Carla grabbed my hands and squeezed. “Girl, you scared us half to death.”
“Hey.”
“How are you feeling?” Eva asked.
“Okay, I guess,” I said, looking down at my leg.
“Oh, don’t worry, Karlina. We talked to the doctor and she said that you were going to recover pretty quickly. You don’t even have any broken bones, but your leg looks badly bruised down there,” Eva said, rubbing me on the forehead.
“Yeah, I know, I feel beaten and battered,” I said, poking my lips out.
“They’re going to do some more x-rays. If everything looks good, she said you should be out of here in a couple days. You’ll still be on bed rest, so they’ve asked one of us to keep you until your parents can be contacted. But, you’re free to stay at my house as long as you want.” Eva smiled.
“What day is it?”
“It’s Thursday.”
“The accident was Tuesday night. We were on the way home. We were looking at some condos.”
Carla and Eva exchanged glances with each other, and then Carla said, “Yes, the accident happened Tuesday night. You were unconscious until Wednesday morning. They called Sandra, and then Sandra got in touch with a guy named Jeffrey something and then that guy called Tasha…and well, we’re here. They couldn’t get in contact with your parents. They’re both out of the country. I’m sure their cell phones aren’t within range, but we’ve left a message on their voicemails that you’re okay and will be with one of us when they get back into town.”
“Thanks, guys. I owe you for this one. I know you two had to take off from work.”
“Girl, you come before work. When I got the call, I left all my work and computer and everything on my desk. When I got here, you were asleep. I went across the street to get a bite to eat and when I came back, you were still asleep. The doctor assured me that it wasn’t necessary that I spend last night in here with you.”
One of the nurses came into the room. “How are you feeling, Karlina? Any pain anywhere?” The nurse checked my leg where they had wrapped it in bandages.
“I still feel a little dizzy. That’s all.”
“Would you like to sit up?”
I nodded. The nurse adjusted the pillow under my back and used a remote control to lift the top half of the bed up. I carefully and slowly scooted my top half up so that I was sitting.
“Good, any pain when you do that?”
“No. I just feel really lazy.”
“It’s the pain meds, honey. It’s almost time for dinner, too. I’ll have someone bring something in.”
“Actually, nurse, I think we’re going to order out for her if that’s okay,” Carla interrupted.
“That’s okay.” The nurse wrote something on the clipboard at the foot of my bed and walked away.
“What do you want to eat, girl? I know this hospital food has got to be nasty,” Carla exclaimed, grabbing a phone book from the nightstand. “Pizza, chicken?”
“I don’t know. I don’t think I’ve eaten since Tuesday. Pizza is fine.”
Carla got on the phone and ordered the pizza to be delivered.
“Eva, can you do me a favor and call my boss again tomorrow? I was supposed to be working on finalizing client contract’s today.”
“I’ve already done that. Actually, you got some flowers from Jeffrey Hawkins at your company. They are over on the table there. They brought them in here yesterday. Isn’t that your boss?”
“Yes.” I looked over and saw a basket of daisies, daffodils, and other mixed flowers. “Jonathan, is he okay?”
“Jonathan is okay,” Eva said.
“I wish I could see him. They said he had a broken leg.”
“Karlina, we didn’t want to talk about this so early. We wanted to give you time to recover, but I hate keeping the truth from people.” Carla walked back over to the bed beside me and Eva.
I turned my full attention to her. What did she mean, keep the truth from me? “Go ahead.”
“Karlina, you know that Jonathan is married, right?” Carla asked.
My mouth dropped wide open and the heart in my chest felt like it had fallen to my stomach. “What?” I choked.
“Karlina, when I came to the hospital to see you Wednesday, I also went to check on Jonathan. His wife was in there with him,” Eva said.
“What?” I repeated, loudly this time. Married? It couldn’t be. How could he be married?
