Bittersweet Catastrophe (Second Chances #2.5) Read online

  I squeezed my eyes shut tight, unable to look her in the eyes. “Was it worth it?”

  “What?” She gasped, though the word came out as more of a whisper.

  “Don’t make me repeat myself. Just answer the goddamn question. I think I deserve at least that much.”

  “Shayne, I don’t know what you think I’m keeping from you, but based on your reaction, I can tell you that you are so far off…”

  “Am I?” My eyes flew open, the anger blazing inside of me threatening to erupt. “How long have you been keeping this from me?”

  “Just this past month. But Shayne…”

  “A month.” I repeated back, letting that sink in. She’d been keeping this from me for a month, and I was too blind to notice that anything was going on. How could I have been so oblivious? God, I was such a fool. Such a fucking fool.

  I calmly pushed back my chair and took my plate and empty beer bottle to the kitchen without another word. I rinsed the dish off, watching the water swirl around the drain once…twice…three times before deciding the plate would look much better smashed into a million pieces. The sound echoed throughout the kitchen as it collided against the wall, scattering jagged fragments across the floor. Liberty’s scream was muffled, her hand flying up to mute her cries, and all I could do was stand there with my back to her and grip the edge of the counter, staring down at the broken pieces surrounding my bare feet.

  Liberty swiftly ran to get the broom and dustpan from the closet and began sweeping up the mess I’d created. On her hands and knees, she appeared so small, so fragile, and yet even through her tears, just as beautiful as the day I’d met her. For a split second, I’d forgotten everything that had just happened between us, the lies, the pangs of jealousy and betrayal that had momentarily consumed me, and I crouched down beside her to help.

  “Here, let me get that.”

  “No!” She scrambled back across the floor. Her chin was trembling, and tears trickled down her splotchy, red cheeks. “You d-don’t have anything on your f-feet. I don’t want you to get h-hurt.”

  My feet? Was she seriously worried about my fucking feet at a time like this?

  “Liberty, sweetheart, my feet are the least of my worries right now. Why don’t you go sit down and rest? You’ve had a long day. I’ve got this.” I reached hesitantly to brush the hair out of her face and placed it behind her ear. She nodded slowly, and I took the broom and dustpan from her hands, but not before she buried her face in my lap and began sobbing.

  “I’m s-so sorry.”

  “Shhh. Baby, let’s not worry about that now.” I brushed my fingers through her hair, hoping to calm her down. I really didn’t want to get into the details of what she’d done or whom she’d done it with. My blood was still boiling just thinking about it, and if I didn’t calm down myself, we were going to have a lot fewer dishes than we did before. Cleaning up the mess I’d made seemed like the better option. “Let me clean this up, and we can talk later. All right?”

  She continued to shake her head back and forth in my lap, refusing to let the subject go. “Shayne…” she looked up at me, her eyes imploring me to hear her out.

  “Please.”

  “But Shayne, I h-have to tell you…”

  I slipped free from her hold and slowly got to my feet, dropping the broom and dustpan with a loud clatter against the floor. With my hands planted on my hips and my head bowed down, I began to shake, unable to fathom how she could possibly do something like this to me. To us. To our babies. Hell, if they even are my babies! For all I knew, this could have been going on for much longer than a month, and suddenly, the entire foundation of our relationship came into question.

  “Baby, I can’t do this right now. I have every worst-case scenario running through my mind, and thinking about you being with another man is tearing me up inside, literally killing me one agonizing second at a time.” I ran my hand down my face, struggling to rein in my emotions. “Just…tell me it wasn’t Brett. Fuck, anyone but him.”

  “W-what?! Are you seriously suggesting–”

  “Liberty, open your fucking eyes. It’s not that hard to see, he’s still pining after you. Since the day you two met, he’s been crazy about you. I’d even go as far as to say the bastard’s in love with you.” It hurt to say that, but I knew it was true. We all knew it. He’d made no attempt to hide his true feelings for Liberty, and if he had his chance, there was no denying the motherfucker would take it. “I know he’s been trying to get back at me for years for sleeping with his ex-girlfriend and for all of the shit that went down with Maddie. It wouldn’t surprise me if he’d stoop so low as to steal my own wife right out from under me.”

