SEAL's Baby (Navy SEAL Secret Baby Romance) (49 page)

I shook and quivered, and once the high
had passed and I lay comfortably in his arms, the regrets began to slip in.
Dylan was still in rehab. He’d been there for almost two weeks and he was doing
great. He thought that I’m waiting for him. Kyle shifted underneath me and I
felt his hands come up and take my face in them. He brought his lips sweetly to
mine and that warmth spread through me, obliterating all thoughts of Dylan – for
the time being.

CHAPTER
SEVENTEEN

KYLE

Amber and I didn’t talk about us. We
didn’t talk about Dylan. We just continued on with life as usual for the next
two months, except for Friday afternoons when she would schedule me for five
o’clock and we’d spend an hour or two after everyone left having wild,
incredibly hot sex in the massage room. I was getting stronger and we’d
experiment with a different position each time. I liked to think of it as extra
therapy. The only one I talked to about it was Greg and, of course, he thought
the whole thing was a great idea. I refused to let myself think about what
would happen when I finished my therapy in another month – or when Dylan
finished rehab. I hadn’t asked her, so I had no idea when that might be.

For now I was happy and for the first time
in my life, I allowed myself to do something without considering the
repercussions or its effect on my future. I moved back into my loft at the end
of the second month after my surgery, against Sarah’s wishes. I was used to
doing things my sister disapproved of, though, so that was okay. Dad was
supportive. I got a full nod out of him when I mentioned it.

I walk with a cane now and I’m much
steadier on my feet. Michael handed over the new account to me, and I worked
from home for now on the designs for the new building the company wanted. If
these kept going well, I’ll go back to the office after I finish my therapy. As
it is now, I communicate with the owner via Skype and I keep myself so busy
that most of the time, Sarah doesn’t even have time to nag me about anything. I
honestly think if life stayed this way forever, I could live with it just fine
– for the most part.

This morning as I worked on my computer, I
got a call that just might change the course of all of that.

“Hi, Kyle, this is Brenda from Dr. Grant’s
office.”

“Hi, Brenda, what’s up?”

“Dr. Grant would like to know if you can
come into the office this afternoon.”

“This afternoon? Okay…can you tell me what
this is about?” After my surgery, I saw them once a week for a while, but after
they took out the staples, I only had to go in once a month for my scans. The
doctor told me that with all tumors there was a possibility of re-occurrence.
He said if they got it all during surgery there was less of a chance, but when
he removed mine there was a small part that had attached itself to too many
nerve endings and blood vessels to safely remove. We did the scans routinely
just to make sure it wasn’t growing. My first scan had been all clear last
month. I had the second one yesterday. Her asking me to come in today freaked
me out a little bit.

“The doctor wants to talk to you, Kyle.” I
had figured she wouldn’t tell me anything on the phone, but it was worth a
shot.

With a resigned sigh I said, “Okay, what
time?” I still wasn’t allowed to drive. Although my coordination was a hell of
a lot better than it was, it still wasn’t quite up to par.

“How is one o’clock?” I looked at the
clock. It was ten now.

“Okay, that will work.” I hung up and
called Greg. “Hey are you busy this afternoon?”

“Yeah, man, I’m sorry. I have a new client
and I have to meet with her about doing some cabinets for her kitchen. Is
everything okay?” I guess he could hear the anxiety in my voice. I hadn’t let
myself think of the possibility of it returning – until now. I was trying to
keep from completely freaking out by telling myself if it was growing again,
I’d have symptoms. I hadn’t had a headache in over a month and everything else
was great. There must be another reason he wants to see me.

“Yeah, it’s fine. I just have a doctor’s
appointment, but I’m sure Sarah will take me. If not, I can take a cab or
Uber.”

“Are you sure? I can try to reschedule…”

“Nah, don’t do that. I’ll find a ride.
Thanks, man.”

I hung up and waited a beat before I pressed
Sarah’s number. I really didn’t want to ask her. She took me for my scan
yesterday, so her imagination would go wild when I told her they wanted to see
me today. I changed my mind about calling her and I was about to just schedule
an Uber when the phone rang. It was Amber. I stared at it for a few moments and
wondered why she was calling me. She never called me, and I never called her.
Like I said, we had our Friday afternoon trysts and that was it...if you didn’t
count the hundred times a day I thought about her…and the dreams…

“Hello?”

“Hi, Kyle.”

“Hey, beautiful, what’s up?” her voice
sounded serious.

“I thought I should let you know… Dylan’s
being discharged today.”

I hesitated. I wanted to be very careful
what I said here. I wanted to say, Screw him, who cares, move in with me, I
love you…
shit
! Finally, I went with,
“So…what does this mean for us?”

She sounded like she might be crying as
she said, “I don’t know yet. He’s clean and he has been for two months now. He
did everything I asked him to do. I, on the other hand, did not. I’m so torn
here, Kyle. I feel like I owe him something…and I feel like I owe you, too.”

She
“owes” me something? What the fuck is that? Is that all this is to her?
“You don’t owe me anything.” That came out in a harsher tone than I had
planned, but suddenly, my insides were in turmoil.

“That’s not what I meant.
 
I feel like… I don’t want to lose you, Kyle.
But the deal I made with Dylan was if he did this, we’d at least try again.”

The anxiety I was feeling just a while ago
boiled and turned into a sudden blast of anger. “I’ve spent the last two months
pretending, Amber. I pretend that you’re mine and I don’t have to share you
with anyone or give you up at the end of this ‘trial’ period you seem to have
me on… But this is where the rubber hits the road and you’re the one who has to
decide what you want. I’m done pretending, so let me know what it’s going to
be.”

