Lucy
Lucy shuffled into her room, her I.V. stand in tow and barely made it to the bed before her knees gave out. She’d walked the entire hallway of the fifth floor three times and it had taken sheer will to make it. Her body resisted with every step. The aches, pains and weakness told her that she didn’t have the strength, she wouldn’t make it, and that she should just go back to bed and rest.
But she’d ignored the nagging voice and kept going. She kept images of her baby in the foremost of her mind and it had served as fuel for her trek. Now that she was back in the confines of her room, she shoved the metal rack to the bedside and all but fell face first onto the uncomfortable bed.
“Need some help?” a familiar male voice inquired from the open door.
Lucy closed her eyes and groaned. Thank God she’d actually donned a matching pajama set. Had she been clad in the ordinary hospital gown, her skinny white butt would have been shining like the full moon.
She wiggled around until she lay on her back and her frail legs dangled from the bedside. She offered Seth a timid smile and nodded once.
“Help me get my legs on the bed?” she asked. “I think I overdid my daily physical therapy,” she finished and sighed heavily.
Seth – the tall, muscular, healthy athlete – strode forward and cupped her diminished calves in his wide, capable hands. Gently he raised her legs and placed them on the bed and observed as she wiggled around and got as comfortable as possible.
“Where’s Jacob?” she asked once she noticed her baby’s absence.
“I dropped him off at daycare,” Seth explained. “I think he needed some playtime with kids his own age, he was starting to act like me,” he quipped and she inhaled sharply. “You know, scratching his ass and burping involuntarily,” Seth finished with a chuckle.
Lucy relaxed and for the hundredth time questioned her decision to keep such important news to herself. Jacob had never seemed to want a father figure, but now that Seth had come around it was like the man filled a gap neither she nor her son knew was missing.
Chris had nagged her, ever since she’d found out she was pregnant, to tell Seth the truth. Her brother was dead sure his friend would do the right thing. But fear kept her lips firmly shut and only the threat of never speaking to him again kept Chris from doing it himself.
Slightly nervous with it being just the two of them, Lucy reached down and tugged at the hem of her shirt, pulling it lower over her stomach. Barely twenty-six years old, she should’ve had a rocking body. But being pregnant and now having cancer had done terrible things to her.
“Why haven’t you told Jacob’s father about him?” Seth blurted and Lucy jerked so hard she nearly fell off the other side of the bed. “Both he and the boy deserve to know.”
“That’s personal,” Lucy answered and continued fidgeting with her clothes. Had Chris said something to Seth? Had he figured it out? She’d never been good at gauging other people. This conversation wasn’t one she was ready to have, so she turned to look up at Seth and smiled.
“If or when the time comes, I will,” she assured.
“When Jacob gets older and demands to know about his absent father?” Seth asked in a slightly raised voice. “Do you honestly think any man wouldn’t be proud to have such a wonderful son? The boy is a gift.”
Seth turned and grabbed the visitor’s chair from the corner and dragged it to Lucy’s bedside. Flopping down into it, he reached up and ran thick fingers through inky black spikes.
Even disheveled, Lucy found him gorgeous. Most women did, she reminded herself. She couldn’t subject Jacob to a father who wasn’t ready to be a father. Seth’s professional career was too important to him to settle down.
“It’s none of your business,” Lucy murmured softly. “If you’re tired of watching him, I’ll find someone else.”
“You have no one else,” Seth snapped and raised narrowed eyes at her. “You’ve pushed everyone away from fear they would spill your dirty little secret,” he accused. “I’m not tired of watching him, I love spending time with him. I just can’t help thinking about all the time his father has missed and you don’t have the right to keep him from the man who would love him.”
Lucy’s eyes narrowed in response and she felt the fires of hell blazing within her blood. How dare this man – this stranger – lecture her? Where had he been these past four years? Oh, that’s right; he’d been partying with every slut he could find. He’d been neck deep up his own ass. Maybe if he’d had a plexi-glass belly button he would’ve known. What would he have done had she told him? Possibly sent a monthly check and called it good?
“Excuse the hell out of me,” Lucy barked. “I have trust issues and with good reason. The only man I’ve ever allowed myself to be vulnerable with left me high and dry mere hours after he’d gotten what he wanted.”
“Is that what all this is about?” Seth demanded and surged to his feet. “You’re punishing this child because you and I had a one-night stand over five years ago?”
“I’m not punishing him,” she argued vehemently. “I’m protecting him.”
“From, what?” Seth demanded in exasperation. “Just what exactly are you protecting him from? Having friends, loved ones he can count on in his times of need, of letting himself care for someone who isn’t his mother?”
“I’m protecting him from the same man who threw me away without a thought,” she fired back and immediately wished the words back. But what was said couldn’t be unsaid just like what was done couldn’t be undone.
There it was; no going back now. Blazing hot fear roared to life in her belly. What had she done? She’d been so careful all these years and now the secret she would’ve died to protect came rushing out, on a trail of red hot temper and the kicker was the fact that she’d told the one person she didn’t want to know.
Seth stopped pacing abruptly and just stood with his back to her. She cursed her temper but she mostly cursed her heart. She’d known, all those years ago, that she’d fallen in love with Seth and it was the kind of love that transcended time. The kind women read about in romance novels or watched on television. But being the shy, young and inexperienced girl that she was, she’d kept it to herself.
After all, how could such a hot guy with a bright future see anything in her? She was nothing more than a geeky librarian. He was the type of man to walk around with a supermodel on his arm.
“Oh my God,” he whispered, jarring Lucy from her rampant thoughts and regrets. “It’s all been right before me the entire time. Why didn’t I figure it out sooner?” His breath hitched and it sounded like someone had punched him in the stomach. Lucy frowned and for a brief moment thought perhaps he was crying.
“Probably because you didn’t want to,” another male voice announced from the still-open door.
Lucy’s eyes widened when she saw her brother standing there, hands hidden in a bouquet of yellow daises. She hadn’t been expecting him so soon and was more than glad to see him. Glad wasn’t exactly the right word; she was relieved. Now she wouldn’t have to deal with this fallout all on her own.