Chapter 24
Logan refused to be admitted, spending the night in a corner of the Intensive Care Unit, half sleeping in a chair next to Gemma’s still form. He awoke every time a nurse or doctor came to check on her, and each time they gave him a sad little smile.
She’s going to make it.
He knew she would.
Jax had almost died from smoke inhalation. When they pulled him from the building, there was soot in his mouth and he was coughing up blood.
Hell, at least he was coughing.
A few more minutes inside and he wouldn’t have been doing that.
Logan didn’t envy Cowboy making that call to Jessa, and he wondered if this would be the straw that ended Jax’s time with HERO Force completely.
Jax had stayed two nights in the hospital and gone home. Gemma was still there.
One bullet had punctured her lung, another her diaphragm. She’d had emergency surgery and a ventilator was helping her breathe. But Logan’s biggest worry was her level of consciousness.
He just wanted her to wake up.
She’d sustained a head injury in addition to the gunshots—though no one knew from what—and her brain was swollen.
She was so damn still, the beeping of the machines and the whoosh of the ventilator the only noises coming from her bedside. He crossed to her and brushed the hair from her forehead.
He never should have let her come to the orchard. She would have been safe back at headquarters, but he’d allowed himself to be swayed by her lobbying, telling himself she’d be okay.
It was foolish, and it had nearly gotten her killed.
“You’re going to go out with me after this. I don’t care if I have to drag you out in public with me. You’re going.”
I love you.
There it was again, the emotion he had no right to be feeling. He’d only known her a few days, but he suspected he would feel that way about her for the rest of his life—even if she chose not to be in it.
And she might not.
“Maybe I won’t drag you.”
God knows, she didn’t even want to date him before all this. It wasn’t very likely she’d change her mind because he’d nearly gotten her killed.
His stare took in the bandages over her chest and shoulder. With a bullet wound only inches from her heart, she was lucky to be alive.
And I’m lucky to have her.
But he didn’t have her. Not really.
She’d come to him looking for sex, but for him, it had become more than that. He cared about her, wanted to spend time with her after she was well, and not out of some sense of obligation.
She was sure to push him away. Hadn’t she already done that, zeroing in on the age difference between them and pointing out all the things he could never have with her?
He wanted kids one day, sure. But if he and Gemma were meant to be together long-term, then he knew there was a family meant for them as well, even if it wasn’t the regular kind. It didn’t matter where they came from.
Four days later she was moved to her own private room. Logan was still there, having only taken short breaks to eat, sleep or shower.
It was pouring rain outside the window, the deluge pelting the glass as he rested his forearms on the metal bar of her hospital bed.
The room smelled like disinfectant, the walls covered in sheets of textured plastic.
He’d had too much time over the last few days to examine their repetitive pattern.
A white-haired nurse came in and took Jemma’s vitals. “Are you the father?” she asked.
Logan furrowed his brow. “No. Her father’s in a nursing home.”
“Not her father. The baby’s father.”
He furrowed his brow. “What?”
The nurse’s eyes opened wide. “Uh…the doctor told me the baby’s father was in here. I just assumed that was you.”
“No.”
Her cheeks flushed a deep crimson. “Please, don’t tell anyone I said anything. Patient privacy is important in this hospital. I could lose my job.”
“It’s okay. You have the wrong room. She can’t have kids.”
The nurse looked at the chart in her hands and back to Logan. “Gemma Faraday.”
“Yes.”
She dropped her eyes, closing the chart as she reached for the rolling blood pressure machine.
“Wait. Is she pregnant?”
“I’m so sorry, sir.”
“Because you shouldn’t have said it or because it isn’t true?”
She was halfway out the door.
“Do you have any idea how much this means to me?” he called. “What if she is pregnant, and she never tells me herself? What if she makes a decision because she thinks I don’t love her, or that she’s too old for me? Maybe it wasn’t a mistake you came in here.”
The nurse stopped walking and faced him. She held up the chart. “A patient’s medical record is strictly confidential. I made a mistake here today.” She turned and placed it in a basket on the blood pressure machine, then pulled it into the hallway and walked away.
Logan stared at the blood pressure cart, Gemma’s chart sitting right inside the wire basket. Either that nurse was a real idiot or one hell of a softie.
He stepped into the hallway and looked from side to side. No one paid him any mind. He took the chart back into Gemma’s room and opened it, his eyes scanning the information.
His heart squeezed in his chest.
HGH levels consistent with day eight of pregnancy.
A wide smile broke out on his face. He was going to be a father.