“I need to prepare you,” Cutter insisted. “His face is almost unrecognizable. But that’s nothing compared to his back, which may have significant scarring. Those were the injuries I could see. I’m still waiting to hear about the rest. He’s in surgery now. I don’t know what for since none of us are family…”
Every muscle in Brea’s body tightened as she tried to hold herself together. “Thanks for the update. How are you?”
“I’m fine. A few stitches aren’t going to stop me for long.”
“I’m grateful you’re safe and relatively unharmed.”
She ended the call, pleading the need to focus on the road. Just over an hour and a stop for coffee at a twenty-four-hour drive-thru later, she made it to Tulane Medical Center. Immediately, she tore into the parking garage, slung her compact into the first available spot, grabbed her phone, and ran as fast as her tired body would take her.
When she found her best friend in the emergency room’s waiting area, her first two thoughts were that it looked like a larger, more crowded version of University’s in Lafayette. The second was that Cutter, Hunter, and Joaquin all sat clustered together, seemingly big and out of place and obviously exhausted. She hadn’t thought to bring them coffee and breakfast muffins or any of the other “nice” things she usually delivered in times of crisis. But she couldn’t spare any regret as she dashed over to them.
“Any news?”
Hunter’s and Joaquin’s confusion showed as Cutter stood slowly, looking disheveled and weary, then wrapped his arms around her. “Other than he’s out of surgery, no.”
“No idea what they repaired? Or where they’re taking him next? Or his long-term prognosis?”
“We’re not family.” And Hunter sounded bitter about that. “Logan has medical power of attorney documents back at the office. Once he gets there…”
Brea understood a patient’s right to privacy, but right now Pierce needed people who cared about him. He needed her watching over him, holding his hand, advocating for him. He didn’t need to be fighting for his life alone. “I’ll be right back.”
It took some polite asking, a bit of cajoling, and a whopping lie she didn’t regret at all to convince his surgeon and the nurse in charge that Pierce had no one he considered family except her. Once they were on board, she finally got the lowdown on his condition and resulting surgery. What they told her was incredibly frightening to hear. It was beyond hard not to lose her composure. She also got permission for the others to see Pierce as soon as he came out of recovery. Suddenly, Hunter, Joaquin, and Cutter were really glad she’d come.
“The surgeon said he had broken ribs, which he can’t do anything about. But Pierce had a punctured lung and some swelling of the brain, along with a broken jaw, sprained knees, and a dislocated shoulder. They also say he’s going through some sort of detox.”
“I think those fuckers addicted him to drugs,” Hunter groused. “Pardon my language.”
Brea shook her head. She had the urge to call those animals something even worse. “Speaking of…what happened to them?”
Their downturned expressions grew darker. “Emilo Montilla, the slimy bastard, got away. We took out a number of his cohorts. The polícia were arriving to arrest even more as we pulled out. We also rescued a woman named Laila in the compound, who was instrumental in helping us arrange the rescue mission.”
Brea didn’t know anything about her or why she’d helped Pierce, but if she had contributed to saving his life, Brea wanted to shake the woman’s hand.
“But Montilla seems to have disappeared somewhere into the desert. Poof…” Joaquin tossed his hands in the air.
That wasn’t good news. She knew without being told that cartels were full of dangerous people with long memories. What were the odds they could give up on Pierce simply because his fellow operatives had rescued him and hauled him back to the States?
“How long until he’s out of recovery?” Cutter asked. “Before they know what kind of permanent damage he’ll sustain?”
She shook her head, resisting the pull of fresh tears. She shifted with nervous energy instead. “I’m hoping it’s not much longer. The surgeon called the operation a success, but he has no idea at this point how much Pierce will eventually recover. The next twenty-four hours are critical, so I’m going to stay.”
Cutter frowned. “In a motel?”
“Yes. I’ll find one later.”
He hesitated, then glanced Hunter’s way, who nodded. “I’ll stay with you.”
