Deserving of Luke (18 page)

The answer, when it came to her, wasn't pleasant, but it galvanized her. She had let Logan do this again—to her and her son—because she was a coward. She was afraid of what he could do to her, of how he could make her feel, and she was hiding out at Penny's because it meant she didn't have to deal with him. Didn't have to face her own weaknesses and failures when it came to Logan Powell.

But no more. She was done with that, just as she was done with him. But he had responsibilities to Luke. He was the one who had opened this can of worms, the one who had insisted he wanted to be a part of Luke's life. Now it was time for him to ante up.

This was it. She'd give him one more chance and if he didn't come through for Luke now, then he was done. She didn't care how loud he yelled or how many scenes he caused or how many lawyers he got, there would be no way she was letting him within one hundred yards of her child.

L
OGAN LET HIMSELF INTO
the house through the garage. After grabbing a beer, he flopped down on the sofa and turned on the TV. It wasn't until he'd twisted off the cap that it occurred to him that he was doing that a lot lately—coming home and getting buzzed in an effort to avoid thinking.

About Luke. About Paige. About the gigantic mess he had managed to make of all of their lives.

He put down the beer with a frown of disgust. The last thing he wanted was to turn into his mother—dealing with the difficult parts of life through a substance-induced haze. Oh, his mother's haze came from her prescription tranquilizers, but denial was denial was denial.

He'd started to call Paige at least fifty times over the past few days, wanting to explain. Wanting to apologize for running out on both her and Luke. But every time he dialed her number, he heard his mother's devastated voice in his head and he'd hung up, too afraid of ending up bitter, miserable, trapped to actually dial the phone.

He knew he was going to have to eventually. After all, he needed to see Luke. The days had passed with agonizing slowness and he knew that part of the reason was because he missed his son. It was amazing how fast he'd grown used to seeing the kid every day, how knowing he had an outing planned made the day go faster.

But he wasn't ready to face Paige yet, not even if it was to talk about their son. He needed a little more time to gird his defenses, to bury the hurt and the guilt and the sorrow so that they didn't spill over her the second he opened his mouth.

Reaching for the remote control, he flipped channels until he found a baseball game. Washington was playing Boston tonight. It promised to be a good game—he needed something to take his mind off his problems.

But he'd barely watched an inning when his doorbell rang. Cursing under his breath, he went to answer it, prepared to tell whoever was on the other side to leave him the hell alone.

He nearly fell over at the sight of Paige on his porch. Paige had come to see him.

But she didn't look like any Paige he had ever seen before. Dressed in an expensive black pantsuit with an emerald silk blouse and black stiletto heels, she looked every inch the successful businesswoman
she was. She also looked completely untouchable and about as inviting.

“Can I come in?” she asked.

“Sure, yeah, of course.” He stopped gaping like an idiot and stepped aside so she could come in. “Can I get you a drink?”

“No, thank you. I wouldn't exactly call this a social call.”

Something about her attitude pricked at him. Maybe it was the stiff way she held herself away from him or the look in her eye that said he was about three levels below the ugliest, most pathetic bug she could imagine. Whatever it was, he found himself wanting to get to her. Wanting to muss up her perfect look a little bit, until he could find the Paige he knew—the real Paige—wherever she'd hidden her.

Unable to resist, he shoved his hands in his pockets and leaned indolently against the wall. “Okay, darlin'. I'll bite. If this isn't a social call, what exactly is it?” He let his eyes sweep over her from head to toe, lingering on her full mouth, beautiful breasts and long, long legs.

Her eyes narrowed and he felt his body react to her challenge, felt himself grow hard when arousal was the last thing he should be feeling. Hadn't he promised himself that he was done with her, that he wouldn't do this? His sanity couldn't take it.

And yet, being in the same room with her made
him want to forget every vow he'd made. She was so damn sexy and smart, so damn perfect for him, that keeping his hands off of her was agony.

“Look, Logan, I don't care about what happened between us. I don't care that you snuck out of my house or that you didn't call me or that things didn't work out.”

“You don't care?” he asked, moving toward her slowly. Crowding her so that she retreated across the room.

“No.”

“Not at all?”

“Absolutely not.” But her voice didn't sound as certain as it had moments ago. Which was exactly what he'd been looking for. Because he cared that things weren't working out between them. He cared so much it was ripping him apart and he needed her to feel some of the confusion and need and desperation that was roiling inside him.

