Page 54 of Letters to Lily

“She did say something to me,” I admitted. He looked startled. “I thought I was seeing Kade in a silver Jeep around town, and one day I saw her getting dropped off at the diner by that same Jeep. Honestly, I figured I was going crazy, because Kade never had a Jeep before. He used to have an old Honda Civic. I asked her anyway, who it was, and she told me it was her boyfriend and that he had just moved to town. She’d read my journal over my shoulders before. She knew his name from them, because she asked about it being so unusual once. She didn’t just fail to tell me about the connection, she lied to me about it.”

“Damn,” Brad huffed. “I’m honestly not sure if I should tell Kade that after what he just did to Jason.”

“He would never hurt a girl, no matter what,” I told him.

“Nope, but I will cut a bitch!” Kristin threw out there. “She best hope that I don’t ever see her somewhere without cameras and witnesses. And someone needs to tell me what Kade did to Jason.”

A knocking on my door called all of our attention to Dr. Marsh as she entered the room. “Hey, I hope I’m not interrupting, but I figured you were probably ready to spring free of this joint.”

“Yes, please,” I begged.

“Are you okay?” Dr. Marsh asked after seeing my puffy eyes and tear stained cheeks.

“Yes, this is life drama, not pain or anything related to why I’m in this bed.”

“Okay, well, remember what we talked about with the baby being able to feel those moods,” she chided briefly.

“I know,” guilt dripped from my words. It wasn’t like I would have been able to process everything that happened in the past few days in any other way though.

“If it helps, Dr. Hot Stuff in the ER had her laughing her panties off yesterday when she got here. His cousin, the almost as hot EMT had her giggling in the ambulance on the way here too.” Kristin winked at Dr. Marsh then.

“Dr. Hot Stuff, huh? You must be talking about Dr. Stevens.” She fanned herself playfully. “I bet he did, he’s as funny as he is easy on the eyes.” We were all nodding our heads in agreement while Brad sat at the end of my bed looking slightly uncomfortable.

“Well, I do have to check to make sure you haven’t dilated further, so if your guests would like to step out into the hall for a moment, we can get this taken care of and hopefully get your discharge papers started.”

Brad stood with Kristin then. “I’ll wait long enough to see if they’re going to release you. I assume Kristin’s here to take you home?”

“Yeah.”

“Okay, then if all is good, I’m going to go make sure my brother got bailed out of jail okay.” I nodded and gave him a watery smile as both he and Kristin stepped out into the hall.

Dr. Marsh checked me out and confirmed that I was dilated to two centimeters, and that she was moving my appointment up by a few days so that she could make sure I got a proper follow up. She also took a look at my back and hip and sent me home with a list of things I could do to try to make me more comfortable. Less than an hour later, I was finally on my way back home.

Chapter 24

Nov. 02

Brad had come over again this morning. I was beginning to think he was acting as my jailer. “I told you I would respect her wishes and stay away for now. I meant what I said.”

“I know. Can’t I just check on my brother?” He asked without making eye contact.

“Sure, if that was what you were really doing. I’m not an idiot, most of the time, I can see you’re trying to make sure I don’t go running to her house the first time I’m not supervised.”

“I heard Jason requested to have the assault charges dropped.”

“Great subject change, but yeah he did. Apparently he told the district attorney and the cops that he deserved a good ass kicking and if they tried to push forward he would be sure to tell everyone how hard he ran his face into the wall, repeatedly.” I had to chuckle at that. “Apparently the camera out front was down, so they didn’t have video and didn’t bother arguing with him. I got the call from Mick this morning telling me charges were officially dropped.”

“Good. He’s right though.”

“About?”

“He deserved that ass kicking,” my brother amended.

“No one is going to argue that,” I huffed out on a laugh. Then I sobered up, as I tried to build up the courage to ask the questions that I needed answered. “Have you seen her since she was released from the hospital?”

Brad nodded his head. “She’s doing fine, just trying to process and come to terms with everything.”

“Yeah, that’s what you said, processing.” I shook my head then. “Man, when I realized who she was that day at the diner, all I’ve thought about since is getting back to her. She ran and now she’s processing. I don’t know what to do with that.” I knew my voice was coming off with frustrated indignation, but I couldn’t hold it back. I was beginning to resent the time supposedly needed to process when I was sitting here wanting nothing more than to get to her.

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