love her, Uncle. I love her so much.”
Her uncle seemed to struggle, both trying to be the man he’d always promised her he would be. Supportive. But it was up against the outright worry that instantly sagged his shoulders. Dimmed his eyes. “Okay. We need to start with some testing.”
“No, Uncle. Please. Don’t say that.” It was a whimper.
Sorrow rushed and spilled and spun the walls. She couldn’t see. Refused to hear.
“I’m sorry, Frankie Leigh, but her heart abnormalities are incredibly severe. There is little chance of her making it to term, let alone through delivery.”
She tried to hold it back, but the sob broke free. She pressed her hand to her mouth.
Trying to keep in the hope. Not to let it go. If she believed hard enough, it would be.
She rocked in the same chair she’d been sitting in for the last five hours. She’d been there waiting and waiting and waiting in a private office after she’d been sent for a special echocardiography in Birmingham.
Her uncle Kale had driven her there after he’d arranged for her to meet with a fetal cardiologist.
Her entire world had dropped out from under her when it had only been him coming through the door to give her the results.
She’d known it the second she’d seem him.
Mourning already engraved on his face.
She pressed her hands to her chest, angling forward. “There has to be something that can be done. There has to be. She . . . she can get a transplant like Evan did. Evan is perfect. She’ll be perfect, too.” The words tumbled free. A prayer. A plea.
Sadness shook his head. “Frankie.”
“No, Uncle, no.”
It wasn’t fair. Wasn’t fair that this curse could steal the life right out of her hands.
Evan.
Oh God, Evan was going to be destroyed.
Blame himself forever.
She gasped for a breath.
It felt like her lungs were collapsing.
Closing in.
Shutting down.
“Please,” she begged, pain sheering through her insides. Twisting her in half. Cutting her in two.
He climbed down to his knees in front of her. “I am sorry, Frankie. I . . . I am devastated over this, and I know it doesn’t come close to what you are feeling right now.” He took her by the hand. “If there was anything . . . anything in this world that I could do, you know that I would. I have to recommend you terminate this pregnancy, Frankie Leigh.”
She clutched at her chest, feeling like her heart was getting ripped right out. “No. No. I can’t do that.”
“Frankie.”
“I can’t.” She clawed away from him, flying from the chair, shaking her hands out in front of her like it could possibly wake her up from this nightmare. She paced, stumbled, tried not to fall to her knees.
But she was breaking.
Breaking, breaking, breaking.
And she had no idea how she was going to come back from this.
How would she ever tell Evan?
The movement of his hands flew behind her eyes. Memories ingrained.
The statements that he’d made.
FRANKIE, WE AREN’T GETTING MARRIED OR HAVING BABIES OR LIVING HAPPILY EVER AFTER. WE WERE JUST LITTLE KIDS. YOU NEED TO GET OVER THAT.
Oh God. Oh God.
Tears raced and her pulse shuddered and her mind whirred with the thoughts.
Flashes of hopes and dreams and dread and fear.
She remembered her childhood belief. All the hearts she’d sewn into that froggy for Evan. Believing there would always be one there for him if he needed it.
If only she could do that for this child. Believe hard enough, and it would be.
She clutched at the bump that was just beginning to show.
Agony clawed as a rush of love flooded into her system.
She looked back at her uncle Kale. “I can’t.”
They drove in silence back to Gingham Lakes. Music quietly playing. A melody that was meant to soothe, but there was no comfort that Frankie Leigh could find.
She rubbed mindlessly at the bump.
Baby girl. Baby girl.
And she prayed with all she had that she could feel her. That she would know, even if she never got to hold her, that she would be forever loved. That Evan wouldn’t take it on as a burden.
As a sin.
The phone ringing through the speakers nearly made her jump out of her skin. Everything too sensitive. Too sharp. Too shrill.
Hope’s name came up on the dash screen. “Hey, baby,” Uncle Kale answered, though his voice was subdued. Different than his normal casual easiness.
But Aunt Hope. Aunt Hope was screaming on the other end of the line. “It’s Evan. He collapsed in class. They brought him by ambulance .