He stroked his hand down her satiny cheek, brushed his thumb over her sweet, pink lips. They parted on a gasp and her eyes turned cloudy in an instant.

“Are you sure?” he asked, leaning toward her, until his mouth was only centimeters from her ear. Though she didn't give an inch, a shudder worked its way through her and he grinned. “Because from
where I'm standing, it looks like you care a whole hell of a lot.”

“You really are a bastard, you know that?” Her voice trembled and he told himself to stop. Told himself that he was, indeed, being a bastard. Whatever he started here wasn't going to end well—that much was obvious. And yet he couldn't help himself. He needed to touch her, needed to feel her body against his one more time.

“If I'm such a bastard, why aren't you moving away?” He brought his other hand up, cupped her breast. Toyed with her diamond-hard nipple. “Why are you letting me touch you? Why are you all but shaking with desire?”

He lowered his mouth, brushed his lips against hers as he waited for her to react. This time, he wanted her to be the one to take him. Her to make the final move that brought their mouths into brutal, brilliant contact.

He was on fire, his body aching for her. His heart crying out for her even as he told himself it was useless. That loving her was hurtful, abhorrent, wrong. That she would hurt him again and again before things were finally over between them.

But none of his arguments mattered, none of the promises he'd made to himself were worth a damn. Because the second he'd opened that door he'd known
that nothing mattered but Paige and his son. And nothing ever would.

She didn't make the final move, didn't bring her mouth to his, so in the end he did it for her. He curled his hand around the back of her head and brought her forward, until her lips touched his.

Lust exploded in him the second their mouths met, and he went at her like a starving man. Thrusting his tongue between her lips, he explored every part of her honeyed depths before stroking along her tongue with his own.

He kissed her until he felt as though he was going to implode, taking everything she had to give and demanding more. More. More. Paige whimpered against him, her hands going to his shoulders and still he didn't relinquish her. He couldn't. He needed this, needed her, in a way he'd never needed anything or anyone in his entire life. And no matter how much she was going to hurt him in the end, there was no way he could let her go.

Except he had to, because suddenly she was shoving at him, her hands pushing against his chest as she struggled to get out of his embrace.

He let go the instant it registered that she wanted him to stop, stepped back and simply looked at her as he ran his tongue over his lips in an effort to pull more of her inside himself. But then he looked at her, really looked at her. The trembling he'd thought
was from passion was actually from grief. Her eyes burned with tears.

“Paige.” He reached for her with the intent of comforting her, but she pulled away so hard that she stumbled.

“Don't touch me. Don't you dare touch me ever again.”

Her words slammed through him with the power of a semi. “I don't understand. I can feel how much you want me.”

“I want a lot of things, Logan, but not all of them are good for me.
You're
not good for me.”

Her words so closely echoed his thoughts that he would have laughed if he didn't feel like he was being ripped apart. “You're unbelievable, you know that?”

“I'm unbelievable? You're the one who slept with me, dumped me, dumped your kid.”

“That's ancient history. I'm not the same man.”

“Aren't you?” She arched an eyebrow. “Because I wasn't talking about nine years ago. I was talking about now.”

“I didn't dump you.”

“What would you call it?”

“I was confused. I needed some time to think—”

“Oh, really?
You
needed time?”

“Yes, damn it. I won't apologize for that. I had to come to grips with what I feel for you. When you
cheated on me nine years ago, it nearly killed me. I know we were young, know that it wasn't supposed to matter. But I loved you then, loved you with everything I had. Knowing that you didn't feel the same way made me crazy.

“I didn't want to be like that again. Didn't want to lose myself to you so completely that you could hurt me like that again.”

Paige laughed, but it was a harsh, bitter sound that set everything inside him on red alert. “I hurt you?
I
hurt
you?
You've got some nerve, you know that?”

“Paige, don't do this. I want—”

“Do you think I give a damn what you want at this point? You're sitting over here, nursing imagined wounds from nearly a decade ago while I'm at home trying to figure out how to explain to my eight-year-old son why his daddy doesn't want to talk to him anymore. Why he didn't show up to take him bowling like he'd promised. Why he hasn't so much as called him in five days.”

Remorse filled him at her words, nearly brought him to his knees. “I'm sorry. I'll make it up to him. I needed to—”

She shook her head and the look in her eyes was filled with a contempt he'd never imagined seeing from her. “
You want. You need.
Isn't that the problem? Hasn't that always been the problem? In your head, it's all Logan, all the time, and to hell with what
anyone else wants or needs. Well, I'm done with it and I'm done with you. Don't come near me or my son, ever again.”

