Read Online What She Wanted by Julie Anne Lindsey - Free Book Online Page B

needed someone, and I was useless to him, too. The nurse said talk to him, but I couldn’t. I never had. I didn’t know how.
    I dropped my face into waiting palms and stifled a frustrated sob. My elbow slid against the journal tucked into my bag. I still had no idea what Mark and Joshua had been arguing about when he had his heart attack. Joshua knew, but I wasn’t speaking to him. Mark knew, but I couldn’t ask him until he woke, and I couldn’t wake him.
    I opened the flap and set the bag at my feet. Mom’s glitter-covered journal was on top. The tiny heart-shaped lock dangled at its side. I pinched the trinket between my fingers and an idea percolated.
    “Would you wake up for her?” I asked the unconscious man before me.
    Of course he would. He’d do anything for her, including grieve for seventeen years.
    I squeezed the book in my hands. Opening it would betray Mom’s trust and invade her privacy. Would it matter, or were trust and privacy earthly constructs, wholly irrelevant to her now?
    He was her dad. He was happy in every photo I’d found of them. I didn’t know that guy. She’d never known this guy. I lifted my gaze to Mark. I didn’t know much about her, but I was confident Mom would want me to help Mark.
    Resolve slowly changed my arguments from reasons to leave the journal alone to reasons she’d want it opened.
    I carried the journal to the nurses’ station. “Excuse me.”
    The nurse beamed. “Yes? Everything okay?”
    I sipped oxygen through gritted teeth.
    This was it. Fate would decide for me. If the nurse could help, I was meant to read the journal. If not, I’d put it away when I got home and stop carrying it around, looking for reasons to peek inside. I cleared my throat. “Do you have any scissors?”
    She furrowed her brows. “I don’t know.”
    I held my breath.
    She opened and closed shallow drawers, rifling through pens and notepads. She lifted stacks of charts and ran her hand into kits with triage supplies. “I thought for sure…”
    Hope dwindled in my heart. What had I expected? Did I think the nurse sat out here scrapbooking? Did I think she had a magic caddy of office supplies? A Mary Poppins bag with one of everything inside?
    “Here you go.” She pushed a pair of tiny silver scissors across the desk between us. “Will these work?”
    Panic wedged in my throat. “Mm-hmm.”
    I accepted the offering stiffly and went back to my chair at Mark’s bedside.
    The journal was heavier as I positioned it on my lap.
    I opened the little scissors and slid narrow blades around the flap that had guarded Mom’s words for nearly two decades. Was I really doing this?
    I closed my eyes and squeezed the handles together. The material split under the pressure. I sucked air and squeezed again. And again. Until the lock swung away.
    A shuddered breath rocked through pounds of painful emotions in my chest.
    I shook my hands out hard at the wrists and fortified my nerves. Inside, a line of delicate, pink metallic script startled me into a sob.
    I pressed shaky fingers to my lips and read the precious words again.
     
    To Katy, with love.
     
    I jerked my attention to Mark, then into the hall. No one else saw it. Was it real?
    I followed Mom’s loopy script with my pointer finger. To me . With love.
    I turned the page and marveled at the sight of my name once more.
     
    Dear Katy,
    If you’re reading this, you’ve either grown up and I’m sharing this with you, or you’ve grown up and I haven’t. If the second one is true, you’ll know what that means. I’m pretty sure that’s the way this is going to go, but I have hope. Never give up on hope.
    I asked your dad to hang on to this journal for you in case I can’t, but your grandpa will have everything else. He’s such a packrat. I think he even kept my retainer. Sometimes he might seem distant, but he’s not. He’s thinking. Overthinking, probably. Just give him lots of hugs and tell him you love him when he gets like that.