Resolution (Mason Family 5)

I still have no idea why they would have told Wade, though. He’s not listed as my next of kin, and hospitals are so strict on policy.

Maybe Gramps is friends with someone high up in the hospital.

The wealthy and their connections.

“He knew. I could see it in his eyes, Rusti. He was … he was reacting to something besides me. I’m going to be fine. Just a little banged up.”

“And pregnant.” She grins. “You’re having a baby. There’s that.”

“Stop saying that.”

“Well, you might as well get used to it, Mama.”

I roll my eyes, making her laugh. But I don’t laugh. I can’t find humor in my life imploding.

“I wonder if my mom felt this way,” I say. “My dad didn’t want me either.”

“Dara …”

I close my eyes after all. “I’ll raise this baby. And if Wade doesn’t want to help me, then I’ll do it like Mom did. It’ll be fine.”

“And you have Cleo and me.”

I snort.

My brain starts to get fuzzy, and I yawn. The doctor said I’d be in pain, and he wasn’t wrong. But I bet he didn’t predict the pain in my heart or how devastated it would feel when it broke into a million pieces.

There are no painkillers for that. I probably couldn’t take them now anyway.

“I just need to have a conversation with him at some point …”

I drift off to sleep.

FORTY-ONE

DARA

“Hey.”

Wade’s voice stirs me from my nap. I don’t really believe it’s him that I hear. I have an even harder time realizing it’s him in my doorway.

He looks … awful. Dark spots under his eyes. Unshaven. He lacks his cool demeanor, and it’s been replaced with something … else. Something detached but also affected.

What the hell?

“Can I come in?” he asks.

“Sure. Yes. Of course.”

I wince as I sit up.

He lunges into action, grabbing my arm, and helps me get situated. His touch is gentle, and I wish it didn’t feel like the last time I would experience it.

His face is sullen as he sits.

“How do you feel?” he asks.

“Like I got hit by a truck.”

He doesn’t laugh. I shrug.

“The police came by today. Told me it wasn’t my fault,” I tell him. “The guy fell asleep at the wheel and hit me.”

“Am I supposed to say that’s good?”

I consider that. “Maybe. I don’t know. None of it feels good right now.”

He runs his hands up and down his face.

The baby feels like an elephant in the room. At some point, I suspect it’ll feel like an elephant inside me too. It’s such an odd feeling to know that there’s a child in there, in my stomach, when I had no idea.

It doesn’t feel real. I don’t feel connected to it yet, which would probably worry me if I could stay awake long enough to think about it.

I open my mouth to just sputter something into the room, to take the pressure off the situation. Maybe if I just bring up the baby, things will get easier?

It takes longer for words to fall past my lips than usual. That’s disappointing.

And unfortunate.

“I’m sorry, Dara,” Wade says before I can get a word out.

“For what?”

He tugs on his hair before raising his face to mine.

The storm brewing behind his beautiful eyes is wild and intense.

My mouth goes dry as I watch him fight an internal battle.

I place a hand on my stomach and catch myself. Slowly, I drop it to the mattress.

He shifts in his seat. His hands wring together as if he’s unable to keep himself from touching me. And out of all of the things I’ve endured with him since the accident—this is the worst.

His refusal to touch me.

It’s so many steps in the wrong direction. The Wade of the late couldn’t stop touching me as if he needed the connection as much as I did.

As much as I do.

He held me at night. Reached for me in the morning. Wrapped his arms around me as soon as he saw me. It wasn’t always just about the kiss that would usually follow or the ass grab that was also frequent.

It was about the connection. I could feel it in the way he nestled me against his chest. I could see it in his eyes … just like I can see now that he’s not going to do it today.

Tears well inside my eyes. I’m surprised I have any more left to shed.

“Are you here alone?” he asks. “I thought Rusti was staying with you.”

“She had to go to work. I’m fine, you know. Small broken bone. Cracked rib. Mostly just super sore.”

He worries his hand around his jaw.

“What are you sorry for?” I ask, circling back to the topic he just began and then walked away from.

“I told you when we started this—the night of Holt’s wedding—that things between us would change,” he says.