She turned on her five-inch heels and headed for the door at such a fast walk it was almost a run.

“Paige, wait!”

“I've waited long enough, Logan. I'm done waiting and so is your son.”

He slammed his palm against the door seconds before she got to it. “You can't do this. You can't keep my son from me.”

“As if I'd have to. You're doing an excellent job of that all by yourself.”

She reached for the door handle, tried to pull it open, but he wouldn't let go. He couldn't. Panic had set in and all he could think about was keeping her there until he could convince her that she was wrong about him. That he wasn't a selfish, self-absorbed bastard. That he did care about someone other than himself.

“Let go of the door, Logan.”

“Not yet.” He willed her to turn around, willed her to look at him, but she didn't so much as move.

“Paige.” He laid a soft hand on her back, was shocked to realize that she was trembling despite the hardass act she was putting on. It made him feel terrible even as it gave him hope. “Paige, please.”

At first he thought she wasn't going to answer, but finally she said, “What?”

“I never meant to hurt you. I swear.”

She did look at him then, her beautiful features contorted into a sneer. “As if you could.”

She grabbed the door handle, yanked as hard as she could. And because he was still reeling from her words—from the look of utter hatred she had leveled at him—he let his hand fall away.

Then she walked down his steps, leaving him with the knowledge that he had let the only thing that had ever truly mattered to him slip right through his fingers.

P
AIGE FINISHED PLANTING
the last group of flowers in the front yard, then stepped back to admire her handiwork. There were bright pinks and yellows and reds—cheerful colors that looked incredibly happy against the newly painted picket fence that rimmed the yard. Luke had chosen the plants in town the other day, and she had fallen in love with them the second he'd pointed them out.

Stretching, she rested her hands on her lower back, which still ached from the marathon painting session she and Penny had embarked on the day before. Then she turned and stared at the ocean beyond the cliffs that bordered her sister's land to the west. Three weeks had passed since her last fight with Logan, five weeks since she and Luke had arrived here, and a lot had changed.

Penny's beach house was almost finished. With the added influx of capital from Paige, she'd managed to get the plumbing and electric fixed in record time. And they had finished nearly all the rooms—painting, stripping the hardwood, staining it, arranging
the furniture and hanging curtains. If things stayed on track, Penny might be able to open by the end of July. It was a little late in the season, but they both figured catching half the summer was better than missing it completely, as they'd originally planned on.

And it wasn't as if there weren't tourists around looking for places to stay. In the past couple of weeks, the beach in front of the inn had filled up as flocks of tourists had moved in, laughing and surfing and building sandcastles on the stretch of beach Paige had somehow started to consider hers. They annoyed her, with their happy chatter and carefree games.

And yet she watched them religiously, took Luke down to the sand to play with the children nearly every day. And wondered what it would be like to be part of a family like that. With a mom and a dad and children, all of whom were secure in the love of the other members of the family. All of whom knew exactly where they belonged.

She was getting maudlin, a surefire sign that she'd had too much time to think. Better to go upstairs and get started retiling the last bathroom. Penny and Luke had gone to town to get more grout, but there was enough left that she could get started. If she kept busy, she wouldn't be able to brood about Logan and the absolute mess he had made of her and Luke's lives.

She was halfway up the stairs between the second and third floors when the phone rang. She almost left it to the answering machine, but some sixth sense she was barely aware of told her to answer it. Taking the stairs two at a time, she managed to reach it as the answering machine clicked on.

“Hello.”

“Paige, it's Logan.”

She hated that her heart beat faster at the sound of his voice, hated more that tears welled behind her eyelids. This whole thing stunk. She wanted to escape to L.A., where she wouldn't have to hear about him or think about him whenever she had a few moments of down time.

But then, when she thought of never running into him again—never seeing him again—something deep inside her screamed in protest. It was an untenable situation, one that was slowly driving her out of her mind.

Forcing herself to be strong, she injected steel into her voice in an effort to keep him from finding out how much he affected her. “I can't talk right now, Logan. I'm in the middle—”

“There's been an accident. Luke and Penny are at the hospital. It's pretty bad—”

The phone slipped from her hand, hit the floor as Logan's words replayed in her head. Then she was
running for the front door, grabbing her purse on the way.

