The Rockers' Babies (The Rocker... Series) (30 page)

like I normally did when I wasn’t ready to talk about something.

Muttering a curse under my breath I sucked it up and just asked him point blank, “Does that mean you

don’t want to try for a baby?” The line went dead and I knew I had pissed him off. Great, just great. “This day blows.” Trying not to worry about the pissed-off man I had to go home to later, I forced my attention

to the pictures still lying on my desk needing my attention.

“You are the most frustrating woman on the face of the planet.” I nearly jumped out of my skin when

Shane walked into my office not ten minutes later. He had to have been already on his way when I talked to

him earlier or he wouldn’t have been able to make it here in such a short time frame.

He slammed the door to my office and pulled the blinds closed to the window that looked out into the

corridor. When he turned back to face me my heart was still beating like I had run a marathon. Wearing

only a pair of basketball shorts, a faded old T-shirt, and running shoes that were tattered but his favorite to run on the beach in he was still the sexiest man I had ever seen in my life. The old Boston Red Sox baseball cap turned backward just made my fingers itch to push it off his head and run my fingers through his short

dark hair.

“Why would you say something like that?” he demanded, jumping right into the heart of the matter.

“Scratch that. Why would you even think that? Damn it, Harper, haven’t we moved on from shit like this?”

“It just sounded like you were having second thoughts,” I told him, still seated because I was in such

awe of the god-like creature I got to call my husband. Seeing the anger and the hurt in his eyes made me

regret even thinking that he didn’t want us to try for a child of our own.

“That wasn’t it at all. Look, baby. You are obviously having a hard time and this is just the beginning. I

don’t want you to hurt like this. I don’t want you to be so unlike yourself and miserable…” He raised his

hands to cut me off when I started to argue. “Don’t you fucking dare lie to me, woman. I want you to be

healthy. You mean more to me than anything in the world, and that includes us having a kid. Do you hear

me?” He stalked toward me, his eyes smoldering with a combination of frustration and love that had me

squirming in my chair for something I wasn’t going to get anytime soon the way this freaking period was

going. “Harper? Do you understand me? You healthy is more important.”

Dumbly I nodded, unable to find my voice with my throat all choked up with a mixture of emotional

tears and need for the sex god just inches away from me now. He put his hands flat on the desk and leaned

forward until his nose was touching mine. “Are we done driving each other crazy today, beautiful? Because

I’d rather be kissing you than arguing with you.”

I pressed my lips to his, letting that be my answer.

Shane

For the second time in a week I sat with Harper in her doctor’s office, waiting for the results of the tests the woman had done the last time we had been in here. Blood work, ultrasound, and a few other things that

I hadn’t been allowed in the room to witness and Harper hadn’t explained to me. I was a nervous wreck

and had been since the last time I had sat here and the doctor had said that Harper could have something

that was called PCOS or something far, far worse… cancer.

I hadn’t known what PCOS was so I had googled the shit out of it the moment we had gotten home the

other night. Once I knew what we were dealing with I had been praying for the PCOS. Polycystic ovary

syndrome caused a hormone imbalance that could produce ovarian cysts, the heavy period that Harper was

still having even now—or no period at all in some cases, as well as any number of other changes that she

had been showing signs of over the last two weeks of this hellish period.

The cancer possibility? Yeah, I hadn’t let myself think about that much because the few times I actually

had I had gone to a very bad place.

Cancer was some scary shit and I wasn’t going to be able to handle anything in life if that fucker tried to take away my girl.

Harper sat beside me in a chair that, while only a few inches away from my own, felt way too far away

for my comfort. She was holding my hand, having been my rock from the moment the doctor had told us

what she suspected was going on with Harper. It should have been the other way around. I should have

been the one who looked like I could conquer the world and everything else that looked like a threat to the person who meant more to me than life. I should have been the one who had held
her
the night we had gotten home from the first appointment while she cried silent tears.

Instead it had been her, looking strong and determined while I stood shaking in my running shoes. It

was she who held me while I cried. Because I couldn’t fucking handle even the thought of losing her.

Emmie was worried about me, but I couldn’t talk to her about this yet. Harper had asked me not to tell

anyone, including Emmie until we knew what we were dealing with. Everyone was still recovering from the

stress of the twins, who were still in the hospital, and Lucy’s kidnapping. It had made this whole thing even harder for me, not being able to talk to my brother or even Emmie. Em knew that there was something

wrong, was calling me almost every hour. I hadn’t taken any of her calls and kept in contact only through

texts because I knew I would have broken down and let it all out.

As soon as we were done here I would call her, I promised myself. If this shit turned out to be bad then

I was going to need Em as much as I was going to need Harper to hold onto.

The doctor finally pulled Harper’s test results up on her iPad and nodded her graying head. “It’s exactly what I suspected, Harper,” the woman said, and I was sure I was going to vomit. Fuck… “PCOS is treatable

and you were doing really well on the birth control pills. I think you should start back on those and we can see if that will get you back to normal.”

Relief washed over me. Harper squeezed my hand, shooting me that beautiful smile. “That’s good

news.”

The doctor shrugged. “It is treatable, but you had mentioned a few weeks ago that the two of you

wanted to try and have a child…” The doctor looked sympathetic and her voice became gentle as if she

were about to deliver bad news. My gut clenched again because I felt Harper’s hand start to tremble. “…But

your PCOS is so severe that I don’t think that will ever be a possibility.”

“But she’s okay, right?” I asked, needing to make one hundred percent sure. Nothing else really

mattered. Who the fuck needed kids? I had all I wanted right beside me. “She’s going to be all right?”

The older woman gave me a small smile. “Your wife is going to be fine, Mr. Stevenson. The inability to

have a child…” her gaze went back to Harper who now had her head bowed, “…well that can take its own

toll.” She stood. “I’m going to give you two some privacy. Take your time.”

