Guardian Cougar (Finding Fatherhood Book 2) Page 8

  He flinched. “Even for me?”

  Her expression remained unchanged. “It’s easier to feel nothing for anyone than to try to let some in and keep some out.” Though poorly worded, her meaning was easy to intuit. She’d rather shut out the entire world than risk softening and feeling something she didn’t want to feel for the child she’d borne.

  For a moment, it hovered on the tip of his tongue to tell her she was being selfish, but he held back the impulse. He had no idea everything she’d been through, and it wasn’t his place to tell her to stop thinking of herself and start thinking of Killian. He had no idea what kind of reaction he would have had in the same situation, and though it was harder than he’d imagined, the best thing he could do was to give her time to cope and perhaps find the missing connection she needed to be more than Killian’s biological mother; to become his mom.

  “I’ll drive you back to the apartment.”

  She nodded, not looking back at the baby as she left his room. She didn’t speak again until they were in the car almost thirty minutes later. Her gaze remained focused out the window. “I need to get a place of my own.”

  He stiffened in shock. “What? Why would you do that?”

  She still kept her gaze turned away, clearly determined not to look at him. “I can’t be there when you bring home your son. It just wouldn’t work. You’ll start to resent me for not being able to bond with him, and it’s not fair to him, because I can’t love him.”

  Her words were cold, but he actually found some encouragement in them. It told him she was thinking of Killian even if she didn’t want to be. She was trying to do the right thing for him, though he thought removing herself from the picture entirely was completely the wrong thing.

  He kept that opinion to himself as he focused on a way to keep her with him and the baby. He wanted her by his side, but he was also convinced she needed time with her son to bond with him, and if she moved out into her own apartment, the path she’d set down would be far more likely to become irrevocable. The greater the distance between her and Killian, the more likely she was to be able to completely disconnect from him forever.

  That might be the eventual outcome, but Jackson hoped not. Killian needed his mother, and he needed his mate. He couldn’t imagine being forced to choose between the two of them, because though he loved Hannah with all his heart already, he knew which of the two was more vulnerable and would be more likely to need him.

  “It isn’t safe for you to move out yet. You said it yourself that Cromwell will keep looking for you. We filed a police report, and there’s a warrant out for his arrest, but no one has found him yet. With his money and connections, it’s not impossible for him to evade justice for years or even decades. You can’t live alone until you know it’s safe.” He held his breath, hoping she would allow herself to be swayed by his words. On a fundamental level, he was convinced she didn’t want to leave him any more than he wanted her to leave. She was just trying to do the right thing in a crappy situation.

  After a small hesitation, she nodded once. “All right. I guess I’ll stay for a while longer, but if it starts to get awkward or weird, I have to leave.”

  He nodded, keeping all other words locked inside. There was nothing he could say to convince her to give the baby a chance. It had to come from her if it was going to work at all. He only hoped she could find a way to love the baby who had already stolen his heart.

  Chapter Nine

  Hannah had been out of the hospital for four days when the phone rang in the middle of the night. She wasn’t in Jackson’s bed, because she felt like she had no right to be there. He was going to build a family with Killian, and someday there’d be a woman who could accept the child without the baggage she carried around. Sharing his bed in the interim would simply make it harder for both of them when she had to walk away. As soon as the baby was discharged, she expected she’d be moving out within a short time thereafter. It didn’t matter if it was safe enough to live on her own. She had to escape.

  The phone rang again, and she slipped out of bed, throwing on a robe as she left the guestroom. They’d taken out the large bed when they converted it to a nursery, so she’d been sleeping on a foldup cot despite Jackson’s nightly offers to share his large bed. It was safer, though far less comfortable.

  She paused for a moment to stretch, working out the kinks in her neck and back from sleeping on the cot before opening the guestroom door and making her way down the hallway to Jackson’s room.

  He opened the door and stepped into the hallway before she reached him, his panic obvious. She braced herself. “What’s wrong?”

  He was pale and sweaty. “Killian’s had a brain bleed. They’re rushing him into emergency surgery.” He swayed unsteadily on his feet.

  For a moment, she hovered on the edge of offering to call him a cab, but winced at the coldness of such an action. She might not be capable of connecting with the child, but she still felt empathy for his plight, and she knew sending Jackson to the hospital alone to deal with this would be a cruel thing. He needed support, even if she was the only one around to provide it. “Let’s go to the hospital.”

  He was a bit shaken and clearly not functioning at one hundred percent, so she guided him through the apartment, retrieving his key for his car before leading him to the parking garage. Technically, she wasn’t supposed to be driving yet, not having been cleared to do so for at least the first three to six weeks following her surgery, but she was certain she could handle it. If not, they could catch a cab together.

  It was easy enough to drive his sedan, and she felt a sharp tugging sensation only once or twice as she navigated the traffic to take them to the hospital. After parking, they rushed in together, and it was natural to hold his hand. His fear and worry seemed to seep into her, and she was almost startled to realize she was concerned about Killian’s outcome too.

