A Diamond in the Dark (21 page)

Leonie had bought her a gift certificate to the day spa in Mason. Rick had given her a new saddle for Thunder. Tiny, a hand-carved wooden sculpture he’d picked up for her while he was in Hawaii. And Ethan had bought her a weekend away at a couple’s retreat in Houston.

Uncle Jack gave Ethan a funny look when she opened his present. “Why would you give her that?”

Ethan just said, “It’s good for a year. She could meet someone and take them.”

To distract him from asking more questions, she asked where his present was, batting her eyelashes at him, causing him to laugh.

“Come sit by me, sunshine.” There was a bit of shuffling around so she could do as he bade. When she was settled in her new seat, he handed her a big tube, inside were what looked to be blueprints.

“It’s lovely, Uncle Jack. But. Umm. What am I looking at?” It appeared to be a small building, but Tia wasn’t sure.

He laughed at her. “Well, I did tell you that I was going to build you your own lab. They start building next month. That gives you enough time to make any changes that you need. I talked to that doctor guy you mention from Mason, and he helped me with the initial specifications.”

Tia was speechless. Yes, he had mentioned it, but she didn’t think it would happen this quickly.

“Oh, and this is for you to start ordering your equipment.”

Tia just sat there staring at the lined picture of a building, that would soon be her lab, and the little black credit card beside it. It wasn’t until a big drop of water landed on the paper that she realized she was crying, breaking her from her silent stupor.

Throwing herself into his arms, she kissed him all over his handsome face. “Thank you, thank you, thank you.”

“You’re more than welcome, sunshine. Thank you for being part of our lives.”

“You couldn’t get rid of me if you tried,” she said, wiping the tears from her face and smiling.

“You are so spoilt, smelly butt,” Rick said as he kissed her on the head. “I have things to do, so I’ll see y’all at dinner.”

Just then the house phone rang, and Rick answered it on his way past. She knew who it was when he asked, “What’d you want, Barbie?”

She snatched the phone out of his hand before they could start bickering at each other. Tia slapped him on the back as he walked away. She spent the next half hour talking to Shelley. No sooner did she hang up than the phone rang again. This time it was Mara. For over an hour she fielded calls from the aunts, uncles, and cousins, all wanting to wish her a happy birthday.

By eleven-thirty she was starting to feel a little restless. After her last phone call, the wait for Axton to get home seemed to be a perpetual loop of minutes. There may be only sixty seconds in each minute, and sixty microseconds in each second, but each one of those seemed to take an eternity. After watching the clock tick away those endless microseconds, it was enough to drive her mad. She looked at the clock one last time to see that only another of those infinite minutes had passed. Tia decided it was time to get out of the house.

Changing into a pair of jeans, she let Leonie know that she was going for a ride on Thunder. It was as good a time as any to break in her new saddle. An hour’s ride in a new saddle was about all her ass could take anyway.

It was another overly warm day, but the humidity hadn’t risen and the breeze blowing over her face would feel ten times better with a good-paced ride. Tia felt a little dizzy as she jumped onto Thunder’s back, but it passed as quickly as it came. Shaking her head to clear the fuzzy feeling, she rode out of the stable at a gallop.

* * * *

Ethan had just turned from talking to one of the hands near the stable when he saw a fully saddled Thunder heading his way. He looked around for Tia, thinking she must have just dismounted. He’d felt a bit bad about giving her his present, but it wasn’t his fault that Ax was late getting back and he figured… Well, he thought he should apologize.

Thunder trotted up to him and nuzzled his shoulder. He took hold of the reins and scratched the big beast’s muzzle.

“Where’s Tia, boy?” He hadn’t seen her yet, and that wasn’t like her. Thunder was Tia’s baby, and she would never allow him to roam around where vehicles frequented without being near.

“Trick!” he called to one of the younger ranch hands. “Hold Thunder for me for a minute.” Ethan ran up to the house to see if Tia had gotten waylaid.

A quick search of the area showed no signs of Tia. As Leonie was telling him that she had gone for a ride about half an hour ago his dad walked in.

They raced out to the barn, looking for the still missing Tia.

They found her in the north field. She didn’t seem to have any broken bones, but she did have a huge lump on her head, and when she had finally come to, she’d started vomiting. It was a much longer ride back to the truck as they had to keep stopping to allow Tia to vomit. Ethan held her in his lap on the back seat of his dad’s truck as they sped the whole way to Mason Memorial Hospital.

