Risking Fate (Mitchell Family #4)(65)
Author: Jennifer Foor

He still wouldn’t turn to look at me. “I hate that you don’t believe me.”

“I’m sorry.” I just couldn’t.

“You’re all I’ve ever wanted. I didn’t know it at first, but once I had you, I knew it right away. I can’t breathe without you, do you get that?” Ty still wouldn’t turn around.

Hearing him say that actually took my breath away. I still had the tubes in my nose, but they were turned down enough where I had to take a deep breath. “Yes.”

Finally, he turned around. His lips were pushed firmly together and he looked so hurt. “I was a shitty boyfriend, everyone knows that, but you were never just my girlfriend, I always saw you as my future. I’ve never been surer about anything except being Izzy’s father. You can doubt my story all you want, but it’s the f**king truth. You think you are the only one hurt here, but for the past two months I have been consumed with guilt. Every single time I looked at you, I saw what I knew I would eventually lose. Do you have any idea how hard it was for me to be happy, when I knew it was only a matter of time? As far as being there for you, well you never had to even ask that, because there is no way in hell I would ever let you go. Just so you know, before I heard about the accident, I had already made my mind up that if you moved back to Kentucky, I was moving there too. I can’t live without you, Miranda.”

He would follow me to Kentucky? He would leave his parents and his farm? It had to be for the kids.

“You’d do that for your kids?”

“No Miranda, I’d do it for you, for us and for our family. I’d follow you anywhere.”

God, I wanted to believe him. I wanted to wrap my arms around him and never let go. He meant every word of what he was saying. I could feel it in every inch of my fragile body.

I reached for my husband and he just stood there far enough away that I couldn’t touch him. “Ty, I know you’re hurting too. I don’t know what the future holds, but every part of me has to believe that God wouldn’t have saved me if he didn’t have plans for us. All I’m asking is for time.”

Ty shook his head and sat back down in the chair. He traced over my wedding ring with his fingers. “I’m sorry, but all I can offer you is forever.”

I looked up when I got the sarcastic answer and he winked at me. “Forever is a good start.”

“I know you aren’t ready to forgive me, but I think we should seal this agreement with a kiss.”

I rolled my eyes. “Don’t push your luck.”

I wasn’t ready to forget about any of it, in fact, I didn’t know if I was ever going to be able to, but as much as I was upset for myself, I hated to see him suffering too. Maybe it was wrong for me to give him some kind of false hope when I wasn’t sure myself, but I did it anyway.

It was a good thing that the doctor came in to check on me, because I wasn’t really certain what else I wanted to say to my husband. The meds were making me mellow, but I knew once I stopped taking them that it was only going to be a matter of time before I went all psychotic on Ty. He was strong and would take anything I threw at him. Not just because he was trying to make it up to me, but because he somehow got off on me being mad at him.

Thinking about him being turned on made me think of him being with Heather, which in turn brought my focus back to the doctor, who had been trying to get an answer out of me the whole time.

“I’m sorry, what did you say?”

“On a scale of one to ten, how is your pain right now?” He had sat down in a chair on the other side from where Ty sat and was looking down at my chart.

“I guess it’s about a six. I itch more than anything.”

He stood up and removed the blanket to check on my stomach. I felt a cold chill as the air in the room hit my body. My robe was being pushed up to my chest so that he could examine my stomach. I closed my eyes as I felt him lightly touching where my staples were. It was instantly warm again as he covered me back up and wrote something down on my chart. “Okay, as of right now, we are going to monitor you for another six to eight hours. If your condition continues to improve, we can get you moved to a regular room as early as tomorrow morning.”

“Thank you.”

“Of course you will still need to be hooked to your IV’s. One is giving you fluids and the other is giving you blood. We are hoping your levels will be good enough tomorrow to stop with the blood. You’re making great progress, but you will need to be on antibiotics for at least ten to fourteen days to fight off any kind of infection. Do you have any other questions for me?”

Ty cleared his throat. “Actually, I have one.”

The doctor kept looking down writing in my chart. “Ask away.”

“My wife hasn’t seen our newborn twins. I’m sure you can imagine how hard it is for her knowing they are so close and she can’t get to them. Is there any way possible that we can let her see them? I know it’s probably against every regulation, but they are the only babies in the NICU and I think if she could see them it would help speed up her recovery on account of her wanting to get better to be with them.”

The doctor smiled and started shaking his head in disbelief at Ty’s long excuse as to why I should be able to see my babies. “Let me see what I can do.”

Ty stuck his hand across my bed and shook the doctor’s hand. “We’d appreciate that. I mean, I’d hate to have to smuggle them in here under my clothes.”

The doctor froze and just looked at Ty like he was crazy. Maybe he actually thought Ty was serious. At any rate, he walked away shaking his head again.

“I think he believed me.” Ty started laughing as a new nurse approached my bed.

She smiled and handed me a cup full of pills. “You need to take these for the pain. They will probably make you tired.”

I took the pills and handed her back the little cup. “Thanks.”

“If you need anything just hit your button.” She pointed to the red button attached to my bed.

Ty leaned over and grabbed the button. “Push it now.”

I slapped his hand. “Why would I do that?”

“Just for something fun to do. I can’t believe there is no television in this room. What are we supposed to do?”

“You’d rather watch that than talk to me?”

Without asking, he leaned over and kissed me on the mouth. “I didn’t say that. I also didn’t want to push my luck. Yesterday I thought I lost you forever, for more reasons than one, I think we have had enough of the serious talk for one night, plus you don’t believe anything I say anyway.”