If Adam had his way, their baby would never enter the world.
“That’s it,” Kelly swore when she saw Liz’s angry tears and misinterpreted them. “I’m going to punch him whether you want me to or not.”
Kelly made a ka-pow motion that drew a strangled sound from Liz’s throat.
“If that would solve anything, I’d say go for it.”
“Hitting him would make me feel better,” Kelly pointed out.
Liz actually considered it a moment, then wiped her eyes. Life was short and regardless of Adam she had a lot to live for, a lot to be happy about. No longer would she give him control over her emotions, over her heart. She and Adam were finished. Not because of him shutting her out, but finished because she was done with him.
“Don’t bother,” she advised her friend, and meant it. “He’s not worth the effort.”
Adam had numbly seen the rest of his afternoon patients. Despite his reduced schedule, he’d even performed an emergency appendectomy. But only because he could go through the motions without thought. Without acknowledging that he was stunned. Horrified. Ashamed.
Finished for the day, he rested his elbows on his desk and dropped his face into his tingling hands.
Liz was going to have a baby.
His baby.
Liz, who was the most wonderful woman he’d ever met, who was the woman he loved, was going to have his baby.
Elation battled horror.
From the moment he’d been diagnosed with MS, he’d known he’d never father any children. He’d planned to have a vasectomy soon after finishing his MS treatments to ensure he wouldn’t.
How the hell could he have known he’d already fathered a baby?
How could he have a child when he’d only be condemning a child to battle with a disease that had the power to demand everything?
To have loved her, never wanted to hurt her, to keep from being a burden to her, he sure was doing a great job on Liz.
First his withdrawal following his diagnosis.
And now this.
He’d given her baby his genetically screwed-up genes.
Had she known about her pregnancy before the crash?
Of course she had. She’d said she had come to his condo to tell him that night. She had even mentioned a family, but he’d thought she’d meant a future family. Not one they’d already started.
He’d told her he didn’t love her on the night she’d intended to tell him about their baby.
No wonder Liz had called him names. He was a bastard.
Fourteen weeks. That meant in twenty-six weeks he and Liz were going to be parents because from the way she’d looked at him he knew she wouldn’t consider an abortion.
Liz was going to be a single mother, raising a baby on her own. A baby who could come down with MS, could require Liz to provide twenty-four-hour assistance, just like Gramps.
Any guilt he’d felt up to that point was as nothing in comparison to what flowed through him at the thought of what he’d done.
In his mind he’d had a clear idea of what the right thing was—for him to set Liz free.
Seeing her unconscious, having battled the thoughts that her life might be snuffed out, he’d realized he had to tell her about his MS, had to tell her he loved her, wanted her in his life. Like Larry had suggested, he’d planned to let Liz decide if she wanted to take that risk rather than him making all the decisions based on some misguided se
lflessness. Selflessness. He’d failed miserably.