Addicted After All (35 page)

Her bodyguard held them back, and I could even detect Rose’s appreciation for Vic. She won’t utter the words, but our parents were right about the extra security. The bodyguards are a helpful force.

Rose paints my toenails on her bed while Daisy makes faces at Jane at the foot of the mattress. The baby sputters happy noises at her aunt.

“Does it annoy you,” I ask Rose and gesture to Jane, “that you can’t talk to her yet?”

She dips the brush into the purple lilac polish. “It’s aggravating at times. Life would be easier if they just came out of the womb with proper verbal skills. It’s one of the many reasons babies are intolerable…” She pauses and her eyes flit to her baby. “But Jane is different. She makes up for the blubbering in other ways.”

Daisy clasps one of Jane’s little hands. “Like what?”

Rose stays quiet for a moment and pensively watches her daughter, those big blue eyes and soft cheeks. “She just gets me.” Her glare turns on me first. “And I know it sounds ridiculous, but it’s what I feel, so it can’t be wrong.” She might as well go ahead and flip her hair over her shoulder to cap it off. Rose twists the polish, sets it aside and scoots closer to the foot of the bed where her daughter lies.

She scoops Jane in her arms, still a little stiff, but Jane snuggles into her mom’s chest anyway. Not offended by Rose’s cold nature.

Rose touches her daughter’s head, thinly combed brown hair. “Don’t tell Connor,” she says to both of us, “but I was nervous she would like him more than me.”

“I was too,” I tell her.

Her yellow-green eyes pierce me, and Daisy laughs lightly, pooling her platinum hair to the top of her head.

“What?” I ask. “I thought we were being honest.” This was sharing time, right?

“In all
honesty
, Jane likes us equally,” Rose explains. “She’s already perfect. Not choosing favorites.” Rose plants a small kiss on the top of Jane’s head and sets her back down on the light blue comforter. “You’re going to be amazing, aren’t you?” she asks her.

Jane smiles big and it reflects off Rose’s eyes, softening her icy exterior by a hundred degrees.

When Rose speaks to Jane, she uses her normal voice, so does Connor, no baby talk.

“I can’t wait until you’re old enough to choose your own clothes,” Rose tells Jane, “and your own hair styles, and your own words. And I get to see what kind of girl you grow up to be.”

It almost brings tears. Rose doesn’t want her daughter to be just like her. She wants her to be herself, a unique individual, to have an identity all her own.

My phone vibrates in my hand. I check the text.

You. Me. Bedroom.
– Lo

My pulse begins to race as I text him back.

Now?
I press send.

Unless you’d like to wait until later.
– Lo

No way.

Now is good.

I take a practiced breath before I climb off the bed, my back aching from carrying so much weight. My stomach is so heavy that I feel like I’m going to explode at any moment. But I just think about those six weeks without sex, and I decide that I want to get as much Loren Hale time as I can.

“Where are you going?” Rose asks.

“Lo wants me.”

“In bed,” Daisy finishes with a goofy smile.

I roast another shade of red, but I don’t deny it. “We’re making up for the six weeks of abstinence.” I pause and ask, “How is it going for you?” Partly, I wonder if it’s really hard, but her struggle will be different than mine, I recognize. Jane was born on June 10
^th
, and it’s already July 13
^th
, so if Rose really wanted to, she could have sex now. Four weeks in. But the doctors recommended six, and Rose usually follows the rules.

“Connor thinks he can have his way with me the
exact
day I’m physically able to have sex again, and it’s infuriating. Maybe I don’t want to have sex on that day.
Maybe
he isn’t going to win this time.”

Daisy and I exchange smiles at how worked up Rose is becoming over her husband.

Daisy adds, “Maybe you don’t want to be tied up too.”

“Yeah,” I agree. “Maybe you’d rather be spanked.”

Rose gives me a look.

“I was being serious, not mean like Lo,” I defend myself. I feel badly about throwing Lo under the bus, but I’ll make up for it in the bedroom. I internally nod at this plan.

Daisy raises her fist in the air. “Girl power.”

Rose exhales a breath and then her eyes suddenly light up, as if a devilish idea has sprouted in her brain. “What if I don’t have sex during
your
six weeks of abstinence too? It’ll be a solidarity pact.” Rose loves those, but I can tell this is mostly about beating her husband in one of their mind games.

