12. Sutton #3
It was miserable. I was alone and scared and could hardly move some days. My doctor was worried because I wasn’t gaining weight as I should’ve been and not getting as much sleep. Eating had been hard but everything I did was for the sweet girl in my arms. I would never regret it.
“There’s more,” Asher stated as I moved Sophie off my boob since she’d finished and if I didn’t get her moving it would be nap time before I knew it. I tucked myself back in and tossed the blanket over my shoulder while I moved Sophie to my lap.
I patted her on the back, more to give myself something to do.
“Just as some of the sickness started going away in my third trimester, the doctors said I was preeclamptic. I had no idea what it meant when they first told me. My blood pressure was high, I had swelling, and I had some issues with my vision.” Once I started I couldn’t stop talking.
The only other person who knew all of this was Iris.
“They monitored me but I seemed to be getting worse. Given all the issues during the pregnancy and because I went to one of my last checkups really short of breath, she was born at thirty-three weeks.”
“What’s normal?” Asher’s frown had only gotten deeper.
“Around thirty-nine weeks.” Sophie let out a squawk, clearly done with me since she started reaching for Asher. “I swear, this girl is nervous around new people but with you I might as well be chopped liver.”
His lips quirked, one side going up as he took Sophie out of my hands. “How long was she in the NICU?”
I’d mentioned that to him before; I was just surprised he remembered.
“Just over three weeks.” That time was pretty blocked out from my head too. All I remembered was sitting next to Sophie, watching her breathing, holding her as much as I could when the nurses let me. It was crazy how she shifted my world so completely.
I shook my head and smiled over at Asher, who wasn’t smiling at all. Not that that was unusual.
“You were alone.”
“Yeah. My friends were all in a friend group with my ex, so they pretty much all abandoned me when he claimed Sophie wasn’t his, that I’d cheated.”
He blew out a breath. “That would have been hard.”
“It was, but I was used to it.”
“What do you mean?”
“I…” I paused, looked down, and then shook my head. “Never mind.”
“Tell me what you were going to say,” he demanded.
“I don’t want to.”
“Why not?”
“Because I don’t want to see it in your face.” I finally looked up to find his amber eyes waiting for me.
“I’m not following you here, sweetheart.” The nickname soothed me a little. That was why I called him Grizzly now, because it got him to drop his guard a little too. “You don’t know how I’ll respond to what you were going to say.”
“Yes, I do. You’re going to pity me and I really don’t want to see that look on your face.”
“I lived in a car for a few weeks before Knight found me, Sutton. I don’t judge people.”
“Ash—”
“I was really angry when I first went to live with Jane and Henry,” he continued like I hadn’t interrupted.
“I started getting into a lot of fights, and since Knight and I were so close he would jump into the fray without even thinking.
Noah would eventually come in, break them up, and try to smooth things over.
“Jane and Henry would always find out and sit me down to talk about why I was so angry. Every time I would see it on their faces. I knew they weren’t as hard on me because I was the kid who ran away from home because his father was an abusive piece of shit.
I saw that look on their faces every damn time and it made me feel small.
“So, I know what not wanting to be pitied feels like, Sutton. I get it. But you have to know I would never see you that way, whatever you did. Whatever you want to tell me, you can because you’re safe with me.
That’s what I learned from Jane and Henry.
They weren’t pitying me—they were caring for me. It’s different.”
I shook my head and smiled at him. “For a man that doesn’t talk much you seem to always know the right thing to say.”
He smirked back. “Only with you. Come on, sweetheart, what were you going to say?”
I sighed. “It wasn’t actually that hard on me, having all of my friends turn their backs on me.
I’ve kind of just gotten used to it. I mean, I was abandoned at a fire station as a baby; it was ingrained in me young to expect people to leave.
” I looked away from him and at the people milling around the zoo having a good time.
“I don’t have a problem connecting with people, I don’t shy away from friendships or relationships, but I just always expect them to end.
People always end up walking away or deciding that I’m not worth their time.
So I’ve learned to expect it and adapt.”
With that dark confession between us, I was done talking. I stood up, tucked Sophie’s stuff back under her stroller, and then turned to see Asher watching me. Sophie was patting the scruff on his face but there was a dark, intense look in his eyes, almost like he was angry.
Lifting an eyebrow, I waited as he almost seemed to shake off whatever he was thinking. Some of the darkness went away as he stood up, keeping a careful hold on Sophie, and stepped in front of me.
“Now I guess I need to feed you.”