His hands shook. He hated hurting her. He hated that Adam had done this to her and hadn’t paid the price Brooke was paying now in pain and sorrow.
“Breathe, Brooke. I’m almost done.” Instead of winding gauze around her arm again, he simply strapped the brace back on, trying his best not to move her wrist at all. “The brace will hold the bandages in place.” He breathed a huge sigh of relief, then pulled her tank top strap down her shoulder and gently peeled the tape away from her skin, revealing the double scars where she’d been stabbed.
It shocked him to see the twin stitched cuts and bruising.
This could have been so much worse.
He tossed the bloody pads into the trash, slathered on a generous amount of medicine, then placed a new bandage over the wounds, taping it on all sides.
He breathed a huge sigh of relief to have one more task done.
But…now came the hardest one.
Cody sat and stared at her abdomen for a long moment, hesitating.
She gently pulled her top up, revealing the large bandage taped to her still-extended belly. She didn’t look six months pregnant anymore, but her stomach wasn’t flat either. Just deflated. Empty now.
His gaze rose to her engorged breasts. Soon her milk would dry up. She’d carried their daughter but never got to nurse her, hold her close and smell her, while she rocked and fed her.
That had been taken from her, too.
He’d never get to see that pretty picture in real life. Well, not with their daughter, but maybe with another child. One day. He hoped.
You’re getting ahead of yourself.
He refocused on her belly, wondering how she had felt about sharing her body with their daughter. What a wonder that must have been for her. But now…she must feel so utterly alone and empty.
He wanted to say something to acknowledge that fact but didn’t have words, because he felt an empty place in his heart now, too, and nothing would take away the ache and sorrow of losing another child for him.
But maybe being here for Brooke, helping her through this difficult time, would help him heal, too.
Cody rubbed his hands up and down her thighs to get her attention again, but all she did was stare at the wall, like she couldn’t stand to look at her abdomen.
He sighed and gently peeled the bandage off her stomach, revealing the eight-inch, crescent-shaped line of stitches carved along the side of her belly button, disturbingly red and angry looking. He carefully dabbed on the medicine.
She hissed in a breath at his soft touch.
He stopped immediately and looked up at her.
Tears slid down her face, and one landed on her chest.
He brushed it away with the pad of his thumb, then brought it to his mouth and sucked it away, distracting her from the pain.
“Cody, please. It’s too much. You have a fiancée waiting for you back home.” She wasn’t in any condition to hear what he had to say about that.
“We’ll talk about Kristi when you’re feeling better. Just know, everything has changed. I am here for you. So if you need me to tend your wounds, wipe away your tears, cry with you, hold you, love you, then I will do any and all of those things, anything to make you feel better. Or at least not worse. Because I understand your grief. I feel it, too.”
Tears filled her eyes again. She didn’t say anything about what he’d said, just gave the barest hint of a nod that she’d heard him, and kept staring at the wall.
He placed his hand on the outside of her abdomen, feeling the heat radiating from her skin. “This one looks really bad. I think it’s infected. Did the doctor say anything about it?”
“He said it would be better in a few days and to make sure to keep taking the antibiotics they prescribed and using the medicine on it.”
“Okay, I’ll put more on later this afternoon and again tonight.” He slathered on the medicine and bandaged the wound, taping it in place.
Others in the dorm were up and making noise in the hall and their rooms. A door slammed and she flinched, then immediately swiveled her head toward the door, like she expectedhimto walk through it any second. Her whole body trembled.
He put both hands on her thighs and squeezed, anchoring her to the here and now. “You need to get away from here and rest where it’s quiet.”