  So help me God, if it was him…he was dead where he stood.

  I waited for her to deny it. To shove it back in my face about how wrong I was and that Brett wasn’t the conniving asshole I made him out to be.

  She couldn’t do it.

  She couldn’t fucking do it.

  And there was my answer, ripping another hole straight through my heart.

  Liberty gradually got to her feet, the expression on her face completely void of any emotion as she shuffled across the floor toward me. It was as if time had slowed, and I was watching every second of this nightmare unravel before my very own eyes. She was just an arm’s length away now, and the anger stewing between us had grown thick and bitter. Before I could get another word out, she raised her arm up high and the palm of her hand came down hard across my cheek. I wasn’t expecting it, although I probably should have after the way I had spoken to her, and the crack of her hand colliding against my face continued to ripple through me as we stood there in deafening silence.

  “How. Dare. You! How dare you suggest that I could do something like that to you!” Her voice shook, and she cradled her hand against her chest, clearly in pain. Knowing how hard she had struck me, her hand must’ve been in just as bad of shape. “God, you can be such an insensitive jerk. You want to know my secret so bad? You want to know what I’ve been keeping from you for the past month?”

  I closed my eyes. I didn’t want to see the look in hers eyes when she delivered the final blow.

  “I have cancer.”

  Three simple words can change your life forever.

  When Liberty let the words, “I love you” slip past her lips for the very first time, I thought that was it…the blinding moment that would change everything. The moment that my life had come full circle, and I’d finally be able to bury the mistakes of my past and move forward with the woman I love. To begin our life together.

  I was wrong.

  So. Fucking. Wrong.

  Three words can also bring your world to a stuttering halt, crashing it down around you and burning it until there’s nothing left but painful memories of what could have been.

  I have cancer.

  “No.” I slumped down to the floor, ignoring the broken pieces of the plate still shattered around me. I didn’t care if they sliced through every inch of my body and caused me to bleed out right then and there. Nothing could possibly hurt worse than hearing her utter those three words. Three words I prayed I’d never have to hear again in this lifetime.

  “And you thought I cheated on you? How could you possibly think I would do something like that? You’re my husband! I love you! Only you!”

  “I…I’m sorry. I don’t know what I was thinking. I guess my mind raced to the one thing that could tear us apart, but clearly I was wrong.” I slowly turned to face her. “Cancer?”

  “Well, the doctor doesn’t know for sure yet, but there’s a good chance that I do.”

  “Wait.” I paused, trying collect my thoughts before the roller coaster of emotions I was riding threatened to jump the tracks. “You have my head fucking spinning right now, and I just want to make sure I heard you correctly. You’re saying you don’t know for sure? What…what would even make you think you have cancer in the first place? This is crazy, Liberty. You can’t just say you have cancer one min
ute and then the next you don’t. So which is it?”

  Liberty sank down next to me and slipped her fingers through my hand lying limp beside me. “Do you remember that day in the shower, when I noticed a little dimple on the side of my breast?”

  Looking back, I thought nothing of it. I was too caught up with having my gorgeous wife’s naked body in my arms and loving the way she came apart around me as she cried out my name. But now… God, I felt like such an asshole for ignoring the concern that was so blatantly evident in her voice that day. I nodded unhurriedly, my voice low and deep, “Yeah, sweetheart. I remember.”

  “Well, I made an appointment to see the doctor the next day, and he didn’t seem too worried about it then, just said he would keep an eye on it. So I thought, maybe I was just overreacting like I always do. You know how I get. Once I let something stew in my mind, I can’t let it go.” Her grip on my hand tightened, and I found her big brown eyes looking up at me nervously. “But when I went back today, after my pre-natal checkup, they noticed that my skin on the side of my breast had become more puckered, so they decided to do an ultrasound.”

