Beck hadn’t thought about this part of the experience. Hadn’t thought about what it would be like to come into the waiting room and announce to his buddies that he was a father. But it was amazing. He’d received a dozen back slaps and his hand had been shaken a thousand times, and there were only three other guys in the room.
He’d slumped into an armchair and let himself breathe for a minute. He was a father. His boys were here. Both of them. The larger boy was five pounds ten, which was an impressive weight for such a young thing. The smaller one was only just over five pounds and the midwives were more concerned about him. The twins would both be taken to the NICU for a day or two, that’s what the midwife had said, but Doctor Nicks had already warned them that was a possibility because so many twins were born premature.
Jaycee had astounded him. That woman had gone to hell and back. She’d breathed through every contraction, pled with him to breathe with her, and thanked him like he was actually doing something useful.
Of course, he wasn’t, it was all her.
But his muse knew how to express herself, even if it was grabbing him to kiss him or pumping her elbow into him as she huffed through the biggest pushes.
The guys had been talking for a while and he’d answered all the questions that he could. They were desperate to see Jaycee, but she’d been so tired that he’d noticed her drifting off as he departed the room. She deserved some peace and he’d hold the guys off as long as he could.
The adrenaline kept him riding high; this was it. The day he’d wanted for so long. His boys were here. Yeah, the hard work was going to start now, but fuck, he was a father. He was actually a father.
The first guy who went toward Jaycee’s room made him lift his head. But the second and third made him slide to the front of his seat. The doctor went rushing in too, a nurse followed, and then Beck was on his feet.
The guys were still laughing and talking, but Beck ignored them and stormed toward the room where Jaycee and his boys were.
Before he could go inside, a doctor came out and put a hand on his chest.
“Prep an OR,” someone inside the room called out.
Beck tried to move forward again, but the doctor blocked him. “Get the hell out of my way,” Beck said, feeling his friends move up at his back.
“I’m sorry, Mr. Smith, you can’t go in there now,” the doctor said and turned a clipboard toward him. “We need your consent to take Jaycee into surgery.”
“Jayc?” he asked, stepping back and coming up against one of the guys. Driving a hand through his hair, Beck didn’t know how to… think. How did he… What the hell? “What’s wrong with her? What happened?” Rage made him lunge forward to grab the guy’s collar. “Who fucking hurt her?”
“She’s hemorrhaging, Mr. Smith,” the doctor said. “She’s experienced significant blood loss. Her body is going into shock. We have to get her into the operating room now if we have any chance of—”
“Any chance of what, you fucktard?” he asked, shoving the guy back against the doorframe.
“Calm it,” Pete said, moving in beside him to pull his hand from the doctor.
Yeah, punching the guy might not be smart, but it would make him feel better. “Are the boys ok?” Pine asked.
His posse were keeping it together, but Beck couldn’t. Reversing out of the group, he felt pressure on his chest until it got hard for him to breathe. Jaycee. If she… if something happened to her…
“Yes, the boys are fine, they’ll be taken up to the NICU as a precaution as explained,” the doctor said. “Nothing has changed with them. They’re just as they were before.”
Beck hated how the doctor kept his beady little eyes on him like he was supposed to fucking do something. Except he was supposed to do something! Jaycee was his woman, she was his muse, she was… his. He couldn’t even figure out how he was supposed to breathe if she wasn’t in the world.
She was his responsibility, no one else’s. Jaycee relied on him to keep her safe. She’d called him her rock. Her anchor. He had to fix this, to fix her. It was his job. He had to make her better. To shelter her. To protect her.
But how?
How did he make decisions without looking into her eyes? How could he think without the scent of her hair in his nose? How could he be calm and rational without her hands on his skin?
The taste of her kiss; that was what he needed. The sound of her voice would make it ok. If he could just have her, just for a minute, she’d guide him, she’d get him through. Yes. The maestro needed his muse. He had to have her beside him, had to hold her.
If he could hold her, she’d be fine. All she needed was him. If they were close to each other, they were both whole. If she needed something, needed air, needed blood, she could have his, all of it. He’d give her his last drop, his last breath.
Jaycee told him she wasn’t hurt as long as he was close to her, as long as they were together. He had to get to her. He should never have left her.
“Please, Mr. Smith,” the doctor said. “You must sign this. Quickly.”
“What is it?” Pine asked, snatching it from the guy. “Let me see that.”
Beck wasn’t used to hearing his lawyer lose his cool. But Pine was frazzled now, and that didn’t help to calm him down. “I need Jayc,” Beck murmured. “I need to see her.”
He tried to march forward, but the doctor got in his way again and he growled. Instinct made his fist ball at his side, but Pete grabbed his wrist. “You can’t see her if they’re working on her,” Pete said.
