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“Oh yeah. I do need one of those.” I climbed from the bed, sighing against his chest when he wrapped his arms around me. It was all I could do to hold back the tears, squeezing my eyes shut as tight as I could, gripping Rhett’s shirt in my hands. He ran his hands over my back in slow, gentle circles until I relaxed against him. Then he pulled back and cupped my face in his big, warm hands, his thumbs stroking my cheekbones. Oh god, he was looking at me with so much tenderness I could melt.
Slowly, almost reverently, Rhett leaned down and pressed his lips to my forehead in the gentlest of kisses. My heart flipped over as I closed my eyes, drinking in the moment.
Until he pulled back, and tracing his thumb along my jawline, said, “Get some sleep. You look like shit.”
I huffed out a laugh. “Get fucked.”
Bopping me on the nose with the tip of his finger, he said, “I’m a phone call away if you need me.”
Then he turned and quietly left the room, leaving me alone with the whirlwind of thoughts and emotions swirling inside me. I sank back onto the bed, suddenly feeling every ounce of fatigue weighing me down.
CHAPTER 33
Rhett
I’ve said it before, and I’ll damn well say it again. I am not equipped for this shit. What the fuck do I know about families, and emotional trauma and healing and love? It was ridiculous for me to be right at the center of this unfolding soap opera. Madness.
I took a deep breath and forced myself out of the car. Sitting there wallowing in my own discomfort wasn’t going to help Scarlett. She needed me, whether I felt equipped for this emotional shitstorm or not.
The hospital hallways were quiet as I made my way up to Scarlett’s room. My steps felt heavy, weighed down by the dread of whatever new bombshell was waiting for us. I couldn’t shake the feeling that the other shoe was about to drop again. Fuck this shit. Honestly.
It had been three days since the Parkers had descended on the hospital to get tested. I was hoping that today was the day we’d find out if any of them were matches. If they weren’t…well, I refused to think about how hard it would be to find matchesin the big wide world. Still, I’d make that happen, one way or another.
Standing just outside Scarlett’s room, I fought the urge to run.Just get it over with, asshole.I pushed open the door to Scarlett’s hospital room, my stomach clenched in knots. The doctor was already there, looking serious. Just fucking great. Another piece of bad news, no doubt.
“Rhett.” Scarlett’s eyes found mine instantly. She looked so small and fragile sitting in that hospital bed. It twisted something deep inside me to see her like this.
“What’s going on?” I asked brusquely, crossing the room to stand beside her. The doctor cleared her throat.
“We’ve received the test results back from Mrs. Parker and her family,” she began. Scarlett tensed beside me. “There are eleven viable donor matches for the immunoglobulin transfusions needed to treat the twins’ condition.”
I huffed out a breath of relief as I felt the knot in my gut loosen just a fraction. Finally, some good news. “Eleven? That’s a lot, right? Is it enough?”
“It is a lot, and it’s more than enough,” Dr. Morris confirmed.
“Thank fuck for that!” The smile Scarlett gave me had my heart squeezing so hard I could barely draw breath. “I should tell my mom.”
I watched as Scarlett’s hand drifted to rest on her belly - such a sweet, maternal gesture. Then it hit me - she meant Laura, her birth mom, not her crappy adoptive mother.
I couldn’t tell if she even realized what she’d said, so I just said, “Yeah, I think she’ll be rapt.”
Dr. Morris smiled as she pushed to her feet. “I’ll let you get on with that, then, while I go and visit Dr. Jennings. I can’t wait to get the treatment schedule in place as quickly as possible and get these babies back on track.”
“Thanks, Doctor. Me too!” Scarlett was up off the bed before the doctor had left the room. “I met with Laura again yesterday.”
“You did? How did that go?”
“Not as harrowing as the first time. We just went to the cafeteria for coffee. They’re all staying in a hotel in Raleigh, but they have to head back to New Bern soon. The kids have all got summer holiday stuff to do. Fuck, where is my phone?” She bent down and grabbed her purse from next to the desk and because I was a weak, weak man, I definitely checked out her ass.
Annnd, fuck, she caught me when she looked over her shoulder to say something. Like a bloody middle school kid, I shoved my hands in my pockets and stared up at the ceiling. Oh, was that a little breathy laugh? Moving right along. “What else did she say?”
“Just some more stuff about her and Ethan. They’re jobs and stuff like that. A bit about the kids. They, um, they really want to meet me.” Her head was bent over her phone as she typed out a text message, so I couldn’t read the expression on her face, but I didn’t miss the quaver in her voice.
“They know about you?”
“Yeah. Apparently they’ve always known.”
“That’s amazing.”