  “Did they find anything?” I swallowed hard, waiting anxiously for her to answer. Of course they found something, you idiot. There was no other reason for her to be telling me all of this now, and the tears pooling along the edges of her lashes didn’t exactly scream that everything was fine.

  “All they would tell me was that the cells appeared to be darker and denser than normal. The radiologist didn’t really go into much detail after that. Regardless, they went ahead and did a biopsy just to be sure, but I won’t have the results back until sometime next week.” She let out a heavy sigh. “So for now, we just play the waiting game.”

  She shrugged her shoulder against my side, and it was then I noticed her sudden discomfort. The strap of her tank top slid down, revealing her smooth tan skin, and the side of her breast closest to her armpit was covered with strips of medical tape; tape that was transparent enough to see blood trapped beneath, evidence of what she had gone through. All on her own. One sidelong glance, and the harsh reality of what she’d been put through had finally settled in.

  This wasn’t just some sick joke.

  My wife could have cancer.

  “Fuck.” I threw my head back against the cabinets with an audible thud, and the pained, guttural sound that tore through my chest was enough to bring Liberty crawling into my lap. She placed a hand on either side of my face and swept her thumbs across my cheeks. The look in her eyes was one full of sorrow and understanding, but it didn’t make sense for her to feel empathetic toward me when she was the one whose health was currently in limbo.

  “It’s okay, baby. It doesn’t hurt that bad. Really. They numbed it for the procedure and gave me some Tylenol before I left. I have more if it gets worse later.”

  She remained in my lap and gingerly weaved her fingers through my hair, comforting me in such a soothing, loving way, but really it should have been the other way around. I had to rectify that right now. I carefully stood, still holding her in my arms, and carried her out of the kitchen, making sure to avoid the broken pieces scattered around us.

  “What are you doing?” she whispered, burying her face in the crook of my neck.

  I continued down the hall to our bedroom and gently placed her in the center of the bed. My gaze lowered to the strap still hanging at the side of her arm before coming back up to meet the questioning look in her eyes.

  “Wait here.” I started off toward the door and heard her shuffling around in the blankets. “Liberty. Stay. Please.” I pleaded, watching her eyebrows draw together, but she nodded reluctantly and leaned back into the pillows.

  I headed back into the kitchen and filled a Ziploc bag with ice before returning to her. She was waiting patiently with her hands clasped over her stomach and studying my every move. When I placed the bag of ice on the nightstand beside her and reached for the hem of her shirt, she grabbed my wrist and shook her head.

  “Trust me.” The mattress dipped as I sat on the edge of the bed and leaned forward to press my forehead to hers. Our lips parted and her sweet breath mingled with mine, a taste I’d never forget and hoped I’d never have to go a day without. “I promised you once that I would never hurt you, and I meant every word. Just…please. Trust me. Let me help ease your pain.”

  Her eyes fluttered closed, and after a few seconds, she released my arm. I warily peeled the shirt up along her torso, and she sat up for me to lift it over her head. Underneath, she was wearing a thin sports bra that shielded most of the tape covering her incision, but it was still enough to see that there was already some bruising. I traced over the bottom of her bra, brushing against the underside of her breasts, and slipped my fingers beneath the stretchy fabric. Liberty’s eyes shot open, and she quickly sat up before I could go any further.

  “No! I…I can’t take it off yet.” She chewed the inside of her cheek nervously. “The doctor said I should sleep with it on. At least for tonight.”

  I nodded and softly kissed her lips. “All right, baby. No worries. Now lie back for me and close your eyes.”

  She resumed her position, her eyes falling shut shortly after, and I picked out a cube of ice from the bag that was just beginning to melt. Placing it between my lips, I languidly dragged it along her exposed skin and felt her shudder beneath me. I took my time and let her body acclimate to the contrast of the cold against her warm skin, starting at her ankles and working my way up to her neck. She seemed to enjoy my playful way of handling a not so pleasant situation, and even as goose bumps continued to spread along her gorgeous body, she kept a smile on her face through it all.