  It was still in a more abstract way than Jackson likely felt, but she experienced the first stirring of anxiety when she contemplated the fact the infant was currently undergoing neurosurgery to stop his brain from bleeding. Even the most hardhearted person would have had a difficult time not being concerned for the baby in those circumstances. It didn’t mean anything, she hastened to assure herself.

  They took up residence in the waiting room closest to the operating rooms, Jackson pacing around like a caged housecat the entire time. He took the cups of coffee she pressed into his hand, often forgetting to drink them. Once they were cold, he’d throw them away, and she’d replace them only to have the cycle repeat.

  She fidgeted in her chair, poised between running away and staying put. She could feel herself approaching a crossroads and was in dangerous territory. She was rapidly reaching the point where she could no longer maintain her numb resolve. She’d soon have to decide for certain that she wanted nothing to do with the child and move on, which meant giving up Jackson too.

  It was a heart-wrenching thought, but so was the idea of accepting Cromwell’s child in any meaningful capacity. She’d wanted no part of the conception or the father, and the birth was a horrible nightmare of images and flashes. How could she love the child? How could anybody expect her to?

  After what seemed like hours, a short man in blue scrubs came out to greet them. He and Jackson shook hands, and she was slightly surprised to find them on a first-name basis. She had not yet met Dr. Anwar Samir, who was the neonatologist, but she shouldn’t be surprised he and Jackson knew each other well. Jackson spent most of his free time at the hospital in Killian’s room, so he’d probably developed a friendly relationship with most of the staff.

  She shifted uncomfortably in her chair as she wondered briefly what they must think of her, the woman who had given birth to the premature child, but had never even picked him up and certainly didn’t visit him on a regular basis. She’d been to his room exactly once; the day she’d been discharged from the hospital two weeks ago. It shouldn’t matter what anyone else thought, but she realized it stun
g to contemplate they’d judged her and found her lacking.

  She resisted the urge to defend herself, certain she imagined the recrimination in the doctor’s dark eyes despite his kind smile. He had to be thinking she was a horrible, unfit mother, but at least it didn’t show through his polite façade.

  “First, let me reassure you the brain bleed was a lower grade than we feared when I made the decision to operate. It often happens with premature infants, especially if they’re on a higher concentration of oxygen as Killian has been while his lungs develop. Typically, it occurs within the first few days of life, but it can happen at any point early on.”

  Jackson flinched. “Will it happen again?”

  Dr. Samir shrugged. “Perhaps, but I don’t think so. He’s stable, and I think he’s going to recover just fine. Obviously, we can’t tell if there’s any permanent damage just yet, but I’ve done hundreds of these operations, and they’re usually far more severe and detailed, taking hours longer than his did. It’s an encouraging sign, and you definitely shouldn’t give up hope.”

  “I’ll never give up on my son,” said Jackson with fervent intensity. His gaze was focused solely on the doctor, and his sincerity was evident.

  A pang shot through her when she saw proof of his devotion to a child that wasn’t even his. Jackson could love Killian wholeheartedly and without reservation, and he wasn’t even related to the boy. For a moment, she felt selfish and petty in her inability to move past her own issues and try to love the child, before reminding herself it was precisely because of those issues that she couldn’t.

  Jackson had it easy, having no sordid past associated with Killian. He had no reason not to love the baby, whereas she had every reason to distance herself, if not hate him. She didn’t hate Killian, but she couldn’t fathom how she was supposed to love him either.

  “Can we see him?” asked Jackson.

  The doctor nodded. “Of course. He’s back in his room, though you won’t be able to hold him for a while. Since it was a grade-one bleed, he should recover quickly, but we don’t want to move him around too much for the next day or two.”

  They fell into step behind the neonatologist, and Hannah’s panic built the closer they got to the NICU. She was torn between the need to support Jackson and the urge to run as they approached the entrance, the doctor using his security badge to buzz them inside.

  Somehow, she found herself in the scrub room, preparing to see the baby again. She wasn’t entirely certain how she’d allowed herself to be in that position, but followed along meekly behind Jackson as he led her to the room. The doctor had departed from them after allowing them entrance, so it was just the two of them as they walked down the corridor.

  She did her best not to look at the few babies in attendance, though she could hear several crying. In particular, they passed a baby in an incubator without any family, and the poor thing was crying continuously. She wondered what his story was, and why there was no one there to comfort him.

  There was a hollow feeling in her chest when she realized if it hadn’t been for Jackson, there might not have been anyone there to comfort Killian either. She hadn’t been able to bond with him, and so he would have lain alone in his incubator, aside from medical staff. She had the urge to weep, and she tried to push it aside. She didn’t want to react to the sad thought, and she didn’t want to care about the idea of Cromwell’s child being left alone with no one to love it.

  Before she was ready, they reached the room, and she hovered in the doorway for a moment, wanting to avoid returning to that small enclosure, and to avoid the sight of the baby with the equipment attached to him.

  There was a nurse with the baby, and Jackson greeted her by name. “Hello, Kimi.”

  She smiled at him. “Hey, Jackson. We had some excitement tonight, didn’t we?” She cast a tender glance down at the baby as she spoke. “Dr. Samir said he’s rallying really well though. It was only a grade-one bleed.”