“That’s an extra month for you,” I remind her. It sounds crazy and tough, but my sister isn’t a sex addict. She was a virgin until she was twenty-three, proudly.

Rose pulls back her shoulders in confidence. “I’m married to the man. I can have sex with him every day for the rest of my life. An extra month won’t kill us.”

I try not to contemplate Connor’s sexual needs. I’m not sure if he’ll be upset by waiting or if he’ll consider this an even bigger challenge and try to win Rose over.

“I’ll join too,” Daisy says with a smile.

My mouth falls. Whaa…

Rose claps her hands. “Perfect. I’ll call Poppy and we can all abstain in honor of Lily abstaining.”

I whip my head around, wide-eyed. “You all don’t have to do this.” I point to Daisy, who twists her thumb ring in a fidgety manner. “You
seriously
shouldn’t be doing this.”
Ryke is going to kill me.

Daisy’s lips just pull higher. “You think Ryke will blow a fuse?” She gasps and her eyes grow big. “The danger.”

I snatch a throw pillow and toss it at her. She laughs while Rose protectively lifts Jane to her chest, avoiding a pillow-assault on her baby.

“In all seriousness,” Daisy says, “it’s a big deal for you, and I want to be supportive too.”

My throat closes up for a second. All of my sisters are willing to share in my struggle, and maybe they’ll even show me that it’s not as bad as I think it may be. I’m happy to be so close to them now.

I have to thank Rose for that. She never gave up on me. Every time I pushed her away, she just kept walking right back into my life, refusing to let me be ostracized. Now here I am, living in a house with my two sisters. Happy.

I’m happy.

“No more crying,” Rose tells me. “That should be our second pact. We can make that one a blood oath.”

“No,” Daisy and I say in unison.

Rose glares. “I always sterilize the knife.”

I smile and wipe my eyes that have misted with tears. My phone buzzes with another text.

Lil. Where are you?
– Lo

When I glance up, I catch Rose typing on her own cell. She has a smug and possibly smitten look on her face. “Connor is not winning this.”

I edge towards the door with a stupid grin. It’s good to know that even with a baby, the nerd stars still align the exact same way.

* * *

I take five steps into the hallway before a dull ache pounds against my back. My limbs freeze as worry and confusion run through me. My phone impatiently buzzes once more.

Lily Calloway. Don’t make me come get you.
– Lo

He rarely sexts me, and this infrequent moment is being ruined by pain. I am not so far away from him. The door is right in sight. I can just brush it off.

As soon as I walk forward, a sharp pain grips my abdomen.
Shit.
This can’t be happening. What did Rose call them? False contractions? Yeah, they’re fake. Pretend contractions. My water hasn’t even broken yet.

Wait…

Rose is not reliable.

She had a baby in a limo because of the same mindset. I quicken my pace to my bedroom and swing the door open. Lo lounges on the bed with an open comic book, his phone right beside him as he waits for me. When his gaze rises to mine, concern crushes his sharp features. “What’s wrong? Lily?”

He jumps to his feet before I can even utter a word.

“I think…I’m having contractions. I don’t know though.” I wince as the pain throbs from my back to my stomach. Like powerful, mutant cramps. Oh my God, these cramps have superpowers. How in the hell am I going to defeat them?

Lo acts swiftly. He grabs his cellphone, bypasses me to push the door open wider, and he calls down the hall, “Rose!”

“Don’t,” I start, shoving his arm. “She’s going to freak out.” I can’t even believe she was his first choice in comrade for this situation. Surely Ryke or Connor ranked higher on his list. But maybe he was thinking about my allegiance. And who I’d be most comfortable with.

He touches my shoulder in comfort, but he can’t reply to me, not when he’s on the phone. “Hi, this is Loren Hale,” he says into the receiver. “Can I speak to Dr. Dhar?”

Rose emerges from her bedroom quickly. She’s alone so I assume Daisy stayed with Jane.

“What’s wrong?” She scrutinizes our lingering presences in the doorway.

I hold my belly, my head dizzying a bit. “I don’t know.” It’s the truth. I have no clue if this is real or fake or something in between. That confusion and darkness frightens me the most.