  I slowly trailed it back down her neck, along her collarbone, and over the swell of her breast. By then, the ice cube had melted, and it was only my lips caressing her skin. She drew her bottom lip between her teeth, nibbling on it timidly as her brows drew together. She knew where I was going with this, and whether she’d like to admit it or not, she was in a lot more pain than she was letting on. I just wanted to ease some of her pain in the only way I knew how.

  I took the bag of ice in my hand, carefully brought it next to her breast, and the second it covered the site of her incision, Liberty hissed in a sharp breath.

  “Shit, are you all right? Did I hurt you?”

  “No. I-It’s fine. It’s just a bit more tender than I thought.” The corner of her mouth pulled up into what I could only describe as the saddest excuse for a smile that I’d ever seen. My poor girl. She wasn’t fooling me. I knew it had to hurt like hell, yet she continued to put on a brave face. So stubborn and yet so beautiful.

  “Are you sure, sweetheart? I don’t want to make it worse.” I cupped her jaw, brushing my thumb along her soft, pink lips until her mouth finally spread into a genuine smile.

  “Really, it’s fine. I’m supposed to ice it on and off tonight anyway.” She sucked in a deep breath and quickly forced it out before placing the bag of ice back in my hand. “Do your worst, Dr. Thompson,” she whispered, giving me a sly grin.

  I leaned forward and chuckled against her lips, delicately placing the ice pack against her breast. She hissed again, eyes squeezed tight in pangs of discomfort, but this time around I was prepared, ready to swallow her cries and kiss away her pain.

  Once the initial shock wore off, she parted her lips and leaned into the kiss, demanding more. Always demanding more. Her tongue traced over my bottom lip, greedily begging me to let her in, and as wrong as it felt to be doing this while she was hurting, I couldn’t deny her request. She looked fucking breathtaking with her hair splayed over the pillow in long auburn waves, her delicious vanilla scent awakening my senses, her fingers digging into my shoulders and nails scraping down across my chest. I loved when she marked me like that, physically claiming me. Nothing got me harder than feeling the woman I love possess me with such ferocity, and I still had the scars on my back to prove it.

  It didn’t take long for the remaining ice to me
lt, and the bag slipped through my fingers as our kiss deepened, devouring one another. My hands slid down her ribs and ghosted over her stomach, feeling the barely-there bump that had begun to take shape over the last few weeks. It was amazing to finally see proof of the tiny lives we had created, not just on sonogram photos but beneath my very own hands. I still couldn’t believe that between the mere inches that separated us were our babies. Our babies. So fucking surreal…

  Holy shit, how had I forgotten about the babies?!

  I pulled back quickly, putting a stop to everything, and tried to catch my breath. My heart was racing a mile a minute, and Liberty lay beneath me, panting just as heavily with a look on her face that screamed she was going to murder me.

  She sat up on her elbows, wincing as she adjusted herself. “Seriously, Shayne?! You can’t get me all worked up like that and then shut me down. You think blue balls are bad? Trying being pregnant with raging hormones. I’m about ready to explode!”

  I sat back on my haunches and buried my hand in my hair. What the hell was I thinking? “I can’t…I can’t do this. Cancer…the babies… Jesus, Liberty, I didn’t even think about how it could affect the babies.”

  My fingers skimmed over her belly where our children lay safely inside of her, or so I had thought, and the murderous glare quickly fell from her face as she nodded in understanding. “There are risks, but the doctor said he would discuss it further when they got my results back. He didn’t want to worry me if it wasn’t absolutely necessary and stress me out more than I already am.”

  I nodded and answered weakly. “Yeah, I guess you’re right.”

  She sat up and slipped her legs over my thigh and her arms around my neck, molding her body to me. All thoughts of being buried deep inside her had flown straight out the window, but I still needed to be as close to her as possible, to feel her pressed up against me, to know that she was still here and not a mere apparition of the beautiful woman I had fallen in love with. I think she sensed it, too…which frightened me even more.