“I am. I can’t handle any extra stress right now and having you here is a lot.”
“I can just stick around to help with the baby.”
“The nurses are here for that.”
“Violet, please, don’t send me home. I don’t even have a home to go to.”
“Whose fault is that?” I snapped at him and then winced and held onto my head. Apparently, pain came with the mood swings, good to know.
“I’ll be by in the morning,” Ridge said and left before I could even gain enough of my vision back to look up and watch him leave.
A minute later, my nurse came back into the room. “Mr. Westover let me know that you seemed to be in pain. How about we take the baby to the nursery for a bit, and you can get some rest?”
I didn’t want my baby out of my sight. “He has the anklet on, right?”
“He will be very secure, I promise. He has his anklet. It matches your bracelet, and you are the only person who has one. We can give one to the father as well, if you request it, but until then, you are the only one who can pick up baby Liam from the nursery.”
“Okay,” I winced again as I reluctantly gave up and allowed the nurse to take my son.
“I’ll be back with medicine to help you sleep peacefully for a while.”
For a while meant two hours max. They would wake me up on and off throughout the night whether the baby was with me or not. Considering I couldn’t use my right arm, I suddenly felt like a fool for sending Ridge away. He should have stayed and helped to take care of the baby through the night rather than me having to rely on strangers to do it. My anger melted away to intense sadness and self-loathing. By the time my nurse was back with some pain medication, I was thankful that a chemical-induced oblivion was headed my way.
Chapter 25
Violet
A week after I gave birth to Liam, I was finally released from the hospital. My son, though healthy enough to go home, stayed with me since I was a nursing mom. Despite the fact that I knew it broke his heart to go home every evening, Ridge showed up every day and stayed until the nurses kicked him out. He didn’t just hang around either. He was in full-on dad mode during those days. It made me wonder what it was going to be like when I finally got home.
I had questions for Ridge, but I was too much of a coward to ask them. So, when he asked to take us home from the hospital, I decided to take him up on the offer. If nothing else, I might finally get the nerve to ask.
Duri was all for the plan. In fact, she was the one who came up with it when she refused to drive me home from the hospital. “You have to figure things out. Even if you never get back together, you have a son to raise. If you want those relationships you both have with him to be healthy ones, then you need to be an adult and work on things.”
She wasn’t wrong. That didn’t mean I was happy with her when she abandoned us at the hospital and called Ridge to come do his duty and take us home.
We were all the way down to the car before I realized one crucial thing. “The car seat for Liam was in my Highlander.”
Ridge offered a sad smile to me. “Don’t worry, I got a new one for our boy. Figured you didn’t have one with the car being totaled.”
To my complete surprise, the car seat Ridge bought was the same one I had before. “How did you know?”
“Well, it had the safest rating, but when I showed it to your dad and Drake, they told me it was the one you had picked out before. Detective Daughtry told me we could get yours out of the Highlander because he didn’t think it sustained any damage, but I figured better to start fresh, just in case.”
I nodded and refused to cry even though I felt the burn of tears building. I sniffed back the sadness and tucked myself into Ridge’s car while he worked with the nurse to get our son buckled into the car seat properly. I couldn’t help since my dominant arm was still tucked into my side for another six weeks or so. Then I would have to start physical therapy.
It was not how I pictured becoming a new mom, but we were making it work through teamwork. After they finished with Liam, the nurse wished us well and Ridge climbed into the driver’s seat. When he didn’t move to start the car, I got nervous and finally glanced over to him.
“I’m ashamed to admit this, but I don’t know where you live.”
My heart dropped straight down to the floor of his car somewhere. It wasn’t supposed to be this way. The man I had been with for a decade of my life didn’t know where I lived and there was so much wrong with that. I gave him the address and looked away because I didn’t want to see any of the judgment I knew was coming when he saw where I lived.
I didn’t live in a bad area by any means, but my modest two-bedroom apartment was a far cry from the multimillion-dollar home we used to share in a gated community.
To my complete surprise, Ridge said nothing about my place as he looked around and checked out Liam’s nursery. It was completely decked out and done in soft hues of yellow and sage green, since I wasn’t sure of the gender.
“It’s cute. Did your dad help you put all this together?” Ridge asked as he laid our son down in his crib for the first time.
“Dad, Drake, and Moreland. Your dad came for moral support, but that man was made to put record contracts together, not furniture,” I joked. We both laughed and it felt good to know that was possible for us to do. I missed laughing with Ridge. We had the best time together over the years and it was probably one of the things I missed the most about having him in my life.