“I’ll grab your bag,” Rose says, rushing into my bedroom.
What bag?
is my first thought. And then I remember:
oh yeah, my hospital bag.
The overnight one that Rose basically packed for me
months
ago. The perks of having an organized, slightly neurotic sister.

 I bury my head in Lo’s chest while he continues to talk to the doctor. He rubs my back, and I grip onto his belt loops for support.
Thank you, belt loops, for always being there for me.

I hear Rose from the depths of my room. “Connor and I are going to drop Jane off at Poppy’s! Daisy will fetch Ryke, and we’ll meet you at the hospital!”

No. I can’t be giving birth today.

Can I? I look up at Lo with squinted eyes.

And he nods in confirmation, like he can read my mind. But I know I wear all of my thoughts on my face for him to pick apart and see.

He’s not scared. Not as much as me. And the confidence that he’s built up for weeks and weeks blows straight through me. I try to hold onto it as tightly as I can, even if it’s just air breezing between my fingers. I try to breathe every little bit of it in. But the terrified bits of me are very, very strong.

I’m about to have a baby.

Oh God.

{ 34 }

LOREN HALE

Lily’s water broke while she was clinging to me. I got her to stop apologizing after we both took quick showers, and by that point, I could tell her pain overpowered her embarrassment—which for Lil means she’s really hurting.

We made it to the hospital without an emergency labor, and now that we’re in the delivery room, I’m positive I’ve glared at an entire staff of nurses on accident. Rose confirms it by saying I have a “bitchy” face. I just hate feeling helpless, having to watch Lil curve her arm around her eyes and shake in pain. It fucking sucks.

And it reminds me of the earlier days of her recovery, back where I had to constantly tell her
no
and grasp her hands, so she stopped being compulsive. Where sex impaired her ability to be a normal, functioning person in society.

It’s a time that I don’t ever want to return to.

Six hours and an epidural later, Lily finally eases. Like she’s ready to float away. I comb my fingers through her hair, preferring her drugged up than in agony.

I could tell that she wanted the meds, but the nurses gave her a hard time about it. Saying things about how recovering addicts should try the all-natural birth. It took all three of us—Rose, Ryke and me—to try and quiet the nurses and convince Lily to listen to what
she
wanted. She’s terrified. Of doing something wrong. Of hurting our son by a choice she makes. People shouldn’t make her feel guilty for wanting an easier birth.

On the hospital bed, she smiles dazedly up at me. I sit on the mattress close to her and can’t restrain my own smile at her cute expression. “Feeling better?”

She relaxes into her pillow like she’s sinking into a cloud. “I love the hot-tempered triad.”

I have no idea what she’s talking about. “The what?”

The door blows open, and my father enters the luxury birthing suite, sipping a coffee. He’s been in and out all day, just walking around the hospital like a lost soul. His dark eyes flit between me and Lil. “See, I thought one day this would happen. I told Greg that you’d knock her up around seventeen.”

My face sharpens.

Greg actually interjects before I can, “Lily is a smart girl to wait.”

Lily looks like she’s floating even higher from the compliment. I’ve heard her dad praise her on multiple accounts, when he’s not immersed in his work.

Our fathers aren’t the only two people here. Lil wanted her sisters present during the long “waiting” process, and even though Poppy and Sam are watching Maria and Jane, everyone else came. Even Lily’s mom, who peers out between a crack in the closed blinds. The room, filled with plush chairs and couches, is big enough for our families. They’ll all leave once Lily’s about to deliver.

My dad laughs into his coffee. “Technically they had an accident—”

“Can you not?” I cut him off, especially as Lily descends from her cloud. Her lips down-turning. I liked it better when she was flattered for making smart choices.

“Hey,” he says, “I’m goddamn
happy
right now.” This is my dad, happy. And I do see it, beneath his dark eyes and his severe face. “I’m getting a grandson.” The pride in his voice takes me aback for a second.

He pats Lily’s feet that are beneath a blanket. “How are you holding up?”

She nods. “Good.”

Greg chimes in with a smile, “That’s what I like to hear.”

I watch my dad walk further into the suite towards his friend.