“I had a feeling that you didn’t know. I knew you weren’t the type to sleep with another woman’s husband. I feel like going down that hallway and slapping him for you, girl,” Eva said.
My heart was beating so fast and I couldn’t catch my breath; I felt as if I had just run a marathon.
“Karlina, it’s going to be okay. Don’t worry about him. Everything’s okay. We’ve got your back.” Carla was trying to comfort me, but it wasn’t working.
That fucking bastard! Why didn’t he tell me that he was fucking married?
“Are you sure?” I turned from Eva to Carla, wanting them to take it back, to tell me that they were just joking.
Carla nodded and whispered, “He’s married.”
How could I have been so stupid? It all made sense now. I had never found out where he lived. He never spent the night at my house. He always needed to go home after our dates. And it explained why he seemed regretful after the one time we’d fooled around and almost had sex. It made sense why he always acted as if he were going to lose me; all the while, he was married. I wondered if his wife knew about me. Did his wife know that he was cheating?
When the pizza came, I promised Eva and Carla that I would eat and get some sleep. They promised they would be here tomorrow to come get me once the doctors released me. After they had left, I didn’t touch the pizza. Instead, I cried myself to sleep.
* * *
When I woke up the next morning, I felt a presence in the room with me. It wasn’t the nurse because she would have been talking to me by now. I looked down and noticed that my leg was no longer propped up, and there were new bandages, this time only wrapped around my ankle. I still noticed that one leg was noticeably bigger than the other. Probably from the swelling. The doctor had said that would go down in a couple of days. I was no longer hooked up to the monitor that checked my vital signs, either. Wasn’t today Friday? Wasn’t it time for me to go home now?
“How are you, Karlina?”
I didn’t expect to hear Jonathan’s voice. I turned my head towards the window, where he was seated in his wheelchair. His left arm was also in an arm brace. He had a leg cast on his right leg. He looked like a miserable, sick puppy dog. “Look, I’m so sorry about what happened that night. I should have been paying attention.”
I finally got the courage to speak. I really wanted to scream at him to get the fuck out of my room, but I just couldn’t bring myself to invoke an argument.
“It wasn’t your fault. It wasn’t either of our faults.”
“I know. Wrong-way drunk driver. But, if I had just been paying more attention, I could have missed him.”
“All that matters is that we’re okay.”
“It looks like you’ll be walking out of here.” He was looking at my bandaged ankle.
“On crutches, I think.”
“Doctors have given me about two or three months to recover. Then rehab for a full recovery.”
“They promised me that I’d be walking again in less than four weeks.”
“I’m glad you weren’t hurt as bad as me.” He rolled the wheelchair closer to my bedside.
I was preparing to say something else, but I looked at his left arm in the sling and there I saw it. A single gold wedding band. So, there was the confirmation.
“Look, Karlina…I wanted to tell you so many times, but…”
“But, what?”
“Karlina, when I met you, we were both involved with someone. I was married and you had a boyfriend. When you agreed to go out with me, I thought it was okay and that we we
re on the same page. I wanted to tell you that night when you revealed to me that you had broken it off with your boyfriend, but I just couldn’t bring myself to do it. I wanted to tell you so many times, but I feared that the consequence would be losing you. I admit that I was selfish.”
“You lied to me, Jonathan. Why didn’t you tell me that you were married from the beginning? Things would have been a lot different.”
“My wife and I were separated and were getting papers ready for divorce, but it didn’t happen soon enough.”
“What do you mean? Were you divorcing your wife or not?”
“I was, yes, I wanted to. Listen, Karlina, I married my wife when she became pregnant with my son a year ago. When my son was stillborn, everything in my world came tumbling down. I was mad at her, I was mad at everyone. I wanted to blame everyone for the death of my son. And then I saw you again. You seemed so young and innocent when I used to see you at the church. You seemed out of reach for me, and it was the only reason I didn’t ask you out back then. I wasn’t good enough for you then. I didn’t want to corrupt you.”
