we get there,” he said to MJ. “Take care of Maddie.”
“I will.” He didn’t hesitate to bend down and hug Merrick. “See you soon.”
“As soon as I can get there,” Merrick said, squeezing his shoulder.
MJ found Maddie sitting in the window seat in her room gazing out at the rain and wind-battered flowers and bushes. She turned to face him when he entered her room. Neither of them said a word.
He took her left hand and rubbed his thumb over her bare ring finger. “Was it hard?”
He hadn’t left her to take a shower. He’d left her to call Talan and break the news that she didn’t want to marry him.
Her eyes flitted up to his, then down to her hand in his. “Yes and no.” She threaded their fingers together and brought his hand to her lips. “Yes, because I hated hurting him. No, because I knew it was the right thing to do.”
MJ flattened his palm against her cheek and ran his thumb across her lips.
“I’ve been in love with you the whole time I was with him,” she said. “He never had all of me. Only a part I let him have…” She looked up at him through her dark lashes, blue eyes blazing. “On loan from you. No part of me ever belonged to him. It was always you.”
How could he possibly be this fortunate? A few days ago, there were cracks and craters in him that had been empty for so long, he didn’t expect them to ever be filled. Now he had his dad, he had a twin sister that he’d have to find a way to come to accept, and he had Maddie.
Maddie. His soul. His heart.
His home.
MJ thought back to tossing a penny in the fountain out on the patio with Holly and Sam, wishing for somewhere to belong. Funny how quickly wishes could come true.
“It’ll always be you,” Maddie said, reaching up and stroking the side of his face.
MJ pulled her to her feet and wrapped her in his arms. She smelled like vanilla and spice and he couldn’t inhale enough of her. Her soft, silky hair caressed his cheek resting on top of her head, and her soft, full breasts pressed against his chest. “Home,” he whispered.
She squeezed him tight. “Home,” she said.
Twenty-Eight
Three days later…
The hospital smelled like a sickening mixture of cafeteria food and Lysol, making Maddie’s stomach gurgle. She jabbed the elevator button for the second floor and shifted from foot to foot waiting for the doors to close.
MJ was with Merrick and Rachael at an apartment Merrick owned in Atlanta. He’d let them stay there while her dad was in the hospital since it was close. Maddie told MJ she needed some time alone with her dad today and she’d call if he woke up. The roller-coaster ride of the past few days left her feeling claustrophobic and in need of air and space to get her mind wrapped around everything that happened.
She approached room two-eighty-one and peeked inside. The bed closest to the door was empty, and her father’s frail frame lay under the white sheet on the far bed beside the windows. He was buried under wires and tubes. Machines blinked and beeped around him.
“Daddy?” she whispered, crossing the room to his bed. “I’m back.” She’d spent the better part of the past few days in this room, only leaving when MJ absolutely insisted she come back to the apartment and get some sleep. She bent and kissed the top of her dad’s head. His gray, wiry hair prickled her nose. “I’m sorry.”
She sat in the chair beside his bed and waited for a nurse to come in and give her an update. When a half hour went by, she turned on the TV to an old movie and let her mind drift to the night before. Exhausted and stressed, MJ had made love to her so gently, so breathtakingly, she’d been shattered and whole at the same time. Needy and complete. Only MJ could make her feel two extremes at once.
Where would they go from here?
She couldn’t let her father live alone, and there was no way he was going back to the Rocha Estate. She’d have to find a place for them to live. He’d retire, and she’d find a job to help supplement his Social Security.
MJ would go back to school. She’d see him on weekends. He’d get to know his father.
It would be good.
But it didn’t feel good. She wanted his