hesitated outside the door of Julie’s hospital room. Rachel had called him and asked him to stay away for a while and get some rest. He didn’t understand why she didn’t want him here. Julie and he were friends. The only explanation could be that Julie was upset with him. While he could understand that since he hadn’t been there when she needed him, it was eating at him. He needed to apologize. After that, if she never wanted to see him again, then he’d figure out a way to live with that. But, God, even the thought of that was devastating.
The sisters were arguing. He could hear their raised voices through the crack of the partially closed door. Already uncomfortable with the fact he was imposing, he didn’t want to make it worse by interrupting a fight, so he leaned up against the wall outside the door.
“The last time I took your professional advice and made some changes in my life…”
He could hear the emphasis and anger on the word changes as Julie said it. Changes. That’s what she called them that Valentine’s Day weekend. Was she talking about the changes she’d made that precipitated their hook-up over that weekend? His blood ran cold. He shouldn’t be hearing this, but he couldn’t force his feet to move away and out of earshot.
Julie continued, “My life completely fell apart. I let someone else determine my actions and everything became so much worse than it ever was before. It was a mistake.” He could hear the tears in her angry voice.
Was he remembering the weekend wrong? Did he take advantage of her? He wanted her so much, did he hear just what he wanted to hear? He never would have guessed that she regretted it, regretted him, but it sure sounded like that. No wonder she was pushing him away and even toward someone else.
“Julie, you know that’s not fair. There was no way to foresee how things would turn out and the changes were working. Before.”
Before what? Before him? Before their amazing twenty-four hours?
“I know things spun out of control, but—”
“Yes,” Julie interrupted, “they spun out of control because I wasn’t in control. Don’t you get it, Rachel? I have to stay in control or else everything spins away from me. Every single time. That’s what happened. You know it’s true.”
“He’s the guy, isn’t he, Julie? You need to talk to him. He cares about you.” Rachel’s voice was low and calm.
What was she talking about? What guy? Were they talking about him? What exactly had spun out of control? What was he missing?
“And tell him what?” Julie’s voice was low. “It doesn’t matter now. I won’t do that to him. It’s over.”
He stumbled away from the room. He was missing something here and it wasn’t something that Julie wanted to share with him. The pain of that echoed through his heart.
He was rushing through the hospital doors when he ran into Colton and Penelope. Colton immediately grabbed him by the shoulders to steady him. Something must have showed on his face because both Penelope and Colton looked alarmed.
“What’s wrong?” Colton asked.
“Did something happen to Julie?” Penelope asked, panicky.
“No, no, she’s fine. As far as I know, everything’s fine with her.”
Colton frowned and turned back to Pen. “Sweetheart, head on up to Julie’s room and let me talk to Chris.”
She considered Chris then stood on her tiptoes to give Colton a kiss.
“I’ll be up in a moment,” Colton murmured.
“Okay, take your time.” She smiled at Chris. “See you later.”
“Bye, Pen.”
They watched her walk away and Chris noticed Colton looked worried as he followed her movements.
“Is she feeling any better?” They hadn’t been to the hospital since Julie woke up because Penelope was so sick from her pregnancy.
“No, there’s no morning sickness about this. It’s actually cruel to call it that, like somehow she’s doing it wrong, because she’s getting sick all day instead of just in the morning. It’s the worst thing I’ve ever had to witness in my life. I hate standing by, watching her puke her guts out constantly, knowing I did that to her. Just pray that someday when your wife gets pregnant she doesn’t suffer from morning sickness.”
And just like that, Chris’s breath hitched and he rubbed at the phantom pain in his chest.
Colton noticed and cocked an eyebrow at him and immediately turned him around. “Okay, it’s time for us to talk. Let’s go down to the cafeteria and grab a cup of coffee.”