“You don’t have to. I appreciate you wanting to protect me, but I can do this.” She needed to.
“I know.” He sighed. “I forget sometimes how damn grown you are. I still remember being sixteen and scaring off the bullies in your third-grade class who pulled on your pigtails.”
She managed a wobbly smile. “You did. But the only thing that scares me right now is Pierce’s condition.”
“That’s why I’m going to stay. I can be as strong as you need me to be.”
“You always are.” She squeezed his hand in thanks.
Hunter and Joaquin stood, then the elder Edgington brother spoke. “We’re going to head home for a spell. I’d like to see Kata and my son, get some decent sleep. Then I’ll be back…”
“Your wife called me earlier, too, and said she’d like to see her brother.” Joaquin pointed at himself. “And my wife is worried sick. Bailey wants me home.”
“Go on,” Cutter said. “If there’s any change, I’ll call you.”
“You’re a bigger man than me,” Hunter said.
Brea wanted to correct him. Cutter had never been her boyfriend and, contrary to popular sentiment, Pierce hadn’t raped her. But Joaquin quickly shook Cutter’s hand, then nodded her way, before he lifted the duffel at his feet and headed out. Hunter did the same.
She sighed. Their opinions weren’t important. Right now, she needed to focus all her energy on Pierce and his recovery.
But the hours waiting for news dragged on. She refused breakfast, choosing instead to pace and pray and worry how she would cope if the worst happened. For possibly the first time in her life, Cutter was unable to soothe or console her.
Finally, at ten a.m., a nurse sought them out. “Ms. Bell? Your fiancé is out of recovery and back in his room. He’s not conscious yet, but visiting hours have begun, so you’re welcome to sit with him.”
Relief filled her. She snatched her purse up from her abandoned seat. “Thank you. I’ll follow you.”
Cutter fell in behind her. “Fiancé?”
She shot him a glare over her shoulder and silently shushed him. Later, she’d take the time and energy to explain that was the only way the hospital staff had been willing to bend the rules. Now was about laying eyes on Pierce.
But nothing could have prepared Brea for the sight of him lying so bruised, half-starved, and lifeless in the sterile hospital bed. Both his eyes were black and swollen shut. Another massive hematoma covered the side of his head, which flared with a goose-egg-size knot and had been shaved to reveal an ugly, multicolored wound. The respirator covering his nose and mouth were the least of her concerns once she saw the stitches in various places on his scalp and the drain taking fluid from his brain to a bag near the bed. Bandages pinned his right arm in place and more surrounded both legs.
The sight of him so broken took Brea to her knees. “Pierce…”
Cutter was right there to pick her up and help her into the chair he rolled to One-Mile’s bedside. He stood beside her, palming his face. “Jesus…”
“He’s in bad shape,” the nurse said. “If it had taken you and your friends even another hour to get him medical attention…”
The shake of the older woman’s head said what Brea could see with her own two eyes. He would have died.
Brea pressed a hand over her mouth to silence her fear, anger, and grief. They wouldn’t help him now. Only her love and her positive thoughts might.
It had been almost a month since she’d ask
ed Pierce for space, but not a day had gone by that he hadn’t crowded into her thoughts. Now she was ashamed for avoiding him, for assuming they had all the time in the world for her to sort out her feelings, for being too afraid of everyone else’s reactions to open her heart to him.
That stopped now.
“What can I do?” she asked.
The nurse shrugged. “Sit with him. Hold his hand. Talk to him.”
“Even though he can’t hear me?”
“On some level, I think he can. He’ll feel you. If there’s a TV show he likes, play it. If there’s a book he enjoys, read it to him. Pray for him.”
“I will. Thank you.”
It struck Brea that she knew Pierce on an almost painfully intimate level as a man—his scent, his kiss, his growl when he found pleasure—but she knew almost nothing about him as a person. She didn’t know his TV preferences or reading habits. Did he have any food allergies? Weird quirks? She’d never asked about his past, his hopes, his concerns. They’d never discussed his politics, his religion, or his beliefs.