The drive to the hospital usually took close to thirty minutes—it was halfway between Prospect and Sunshine, another small Oregon coastal town. She did it in fifteen minutes, praying the entire way.

Panic was alive within her, making it nearly impossible for her to think as she drove into the first parking spot she saw then ran for the emergency room doors. She didn't know what was wrong, didn't know who to talk to, didn't know anything—

Luke, oh, God, Luke. Penny. A sob welled in her chest. Later. There would be time enough to cry later after she knew how bad they were. After she'd seen her sister and her baby.

The first thing she saw in the emergency room was Logan, standing to the right of the doors, his silver eyes fastened on the entrance.

Suddenly his strong arms were around her, holding her up when her knees would have buckled. “Tell me,” she said against his chest. “Luke. Penny. Please. Tell me about my baby.”

“There isn't much to tell. They were involved in a head-on collision with a bunch of drunk teenagers who were driving on the wrong side of the road. Luke was unconscious when we got to the scene and he hasn't woken up yet. They're doing some tests now, a CAT scan and a few other things trying to see
if—” His voice broke. “Trying to see if there's any damage.”

“Damage?” she asked, trying to comprehend what he was saying…and what he wasn't.

“Brain damage, Paige. He hit his head really hard and they're trying to see—”

Not even Logan's strong hands could keep her from sliding to the floor. “He might be…”

“They don't know.” He crouched down next to her.

“Well, what do they know?” she shrieked.

“Nothing yet. It's going to be a while.”

“Oh, my God. Oh, my God. Where's the doctor? And why aren't you with Luke?”

“I was with him, Paige. They took him away to run the tests and the nurse promised to come get me as soon as he was back in the ER.”

“I want to see him. I need to see him, Logan.”

“You will, baby. I promise. As soon as he gets back, I'll take you to him.”

She nodded, but she could barely understand the words coming out of his mouth, could barely comprehend where she was and what she was doing there. Logan lifted a hand to her face, brushed her hair back from her eyes. As he did, she realized he was trembling. Big, tough Logan Powell was shaking like a leaf.

She wrapped her hand around his and held it to
her chest, trying to comfort him as he was her. “And Penny? What about my sister?”

“She's going to be fine. She has a number of cuts, a few deep lacerations to her arms. She's getting stitches right now, but the doctor said she'd be able to go home today.”

“Thank God.”

“Do you want to see her? She was upset about Luke so they had to sedate her. I think she could really use a hug from you right about now.”

“Yeah, of course.” She looked around the emergency room blindly. She knew she needed to get up but she couldn't seem to move, to think, to function.

Logan stood, then slowly eased her to her feet. “I've got you.”

“I can't do—”

“You don't have to do anything. Let me take care of you.” He wrapped his arm around her waist and guided her carefully toward the admittance desk.

The nurse must have recognized him because she buzzed them through and then she was standing outside the room where a doctor stitched a long gash on Penny's shoulder.

Paige started to shake as she looked at her sister, shocked at how much blood there was on her. Her shirt had been cut off and lay discarded on the floor. It was drenched in blood, as were her jeans and
much of her skin. To Paige's shame, all she could think about was if her sister looked this bad and was deemed all right, what did her child look like?

The doctor finished with the cut and as he prepared to do the next one, Logan pushed open the door, nudging her inside as he did so. Both Penny and the doctor looked up as they entered, and though it seemed like the doctor was going to object to their presence, an intimidating look from Logan had him snapping his mouth shut.

“I'm so sorry! Oh, God, Paige, I'm so sorry. I tried to get him out. I tried—”

“Shh, Penny. Stop.” She crossed the room in two strides, and ran a soothing hand down her sister's hair. She wanted to hug her, but Penny was so banged up she couldn't figure out how to do it without hurting her. “It's not your fault.”

“It is my fault. It is. I saw them, but I couldn't stop. I couldn't get out of the way—”

“I just got her calmed down enough to work on her,” the doctor said. “If you're going to upset her again, you'll have to leave.”

Paige ignored him. Grabbing her sister's hands, she said, “Penny, stop it. Just stop it. Logan was there, at the site. You did everything you could. This isn't your fault.”

“But—”

“It isn't your fault, Penny,” Logan said. “You have
to calm down and let the doctor take care of you, or he's going to knock you out and you'll be stuck here until tomorrow. We're here, they're taking care of Luke. Everything that can be done is being done.”

