“No? Really?” He closed his eyes—not thinking about the last time he was in this elevator. The last time he saw his father.
She shook her head.
“Sounds like he’s a happy-go-lucky kinda kid.” He rocked on his feet, anxious to get this over with. Not that it was going to be over. They were taking the kid home with them. Forever. His head pounded.
“Maybe he is. Right now, he’s scared and hurt and lonely. With limited vocabulary.” She shook her head. “His mother and his father disappeared, Nick. Can you imagine?”
He’d lived it. Older, maybe—but he was pretty sure knowing your father willingly deserted you was worse than what the kid was going through. “Sort of, yeah,” he reminded her.
“You do. Of course you do. I didn’t mean it like that.” She took his hand and squeezed. “Besides, you’re stuck with me.”
“He’s got you now, too.” He tried hard to sound like it didn’t bother him. But it did.
Her hand squeezed again.
The elevator doors opened, and Nick winced at the screams coming from somewhere on the floor. “Please tell me that’s not him.”
“That’s him.” With a deep breath, she set off down the hall, head held high, determination in each step. His mother was a woman on a mission. A real-life fricking superhero.
He was a suck-tastic sidekick, hanging back and useless. When they got to the door, his mother went right in. He stood outside, where he could see everything that was happening but no one inside could see him.
He didn’t give the old lady knitting a second look.
But the little boy—Jack—he couldn’t look away.
His chest hurt, instant pressure clamping down on his lungs and heart.
Jack wasn’t a kid.
He was a baby, pudgy and pathetic. Tears streamed down his red cheeks, making the pressure harder to bear. His white-blond curls shook with his hiccups. And he wiggled, trying to get away from the large blue cast swallowing him up at the waist. It covered his entire right leg, part of his left leg, and had some handle-looking bar running between his legs. A major pain in the ass. Jack turned away from his mother when she smiled at him, closing his eyes and sobbing into the blanket he gripped tight in both fists.
Maybe Nick was wrong. Maybe he was lucky.
He understood his father was gone and wasn’t coming back. Jack didn’t. He’d had a mom and a dad. Now they were…missing. He was too little to ask questions or understand what was happening.
Jack was…alone. Completely alone.
It hurt to breathe now, physically hurt.
Mrs. Baker left, smiling at him, then waddled down the hallway to the elevator. Nick watched, tempted to escort the older woman to her car just to get away. But that was running away, and he wasn’t a runner—not when his mother needed him.
“Hey, hey, Jack,” his mother crooned, doing her best to soothe the crying kid. “We’re getting out of here today. It’s going to be okay now.”
Jack wasn’t listening. He covered his face with the corner of his blanket and fought the cast to turn away.
Nick couldn’t take it. He walked into the hospital room and stood there, watching.
“Is he in pain?” he asked.
“What?” she asked, patting Jack’s hand.
“Is he in pain?” he asked, louder this time.
Jack stopped crying. He turned and stared, straight at Nick.
Nick swallowed, eaten up with all the horrible things he’d thought and said. None of this was Jack’s fault. He was a baby. Just a baby—with no one and nothing.
Jack tried to sit up, but the cast wouldn’t let him. With a grunt, he flopped back, still staring at Nick. “Da,” he said, reaching toward him with both hands. “Da,” he repeated, smiling at him like he was the best thing in the whole fucking world.