Pretty Little Mistake

Helpless.

It’s the only word to describe how I feel.

Lennon woke me roughly, shaking me desperately. I was about to grumble over the rude awakening when she pointed to the bed, the blood on the sheets. Not a lot, but it was there, it was red, and I’ve never been more scared in my entire life.

I threw on my clothes, grabbed the rental car’s keys, and hauled her to the nearest hospital. It was twenty-five minutes away. I made it in less than fifteen.

Lennon lies in the bed in the emergency room, each section curtained off. They had her change into a gown before they started running tests. She stares straight ahead, her color pale. She hasn’t spoken in the last ten minutes, like if she opens her mouth and utters a single word, it’ll break some sort of spell.

I can see it, her shutting down from the fear.

“Len—”

“Shh,” she begs, her gaze never wavering from straight ahead of her. “Don’t say anything. Please?”

The problem is I don’t know what to say. But I want her to know I’m here.

I slip my hand into hers, entwining our fingers. “I’m scared too.”

“Beckham, I’m begging you. Just be quiet.” Her words end in a choked sob.

I hate this, that she won’t let me comfort her. Her hand is stiff in mine, but I keep holding on because I need the touch. If I hold on tight enough, I can make things better. I have to.

We’ve been here for hours already and haven’t seen a doctor, only a nurse who occasionally drops by.

We might be losing our baby, and they’re not treating it like an emergency.

“That’s it,” I growl, letting her hand go. I shoot to a standing position, swatting the curtain aside. “Someone send a doctor in here now to look at my wife,” I bellow. Sure, she’s not my wife, but I don’t give a shit right now. If a fake marital status will get her seen faster, so be it.

“Sir.” A nurse I haven’t seen before speaks up. “I’m going to need you to—”

“No.” I slash my hand through the air. “I have the utmost respect for medical professionals, but this is beyond ridiculous. You took blood work from her when we first got here and said someone was going to do an ultrasound. It’s been two hours.” I wave two fingers through the air. “And the blood work isn’t back, and no tech has been by. This is—”

“We’re very backed up tonight. There was an accident—”

Is this how we’re going to play it? Constantly interrupting each other? Fine.

“Did the people in this accident require an ultrasound?”

“I can’t speak to you about other patients.” She smooths her blonde hair down, getting ruffled.

“The answer is no, Tina,” I say, reading her name tag. “I’m betting there’s a very low chance they needed an ultrasound tech. Stop bullshitting me and get something done. We might . . .” My throat closes up, not wanting to say the words. “We might be losing our baby, and you’re all doing nothing.”

“Beckham,” Lennon says softly behind me, “please.”

I turn around to her. Small. Frail. Her hands clasped protectively over her stomach like she can make everything okay if she holds on tight enough. I shake my head. I won’t be thwarted from my mission.

“Get someone down here. Now.”

Tina shakes her head, annoyed. I’m sure if I were in her position, I’d feel the same. They probably deal with people like me all the time, but this, forcing shit to get done, is all I can do right now to help, so fuck it all, that’s what I’m going to do.

I leave the curtain open so I can make sure they actually get something done and take my seat back by Lennon’s side.

“You didn’t need to make a scene.”

I touch her belly, rubbing my thumb in slow circles. “Yes, I did. It’s not just you I’m trying to look out for. It’s them too.”

She looks at me then, mouth wobbling, and then she just breaks down crying.

I wrap my arms around her. Like her cradling her stomach protectively, I do the same to her. I doubt it’ll be enough, but I’m damn sure going to try.

Bed rest.

No flying.

No sex.

Lots of checkups.

That’s Lennon’s future until the baby arrives, but it could be a lot fucking worse.

We still have our baby. That’s all that matters.

Preeclampsia, the doctors said. It was sudden, and the bleeding was terrifying. They said it could’ve been a placental abruption. Thankfully, it wasn’t, but I chewed them out for not tending to Lennon sooner. She could’ve died or gone into multiple-organ failure due to their negligence.

I help her into the bed at the inn. The sheets are new and the place has been tidied up. I let the owner know what was going on and that I’d appreciate things being nice when we got back.

Mostly I just wanted the bloodied sheets gone.

Though it wasn’t a lot, I never want to see them again, and I’m sure Lennon feels even more that way.

Once I have her in bed, pillows behind her so she’s sitting up, blankets squished in around her, I level her with a stern stare. Hands on my hips, too, so she knows I mean business.

“As soon as we’re back in New York, you’re moving in with me. No arguments.”

“Are you crazy? No—”

I mime zipping my lips. She falls silent. “You’re on bed rest until you go into labor. You have months until that will happen.” Unless the baby comes early, but we don’t want to talk about that. We’re not at the viable stage yet, so I’m taking every precaution necessary. “I can take care of you at my place.”

“I’m not helpless.”

I sit down on the end of the bed by her feet. “I know you aren’t, but you do need someone through this, and that someone is going to be me. You’ll have Cheddar to keep you company. It won’t be so bad. You’ll see.”

“Oh no, the magazine!” she cries out, trying to reach for her phone. I grab it before she can get it. “Jaci is going to fire me.”

“I highly doubt it. You can work from home. Now, stop stressing. Remember, the doctor said stress isn’t good for the baby.”

With a sigh, she lies back as far as the mountain of pillows will allow. “Okay.”

“Do you want to stay here or head back to New York and get the ball rolling on moving your things in?”

She shakes her head. “I want to stay. If I’m going to be locked in a proverbial prison with you for the foreseeable future, at least my scenery is different here.”

