Next to me, Rhys groaned. “Oh God, another baby? What happened to us being a band of rockers? Now we’re a band of dirty diapers and Dora. I mean, seriously guys, we’re going to have to have a separate eighteen wheeler to get around all the crap for your kids.”
“Shut up, jackass,” AJ replied.
As the happy conversation buzzed around me, I didn’t hear any of it. I was too overwhelmed by the news of Mia’s pregnancy coupled with holding new life in my arms. Mia and Lily had what I desperately wanted, and the green-eyed monster of jealousy was rearing its head.
Sensing my jangled emotions, Lucy’s face scrunched up, and she began to cry. “Guess I better give her back now,” I said, before handing her to Lily.
“Shh, sweetheart. It’s okay,” Lily cooed softly, and within a few seconds, Lucy was quiet.
The walls of the room seemed to close in around me, and I fought to breath. I knew I had to get away, or I was going to lose it and start screaming. I bolted for the door when Jake reached out to grab my arm. “Where are you going?”
“Just to the bathroom,” I lied. I forced a smile to my lips before I slipped out of the door. Fighting the tears, I started putting distance between myself and Lily’s room. Somehow I ended up down the hall at the nursery. There were only a few babies inside since most were in the rooms with their mothers. Leaning in, I placed my hand on the glass.
A newborn baby boy slept peacefully wrapped in a tight cocoon of blankets. The name on his bassinet read, West. He had a head full of dark hair, and even in his sleep, his mouth worked on a phantom pacifier.
“Abby?” Jake questioned softly from behind me.
I didn’t turn and look at him. Instead, I kept staring at the sleeping baby. “Did you know that I wanted to be a Labor and Delivery nurse?”
“No, I didn’t.”
With a nod, I replied, “If I had finished my degree, that’s what I had planned on doing. I couldn’t imagine anything more fulfilling than helping to bring life into the world.”
Jake took a tentative step towards me. “Look, I know you’re upset about seeing Lucy and then the news of Mia’s pregnancy.”
A mirthless laugh escaped my lips. “Makes me a horrible person to be jealous, doesn’t it?”
“No, I think it’s only natural for you to feel that way. Kinda like when I see guys and their mothers. We can’t help what we want.”
“No, we can’t.”
“Maybe…maybe we can start trying for a baby.”
Although Jake’s words should have been music to my ears and the answer to a prayer, they instead just brought pain from something I’d been carefully hiding. “It won’t work,” I whispered.
“What do you mean it won’t? We haven’t even tried,” he protested.
My eyes snapped shut in pain. With the walls of my carefully constructed façade starting to crumble, I figured I had no reason to continue harboring my horrible secret. “I have to tell you something, Jake.”
“What is it?”
“I’ve been lying to you,” I choked out.
His dark brows furrowed in confusion. “About what?”
I slowly turned to face him as my heartbeat began to race out-of-control. “I stopped taking my birth control a few months ago right after I was cleared from my surgery.”
Jake stared at me in disbelief. “What?”
“I wanted a baby, and I knew it was going to be harder to conceive. You said after I came out of surgery, that when the doctor cleared me, we would try. So I thought…I thought if it took us a long time to get pregnant, then you really would be ready then. Then at the same time, the waiting and the wondering if I could was too much to bear.”
The color drained slowly out of Jake’s face. “You promised. You swore to me on our honeymoon that you would never do anything so horrible as to go behind my back.”
Tears pooled in my eyes before streaking down my cheeks. “I know. But things changed with my surgery—”
“Not enough to make you lie to me.”
“I’m sorry, Jake. I’m so, so sorry.”
He shook his head. “I can’t believe it.”
“You don’t understand what the last nine months have been like for me. I wanted to believe everything would be all right, but I couldn’t. And then I couldn’t talk to you about it because I knew how you really felt about having a baby.”
“So you’re trying to make this my fault?” he shouted, which caused a few nurses to turn their heads in our direction.
“No, I just want you to try to understand why I did what I did. I want you to see that even though I wasn’t thinking straight, there was a reason.”
“A reason for you to deceive me?”
“Please, Jake,” I begged.
He stared at me before shaking his head again. “It’s like I don’t even know who you are anymore.”
When AJ appeared before us in the hallway, Jake pointed a finger at him. “Take Abby home. I can’t be around her right now.”
Sobs overcame me as I watched Jake stalk down the hallway to the elevators. AJ’s comforting arms came around me. “Shh, it’s going to be all right.”
Something deep within me wondered how it ever could be. After all these months of deception, I had somehow known that Jake would react the way he had. Even though I knew his anger and his hurt would cause him to walk away, I hadn’t changed my mind or come clean. And now, I had to live with the consequences.
Chapter Eleven
The scenery became an emerald blur, as I stared out the window of the bus. It was kinda ironic, as the last few hours, after I’d stormed away from Abby at the hospital, had been a painful blur as well. Well, painful didn’t quite cut it. In the moment, it had been f**king agony hearing her admit to stopping her birth control, and now hours later, the ache still hurt so bad it was hard to breathe.
I hadn’t gone home or even to our apartment in the city. Instead, I had just walked around downtown Atlanta—gone to Centennial Park, watched the kids playing in the water fountain. A few people recognized me and asked for autographs, but for the most part, I was isolated and alone in my torment. I’d finally headed back when it was almost time for the bus to pull out.
Abby had stood beside our bus with Angel on her leash. Her eyes were puffy and swollen from crying. “Jake, please, talk to me,” she began, but I kept walking right past her. Instead, I did what I did best, which was basically shut people out and be an ass**le. I had climbed onto AJ and Mia’s bus without a word to her.