Chapter 16

Tia felt like shit. Her head hurt, and her stomach kept flipping over. She’d already vomited a few times, but the nauseous feeling wouldn’t stop. She wasn’t sure, but she thought it was Ethan who had found her. She couldn’t quite remember what had happened. Her last recollection was sitting astride Thunder, a wave of dizziness had come over her, then it was all a little fuzzy.

She’d had a concussion once before, but nothing like this. Her whole body ached and she couldn’t open her eyes. When one of the poor doctors had shined a light into them, she’d vomited all over him.

Eventually they moved her from the triage area to a private room, which she was grateful for. It was reasonably quiet and dark, unlike the emergency area. They—the McGraettys—were waiting for a doctor to come and see her, but again she couldn’t be sure if they’d already been, as she kept slipping in and out of consciousness. One minute she was vaguely aware of what was going on around her, the next time she would come to, she could tell time had passed.

A soft squeezing of her hand brought what little attention she had back into focus. “Hello, Tia. I’m Doctor Rolan,” a raspy, masculine voice whispered, but it sounded like he was screaming straight into her eardrum. She whimpered in pain. “Shh. I know your head hurts, but I need to ask you a few questions. I heard that you came off your horse? If that’s what happened, you can squeeze my hand if you can’t talk yet.”

Tia squeezed it.

“Good. Well, you have a nice-sized lump on your head, so we’re going to send you down for an x-ray to make sure that nothing cracked. I’ll also give you some medicine that will help with the nausea and pain.”

She squeezed his hand again before he let it go. Ethan asked him a few questions that she couldn’t hear as they were talking so softly.

“Oh! I forgot to ask. Standard procedure...is there any chance you could be pregnant, Tia?” His voice was louder, but still soft enough to not hurt her aching brain.

Before she could say anything Jack answered for her. “No.” Until he spoke she’d forgotten he was even there.

Her head was killing her, and she still couldn’t open her eyes. She knew Ethan was in the room, not only had she heard his voice a few times, but he also hadn’t let go of her hand since he had found her. She squeezed his hand to get his attention.

“What is it T’T?” he asked, leaning down close to her so she didn’t have to talk loudly, which she appreciated since the sound of her own swallowing was hurting her head.

“You. You…you need to tell the doctor.” She squeezed his hand again to try and get her meaning across. Her and Axton hadn’t been using any form of protection. And in all honesty, she had never once thought about it.

“Okay, sweetie. Is there anything else?” Ethan asked, bringing her thoughts back into focus.

“I...I had a dizzy spell when I first got on Thunder. But…it passed quickly. I think, I might have been dizzy again and that made me fall.” God, every word she said was painful.

Ethan let go of her hand, and she heard him tell the doctor that she’d been dizzy. The doctor said something about running some tests. Just as the doctor left, she heard Ethan tell them he was going out to make a call. She hoped he was telling the doctor that there was a possibility she could be pregnant. If she was, she didn’t want to take anything that could hurt the baby. Come to think of it, her period was due three days ago. With that thought Tia either passed out again or drifted off to sleep.

The next time she awoke it was to her uncle telling off some poor nurse. “Why haven’t you given her anything for the pain? She’s been lying there moaning in her sleep.”

“Sir, I’m going to have to ask you to quiet down. Loud noises are not going to help the young lady,” replied a matronly voice.

“Dad, I’m sure they’re doing everything they can for her.”
Ethan.
He was still in the room too. Good.

“We have given her pain meds, sir. But I’m afraid the ones that pregnant women can take aren’t as strong—”

“What!”

Tia whimpered at the sound of Jack’s booming voice. Rolling over, she vomited onto the floor.

“That’s it! If you don’t leave the room, I’m going to call security.”

“Come on, Dad, let’s sit in the hall.” Ethan literally pulled him from Tia’s room.

* * * *

Jack was… He was… He had no clue what he was.
Pregnant.
How was she pregnant? She said she wasn’t seeing anyone.

“How?” He turned to ask his son.

“Umm, Dad, I don’t think I really need to explain how someone becomes pregnant to you,” Ethan said on a chuckle.

