Total pages in book: 95
Estimated words: 90951 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 455(@200wpm)___ 364(@250wpm)___ 303(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 90951 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 455(@200wpm)___ 364(@250wpm)___ 303(@300wpm)
He doesn’t.
Smile fading, I add, “You can’t come stay with me, Blue. First of all, I don’t have room for you. Clover’s in the second biggest bedroom, and we turned the third bedroom into a music room. Second of all, I just found out you haven’t been ghosting me for months. Right after a traumatic event. I have no idea how I feel about anything that’s happened this morning, except—”
“It’s not about that,” he cuts in, his brow furrowed. “It’s about Clover. She’s going to need meaningful help, the kind that involves a lot of heavy lifting. And you’re hurt. And pregnant. You need to rest and heal, not put yourself or the baby at risk trying to lift a grown woman in and out of bed. Or from her wheelchair to the couch. Or…wherever.”
Wheelchair. Shit. I sag, the wind going out of my sails.
I hadn’t thought about that, but he’s probably right. Her arm, leg, and hip are all seriously messed up, basically the entire left side of her body. How on earth would she manage crutches like that? She’s absolutely going to be in a wheelchair.
And she’s going to need help with everything, absolutely everything, probably even getting onto the toilet. I can cook and clean and bring her meals and fetch her meds, but I’m not sure I’m physically up to the task of being her full-time caregiver.
“I’ll hire a nurse,” I say, sitting up straighter again.
Blue arches a brow. “Twenty-four hours a day? You’ll need two. Maybe three.”
“Then I’ll hire two or three,” I shoot back. “I can cover it. I have my own money, Archer. Plenty of it.”
The words hang between us, the subtext no longer about Clover.
Now, we’re both thinking about that fifty thousand dollar check again. The one I never cashed. The one I would rather have died than cashed, even if I’d actually needed the money. I’m too damned proud.
And so is Clover, a voice whispers at the back of my mind. She’s never going to let you hire round-the-clock nursing. If you try, you’ll just drive her away.
I nibble my bottom lip.
The inner voice is right. I know Clover. She might—might—let me and Blue float her basic expenses until she’s back on her feet. But she’s never going to accept more than food and shelter. And explaining that hiring help would actually be easier for me physically than doing the labor myself will only drive her away faster. She’ll feel like a burden, call her flaky dad to come pick her up, and be on her way back to Missouri before I can say “please don’t go.”
That’s the last thing I want.
Clover’s dad isn’t a bad man. When I texted him earlier, he was appropriately upset about the car accident and worried for his daughter. He’s ready to help any way he can; all Clover and I have to do is ask.”
But we shouldn’t have to ask. She shouldn’t have to ask. From what I’ve gathered, that’s always been the problem with her dad. He’s a nice guy who floats through life, being relentlessly pleasant and benignly neglectful.
At least, it’s benign now.
When Clover was a kid, who didn’t know she had to tell her father to buy her new clothes or take her to the doctor when she was sick, it wasn’t so benign. And don’t even get me started on the trauma he caused by letting poor twelve-year-old Clover start her period with absolutely no warning about what the hell was going on.
As she got older, it sounds like she got better at asking for what she needed, and her father got better at meeting those needs, but not at anticipating them. If she goes to stay with him, she’ll have to ask for every tiny thing, all day long. It would be demoralizing and far from conducive to healing from a major injury.
Besides, I’m sure having me help her out in the bathroom will be embarrassing, but not nearly as bad as having her father do it. I have a close, loving relationship with my dad, and I still don’t want him to see me with my britches down at this point in my life.
“I know you have money,” Blue finally says. “But Clover won’t want you spending that much of your money on her.”
“I know,” I mutter, crossing my hands over my stomach, where Bean is stretching in her sleep.
“I doubt she’d stand for it,” he adds.
“I know,” I repeat.
“It would probably make her feel like she had to go back to Missouri, and I don’t think being with her father is the best for her right—”
“I know,” I cut in with a huff, softening my tone as I add, “I was just thinking the same thing.”
“Sorry,” he says, his lips quirking. “I can’t read your mind.”
I arch a brow, thinking, Are you sure about that? It seemed like you could before. I would have sworn you knew my mind like the words to your favorite song. Right up until the day you wrote that stupid letter.