“I want you,” she whispered. “But…”

I was over-wrought emotionally. I couldn’t
take any more of this. “When you can say that to me without any buts, Amber,
call me and if I’m still around, we’ll talk. Until then, I can’t do this. I’m
not going to share you with him.”

“I’m not asking anyone to share – and what
does that mean…‘if I’m still around?’ Are you okay?”

I hung up. I didn’t owe her an
explanation. I didn’t owe her anything. I was pissed and there was no telling
what I might say if I stayed on that phone. Apparently, I had bigger fish to
fry, anyhow. I called my sister and told her I needed a ride and then I spent
the next two and a half hours wondering how a few phone calls could cause the
pendulum that controlled my life to swing from one end to the other that
quickly.

*******

“Kyle, the radiologist sent over the
report on your scan yesterday.” I was in the doctor’s private office. I made
Sarah stay in the lobby. That was quite a feat.

“Is the tumor back?”

“It’s growing,” he said. Everything inside
of me quivered. “The tissue we left behind has taken hold and has begun to
spread.”

Fuck
.
I sucked in a deep breath. “So, why am I not having symptoms?”

“Because it’s small and it’s just
beginning to grow.”

“Can we stop it…or take it out?”

“Well, this one is a little bit different
than the one we took out. The tissue was left in there in the first place
because of vascularization. That means it was tangled up in your blood vessels
and too dangerous for us to try and remove. It’s only gotten more entangled as
it’s grown-”

“Why didn’t we see this on the last scan?”
I interrupted.

“Like I told you, it’s still small, but
it’s growing. In the last scan, it still only looked like residual tissue. So,
as I was saying, surgery won’t be an option here. But one very good option we
do have is radiation therapy.”

“Like shooting moonbeams into my head?” He
laughed. I wasn’t trying to be funny.

“Yeah, like that. We can have you see the
radiological oncologist and he’ll talk to you about the options and how many
treatments he thinks you’ll need – and a prognosis.”

“Prognosis
as in how long I have left to live?”

“Kyle, this tumor is not in a life
threatening place – yet. If it continues to grow, there is a chance that it
will wrap itself around your brain stem and affect your vital functions such as
breathing. So, that’s why we need to make sure we don’t let that happen. You’re
very lucky that we caught it so soon.”

Lucky was not how I felt at the moment.
Pissed, sorry for myself, scared…I was feeling a lot of things, but not lucky
at all.

CHAPTER
EIGHTEEN

AMBER

“Do you want pizza tonight?” Dylan was
yelling at me from the other room. I just walked through the door. Kyle hadn’t
shown up for therapy for the second week in a row. He wouldn’t answer my calls
or my texts… I was worried about him and didn’t know what to do.

“I don’t care.” I tossed my purse and keys
down on the table and sat down. As I was taking off my shoes, Dylan came out
from the kitchen with his phone pressed to his ear. He had on a pair of jeans,
but no shirt and no shoes. He hadn’t shaved in almost a week and his belly was
starting to hang over the front of his pants. He’d traded in his alcohol and
drug addiction for food and television.

“Pepperoni?”

“I don’t care.” He made a face and
finished ordering his pizza, with stuffed crust and breadsticks.
 

“What’s wrong with you?” he said after he
hung up.

“Nothing.”

He waited like he thought I was going to
say something else. When I didn’t he said, “Seems like something.” He sat down
next to me. He smelled like the horses.

“When was the last time you took a
shower?”

He made another face, but to his credit,
he didn’t say what I knew he had to be thinking… I was being a bitch. “This
morning, why?”

“You smell like your horse.”

He actually smelled himself and then he
said, “I was petting her when I went out to feed her. I’ll take another shower
before bed. Did you have a rough day?”

Every
day is a rough day when you’re pretending
, I thought. “No,
it was fine. I’m going to shower now if you’re not going to.”

He grinned. “I’ll just take one with you.
The pizza won’t be here for forty-five minutes…”

“No, I just need a minute to decompress,”
I told him.

“If the day was fine, why do you need to
decompress?”

“Dylan, please…”

“Fine, whatever.” He picked up the remote
and switched on the T.V.

I got up and went to take my shower. He
lay down on the couch. I couldn’t for the life of me understand what either of
us were doing. He acted as miserable as I was. While I was alone in the safety
of the shower – in the bathroom that still had no door – I resolved that we had
to have this talk and we had to do it tonight. We were both wasting our lives.

When I finished and got back out to the
living room, I found him eating pizza. I sat down next to him as he handed me a
piece. I sat it down and said, “Dylan, we need to talk.”

“About?”

“I can’t keep doing this.”

“Doing what?”

“Jesus, Dylan! Do you not see how
ridiculous this relationship is? You’re twenty-five years old. All you do is
eat and watch television. I’m twenty-four and all I do is work and watch you
eat and watch television. What kind of life is this?”

I saw something of the old Dylan flash in
his eyes. He took a long drink of his Pepsi and then he said, “So, let me get
this straight. When I was riding in the rodeo and partying and having a good
time, you were miserable. Now that I’m not riding in the rodeo and not partying
and having a good time, you’re miserable. So, the only common denominator is
me. I make you miserable no matter what I do.”

“Do you love me, Dylan?”

“What?”

“You heard me. Do you love me?”

“Of course, I love you, Amber. I’ve loved
you since I was a kid. It’s not me. I still want you. You turn me down every
time I try and get close to you. I think the question is do you love me?”

I had to really think about the answer to
that one before I spoke. I could tell by the look on his face that my
hesitation hurt him and I didn’t like that, but we had to do this. Finally I
said, “I’ve loved you since I was a kid, too. But…”

“Here we go.”