Paige didn't know if it was his words or the authoritative way he delivered them, but Penny lay against the hospital bed with a shuddering breath. Tears leaked from her eyes and Paige's heart broke for her sister.

“I need to finish stitching her,” the doctor said, though his voice had warmed considerably from when they'd first entered the room.

“Can she stay?” Penny whispered, her hand clutching at Paige's.

“I'm not going anywhere, Penny. So you squeeze my hand until your heart's content.”

 

H
OURS LATER
, L
OGAN STOOD BY
Luke's bedside with Paige and waited for the doctor to come discuss the results of all the tests they'd been running on him since he'd been admitted. Luke had been moved to pediatric ICU, something Logan didn't interpret as a good sign, and he was going crazy with the unknown.

A quick glance at Paige showed that she was as pale as he felt. She had Luke's hand clutched in her own, and she was whispering soothing words to him, though he had yet to regain consciousness. Her eyes
were red, her jaw tight, but she was holding it together better than he was. Who would have guessed?

He glanced at the clock, saw that only three minutes had passed since the last time he looked. They'd been the three longest minutes of his life, this afternoon the longest afternoon of his life, and if a doctor didn't get in here and talk to them soon, he wasn't going to be responsible for his actions. Officer of the law, be damned. He would beat the information out of the staff if he had to.

“He's going to be fine,” Paige whispered.

“Of course he is.”

“No. You need to say it like you believe it, Logan. Luke is going to be fine. He's going to walk away from this. He's going to—” Her voice broke, but she didn't cry. Didn't so much as tear up.

“Paige.”

He reached for her free hand, held it in his own. And though he had meant to comfort her, in the end, he was the one who was comforted. So much so that the excruciatingly slow passage of time somehow become a little more bearable.

It was nearly nine o'clock before a doctor came in. He was young and tired looking and Logan instantly distrusted him—a feeling that only grew when the doctor called him Mr. Matthews.

“How's my son?” he demanded, barely conscious
of the fact that Paige's fingernails were digging into the back of his hand.

“To be honest, we're not sure yet.” The doctor walked over to the computer on the table against the wall and pulled up some images of Luke's brain. “If you look here, you can see that there is some swelling in his brain, particularly around the frontal lobe.” The doctor traced the image with his pen.

“There's also a shadow over here that concerns us.” Again, he used the pen as a pointer. “It's in the premotor cortex, which affects voluntary movement of the body.”

“He's paralyzed?” Logan asked, as the world around him turned gray.

“First of all, it's way too early to even consider that. I don't think paralysis is going to be a problem, based on the area of the brain I'm seeing injury in. But swelling does hide a lot, so we'll do another CAT scan tomorrow morning, and a third probably tomorrow evening. Just to see where we stand.”

“Where do we stand right now, Dr. Roberts?” Paige spoke for the first time. “I won't hold you to anything you say right now, but please, tell me what you think. What's going on with Luke?”

“He started to come around earlier, but due to the swelling we're keeping him unconscious. If it goes down as I expect it to, we should be able to bring him around tomorrow evening or the following morning.
As for damage, symptoms…” He shook his head. “I just don't know yet. This part of the brain isn't responsible for the ability to move different body parts, simply the ability to coordinate movements. Walking, for example, requires the motion of both legs, the swinging of the arms, et cetera. Hitting a baseball requires the arms, legs, hands, back, shoulders. Damage to this area normally results in some jerkiness of movement, or lack of coordination. An inability to smoothly coordinate all of these body parts together.

“But nothing is guaranteed right now. And everything depends on how or if the swelling goes down on its own. I know that's not what you want to hear, but this is a waiting game. We have to watch for a little while and see what happens. See how much Luke's body can heal itself. Once that happens, we'll have a better idea.”

Vaguely, Logan was aware he had started to sway. Paige wrapped an arm around his waist to bolster him as she continued asking questions of the doctor that Logan hadn't even thought about. Questions that he knew would have occurred to him two minutes after the doctor walked out of the room.

As the doctor wound down, Logan felt his stomach twist. He couldn't do this, couldn't sit in this tiny little room with his son—
his son
—and wait to find out
what was going to happen. Wait to find out if Luke was going to be okay. Wait to see—

A sob rose in his throat. But he couldn't cry. Not here and not now. Not when Paige managed to hold herself together so well.