  “What does that mean?” Hannah surprised herself by asking the question, uncertain why she did. It had nothing to do with her, or so she tried to tell herself, but the question had emerged just the same.

  “There are four levels of severity, from one to four,” said the nurse briskly. “Grade-one is the best you can hope for if a baby has to have an intraventricular hemorrhage. With grade-one and two, there is rarely any permanent or lasting brain damage. He should recover and be on track to go home in a couple of weeks.”

  Her eyes widened. “That soon? I thought premature babies had to stay in the hospital until they were technically full-term.” She wasn’t certain where she’d acquired that information, but it was in her brain.

  The nurse shrugged. “Sometimes they do. In particular, very premature and micro-preemie babies usually end up staying for months. Killian was thirty-two weeks, and though he’s a little small, he’s healthy. He hasn’t had any major complications aside from the bleeding, so as long as he continues to be stable, he should be home soon.”

  For the first time, she allowed herself to look down at Killian again. She hadn’t seen him since that day four days ago when she’d stopped by on her way out after discharge. He looked basically the same to her, though perhaps a little paler. She’d expected a huge bandage to be on his head, since he’d just had neurosurgery, but there was only a small square of gauze taped to the top of his head.

  They’d shaved his fine blond hair in that area, but otherwise, he looked the same. He had an oxygen mask that she didn’t remember seeing before, but it might have been there. She thought it had been a tube the last time though. Despite the nurse’s words, concern spiraled through her as she considered the idea he was deteriorating. She was surprised by the wave of panic that went through her at the thought, and the sharp pang of loss that left her chest aching as she struggled to breathe through it.

  Without thought, and before she could talk herself out of it, she put her hand into the incubator, lightly touching his leg. Even through the latex of her glove, she could feel the warmth of his skin. She was certain it would be soft, and he’d probably melt against her if she was allowed to hug him.

  That she suddenly wanted to hug him shocked her, and she almost stumbled as she took a step back, straight into Jackson’s chest. He didn’t speak, but his arms came around her to offer silent support, and he squeezed her shoulders.

  “You can take off your glove to touch him if you want. He’s past that stage of protection, even with his recent surgery.” Kimi imparted the news impassively, but her eyes gleamed with interest, and perhaps something less identifiable.

  Hannah was certain they had to know at least part of the story of why she hadn’t bonded with her son, and though she hadn’t felt blatant disapproval radiating from the nurse, she was sure the other woman was trying to facilitate her taking an interest in Killian. She should’ve resented the meddling, but she was too focused on the baby as she took off her glove and put her hand in the incubator again, this time feeling his thin thigh, which seemed tiny and fragile.

  Everything about him was fragile, and as she stared down at him, it struck her that he was as much a victim of Cromwell as she was. In a way, perhaps he’d been even more victimized, because his own mother had rejected him. Once again, she was thankful for Jackson, and that he’d been there to provide the affection she couldn’t.

  Her hand stilled on his leg, and she fought the urge to pull away. It would be easier if she just turned around and walked out, trying never to think about him or this moment again. That was the simplest course of action, and until tonight, and it seemed completely doable.

  Now, staring down at the vulnerable baby in the incubator, she realized it wasn’t easy at all. As she looked at him, Theo’s nose faded away, and she saw her own features on his sleeping face. He was her child, and he had nothing to do with Theo Cromwell.

  Tears suddenly sprang to her eyes, and her shoulders shook as she started to sob. The icy, numb feeling that had invaded her for the last seven days, allo
wing her to function, started to fade away. Every tear that leaked from her eyes could have come from the ice melting around her heart.

  She sobbed as Jackson carefully turned her to face him, putting his arms around her. She was forced to stop touching Killian’s leg, which only made her cry harder. Suddenly, she wanted to hold her baby more than anything. As she had the thought, her breasts started to tingle, and the sensation of milk letting down reminded her she hadn’t felt it for several days. She thought her milk was drying up, but now she had a cautious moment of hope that maybe she could still provide it for Killian.

  She wanted what was best for him, and for the first time since remembering the circumstances of his conception, she was convinced she was what was best. Between her and Jackson, they could give him a happy, stable life.

  She was too immersed in tears to be able to verbalize any of her recent epiphany, but Jackson seemed to understand what was happening. He held her tightly and whispered softly to her, assuring her Killian would recover, and they would all be fine.

  “We’re going to be a happy little family. You’ll see.”

  She nodded at his words, clinging to them like a talisman as she held on to him while weathering the emotional storm threatening to break her. Finally, the tears abated, and even her hiccups subsided. Once she was semi in control again, she eased away from his embrace to turn back to the baby.

  Looking at him now, all she felt was a wave of love, and she put her hand back in the incubator to grip his small foot in her hand. He kicked his leg lightly, and she smiled. She was certain Jackson was right. Killian was going to be fine, she was going to be okay, and they would soon be a happy family. Just the three of them. For the first time in too long, aside from the brief period of time when she’d had the bliss of forgetfulness, she was optimistic about the future and certain she not only deserved happiness, but would find it easily with Jackson and Killian.