As soon as the door closed behind the doctor I pulled Harper into my lap. I was shaking with relief, but

she was motionless. Her head leaned against my chest and she just sat like that for a long moment while I

ran my hands up and down her spine. “I feel… empty,” she whispered as the first sob racked her and shot

me straight in the heart. “Why do I feel so empty?”

“Sweetheart…” I kissed the top of her head, “…I’m sorry. I know that you wanted our baby…” My

voice trailed off because I didn’t know what else to say to her. Maybe I was a selfish bastard. Okay, there was no maybe about it. I really was a selfish bastard, because right then it didn’t bother me that we weren’t going to get to have a child of our own. I was so happy that I wasn’t going to have to face the fear of losing Harper that nothing else in the world mattered. I didn’t need a kid of our own.

I just needed her.

Chapter 27

Emmie

My calendar was spread out in front of me and I was trying to figure out exactly how to fit in going to

New York for the birth of Lana and Drake’s daughter and be back here in time for the twins to be released

from the hospital. Lana’s due date was next week and the doctor had said that more than likely Luca and

Lyric would get to come home. The twins’ sleep apnea alarms had been going off less and less but still not

three nights in a row yet, but next week was looking like a huge possibility.

“You have a meeting with Mia’s preschool teacher in two hours.”

I didn’t even look up at the woman as she spoke and I was sure that she hadn’t been expecting me to

anyway. I’d hired three assistants so far and only one of them had made it longer than a week. The first one had quit because she couldn’t take my attitude. I’d told her the day I’d hired the woman that I wasn’t an

easy person to work for. She hadn’t believed me, which had been made blatantly apparent when I had

started chewing her out for not immediately telling me when Lana had been on the phone—an emotionally

wrecked Lana at that. Stupid bitch—the ex-assistant, not Lana.

The second assistant had quit when I had told her point blank that
my husband
was my husband and

not ever going to start an affair with her. I didn’t even remember the woman’s name because for one she

hadn’t worked for me for longer than five hours before she was trying to get Nik to sign her tits. For

another, she really hadn’t been worth getting to know. The chick probably could make it big on screen,

though. She had fooled me into hiring her, pretending to be a serious career-minded individual who wanted

to learn the music business.

Rachel was a different story, though. She had proven to be efficient, handling all my phone calls, the

mail and most of the emails that came in. She was thirty-eight and had the tone of an angry fifth-grade

teacher who only softened when she spoke to Mia and Lucy, which deterred most people who were only

calling to annoy the hell out of me. Having spent her life in a house full of nothing but chaos she knew how to micromanage and kick ass over the phone.

Honestly, the woman was a godsend. Now if only I could clone her my life would be so much simpler.

“Thanks,” I muttered, still considering the calendar.

“Your husband wants to know if you want to pick up dinner while you’re out or if he should grill

steaks.” I flicked my eyes up but only briefly, wincing as soon as I did so because my eye was still pretty sensitive. The scar that went from my hairline to my eye brow was itchy and irritating, but it didn’t compare to the lingering pain underneath. “Shane asked me to have you call him at your earliest convenience…”

I picked up my cellphone, ready to call him back now. Shane and Harper were going through a lot at

the moment. Well Harper was, Shane was in a better place than she was at the moment. Which probably

made it all the worse for poor Harper. She couldn’t understand why he wasn’t more upset over them being

unable to have kids. I could see it from both of their points of view. Shane was just happy to have Harper

and not have to worry about losing her to the dreaded C word. Harper was slipping deeper into depression

more and more every day because she wasn’t going to be able to have something I cherished every day.

That depression was also making old scars resurface and crack open.

“…and Axton Cage is holding on line two.”

“Ax?” I frowned and reached for the phone on my new desk instead of my cell. Everything in the

guesthouse was new actually, except for the small kitchen that I hadn’t bothered to have taken out. It had

taken two weeks to get the layout I had wanted from the contractor. What had once been the living room

was now a reception area that had Rachel’s desk as well as a few chairs and the walls were covered in

beautifully framed posters of both Demon’s Wings and OtherWorld. The bedroom was now my office and

really my sanctuary since I hid out in here more often than anywhere else. Rachel had made it so easy for

me to push off things on to her.

That Axton was calling my office and not my cell was enough to cause me to worry. He texted me

twenty times a day even if it was just to say hi or send me a picture he had found on Facebook. “Hey,” I

greeted. “What’s up?”

“I want Liam out.”

I blinked at how cold his voice was. I don’t think I had ever heard him as pissed off as he was right

now. That it was because of Liam Bryant didn’t surprise me, of course, but Liam was still in rehab in

upstate New York. Axton shouldn’t even know where he was, so why the fuck was he so mad? “Why?”

“Do I need a fucking reason?” he snarled and I glanced up at Rachel who was still standing in the

doorway of my office. Nodding my head she backed out and closed the door behind her.

“Okay, just calm down,” I told him calmly. “Whatever is going on we can work it out, Ax. Stop biting

my head off and tell me what’s going on.”

“He’s a backstabbing dickwad, that’s what is going on. Just because he’s so fucked up in the head he

thinks he should be entitled to everything he sees and wants. I want him out or I’m walking.” My eyes

narrowed, knowing that whatever had pushed my friend over the edge was huge. Through everything he

and OtherWorld had been through he had never threatened to leave the band before. He loved what he did

and having his bandmates standing behind him on stage had always been something he was proud of.

“Is this because he was screwing around with Gabriella Moreitti?” Just saying her name left a bad taste

in my mouth, but I knew it had to have something to do with the little Italian rocker. It wasn’t until very recently that I had learned that Axton’s ex had been shacking up with Liam, but had kicked his ass to the