“Jonathan, stop…”
“I moved out to Florida to take a job and stuff and you know…life goes on. Then I saw you again. I couldn’t take my eyes off you, Karlina. I finally knew what it felt like to actually love someone and know why people actually get married in the first place. When I laid eyes on you, I knew that you were the one for me and I also knew that I couldn’t be with you if I were still married. I presented my wife with the divorce papers shortly after I met you and then she told me that she was pregnant again.”
“Does your wife know about us? Did she know that you were—”
“She kept hinting that she knew that I was with someone else, but…” He shook his head. “Now she has the proof.”
“Jonathan, I am so hurt right now because there was no excuse to lie to me. Marriage is a really serious commitment. And to lead me on to think that we could have had something with each other eventually when we were both ready…if I weren’t stuck in this bed and you weren’t stuck in that wheelchair, I would kill you. You wasted my time. Do you know what I gave up to be with you?” I was getting fired up now, and my headache was returning.
“Karlina, I am so sorry. What can I do to make this up to you?”
“You can start by leaving my room.”
“I’m sorry. I had every intention of divorcing my wife before she told me that she was expecting my child again.”
“So, now you’re telling me that you would stay in an unhappy, unfaithful marriage.”
“I haven’t quite decided what I will do. I realized that I married the wrong woman for all the wrong reasons.”
“I hope that you don’t continue to cheat on your wife. You shouldn’t remain in an unhealthy relationship and you shouldn’t tie anyone down without telling them the truth.”
“I know this now.”
“Karlina?” There was a call from my doorway. It was the nurse. “Someone is here to pick you up. We’re going to try the crutches again first. We can always switch to the wheelchair. I’ll be right back with the crutches and your belongings.”
“Well, will I see you again?” Jonathan asked.
I rolled my eyes. “What do you think?”
“I’m asking you if I can?”
“Are you serious?” I hissed. “Are you telling me that you want to continue cheating on your pregnant wife with me?”
He lowered his head. “If I divorce her, will you change your mind?”
“You know what…get out of my room! Get out, now!”
He wheeled his chair towards me and took a black velvet box out of his pants pocket. “That night, if we had made it home…I wanted to ask you to…” he opened the box and revealed a princess cut diamond ring.
“No.” I stopped him, shaking my head.
“Please, I know you’re angry. If you had said yes, I would have known that it was time to divorce my wife and move one. I just needed some confirmation that it was really love—”
“There was no love!” I spat at him. “You didn’t love me!”
“Will you rethink it—”
“No, please get out! Or I will call for the nurse. There is no more us, and there will never be!”
Jonathan closed the box, placed the ring next to me on the bed, and rolled his wheelchair away from me. “I understand. If you ever need me again, then you know where to reach me.”
“I don’t need anything from you!”
He took one last look at me and he was gone. At that moment, the nurse came back in the room with the crutches and my belongings.
“Aren’t you ready to get out of here?” she asked, helping me out of the bed.
“Oh, yes.” I nodded.
“Good. Do you want to take this?” the nurse was holding up the little velvet box.
“Actually, no. Will you give it back to the man that was just in here?”
“You mean the guy in the wheelchair? The one a few rooms down?” the nurse asked.
I nodded.
“I can do that for you.” The nurse put the box in her pocket. “Let’s hurry. There’s a nice gentleman that’s been waiting so patiently down there for you.”
“Gentleman?” I was confused.
“Sean Brooks. He’s picking you up, right?”
“No, my friend, Eva—” I started.
“Oh, right,” the nurse interrupted me. “Your friend called to tell us that she sent another one of your friends to pick you up.”
My whole body stiffened and the nurse had to support my back to keep me from falling over.
“Is everything, okay?” she asked.
“Yeah. My cell phone?”
“Your cell phone is probably somewhere in your car. You’ll be able to go to the tow company and get your other belongings once you get out of here, don’t worry. Are you feeling okay on those crutches, Ms. Nguyen?”