Spinning on his friend, Beck felt nothing but fury. “I can’t function without her! I can’t… I can’t fucking breathe!”
As Beck rubbed his chest and tried to swallow, Pete put a hand on his shoulder and leaned close. “You need to sign this,” Pete said.
“What’s the worst case scenario?” Pine asked, his voice suggesting he was reading.
“Worst case, we lose her,” the doctor said, and the next time Beck opened his mouth, he forgot how to inhale. “But surgically, we may have to perform a hysterectomy.”
“What?” Beck snapped. “You can’t!” She’d have every chance of having future children taken away from her.
“If it’s that or death,” Pete said. “You have to save her life. You’re the only one who can save her life.”
Pine held the clipboard out at his side and Beck glanced down at it. Pete squeezed his shoulder, but he couldn’t… he could… “I need my muse,” he murmured. “I don’t make decisions without my muse.”
“Your muse is going to die if you don’t sign that piece of paper,” Pete said.
“Sign it,” Pine said, elevating it. “Sign it and save Jaycee.”
Grabbing the pen, Beck scrawled his name at the bottom of the sheet. The doctor said nothing, just turned and stormed back inside. The door swung back and forth. Hearing the distinctive drone of a life support machine made him sink down into a crouch.
She was… was she…
Dropping his face into his hands, Beck lost his last thread of sanity. If his muse was gone, if his girl had left this world without him… he wouldn’t go on. He wouldn’t be able to. He’d wanted children so bad and to give him this gift, she’d made the ultimate sacrifice.
To give their children life, she’d forfeited her own.
She looked so peaceful lying there under the pure white hospital sheet in the middle of the room. Her hair was spread around her shoulders and he couldn’t believe how natural she looked. How pure. How innocent. Her face was relaxed, her eyes closed, her beauty undeniable.
Beck didn’t want to go closer. He didn’t want to touch her skin. All he wanted was her warmth at his fingertips, but it wouldn’t be there. His muse, his beautiful, perfect, wonderful muse was gone.
This was his last chance to say all those things he wanted to say. Except now it felt like there was nothing to say, yet not enough time to say it all.
The door at his back was calling to him. He could do it, he could turn and walk out, and she’d be alive in his mind’s eye forever. The plan was always for them to be parted now; he could kid himself that she’d gone out into the world after giving him the greatest gift her body could give.
He felt selfish.
He hated himself.
If it wasn’t for his need, his wishes, she’d still be here, singing in the club, enriching the lives of everyone she met.
He’d have to tell Mavis. He’d have to go to the precious woman who’d made raising this beauty her life’s work and tell her that he’d destroyed the masterpiece that she was.
And the boys, how could he ever tell them what he’d done to their mother?
Moisture flooded his mouth; he made himself so sick that he couldn’t bear to be near to himself. Every day he’d have to look into the faces of their children and he’d know that he was responsible for the loss of the incredible creature who had borne them.
Edging back, Beck wanted to run, wanted to leave this room, leave the hospital… he wanted to leave the earth.
What a coward. His Jaycee needed him. He’d be the last person to ever lay eyes on that perfect face. He couldn’t fail her now, not when he’d already failed her in every other way.
Sucking a breath through his nose, he started forward. With every step nearer, he picked out new features, all these details he’d missed before. How had he never noticed the perfect curve of her earlobe? Why had he never spent time learning every line on those full lips?
The sketchpad that hung in his hand was meant to be a tribute to her. But as his pain welled up inside him, he had to stop walking.
“Muse,” he said, but the word stuck in his throat, Beck wasn’t even sure it came out. “Girl, I’m so sorry, baby.”
It wasn’t enough.
Nothing was enough and nothing ever would be again.
The chair to the left was meant to be for him, but he didn’t deserve it, he didn’t deserve any comfort.
When his arm bent, he wasn’t aware of the pencil moving toward the paper until he heard the scrape of the graphite against the pulp. That flawless face was going to be engrained in his memory for the rest of time. Jaycee had been so adamant about him burning or shredding every picture he’d ever drawn of her and he’d promised her that he had.
He hadn’t.
The pictures meant too much to him, every one of them portrayed a moment of his life, stolen with her. He could never have known how precious they would be to him. That smile. Those sultry eyes. The far-off look of longing she got when she was gazing at The Abyss. He’d immortalized his woman on paper, but it wasn’t enough.
Even now as he tried to cast his artist’s eye over her, he felt the hatred burning his guts. How fucking dare he! This was wrong! Clenching his fist around the pencil, he stormed forward and slammed his knuckles against the metal slab she was laid out on.
