The Baby (The Boss 5)

“I will,” Valerie volunteered, wiping her eyes with the tissue crumpled in her fingers. She wasn’t crying so much as constantly leaking tears. It was hard to know what to say to her, when she seemed to be holding it together so well.

“Can I do anything for you?” I asked Neil, putting my hand on his shoulder. The stupid wooden armrests between the chairs prevented me from taking him in my arms, but he didn’t seem as though he wanted to be touched, anyway.

He shook his head. “No, just the clothes. You’ve thought of everything.” He was trying to be encouraging to me, even when our life was falling to pieces.

We waited in silence, except for when Laurence would offer to get us coffee or something from the vending machines. We always declined, though he did get Valerie a cup of tea, and she drank it.

I liked Laurence. He seemed like he took good care of Valerie.

Penny arrived faster than I could have expected her, about forty-five minutes later. I saw her and Ian—Ian?—get off the elevator together. She spotted me through the waiting room windows, and I got up to meet her in the hallway.

“What’s going on?” Ian asked, looking past me to Valerie and Neil in the waiting room. He carried my black garment bag, the legs of a pair of Neil’s jeans hanging below the hem.

“There was an accident.” My throat stuck together on a sob. “Michael’s dead. Emma’s in surgery.”

“Oh, no. Oh, Sophie, I’m so sorry.” Penny put her arms out and hugged me.

“I’m going to speak to Neil,” Ian said, nodding toward the waiting room and slightly lifting the garment bag. “Drop these off.”

Of course, he would be doing more than just handing off a change of clothes. Ian was one of the most covertly caring people I’d ever met. He probably felt just as helpless as I did.

When he’d gone, I turned to Penny. “So…what is he doing here?”

“He was driving me,” she said, her brow crumpling. “We can talk about it later.”

I was tempted to insist we talk about it, now. It seemed like it would be a good distraction. Then, I realized how futile it would be to try to distract myself from this.

This wasn’t just a passing moment I needed to turn away from. This was going to be a part of us for the rest of our lives. Neil and I would have to be there for Emma and watch as she went through all the horrible days and months and probably even years that would follow.

I thought of how I would feel if Neil were taken from me without warning. The lonely, incomplete feeling broke me down, and Penny put her arms around me. I cried, and she cried, and when Ian returned, he stood back awkwardly until we parted.

“Is there anything else we can get you?” he asked with the helpless look of a man who needed something to do. He could get in line behind me.

I shook my head. “No. I don’t think so. Go home. I can update you tomorrow.”

“Okay.” Penny gave me one more hug, and Ian stepped up to give me one, as well. They walked to the elevators together, and I watched them go.

There was a small bathroom in the waiting room. Neil and I took turns getting changed, and I hung his tux and my dress on the padded hangers Penny had brought. There was a reason that girl was my assistant.

An hour and a half had passed since we’d arrived at the hospital. I flipped back and forth from a timidly optimistic “no news is good news” stance and a panicked, “what if something horrible has happened and they forgot to tell us.” I tried to believe the former was the case.

All of us seemed isolated in our own worry. We didn’t ask each other how we felt. We didn’t talk, at all.

I’d lost track of the time when the doctor appeared in the doorway.

Neil jolted out of his solitary thoughts and stood, taking a deep breath, his hands in the back pockets of his jeans. His brow furrowed and he tucked his chin to his chest before he looked up.

Valerie stayed where she was, her eyes wide, lips slightly parted, as though she wanted to ask what we were all waiting to hear.

The doctor was young, and tired. A surgical cap covered his dark hair. He looked at each of us in turn, then back to Valerie. “I’m sorry.”

I swore I heard the clock on the wall tick in the total silence that fell. It didn’t last long enough for me to hear the next one. A long, shuddering, “No!” poured from Valerie’s mouth, and she curled in on herself, her forehead against her knees as her body wracked with agonized sobs.

“Emma suffered blunt force trauma to her chest,” the doctor went on, as sympathetically as anyone could describe something so horrific. “We weren’t able to stabilize her during surgery. We did try everything we could, but the damage to her heart was…too extensive. I’m sorry, but she died.”

Died? Not, “passed away?” Not, “we lost her”? That raw, painful word, “died”?

“No.” Neil took a step back, shaking his head. “There must be something you can do.”