Always on My Mind by Susan May Warren Read Free Book Online Page A

her,seeing her with stringy hair, soiled and fat, coiled in pain. She jerked her arm back. “Go away, Casper.”
    The words burned through her, but she swallowed any attempt to soften them, opened her eyes, and steeled herself against the sight of him.
    If anything, up close he’d only managed to become more devastatingly handsome, with a ragged beard and his chocolate-brown hair curling out the back of a red bandanna.
    He frowned, his sea-blue eyes filled with a concern that could make her weep, especially when he reached out for her again. “Let me help you up.”
    She shook her head, pushed up from the floor. “No. Please, Casper, leave me alone.”
    The next contraction rolled over her, and her body betrayed her. She whimpered, collapsing back to the floor.
    “Hardly. Grace, get me a blanket. Raina, relax. You have to breathe. The baby needs air. Breathe.”
    She’d breathe as soon as her body decided not to turn inside out.
    By the time the contraction released, she was crying. She barely noticed as Casper draped a blanket over her.
    “It wasn’t this bad before,” she gasped.
    “Before?” Casper said.
    “She went into preterm labor a couple weeks ago. She’s been on bed rest ever since,” Grace said as if Raina couldn’t speak for herself. Or maybe she couldn’t because another contraction gripped her, and this time she felt her entire body begin to shift as if the baby had moved inside her.
    “I think we’re running out of time,” Raina said when it ended. She opened her eyes and found Grace. “Okay, let’s go.”
    She was shaking, however, and groaned. Probably that was all Casper needed because suddenly he slid his arms under her and picked her up.
    As if she weren’t the size of a small Volkswagen.
    And Raina, thanks to her pitiful state, uttered barely a protest. He curled her to his chest as Grace tucked the blanket in around her.
    Oh, she’d forgotten the heady sense of being in his arms, the solid planes of his chest, the cotton and surf smell of him, the way he could make her believe she was safe. She hated herself a little when she reached up, grabbed a handful of his sweatshirt. “Please don’t drop me.”
    He gave her a look then, his expression so pained or perhaps horrified that she had to close her eyes. “Never.”
    He carried her from the apartment into the elevator, Grace trotting behind with Raina’s bag.
    “Your car or mine?” Casper said.
    “Mine,” Grace said. “I’ll drive; you hold Raina.”
    Raina didn’t argue. A contraction hit, and she clung to Casper, this time trying to relax, grateful for his grip on her.
    “Breathe, Raina. Just in and out.” He demonstrated as if he’d taken the preparing-for-childbirth classes with her.
    For a second, regret filled her throat. What if he had? What if she’d told him about the baby instead of pushing him out of her life?
    Except, well, the baby wasn’t his, was it?
    She closed her eyes and breathed.
    When they got to the car, he lifted her into the backseat, climbing in beside her. Grace added the bag to the trunk of her Altima and then ducked into the front.
    “Don’t have this baby in my car,” Grace said as she pulled out.
    Raina tried to laugh, but the entire thing seemed so wretched that she could only offer a sad rumble.
    Casper tucked her sweaty hair behind her ear, and she looked at him, her lip caught in her teeth.
    His eyes were wet. “Why didn’t you tell me?”
    “What exactly could I have said that would have made any of this okay?”
    He glanced away, a tear hanging off his chin.
    “I . . . I didn’t mean for this to happen. I wish   —”
    “I know.” He looked at her then, a softness in his eyes. “I know.”
    She couldn’t bear it, even as the next contraction rose through her. “You shouldn’t be here. I . . . You shouldn’t have come back.”
    And then, as Grace drove toward Methodist Hospital, she focused her breathing, concentrating through the pain. Don’t have the baby in