“Damnit, Muse!” he said, smacking the slab again, making the sheet between his fingers and the cold metallic surface shift. “I’m sorry! I’m so sorry! Baby, I…”
His voice cracked and he sank into a crouch when his knees buckled.
There weren’t any words that would bring her back, weren’t any words that would fix this. Beck was responsible. Him. Only him.
With his head bowed on his fist, he squeezed his eyes shut.
He’d looked at her.
It all started that day. That was the day his life changed. The day that put them on this path. If only he’d known it would end this way.
When she’d been sitting in that procedure chair telling him that his swimmers were doing their work, she’d been smiling. Could she have known that those swimmers would be responsible for her demise? And he’d broken her heart, he’d tried to turn his back on her that day; all because he couldn’t be man enough to face how he felt about her. He’d tried to back out.
What kind of an idiot was he? He’d looked into the eyes of a beautiful woman and told her he wanted out. He’d told her that he was out. She’d told him that he’d feel the same way for any surrogate.
No.
He would never feel this way for any other woman. There would be no other woman. He belonged to Jaycee and for him it was as simple as that. For as long as he lived, he would never touch another woman, never draw one. He’d never create again. There was no inspiration, no creation, not without her.
The only time his pencil would touch paper would be to capture her. Jaycee. His muse. There wasn’t another.
Thinking about the course of their relationship, he couldn’t believe how close he’d come to losing her after that kiss. Being so overwhelmed by how it felt to taste her had made him run like a goddamn coward.
He’d betrayed her when he’d tried to void the contract and he hadn’t even chased her when she’d stormed out.
Screw that.
He should’ve grabbed hold of her and tied her to his bed. Jaycee was an emotional woman and he’d hurt her. He was an asshole. She should never have shared her body with him. He was a cretin. Lower than low.
If it wasn’t for the pickle juice and the pregnancy, she’d have gone about the rest of her life hating him.
But wasn’t that better than this?
Beck would rather have her out there in the world hating him with the fury of the devil if it saved her from this. If he could have her back, if he could give her life again, he’d let her go to live her life free of him.
Sending out a silent plea to every higher power that may be out there, he made the vow, he wouldn’t be selfish again, never again. This unspoiled, gorgeous being deserved her life. Beck should never have presumed to take it from her and that’s what he’d done. He’d stolen her spirit. Her life. He should’ve left her alone. Should’ve accepted her first no. He should’ve let her go. He would let her go.
He didn’t deserve her.
Didn’t deserve to breathe.
If she wasn’t here, he didn’t want to be either.
No.
Surging to his feet, new purpose made him scan the room. There had to be a knife, a scalpel, something he could use to hurt himself the way he’d hurt her. He’d spill every drop of his blood to get to her, wherever she was. He had to apologize, had to grovel, had to throw himself at her mercy and spend eternity worshipping her.
Turning away, he took a step.
Something grabbed his wrist tight.
Inhaling in shock, he spun back to see her hand there, around his arm. “What do you think you’re doing?” she whispered, her lips moving, but nothing else.
“Jayc?” Bending over her, he stroked his fingers down her face and touched her mouth with his. “Muse, you’re—”
Her eyes popped open, but she didn’t look happy. “Our boys need you, Beckett Trent. What do you think would happen to them if you came with me? I told you to stay with them. I told you to love them.”
“You need me,” he said. “I can’t be here without you.”
“Yes,” she said. “You can. You were always supposed to do this without me. You don’t need me.”
“I breathe you,” he said, “there is no me without you.”
“And without you, I die for nothing,” she whispered. “Those boys need your love. They don’t deserve the life you or I had. You’re going to give them everything. Give them your all. You’re going to love them so damn much that you’ll make up for every hurt you ever went through. You’re going to love them enough to erase my mother’s hatred. I need you, Beck. I need you with them.”
“Without you, I—”
“We will be together again,” she said and when she smiled, he thought maybe his heart stopped. “I’ll wait for you every second. I’ll love you every second, and when it’s time, I’ll stand with you, in your arms, and we’ll decorate the canvas together again.”
“I don’t know how to do it without you.”
“I’m there. Every time you touch a brush. Every time you mix the paint… Every time you sweep those incredible colors on the canvas. I’m with you, Maestro… Don’t ever forget what I told you about hope. There should always be hope.”
“But sometimes it’s hidden,” he said and gazed at her mouth. “I love you, Jaycee Kirk.”
“And I will never leave you,” she said. “I am yours, Maestro. Yours.”
When her eyes closed again, her lips met and her hand fell from his arm. She was gone. He’d lost her all over again and when the desperation burst in his belly, he kissed her again and rested his head on hers.
He had to let her go. She’d left him, and he was never getting her back.
But he had her soul, in his heart, in his boys. Jaycee was his inspiration from now until the end of time and nothing could take her away from him.