Page 51 of Father Knows Best (A Family Affair #1)

“My knee,” I tell her, leaning toward the open sliver of the window. I rest my head on the door, and suck down the cool air, taking deep breaths, forcing my eyes to stay closed to help quiet my brain.

It’s Monday, and it’s after eight. Not many people are out, and the drive to the ER is supposed to take about twelve minutes, according to the map inside Roberta’s car.

She talks the whole time—cursing her high heels, herself, apologizing, cursing the clients for making us go down there, cursing the man or woman who invented cobblestone, then cursing the person who decided cobblestone is best on a sloped driveway with no sidewalk.

By the time we’re at the ER, I’ve been giggling and laughing enough to be distracted from the pain a bit, and have calmed down almost completely.

A man in green scrubs helps me into a wheelchair, and rolls me from the front doors back into a triage area. After she parks, Roberta meets me in the triage area, and gets out her phone to call Sutton.

“Mrs. Mercer,” a woman says, pushing past the cart of supplies and pinned-back curtain to enter the small space. I sit on a table wrapped in white paper, and Roberta sits in the rolling little doctor’s chair, but jumps to her feet the moment the woman enters.

“Wow,” she says, lips turned down in surprise. “She’s getting seen already?”

The doctor looks between Roberta and myself. “Mondays are slow at this hospital.”

I glance at the name sewn into her coat.

Dr. Richards. She touches my foot while a nurse bustles in, taking my blood pressure and temperature, asking to copy my insurance card and what my date of birth is.

It’s decided relatively quickly that I need an X-ray, but before that, she orders a blood draw.

The nurse who takes my blood disappears, and reappears with another wheelchair.

“Alright honey, getting you up to X-ray.”

Roberta gets to her feet. “Where can I wait?”

The nurse doesn’t even look at her. “The waiting room.”

Roberta pushes my hair back, and gives me a timid smile. “I’m so sorry about all this, Avery. I’m gonna call Sutton now, okay?”

I wiggle my toes and nod to them. “Look, I can move my toes. Don’t feel bad.”

The nurse locks the wheel on the wheelchair before helping me into it. I say goodbye to Roberta, handing her all my belongings to keep until Sutton arrives. The hospital is cool and somewhat dark, and Dr. Richards was right–hardly anyone is here.

The nurse uses her badge to get us into a series of hallways and doors, and though the pain is easing a little bit, and I know my toes are still working, I find myself suddenly feeling a rush of sickness from the pain.

I grip the arms of the wheelchair and close my eyes, hoping the X-ray is somewhere near us so I don’t get motion sickness and puke everywhere.

The nurse lets us into a room, where the X-ray technician looks to be cleaning down some of their machines.

The two of them talk, and I watch them through the thick, noise-proof glass.

Their heads turn to face me, and then my nurse holds up a finger.

She moves across the room to the computer on wheels, and starts to type.

The technician nods, and continues wiping the machine.

A moment later, the nurse reappears, grinning. “Okay, we’re all ready for you.”

The technician reappears with a large lead apron. He sets it aside as they help me on the gurney, and when I’m lying flat, he pulls the apron over my abdomen and chest. “That okay?”

I nod. “If it’s just my foot–”

He smiles. “They want your hips and knees, too, sweetie. Gotta make sure nothing got twisted beyond that ankle. Normally you’d just stand up against our screen there,” he says, pointing to the X-ray area with places marked on the floor for feet. “But you can’t stand, so we’re improvising.”

I nod. “I guess that makes sense.”

“And this lead blanket is to keep you and the baby safe. But don’t worry, non-abdominal X-rays are safe. Now just lie back and try really, really hard not to move. I’m going to take a picture, check my screen, and repeat that about five times, okay?”

He gets to work, angling the portable X-ray above me toward my hips first. He does what he says, moving the machine then going back to his computer. I don’t know how long he moves around or does what he does because… I’m pregnant.

The X-rays don’t take much time at all, and when the nurse rolls me back into a room to wait for Dr. Richards to come take a look, she asks if I’d like Roberta to wait with me.

When Roberta comes back, she’s brought me a coffee and tells me that Sutton and Geo are on the way.

The nurse wraps my ankle and foot in a crepe bandage, meant to keep the injury tight and compressed for the first week.

I watch the woman work on my foot, but can’t take my mind off of Sutton and his dad.

I smooth my hand over my head, hoping that they got the chance to finish their talk before this call came in.

After all, I hadn’t heard from Sutton since he left.

I assumed that meant they were in the thick of it, and now that I know that I’m pregnant, I can’t seem to care about my knee or foot or whatever else is hurt.

I hardly feel the pain at all anymore.

I just want them to have their talk, so we can make things right with us. It’s more important than ever before.

“You okay?” Roberta asks after I’ve stared at the surface of the coffee for too long.

I look up at her. “You know what they told me?”

She shrugs.

“I’m pregnant.”

