuff than most. You know that.”
“Even titanium melts with enough heat thrown at it.”
What the heck was wrong with him lately? His uncharacteristic behavior was starting to grate her very raw nerves. “Careful, Drake. Your give-a-shit is showing.”
“Christ.” He grabbed her arm and dragged her into what looked like an empty employee lounge. He pinned her against the wall, hands pressed flat at either side of her head, and his face so close she could count his eyelashes. Dark stubble dusted his wide jaw, adding to his mysterious broody vibe.
Her breath hitched and caught while her body got naughty, naughty ideas. His purely male scent swirled around her and she wanted to sink into him. Heat fanned from her belly out, until she was engulfed in flames. Alpha testosterone waves rolled off him as she struggled to fight the urge to climb him and latch on. Everywhere.
Mouth in a firm line, his gaze darted back and forth between hers. “I have always given a shit, Zoe. That’s not something I turn off, even if I could. I care about you more than you will ever know. So yes, I’m worried about you. If you don’t like it, I couldn’t give a good goddamn.”
They stood there, sharing air, her trying not to melt into a puddle at his feet while he panted like he’d run a ten-mile. Then he…dropped his gaze to her mouth. His jaw tightened. His brow furrowed. And any amount of irritation left in his expression died a slow, consuming death. Bewilderment mixed with longing in his eyes the longer he fixated.
She must’ve had more than the one beer tonight or hit her head and gotten a concussion, because no way in Haiti was Drake O’Grady staring at her like he wanted nothing more than to kiss her. He was obviously struggling against the urge, but yeah. There was a definite interest.
She was poking the bear and knew it, but sometimes a girl just had to tempt danger. “You got upset the last time we were in…what did you call it, close proximity?”
He sucked in a gale force wind, nostrils flaring. His gaze jerked back to hers. “I…” With a slow blink, his throat worked a swallow. “For the past few months, being around you has been unnerving.”
He had her pinned to the wall in a hospital and he was unnerved? “What does that mean?”
Offering little more than a slight head shake, he studied her expression as if measuring his words by the milliliter. “There’s this ache in my gut and a burning in my chest.”
Her lungs threatened to quit. “Maybe it’s heartburn.”
“It’s not heartburn.”
“Are you sure? Perhaps some antacids would help.”
He closed his eyes as if seeking patience and opened them. “I’m positive. I’ve been chewing a roll a day for two months. It’s not indigestion.”
“It sounds like it to me. You know, burning in the chest and—”
“It’s not heartburn, Zoe. Would you, for just once, listen to me?” His jaw ticked, and she said to hell with it. Drake off his axis was too tempting. This was all a concussion-induced dream anyway.
“An ulcer, then. We’re in the hospital. Why don’t you make an appointment—”
“Christ, Zoe.” He shoved off the wall and stalked away from her. He laced his fingers and stacked his hands on his head. Back tense, biceps bulging, he took a second to seemingly collect himself before turning around. His arms dropped to his sides. “What I’m experiencing is not an ulcer or indigestion or heartburn.” His gaze seared into hers. “And I need to know if I’m the only one in this or if you’re feeling it, too.”
A drunk dream, for sure. Had to be. A decade ago, she would’ve given anything to have him stand in front of her and so much as hint he was aware she was a female. That he saw her as more than a friend, or worse, his wife’s best friend. But too many obstacles and years and conflict lay between them now. Still, she wanted to give in. Just once, she wanted to feel good.
“You know what? I’m sorry. This has been an unfortunate side effect the last few months, too—my inability to think straight.” He headed for the exit. “This isn’t the right time or place for this conversation.”
Shaking, heart pounding, she slumped against the wall. Shocked into idiocy, she paused to collect her breath and followed him in silence to the waiting room. Cade, Avery, Flynn, Gabby, and Brent stood to greet them.
“How’s your mom?” Avery offered a hug.
“She’s going to be fine.” Zoe recanted what the doctor had said about rehab and everything else.
Gabby stroked Zoe’s shoulder. “Can we do anything?”
“No. Thanks, you guys. I’m—”
“Do you still have a key to Zoe’s house?” Drake looked at Brent, arms crossed.
Brent’s hesitant gaze shifted to Zoe and back to Drake. “Yeah, sure.”
“Good.” Drake nodded. “Can you swing by there and get a change of clothes for Zoe? Feed the cat, too. Thanks.” He looked at Flynn. “Bring my dogs over to your place this weekend please. I’ll pick them up on Sunday.” He moved on to Cade. “Let the team know Zoe and I won’t be playing softball tomorrow. Someone from urgent care can fill in.” And last, he spoke to Avery. “Can you reschedule Zoe’s Monday clients? Just in case.”
Everyone nodded slowly as if they weren’t sure they’d heard him correctly. Zoe had to unlock her jaw to close her mouth.
Drake faced her. “You don’t have to do everything alone. I’ll meet you back in your mom’s room.” With that, he turned and strode out.
Crickets all but chirped in the silence.
Avery cleared her throat. “Well, that was, uh…”
“Jarring,” Cade finished for her. “I think I’m frightened. He just took charge, yeah? Correct me if I’m wrong, but did my big brother just get…involved?”
Drake had been like this after Heather had been diagnosed terminal. He’d gone into robot mode and, with an air of dictator, set a plan in place, then turned back into his caring, compassionate self when things had gotten squared away.
Shaking her head, Zoe thanked her friends and saw them off, preparing to sit vigil at Mama’s bedside. She ran into Gayle on her way out, and thanked her as well.
The deep rumble of Drake’s voice stopped Zoe just inside the doorway of her mom’s room. He was sitting on the bed at Mama’s hip, holding her hand. She was awake, but barely, if her heavy lids were any indication.
“Jimmy?”
Closing her eyes, Zoe fought exhaustion and the twist in her stomach.
“It’s me.” Drake grinned.
Mama tried to sit up. “Where am I?”
“The hospital. Everything’s fine.” Drake eased her back to the pillow with a hand on her shoulder. “You took a fall and broke your leg. They want you to rest.”
“Is the baby okay?”
“Yes, she’s fine.” Drake never missed a beat, and Zoe could’ve kissed him for that alone. Arguing reality or correcting her mom didn’t work. She was too far gone. Mama had always been intuitive, which had made it harder for Zoe to play along with the old memories haunting Mama’s mind.
“Thank goodness. It’s a girl?”
He cleared his throat. “Yes.”
“I think Zoe is the right name. What do you think?” Mama’s eyes widened. “Are you sure she’s all right?” She clutched her stomach and eyed the I.V. in her hand, confusion marring her brow.
“Shh.” He squeezed her hand. “Zoe is just fine. And you know what? I’m feeling a little psychic. Want to know her future?”
Mama’s laugh was sleepy, her lids droopy. “Tell me.”
He shifted as if he were settling in, earning another sleepy laugh. “When she grows up, she’s going to be stubborn and strong-willed like her mom. In the best way, of course.”
She smiled, her eyes slipping closed.
“She’s a stunner with her gypsy heritage. Quite gorgeous, also like her mom. The stop traffic kind. Petite, but mighty, she’s no pushover. She wields colored pencils and a sketchbook like a master, but she’s a genius with a paintbrush. Her smart mouth is quite frustrating, but she’s loyal to a fault.”
Zoe slapped a hand over her mouth to keep a sob from escaping. Hot tears burned her cheeks. Damn him and his beautiful, stupid, gallant heart.
Mama must’ve fallen asleep because Drake started to rise. She made a quiet sound of protest and he sat back down. “Jimmy, is that you? Where am I?” The medication was kicking in again. Her words were slurred.
“It’s me, and you’re safe.”