Page 75 of Wilder Heart

“No, she’s not alone. She asked me to call her parents. Her mom is with her.”

Lain inhaled and exhaled loudly. “Her parents. Okay. That’s—no, yeah, that’s fine. Annalise?”

“Is standing right here beside me. She wanted to talk to you. Here, I’ll put her on.”

He passed the phone to her, and she bounced on the balls of her feet as she put it to her ear. “Hi, Daddy! Yeah, we’re at the hospital. Yeah, Momma’s been fine. Her ‘tractions were hurting her but she kept squeezing Uncle Wilder’s hand until he said bad words and that made her feel better.” She giggled, and Wilder’s face flamed. “Yeah, he has been. Grandpa’s here now, too. When are you gonna get here? …Oh. Okay, well, that’s fine. As long as you’re coming. Okay, I love you, too.” She held the phone out. “He wants to talk to you again.”

Wilder wanted to sink into the floor as he raised the phone to his ear again. “Hey.”

“Call me if there are any updates, okay? We’re coming just as fast as we can, butCashwouldn’t let me drive.”

Distantly, he heard Cash’s raised voice. “Because we want you to get to the hospital in one piece, and you were driving like a maniac in thesnow!”

Wilder couldn’t have stopped the way his whole body melted against the desk if he’d tried. Just hearing Cash’s voice soothed the tension in him. There was a very real chance he’dcollapse right into the man’s arms when they finally made it to the hospital. That would be quite a way to announce their relationship to Lain.

“I was not! Ugh, whatever. Listen, Wilder, just stay there. We’ll be there as soon as we can.”

We. Cash was coming. Cash would be there in a few hours. Lain would take over as Mary-Beth’s support person—he didn’t count Robert and Emily in that regard, because they didn’t seem to care about being a go-between for Mary-Beth and Lain—and Wilder could sink back into the background where he belonged. This wasn’t his show. He wasn’t meant to be here, and he was hanging on by his fingernails.

“Okay. See you soon.”

He hung the phone up gently, bowing his head over it and sinking his fingers into his hair as he gathered his will to turn around and face reality once more.

Annalise smiled up at him, the most resilient of them all. “Doc McStuffins now?”

He chuckled. He was supposed to be strong for her, but he had a feeling it was the other way around. “Yeah. Only if you’ll relax and try to rest while we watch it.”

“Okay! Momma packed my favorite blanket. We can share.”

Robert looked like he might pop a blood vessel in his forehead, but Annalise was oblivious, taking Wilder’s hand and leading him back to Mary-Beth’s room.

Sometime during thesecond episode of Doc McStuffins treating her little plushie animal patients, Annalise fell asleep wrapped in her feather-soft blanket speckled with stars and galloping horses, tucked under Wilder’s arm and snoring softly against hischest. Robert sat stiffly in the rocker across from them, watching like he thought Wilder might try to smother her at any moment. For lack of anything else to distract him, Wilder kept watching the show with the volume turned down low. He intended to ignore Robert for as long as possible.

Finally, Robert broke the silence. “You should leave while she’s asleep.”

“If I move, she might wake.” He kept his voice low.

“You can tell her you’re going to the bathroom or for a cup of coffee.”

“I’m not in the habit of lying to children.” He brushed one of Annalise’s braided pigtails with his thumb.

“Let’s not discuss what you are or aren’t in the habit of doing.”

Enough of this. Wilder met Robert’s eyes. “You don’t know me.”

“I know enough.”

“You’re judgmental.”

“You’re a monster.”

“She doesn’t think so.”

Robert scoffed. “She’s seven. She doesn’t understand the way the world works.”

“Nor should she. She’s seven,” Wilder repeated.

Robert’s expression hardened. “You shouldn’t be here.”

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