Fucking smartass kids.
They might be grown men, but they knew better than to show him any disrespect. “Ethan, why do you seem so calm about this?” When he didn’t answer, Jack grabbed him by the scruff of the shirt, lifting him off his seat. “Answer your father, boy. Why do you seem so calm about this? Is it your baby?”

Out of the corner of his eye he could see Rick rushing toward them. Jack hadn’t been this pissed off with one of his boys since he had caught the twins smoking pot at fifteen. After the tanning he had given them they hadn’t been able to sit for a week. At the moment he was minutes away from showing Ethan his fist, up close and personal, if he had touched Tia.

“Christ no. Dad. No. Calm down.” Ethan slumped back onto his chair when Jack let go of his shirt, one of the buttons having been ripped from it. He was relieved to know that his son hadn’t crossed that line with Tia, but it didn’t help with his anger.

“What the hell is going on here?” Rick asked.

“Did you know your sister’s pregnant?”

“What! Christ. Is the baby going to be okay?”

“I’m only going to ask you this once. Do either of you know who the father is?” He could see the hesitation in both. A father always knew when his kids were hiding something from him. And these two were definitely not telling him what he wanted to know.

“If one of you doesn’t tell me soon... Don’t think for a minute that either of you are too old for me to get the strap out.”

“Shit. It’s not my place to be telling you this, Dad.” Jack really didn’t care if it wasn’t Ethan’s place to tell him. Tia was his daughter, and he needed to know who had knocked her up.

“Ethan, the longer you take in telling me, the madder I’m getting.”

Ethan finally looked him in the eyes. “Axton and Tia have been seeing each other for about a month.”

“Fuck, Ethan, he has enough to worry about without you telling him this now.”

“Mind ya business, Rick. He thought I was the baby’s father.” Ethan, usually the calmer of the two, got into Rick’s face. “And how the fuck do you know about them anyway?”

“Jimmy Doland had her cornered in town the other day—”

With that Jack slapped the back of both their heads, stopping them from speaking. He had just found out that Tia was pregnant with his brother’s baby, and his idiot sons were busy arguing with each other.

“You knew about this too, Rick?”

“Yeah, Dad. Like I was saying—”

“Enough!” Jack looked at the other two, sitting in chairs across from Tia’s room. “Did you two know about this?”

Tiny nodded, but thank Christ Leonie said no. Jack didn’t know how he’d take it if she’d kept something like that from him. Looking back at his boys, he couldn’t think of anything to say. His fucking brother had been sleeping with someone he thought of as his daughter.

Leaving his boys bickering outside Tia’s room, he took Leonie’s hand and headed to the other end of the hallway.

“Fuck!” Ethan exclaimed.

“Yeah, the shit is gonna hit the fan when Axton gets here.”

“Shut up, Rick.”

* * * *

Ax was starting to get antsy. It was half past one, and Tia hadn’t shown up yet. Instead of waiting for her, he decided to go over to the main house to see what was holding her up. He spent the next forty minutes not being able to find anyone. When he asked one of the hands where everyone was he’d said he wasn’t sure but that Troy would know. Well, great! He hadn’t come across their foreman Troy either. He headed back to his place, wondering where the hell everyone was, and getting pissed at Tia for not coming over like she said she would.

Walking in his front door, he slammed it behind him, angry because he hadn’t been able to find anyone. He raced to answer the ringing cellphone he’d left sitting on the kitchen counter, hoping she had a good excuse. “Tia?”

“Ax, it’s Ethan. You might wanna get over to Mason Memorial—”

“What? Why? What’s happened?” His stomach had fallen through his feet—that feeling you get while riding a roller coaster—with the assumption that something had happened to Jack. They might not be exactly talking at the moment, but he was Axton’s brother, and he loved him. Ethan’s next words had him almost vomiting.

“Tia. She came off her horse and has a bad concussion.”

Ax had ran out of the house the moment Ethan had said Tia’s name, making the normally two-hour drive to Mason in about an hour and fifteen minutes. Pulling his truck into two spaces, he ran into the hospital.

Ax flew down the hallway, in the direction the nurse had pointed, and saw Ethan sitting outside what he guessed was Tia’s room. Before he could enter the door, Jack was in front of him, blocking his way. “Move, Jack. I need to see her.” Instead of moving out of his way, Jack threw a punch that had Ax flat on the ground, the back of his head meeting with the laminated floor.