“Yes.”
When we reached the lobby downstairs, sure enough, Sean was waiting for me, in the flesh. When he saw the nurse helping me off the elevator, he half ran, half walked over to us.
“Hi,” he breathed.
“Hi.”
The nurse handed my bags to Sean, who threw them over his shoulder.
“Great. Well, it was nice knowing you.” The nurse gave me a small hug then lifted my arms up so that I was now rested on Sean.
“I know what you’re thinking. Your face gives you away every time,” Sean said as he helped me towards the door.
“I appreciate you coming to get me. I wish someone would have told me you were coming to pick me up, or at least given me a choice in the matter.”
“It was all so sudden, I just offered to do it. Eva got a hold of me this morning at my place, which was when I found out about the accident. We were able to reach your parents this morning, and they’re catching an early flight in the morning. They should be here Saturday afternoon and I told them that I’d take care of you.”
“Thanks for coming to get me anyway,” I said as we walked out the door, where his Range Rover was parked in front of the door. He opened the passenger side door.
“Can I sit in the back?” I asked.
“Why? Are you still mad at me?”
“No, I’m…I’m…” I was actually still a little uneasy from the accident and I didn’t want anything to remind me of what had happened.
“Oh!” With that, he lifted me up into the back seat of the SUV. After he got inside, he turned around to look at me. “You know that you cannot assist yourself for at least another four weeks?”
“I know, once my parents get here, I’ll ask them to stay with me for a little bit, or go to Tasha’s house.”
He turned around, started the engine, and pulled off. All of a sudden, my eyes felt heavy and I was exhausted. I leaned over on the seat and closed my eyes.
24
When I woke up, I had yet another headache. Except it was one of those headaches you get when you wake up and realize
that you’ve slept too long. I always felt bad when I slept in past twelve noon on weekends, and that’s how I felt now. I lifted myself up and sensed that I wasn’t in my own bed quite yet. But I wasn’t at the hospital either. The bed was much too comfortable and much too soft. When I opened my eyes, I felt lost. Where was I? I recalled Sean saying that we would go to his house, but this wasn’t his house and this wasn’t his bedroom. The room I was in was three times the size of what I remembered. I looked down and saw the silk sheets and duvet cover wrapped around my torso where I lay. The bed that I sat on was huge. It was almost king-size, maybe even bigger. I didn’t remember getting in this bed. Although, I did remember passing out in Sean’s SUV. Gosh, I didn’t even remember him bringing me in here. What was wrong with me? Certainly, I couldn’t have been that tired. It must have been the drugs.
I pushed the covers off my body and looked at my left leg. It was certainly a little swollen, but it was a good thing that I didn’t feel any more pain. I was also glad that I didn’t recall the pain from right after the accident. I looked around again, still trying to figure out where the hell I was. And where the heck was Sean? I wished I could get up and figure out whose master suite I was in, but I was utterly helpless. I noticed there was a remote control on the nightstand that displayed the same brand name as the wide-screen television over the fireplace in front of me. I turned the TV on and changed the channel to a local station. The on-screen information revealed that it was five in the evening. I’d left the hospital around eleven this morning. Had I really slept that long?
The doorknob rattled, and Sean stood in the doorway with a tray.
“I knew I heard something up here,” he said.
He walked towards me and placed the tray on the nightstand beside me. On the tray was a glass filled with iced water and the rest was concealed in white Styrofoam take-out containers. But it sure smelled good, whatever it was. Suddenly, my stomach growled and I prayed that he didn’t hear it.
“How are you feeling?”
“I feel like I slept all day.”
He grinned. “Well, you did. I brought some food. I’m sorry that it’s take-out, but I don’t have much in the fridge to eat and no pots and pans to cook with. Are you hungry?”
Seduced by Sin: Sean (Rugged Riders #3) Page 14