That realization left her feeling ashamed and distressed. She hadn’t taken the time to learn him before allowing their incendiary chemical attraction to overwhelm her good sense. And now she might never have the chance to learn the real, true Pierce Walker.
Something else to mourn.
She reached for his big hand. It, too, was bruised. And battered. But she held it between hers and closed her eyes, feeling tears burn down her cheeks. “You’re not alone anymore. I’m here.”
No response. Not that she’d expected one. But she’d wanted it. She’d wanted the miracle. Some foolish part of her had hoped that she could heal him with her caring and her touch.
Cutter dropped a hand on her shoulder. “Don’t lose faith.”
He was right. This was the real world. The miracle would be Pierce surviving.
She met his glance. “I’ll keep praying.”
“I’ve never known anyone with a bigger heart. I don’t know everything he did to you—”
“Don’t.” She couldn’t talk about that night with Cutter. “Not now.”
He held up his hands. “I won’t. But your capacity to forgive is humbling.”
Pierce had done nothing that required forgiveness, and she didn’t want to waste the energy defending him now when he needed her more. “It isn’t.”
Because she hadn’t forgiven herself for being human, for being weak in the face of temptation. But in some ways, she’d cast Pierce into the role of her personal Satan. It had been so easy to believe he’d lured her with his attention, his masculinity, his sexuality. He might have seduced her…but she had let him. And deep down, she’d blamed him. He had taken her breath away. He had overwhelmed her.
It had been so unfair. Pierce hadn’t done anything except be himself. Acknowledging that painful truth made her want to cry. She needed to accept the blame for her own actions—and not let well-meaning people like Cutter and Daddy tell her she was too good to be at fault.
She would also have to decide what—if anything—came next for her and Pierce.
But the days of turning her back on him simply because she didn’t have the strength to confront her own moral fragility were over.
“Would you mind leaving me alone with him?”
Cutter hesitated. “Are you sure?”
That she was ready to handle this, no. But she needed to. “Yes.”
“All right. I’ll, um, get us a motel room and wait there until I hear from you.”
She nodded absently, then scanned him. “Are you okay to drive?”
“Yeah. And I’ll be one-hundred percent after some food, a shower, and a nap.”
“Thank you.” She fished her car keys out of her purse and handed them over. “I’ll call you when I’m ready to leave.”
“All right.” He pressed a kiss to the top of her head. “Bye.”
“Bye,” she called after him. As the sound of his footfalls grew fainter, she took Pierce’s hand again and let her tears fall. “I came as quickly as I could. Oh, Pierce… My gosh. I can’t even imagine how much you’ve suffered. You’re probably not aware I’m here, and it’s not much, but I’ll stay by your side. I’ll hold your hand. Together, we’ll do everything we can to make sure you pull through.”
Hours passed. She prayed and prayed. Nurses came in to check his vitals, draw blood, and change his sheets. She flipped channels on the TV until she found a sports station she hoped he might like. The shadows coming through the windows lengthened. She’d nodded off in her chair once or twice but awakened with his hand still in hers.
Early in the evening, the doctor came by to check on him. He glanced at Pierce’s chart, studied his progress, then ordered more tests. As the orderlies took him away, she squeezed his hand, then glanced at the clock. It was nearly six in the evening. She hadn’t eaten all day.
After a quick call to Cutter, he picked her up and took her to a nearby diner, where she devoured everything on her plate. At the motel room, she took a shower, then fell onto one of the two beds for a long nap. Cutter grumbled when she asked him to take her back to the hospital alone, but he did it.
When she arrived, it was late. The hospital was noticeably quieter. She was grateful the doctor had given her permission to stay as long as she liked.
She turned off the sports channel and turned on some of her favorite music, setting the device on the table close to Pierce. “I don’t know how you feel about Coldplay, but if we’re going to get along, you have to at least be willing to tolerate them.”
Silence, except for Chris Martin’s vocals.
She sat and stared.
