Was he finished already?
I stopped pouring Oliver’s sweet tea, glanced up, and saw Nate was still out on the floor talking to his mother, who had stopped in for a visit with Marley, Nate’s adorable baby girl.
My boss was right there. Barely ten feet in front of me. Crap. There was no sneaking a phone call now. Nate would totally bust me. Three strikes and I was out.
Begrudgingly, and against all of my heart’s desires, I ignored the call and went back to pouring the sweet tea.
My phone stopped vibrating, then a second later it started vibrating again, and not indicating I had a voice mail waiting on me. No. This was another call. Jamie didn’t even bother with a message. He was hitting Redial.
He was really wanting to talk to me. And I was really wanting to talk to him. Screw it. I set the pitcher down, let go of the glass, and reached for my back pocket.
Nate turned his head at that exact moment, as if he could fucking sense my unprofessionalism from where he was standing and the lengths I was willing to go to, and looked at me through his dark-rimmed glasses with eyes that were hard and suspicious and calculating firing strategies.
At least, that’s what I was seeing.
I flashed him a smile that was top-notch employee professional, and resumed gripping the pitcher and the glass.
Nate looked away and resumed speaking with his mother. The phone stopped vibrating. I closed my eyes and gathered breath in my lungs, started to expel it slowly and calmly, hoping to embrace that feeling instead of going manic up in here, but nearly choked on my breath when my pocket started vibrating yet again.
My eyes flashed open, widened, and focused on Nate’s profile. We were up to call number three.
Three. Three attempts wasn’t just wanting to talk to me. Three attempts was needing to talk to me. Later wouldn’t do. It had to happen now.
My heart started racing.
I spun around while digging my phone out of my pocket, bringing it in front of me after I was facing the kitchen so Nate couldn’t see it. I looked at the screen, my thumb automatically sliding to unlock it so I could shoot Jamie a quick text of explanation when the name of the caller came into focus.
My thumb quit sliding. Jamie wasn’t calling me right now. My mother was.
And after the final vibration cleared the screen a second later and my missed calls displayed, I saw it had been her calling me all along.
My stomach clenched. My heart was racing for an entirely different reason now. My mother never dialed me up urgently like this.
What if something was wrong? Oh, God …
Gripping my phone in my hand, I spun around and held it in the air, waving it and grabbing Nate’s attention.
“It’s my mom,” I whispered, counting on his ability to read lips since my voice couldn’t carry any louder right now.
Worry had its hand curled tight around my throat.
Nate nodded, then jerked his chin at the door to the employee lounge, indicating that was where I needed to take the call. I made it out from behind the bar before I was dialing her back, but I never made it to the lounge.
My mom answered on the first ring, and I heard her voice, her panic, which told me all I needed to know before she even uttered the words a breath before my phone hit the floor.
I never even bothered to pick it up. I was too focused on getting out of there and getting to my parents.
As it turned out, I did leave in the middle of a shift that day. But not to hop on a plane.
While my man was winning another title, I was driving to Raleigh Regional Hospital.
My father had suffered a heart attack.
* * *
“Mom,” I groaned, covering my face with my hands as I stood at the foot of the hospital bed.
I had arrived minutes ago after hightailing it out of Dogwood Beach like a bat out of hell.
I shaved close to forty-five minutes off my three-hour drive time. I got cleared at reception and assigned a visitor’s pass, was told my father’s room number after screaming my demand for it, and ran through the ER with tears streaming down my face.
I was expecting the worst. My father hooked up to machines and possibly unconscious, or news that it was just too late, we’re sorry, and we did all we could do.
My mother could’ve been calling to inform me of this devastation. However, I had no way of knowing since my phone was back in Dogwood Beach.
I was panicked, hysterical, and scared out of my mind.
So you can imagine my shock and alarm when I threw open the curtains to his room, darted inside, and saw the state my father was currently in. Sitting up in bed. Hooked up to machines but with nothing beeping, only monitoring. Eyes alert. Smile tugging at his mouth as he watched my mother’s continuing freak-out.
That’s right. The man was smiling on the day he’d possibly had a heart attack.
Possibly because I didn’t know for sure if he’d had one or not. I was still trying for specifics. It was like pulling teeth at this point.
Dropping my hands to the foot rail and holding there, I frowned at my mother as she stood beside the bed, arms folded under her chest, foot tapping, and anxious eyes glued to the monitor.
My father had just revealed there was a chance he hadn’t suffered a heart attack. His exact words being, “Your mother exaggerates.”
“Okay, you need to tell me exactly what the doctor said,” I insisted, directing my words at either of them, not caring who answered, just needing an answer. “Was it a heart attack, or what? What are they saying?”
My mother’s quietly admitted “They aren’t sure” came at the exact time as my father’s conceited and overly confident “Nope.”