Page 12 of Healed Hearts

Wren’s eyes light up. “Beck said stickers,” she says, looking at Holden like she’s scoping him out for stickers he may have hidden on his body. He laughs. Light and bubbly—musical, almost. My heart does a slow roll in my chest, something inside me lighting up at the sound.Not a fucking appropriate reaction, Julian.

“Idohave stickers. Let’s get you taken care of and I’ll get you some. Sound good?” he asks her, tapping her on the nose. She smiles at him like he’s the sun, and yeah. Felt that, kid.Nope.Not doing that. Redirect those thoughts. He turns his attention to me again. “I’ll be right back. They can get a little iffy with needles. You should probably come hold her.”

My eyes follow Holden’s movements as he walks out of the room. The second he shuts the door, I’m sagging in relief. Jesus Christ. Did he really not recognize me at all? Why does it matter if he didn’t? It doesn’t. It’s fine. Totally fine.

“Daddy?” Wren asks, and my attention is pulled quickly to her. Fuck. Dad of the year, everyone.

“Yes, baby girl?” I ask. I step toward her, lifting her into my arms before sitting down on the exam table with her on my lap.

“Stickers?” she asks, dark brown eyes blinking up at me.

“He said he’d bring you some,” I respond, pressing a kiss to her temple.

She nods and reaches for my phone again. We sit like that for a while—the sound of some YouTube video playing softly in the background. I peek around her to see what she’s watching, but I lose focus when the door opens.

Holden breezes into the room with what looks like supplies to collect her blood sample. It’s nothing like the number of samples they collected from Maya over the time she was sick, but it makes my vision go a little dim around the edges and my heartbeat pound in my ears anyway. I watch his hands as he gets everything set up. Wren squirms in my lap, but I barely even notice it. I can’t pull my eyes away from the small needle he has, nothing like the giant one they used to poke Maya with, the tube that’s going to be holding my daughter’s blood, the gloves—the fucking gloves. My chest is burning like it’s on fire. Am I breathing? I’m not sure that I’m breathing.

I feel Wren’s hand patting my chest, but it’s dull. Muted. Holden’s saying something, but it sounds like he’s underwater.Jesus, Julian, breathe.

Wren’s weight is lifted from my lap, and then Holden’s staring at me, inches from my face. His lips are moving, but I can’t hear anything he’s saying. He lifts my hand and places it on his chest.Oh, I like that.I can feel it rise under my fingers. I watch his lips as they move, and it looks like he’s counting. One. Two. Three. Four. Then he exhales, his chest deflating with it. One. Two. Three. Four.Oh.He wants me to breathe with him. I can do that, I think. I force my chest to fill with air, watching his lips as he counts, then let it out slowly when he does. He nods, then starts back up. I follow his breathing until awareness starts to creep in—Wren crying, Holden counting, the feel of his body heat against my fingers through his scrubs.

The second I realize what’s happening, I pull my hand away, almost falling off the exam table in my haste to get to my crying daughter. I lift her into my arms and tuck her against me. Her little sobs sink under my skin and make me want to cry with her. “Daddy’s sorry, Wren. It’s okay,” I whisper, rubbing her back as she cries into my shoulder.

Chapter Five

Holden

“One, two, three, four,” I count out loud, trying to get Julian to calm down. If I wasn’t freaking the fuck out, I’d be laughing. Cackling. Manically. Like I did last weekend. Two scores for Holden. Two separate occasions of awkward hand-shaking. Who does that? Me. I do that. Fucking facepalm.

Wren starts crying, clearly worried about her dad. To be honest, I’m worried too. This man is massive. If he falls out over a needle, there’s no way I’m getting him up off the floor.

As he starts to come back to reality, his brown eyes settle on mine. I can tell he’s actually seeing me and not just looking through me. I try to give him a little smile, to reassure him he’s okay, but then an awful, terrible thought hits me. He has a kid. A young kid. Did I help him cheat? Did he cheat on his wife with me?

I didn’t see a ring, but if he was going to hook up with someone, he probably wouldn’t wear one. My smile slides off my face as I drop my eyes and look at his hands. He pulls away from me abruptly, almost falling over, and for a second I worry he’s passed out, but then he’s sweeping Wren into his arms and whispering softly to her while she cries against his shoulder.

I give them a few minutes while everyone tries to compose themselves. By the time he gets Wren calmed and sits down, I feel raw and scooped out inside. I swallow hard and turn toward the sink to wash my hands again.

When I’ve collected myself enough to turn to face them, Julian is doing everything he possibly can to avoid looking in my direction. Which, yeah, I can’t blame him. I literally acted like I didn’t even know him after he gave me quite literally the best night I’ve ever had. He made me feel safe. Safe enough to fall asleep on him. But then, if he’s cheating, maybe it’s for the best that I pretend I don’t remember him.

“Are you ready?” I ask Wren, trying to find my smile again.

She nods, her tear-stained face turned toward me, her head resting against Julian’s chest.

“Okay. Be a brave girl for me, and I’ll get you lots of stickers, okay?”

She nods again, then turns away from me, tucking her face into Julian’s chest. I find a vein quickly enough, and she doesn’t even flinch when I insert the needle. Pulling on an old tactic, I try to keep her mind occupied. “How old are you?”

“I’m three and a half.”

“Wow! That’s so big!”

In no time at all, I’m finishing up and putting a Band-Aid over the spot where I did her blood draw.

“All done, sweetheart,” I whisper, and she turns back to me. I point at her bandage and tell her, “We match.”

A grin splits her face as her sleepy eyes—the same shade as her dad’s—flip between my scrubs and her Band-Aid. “You were so brave, Wren. Let me go get you stickers, okay?”

“Okay,” she whispers, giving me a slight nod.

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