Nothing.
Dang it, she had to stop hoping for the miracle.
“It feels strange not to have been at the church’s market tonight. It’s one of my favorite things to organize every year. I usually find a lot of Christmas presents there, you know. Well, you don’t know, but I do.” When she tried to imagine big, bad Pierce wandering around all the little handcrafted items that interested and fascinated her, she smiled. “It might not be your thing. But if we’re going to get along, you might have to tolerate that, too.”
She took his hand and squeezed it again. “When you wake up—not if, because I’m determined you will—we have a lot to talk about. And the first thing I want to tell you is how much I missed you.”
Tears stung her eyes and trembled on her lashes.
As they began to fall, he twitched in her grip…almost as if he was trying to squeeze her hand in return.
Her heart leapt to her throat. She watched him, blinking, holding her breath, almost afraid to hope. “Pierce?”
He turned his head toward her voice and tried to open his eyes. “Brea…”
* * *
Wednesday, October 15
One-Mile glanced at his phone. It was after seven in the evening. Brea was usually here by now. He’d memorized her schedule—hell, her every move—in the weeks since he’d been released from the hospital.
He texted her. She didn’t answer.
Fuck.
A solid dozen of his worst what-if scenarios—everything from a car accident to violence to her quitting him—rolled through his head. Panic crowded in. He sucked in a rough breath to cool his anxiety. Brea was a good driver. The likelihood of anyone shooting up the small-town salon where she worked was slim. And she would never turn her back on anyone without a word, much less the man for whom she’d been a savior for the last month.
After he’d awakened in the hospital in New Orleans, Brea had maintained her vigil at his bedside for the next two days. Cutter stayed glued to her, but by unspoken agreement, they’d kept the peace, in part for her. The other part… Well, he’d saved Bryant’s life in the past, and now the Boy Scout had saved his.
They were square.
Everyone had encouraged him to talk about his time in Mexico. His bosses and his team claimed they’d come to visit, but he knew the drill. They mostly wanted tactical inform
ation—how many men, what kind of operation, who were the key players. Brea had simply encouraged him to share his experiences with her. One-Mile had declined. First, he hadn’t seen much that would be helpful. Second, he didn’t want to traumatize Brea any more than she already was.
Since his release nearly a month ago, his condition had improved day over day. He and Brea had settled into a rhythm. She came every night after work to puree him some dinner, tidy up his house, and do an occasional load of laundry. They talked—at least as much as he could with his jaw wired shut—mostly about his physical therapy and doctor’s appointments, his frustration with lingering headaches, short-term memory losses, and periodic exhaustion. She empathized, always doing her best to maintain a cheerful front and positive outlook. Yes, he knew how far he had come in just over a month. But he was impatient to be one-hundred-percent healed.
When he could get her to talk about something other than him, Brea admitted how much she worried about her father’s heart condition and fretted about organizing activities at the church. He sensed she had something else on her mind, but the few times he’d asked, she’d given him a false smile and changed the subject.
He had no fucking doubt he was in love with her…but he was clueless about where he stood. Trying to express himself beyond the superficial when he couldn’t really enunciate was somewhere between grating and I-want-to-punch-a-fucking-wall frustrating. For multiple reasons, it was hard to ask why she’d stayed by his side and done everything to help him over the last month. Because she had feelings for him? Or because she just felt sorry for him?
The idea of being her pity project made him sick.
So did the knowledge that she was still with Cutter.
During her bedside vigil in New Orleans, he’d figured out that she spent her days with him…and her nights in a nearby motel room with Bryant. If he’d had any doubt before that the two had “taken their relationship to the next level,” he didn’t anymore. Sure, Brea might have refused to fuck her boyfriend while giving most of her waking attention to the guy who had popped her cherry. But realistically, if the tables had been turned, One-Mile would have been all over Brea every chance he got. He couldn’t be in the room with that woman and not crave her. But he would have wanted to remind her that, no matter how much attention she paid to another man, she belonged to him.
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