He turned to find me standing behind them, shocked at what I’d overheard most likely. “Brooke,” he said calmly, “this is Janice Thorndike, someone who used to be my friend at one time. Now, I don’t recognize her anymore, because she’s become a complete stranger to me.”
“Fuck you, Caleb,” she screeched. “And fuck your English cunt whore, too.”
“Janice, meet my fiancée, Brooke Casterley,” Caleb said.
I just stood there, gaping at the two of them in utter astonishment. Frozen in place as my emotions collided with the logic of what had happened to us. My hands went protectively to cradle my belly. Caleb and Janice both tracked the movement of my hands with their eyes. It was as if we all comprehended the stark truth in the same few seconds—a brief increment of time that stretched out painfully in slow motion and perfect illumination.
Caleb faced me, then turned a ghostly shade of white. “You are pregnant—”
“Noooooo,” Janice screamed as she grabbed a champagne flute and smashed it against the bar counter.
The sounds of breaking glass and shouting erupted amid the scramble of bodies rushing toward me. I didn’t feel the pain where she slashed at me with the broken glass. I was in automatic defense mode, my goal to protect rather than fight.
Protect my baby at all costs.
I registered the hard floor beneath my back with Caleb hovering over me, his white shirt collar dark with blood as it dripped down from a wound in his neck. Caleb was hurt. I felt the pressure of his hands at my side along with a throbbing dull ache as he shouted, “Call 9-1-1. Call 9-1-1. Call fucking 9-1-1!”
I was wet where his hands were pressing into me.
It was my blood?
My blood . . . probably blending into the color of my gorgeous ball gown almost perfectly.
I tried to speak, but no words would come. I wanted to tell Caleb I loved him and had no regrets about anything.
Being loved by him was the best thing to ever happen to me.
I could hear him speaking to me even after everything grew dark.
“I love you, and you’re going to be okay.” He cried the same thing over and over again in a chanting prayer.
My Caleb cried out his love for me so I could hear him. So I’d never forget.
Caleb
I wouldn’t let anyone touch my neck until Brooke was wheeled into surgery.
At which time they had to force me to leave her side.
I shuddered to recount the last hour of terrifying agony. My brother’s presence was the only thing keeping me from losing my motherfucking shit in the middle of the ER at Mass General. I barely comprehended what the doctor had said about Brooke’s injury assessment. My only focus was on her, so thank God for Lucas being here to relay the details to me after the doctor had left.
“She’s going to be okay, bro. The surgery is minor, doc said. They’re going in as a precaution because a small piece of glass showed up on the ultrasound, and they want a pristine wound before they stitch her up.”
“She’s pregnant. I heard him say around seven weeks give or take.” I couldn’t believe it, but it was confirmed before they wheeled her away. One of the first questions they asked me in the ambulance was the possibility of pregnancy. I had to tell them yes. The look on Brooke’s face when she overheard me with Janice—she hadn’t known she was pregnant, either. This was a complete surprise for all of us.
“Yeah. You’re going to be a father, big brother.” He slapped a hand down on my thigh. “Your turn to get stitched up. The nurses need to do their job now.”
I let them sew up the gash in my neck and was never so afraid in all my life. What if Brooke didn’t want to marry me now? What if she wanted to leave me or wanted an abortion? I didn’t know the answers to those questions yet, but I knew she wasn’t ready to get married right now. Or be pregnant again.
I’d done the same thing that Patten had done to her.
If you try to force her into a corner, she will run from you as far and as fast as she can, and she won’t look back, either. Fuck. Her grandmother’s words hit me brutally hard right at that moment.
Would she be able to forgive me? Would she see this as the same entrapment she’d gotten from Patten? Could she even still love me after this fucking nightmare was behind us? Would it ever be behind us?
Question after question played in my head like a song on repeat. And I knew no fucking answers to any of them.
I asked them to point me in the direction of the hospital’s chapel. It had been a long time for me since I’d set foot inside a sanctuary of worship. Didn’t matter, though, because it all came back to me. Catholic roots spread deep.
I fell to my knees and prayed.
And the fear of losing the most important person in my life and even our innocent child before I’d have the chance to know him or her absolutely slayed me down to the most humble soul on earth to ever plead for mercy.
SOFT fingers worked their way through my hair. I knew those fingers, and I recognized their familiar pattern of rubbing and gently tugging on sections at a time. My girl had told me before how much she liked having her hands buried in my hair . . .