As much as I know she’s upset about being put on bed rest, I know she’ll do anything to make sure the baby is okay. When we got word that the baby was fine, I don’t think I’d ever known relief like that.

“Try to take a nap. I’ll bring you some water.”

Neither of us has had any sleep in . . . I don’t know how many hours. It feels like we were at the hospital for six days.

When she doesn’t protest the nap comment, I know she’s truly exhausted.

It doesn’t take me long to get her a glass of ice water and bring it back to the bedroom.

She’s got her arms wrapped around herself, cradling her stomach protectively, just like she did in the hospital.

“What if we’d lost this little nugget?”

I set the water glass down. “We didn’t.”

“But what if we had?” she protests, her voice hoarse from all the crying she’s done. “We’re not together, Beckham. We’re not a real couple.” As if I need the reiteration. “It’s not like we can just try again in a few months. This was never supposed to happen anyway.”

“Don’t talk like that.” I shake my head roughly. “Don’t say that shit.”

“Why not? It’s the truth. This was supposed to be a one-night stand, not this . . .” She gestures around her. “You don’t even like me.”

“I like you just fine.” So much so that I might even love her. “But you need to stop going down this path, thinking like this. Little nugget, as you called her, is just fine.”

She nods woodenly. “I think I do need that nap.”

“Okay. Let me fix your pillows.”

After some minor grumbling on her part, she lets me move some of the pillows so she can lie back more.

“Thank you,” she says, grabbing my wrist so I can’t run away. “You don’t have to do this. Take care of me.”

“I take care of the people I . . .”

Love.

Care about.

I think of my dad back in New York. How his health is failing. How I’ve never really gotten the chance to know him, but I’d still do anything for him.

I guess I have a heart after all.

Lennon saves me the embarrassment of finishing my sentence by kissing me. Her lips are chapped from being in the hospital. The stale air can’t be good for anyone.

“I know,” she says, meeting my eyes for only a millisecond. “I feel the same.”

It’s dark out by the time I finish making all the arrangements to have Lennon’s things moved into my apartment so they’re already there when we get back. Laurel wanted to give me hell for it. Once I explained the situation, she agreed it would be for the best if Lennon was with me. I also sent an email to Jaci, informing her of the situation and that Lennon would need to work from home for the foreseeable future and that, by extension, I’d need to be home as much as possible. As a photographer, I do have to go out more than Lennon would normally need to, but I’ll make it work, reschedule shoots so some are the same day. Fuck, I’ll get Cheddar’s cat sitter to check on Lennon if I have to. I’m not sure she’d really appreciate knowing that she has the same sitter as Cheddar, but what she doesn’t know won’t kill her.

“Beckham,” she calls out from the bedroom. “I need a break from this room. I’m coming to the couch.”

I hop up from the kitchen stool, sprinting to the bedroom. “Not without my help, you’re not.”

She rolls her eyes, already halfway out of the bed. The nightgown I bought her from the local Target, covered in gingerbread men, hangs down past her knees.

“I’m on bed rest. That doesn’t mean I’m incapable of getting around on my own, just that I need to be seated most of the time.”

“And like I told you, I’m going to help you.”

“God, you’re a tyrant.”

I wrap an arm around her, guiding her to the couch in the living room. She’s right, she’s able to get around just fine on her own, but it makes me feel better to help. Like at least I’m doing something.

I don’t like feeling useless, like I can’t fix something.

This entire situation has me feeling inept.

Once she’s seated on the couch, she grabs the nearest blanket to drape over her legs. “Let’s watch a movie.”

Since I just spent the last I don’t know how many hours getting everything set up for our return to Manhattan, watching a movie sounds like a great idea to me.

Fuck, we spent all of Christmas in the hospital. I was so stressed about her and the baby I forgot.

“Pick a movie,” I tell her, heading back to the bedroom.

I riffle through my luggage, pulling out the gift. I don’t know what made me get it, think it would be a good idea, but when I saw it, I knew I had to buy it for her.

The box is small, smaller than the palm of my hand.

She’s scrolling through the Christmas movie options when I return. I sit down on the coffee table in front of her and hold the box out.

“Merry Christmas, honeybee.”

Her eyes dart from the box to me. “You . . . you didn’t have to get me anything.”

“I know.”

“I didn’t get you anything,” she whispers, almost like she’s ashamed. “I didn’t think we were doing that.”

“I don’t need anything.” I shake my hand, wiggling the box. “Take it, Len.”

She does, ripping off the bow so she can remove the lid to reveal what’s inside.

“It’s beautiful,” she gasps, pulling out the dainty gold necklace with a tiny bee charm dangling from the end of it. Beside the bee charm is a small blank gold disk charm. “Thank you, Beckham. I love it.”

“When I saw it, I knew it was meant for you. I had them add the other charm so I can add the baby’s initial when she comes.”

“Again with the she.” After removing the necklace from the box, she holds it out to me, then turns around to lift her hair off her shoulders. “Put it on me, please.”

I drape the necklace around her collarbone, struggling with the clasp until I finally secure it. “We’ve been over this. My gut says it’s a girl. My gut has never steered me wrong before, so I’m not going to stop believing it now.”

She turns back around, settling herself into the cushions. Her fingers go to the necklace, rubbing at the charm.

I like it there. My honeybee wearing a honeybee. My mark on her.

I’m falling in deep with her, and it scares me shitless. Caring about people gives them the ability to hurt you. But I don’t know how to stop this. Not when it comes to her.