Sawyer (Carolina Reapers 2)

“Do you want me to call the father?” she asked as she headed toward the door.

A bucket of ice-water crashed over me.

Sawyer.

Not twenty minutes ago, he’d told me how relieved and hopeful he was at finally being free. Finally, being able to put himself first, for once. To explore life without the burden of hospital visits and worrying constantly.

“No,” I said a little too quickly. “He’s…busy.” I didn’t want to explain just how important the next two weeks were for him.

“Okay,” she said. “Is there anything I can get for you while we wait for the CT results?”

“No, thank you,” I said. I wouldn’t know what to ask for right now even if I did need something. I was too busy watching a life flash before my eyes—one that held so much promise and was nothing like I’d ever planned.

I smoothed my good hand over my stomach an hour after the nurse left, my injured arm stinging something fierce. Annabelle perched on the chair across from my hospital bed, quiet, reflective.

“I never thought…” I started to say then my airways clogged. I cleared my throat and tried again. “I never thought I could feel this way.” I focused on Annabelle, on my oldest friend, to keep me from spiraling.

Pregnant.

I was pregnant.

With Sawyer McCoy’s baby.

The universe had a sick sort of sense of humor. Giving me a piece of him when I couldn’t have the whole.

“I never…never wanted this,” I said, but couldn’t stop myself from protectively laying my hand over my still-flat stomach.

“I know you didn’t, Echo.” Annabelle sighed, not a hair out of place. “But you know I’ve always said that nothing happens on our own timeline.”

“I know,” I said. “Fate. You’re a strong believer in fate.”

“And you’re telling me you aren’t?” she asked, eyeing my tummy. “How could you not be? With a miracle like that growing inside you.”

“I don’t like the idea of not being in control of my own life anymore, Annabelle. I’ve had enough of that with losing my own family. And now…” Tears coated my eyes. “Now this speck of life inside me means more to me than my own soul. How do you explain that?”

“Easy,” she said, tapping her perfectly pink nails on the bar. “Love.”

I nodded. “You’re right about that.” This—what I felt for this baby—it was the purest love I’d ever experienced. I loved Sawyer with my whole entire heart, but this? This baby beat him out tenfold. Now if I could’ve had them both, the world might’ve burned from the happiness pouring out of me. But that wasn’t in the cards for me. Sawyer may love me, but he’d just gotten to a place where he was finally putting himself first. And he deserved that. He wouldn’t want this life.

I’m sorry, baby.

“When are you going to tell him?” she asked.

I shifted in the uncomfortable bed.

“You do know you have to tell him, right?” she asked when I hadn’t said anything.

“I know I have to. He has the right to know. But he doesn’t want this life, Annabelle. He’s on the road—”

“There are a ton of hockey players with kids and happy marriages, Echo Hayes,” she cut me off. “So don’t go using that excuse. Sawyer McCoy’s own coach is a prime example.”

“I know. I know,” I said, slightly delirious. So much had changed in my life and I’d only known about the baby for an hour.

My world completely turned on its head.

Because of Sawyer.

First, he got inside me—showed me what real love felt like.

Second, we’d broken each other’s hearts.

Third, I’d nearly died, and when I came to…I wasn’t alone anymore. It wasn’t just me I had to live for anymore. It was us.

“I’ll tell him. After the Cup,” I said. “I’ll be likely to get more than five minutes with him then.” I was a tad bitter. I could taste it on my tongue. I’d been close enough to happy to feel it, and now…now it didn’t matter.

This baby did.

Sawyer’s baby.

Mine.

Ours.

“That’s not far away,” she said. “What will you do until then?”

I laughed a dark laugh. “You know a place I can order a onesie with the Scythe logo on it?”

“I haven’t heard a peep from you since the accident, and then you call out of the blue begging for Lukas’ jet?” Langley chided me as I followed her into the family-guest box of the arena.

“I didn’t beg,” I said, taking a seat next to her, Faith and Harper already seated and glancing at me with too-knowing eyes.

“We’ve been so worried,” Faith said.

“It was bad enough we had to see you in a hospital bed, but then you ghost us?” Harper finished.

“I’m sorry,” I said, wrapping a Reapers hoodie emblazoned with McCoy on the back tighter around me. One of the items Sawyer had left in my loft. I shouldn’t have worn it. It still smelled like him. But I needed something warm for the cold arena, and I’d be lying if I said it didn’t feel good to be drenched in his scent, even if it was fading.