Irresistibly Yours (Oxford #1)(69)

Don’t come, he’d said.

Penelope tried not to read too much into it. He was probably just being a good guy—not wanting to take her away from the baseball game.

Don’t come.

There was something so final—so harsh about those two words. One sentence.

Don’t come.

“Too damn bad, Cole,” she muttered. “I’m coming anyway.”

Penelope tossed a twenty at the cabdriver, not bothering to wait for change, and sprinted into the hospital.

She started toward the reception desk then skidded to a halt and took several steps backward when she saw the gift shop out of the corner of her eye.

A couple emerged carrying flowers, but Bobby wouldn’t want flowers. Her eyes drifted to a display of balloons. Bobby would love balloons.

Ten minutes later, Penelope made her way to the reception desk with an enormous bouquet of orange, blue, and white balloons.

Penelope was in luck. She’d come during visiting hours.

Penelope followed the nurse’s directions to Bobby’s room, ignoring the annoyed looks she got when her balloons took up the entire elevator.

Her heart pounded harder as she approached Bobby’s room. Please let him be okay. Please let him be perfectly okay….

She got as far as the open doorway and froze, unsure of her best move.

Surprise!

It’s me!

I know you said don’t come, but I love you, so really, it wasn’t a choice…

In the end, it was Bobby who decided for her. He turned his head, and his face broke into a smile that felt like it lifted her heart right out of her chest.

“Penelope!”

Cole’s head whipped around.

He was seated in a chair next to Bobby’s bed, and even as she pasted on a smile for Bobby’s sake, inwardly she lurched at the look on Cole’s face.

He looked like he’d aged five years in two hours.

“Are those for me?” Bobby asked in a delighted voice, apparently unaware of his brother’s distress.

“Um, of course they are,” she said, coming toward the bed.

“Mets colors!”

“What else would I bring?” she said in a scoffing voice.

There was a tiny table and chair against the wall. “How about I tie these here?” she asked, looping the ends of the balloon strings through the rung on the back of the chair.

“Okay!”

“Who’s the bear from?” she asked, nodding at the enormous stuffed bear on the table.

“My friends at the Big House. They can’t come see me yet, but Cole said they wanted me to have the bear.”

Penelope risked a glance at Cole. He was standing now, hands shoved into his back pockets as he stared at Bobby with a bleak expression on his face.

Penelope’s smile never wavered, but her eyes skimmed over Bobby. His foot was in one of those sling things, a cast running all the way up to his upper thigh, but it was the only obvious sign that he’d been hurt.

“What happened?” she asked, coming to stand beside him.

Bobby sighed. “Cole’s mad.”

Cole ran a hand through his hair. “I’m not mad, it’s just—”

“I’m not supposed to leave the house by myself,” Bobby explained with a voice resembling a weary teenager’s. “But Penelope, I had to.”

She reached out and rubbed his arm. “What for?”

His eyes were wide and earnest. “For Carly. I wanted to get her flowers. Yellow ones, ’cuz they’re her favorites.”

Penelope swallowed. The sweetness was killing her.

“I didn’t know the taxi wouldn’t stop,” Bobby said glumly.

“You should have waited for me, Bobby,” Cole said.

“I know. You’ve told me a hundred times.”

“Then why—”

“I wasn’t going to see you till Wednesday,” Bobby said. “I needed the flowers for Carly today.”

Oh, Bobby, no.

Penelope closed her eyes.

She knew Bobby didn’t mean any harm. He was just stating facts without a single thought to laying blame.

But instinctively, Penelope knew it was the worst possible thing he could have said.

A glance at Cole confirmed it. He looked destroyed.

And Penelope knew why. Sunday was Cole and Bobby’s day; any other Sunday, Cole would have been there when Bobby wanted to get the flowers. Could have gone with him. Could have stopped him from stepping into the street.

But Cole had rescheduled for another day.

For her.

“Will you sign my cast?” Bobby asked. “My doctor says I have to wear it for weeks but that I can have everyone sign it if they want to.”

“I’d love to.”

“Okay,” Bobby said happily. “You can sign it after Carly. And after Cole.”

“Uh-huh, I see where I rank,” she teased.

“Penelope, can I talk to you for a sec? Outside.” Cole’s voice was gruff.

Uh-oh.

“Sure,” she said, smiling at him. He didn’t smile back.

“Bob, can you keep yourself busy watching TV for a few minutes?” Cole asked.

“Definitely,” Bobby said, attention already turned to the television. “Do they have ice cream here?”