Her eyes widen. “Avery Mercer!” she squeals. “I didn’t know you guys were trying!” She looks at her watch, as if to do reverse math. “Wait. The wedding was just?—”

“Four weeks. You’re about four weeks along,” Dr. Richards says, clicking the small door closed behind her.

She turns on the light boxes and shoves a few of my X-rays in them, narrowing her eyes at the cloudy images before her.

“What I thought.” She clicks the light box off and shoves the images into a manila folder.

Her stern face focuses on me. “No break. Hips, knees and ankles all look good. Just a bad sprain.”

She scribbles on a pad and hands it to me. “Because you’re pregnant, use these sparingly, only when absolutely necessary. Otherwise, Tylenol should do the trick. RICE therapy. Rest, ice, compression and elevation. Stay off it for a few days. It’s a bad sprain, but just a sprain.”

“Thank you so much,” I say, then reach for Roberta.

The doctor stops me. “Hospital policy. You’re going out in the wheelchair.” She places a hand on my shoulder to ease me back down. On her way out, she stops, peering down at Roberta’s satin pumps. She points at them, but looks at me. “Were you wearing shoes like that when this happened?”

I wiggle my good foot with the Birkenstock on it. “Nope, just a klutz.”

She smiles, and the nurse rolls me to a payment station in the hallway, where I swipe my card for the services, and Roberta taps away at her phone. When we’re done, the nurse passes the reins to Roberta, and she rolls me out.

Sutton and Geo are the first people I see when we turn the corner to the lobby, and my stomach flutters at the sight of them. I search their faces for any traces of what may have been discussed or concluded, but instead only find concern. So much concern.

Sutton sees me, and rushes toward me, dropping to a knee at my feet. “What happened? Are you okay? Who did you see?” He looks down to my foot, his hands coming to hold it sensitively, cautiously, like he doesn’t want to break me. Geo is by his side in a matter of seconds, his soft eyes on mine.

He hasn’t spoken, but stands stiffly by Sutt’s side, assessing.

“It’s my fault. We were at the house in the Haight and I slipped on the cobblestone, and took her down with me. Only, she got hurt and I didn’t.” Roberta places her palm across her forehead, guilt leaving heavy bags beneath her eyes. “I’m so sorry again, Avery.”

I squeeze her hand and release it, then pay my attention to Sutton and Geo.

“It’s a sprain. They did an X-ray and nothing is broken or out of place. It just hurts a lot and I need to stay off it for a week but otherwise, I’m okay. I guess rushing down here was kind of a false alarm. I just… thought it was broken because it hurt so bad.”

Roberta passes Sutton a card. “Dr. Richards, and yes I got her card because I figured you’d want it.” She hands him the prescription and medical paperwork, too. “And here’s her discharge paperwork.”

“You’re okay?” Geo finally says, his voice hoarse and thin.

Sutt weaves his fingers with mine and kisses my knuckles, eyes on me as he replies. “She’s okay, everything is going to be okay. Just a slip.”

“Your phone wasn’t working. We–” Geo stops and restarts. “ Sutton couldn’t get a hold of you.”

I fish the broken phone from my purse and show them. “I landed on it. It’s toast.”

Geo nods his head, and Sutton glances back at him. “She’s okay. It’s okay.”

Roberta’s brows come together. “Sutton Mercer, are you actually calm and collected? I thought for sure you’d have my ass for letting Avery get hurt. Marriage has softened you,” she teases.

“You didn’t let me get hurt,” I tell her.

Sutton looks up at Roberta, and his words leave my chest hollow. “I had to be collected.” He tips his head toward Geo. “He was freaking out.”

I caution a quick glance at Roberta, who watches Geo as he bends, pushes my hair from my cheek, then kisses me. His lips drag to my ear, where he kisses me again, then below it, for a third kiss.

One kiss on the cheek is already pushing it where a father-in-law is concerned, but three kisses? Two of those being on the neck? It’s so private, giving so much insight (or confusion) into us. Sutton, my husband, doesn’t even like kissing me that way in public.

But Geo is not Sutton, and that’s kind of the whole fucking point.

“I’m glad you’re okay, sweetheart,” Geo says, then boldly presses his mouth to mine.

When the kiss ends, I look at Sutton, shocked at his dad’s actions, but when I find his eyes soft and a gentle smile curving his lips, I realize that their talk was good.

Things must have led in a good direction.

Still, Geo just kissed me in front of Roberta and I do not know what to say or do. Sutton, realizing why my eyes are hysterically plastered against him, gets to his feet, standing squarely between Geo and Roberta.

“Roberta, listen–”

She stops him with a hand leveled horizontally between us. “Nope. Don’t feel like you have to share something you’re not ready to share just because we ended up at the hospital tonight.”

Sutton strokes a hand over his head, tousling his hair, and exhaling. “Thank you.”

She smiles. “Call me tomorrow, let me know how you’re doing.”

“I will,” I tell her, knowing full well that my foot will be the last thing we talk about. And when we get home, I have a feeling my foot and this injury is the last thing to come up.