End Game (Vegas Aces #5) - Lisa Suzanne Page 0,2

stare at it.

It must be a million hours of waiting that in real time is only about three minutes.

And in those three minutes, a million thoughts run through my head.

I read somewhere once that an hourglass is a sign that life is fleeting—that pirates used them as symbols on their flags to scare their victims. I get that an hourglass symbolizes time, first and foremost, but it’s that other symbolism that strikes me now. The sands of time will run out for all of us at some point, whether it’s on our careers or a season or our entire life. It’s inevitable. The one thing we really can’t stop is time, yet it’s such a limited, precious thing.

Whatever this test says when the hourglass stops flashing, one thing is certain. I want whatever fleeting moments I have left on this Earth to be spent beside Luke.

Yet I fear for us. This injury and whatever secrets are still held in his past are two things that have the power to come between us.

I’ll do everything I possibly can not to let them.

Luke’s words come back to me. I want you to just hold out for the me you know. He’ll be back, and we’ll have our life back in a couple months, and we’ll be stronger for it.

He issued that warning before the injury. Does it still hold true? Will he be back? Or did the Luke I fell in love with change forever when Allen Hammond plowed into his knee?

That man he referred to when he said the me you know is my Prince Charming. That much I know.

The hourglass keeps flashing, and then a single word appears on the screen.

Pregnant.

CHAPTER 2

Tears roll down my cheeks. I’m not sure whether they’re happy tears or something else just yet, but whatever the case is, this baby is Luke’s without a doubt. I’m having a baby with the man I’m in love with.

Holy shit.

I feel a little dizzy at the thought of it.

I type what do I do if I’m pregnant into my search bar on my phone, and it says I should make an appointment with a doctor ASAP.

I don’t even have a doctor out here.

Michelle’s doctor was a little mean to me, but it was in the interest of her patient. Since it’s the only doctor’s office I even know about here in Vegas, I immediately call and book an appointment. They can’t get in new patients until next week, and I suppose I’ll wait to tell anybody anything until I’ve gone to that appointment and confirmed everything’s okay. Then I’ll have a due date. I’ll have more information, and I’ll be equipped to handle whatever Luke’s response might be.

I draw in a deep breath, shove the test into the bottom of my purse, and hide my purse in my closet.

I stare at myself in the mirror.

I’m the same girl I was before I left for Denver, yet everything is different. Same dark blonde hair. Same blue eyes. But now I know something about myself I didn’t before.

I hear the front door open and close. I swipe under my eyes, and then I hear my brother’s voice. “Hi honey, we’re home!”

I rush down the stairs. Josh is wheeling Luke in a wheelchair into the family room, where Michelle is already waiting on the couch with a sympathetic pucker on her face.

Josh helps Luke up from the wheelchair and onto the chaise lounge section of the couch, a place where I’ve laid with Pepper beside me a few times, by far the comfiest seat on the big sectional. I shove a few pillows under Luke’s knee to keep it elevated and one behind his back before I sit beside him and study him.

He looks different. Still handsome. Still the man I fell in love with. But different.

His eyes are haunted and ringed with dark circles like he hasn’t slept. He probably hasn’t.

“How are you feeling?” I ask. I press a kiss to his lips—a kiss that isn’t returned.

Just hold out for the me you know. He’ll be back.

“Fine,” he mutters.

“He’s in a bit of a mood,” Josh says, moving the wheelchair into a place behind the couch. His cheerful tone is a total contrast to Luke’s rather sullen attitude.

“I don’t blame him,” I say. “Besides, I know how to cheer him up.” I wiggle my eyebrows at Luke, but it doesn’t even get him to crack a tiny smile. Michelle snorts across the couch.

“You can’t just mount him with his knee