by Ella Frank
Talk about an understatement.
“He’s just come out of recovery and been moved up to his room. He’s still pretty out of it, but if you’d like to come and see him, you—”
“Yes,” I said before she could even finish.
She smiled and turned on her heel, slipping her hands into her pockets as she led me out of the waiting room. I fished my phone from my pants pocket and sent a text to Bailey: He’s awake. Surgery went well. Being taken back to his room now.
“He’s just in there,” she said. I sent the room number to Bailey then stopped outside the door.
I had no idea what to expect on the other side, and I wasn’t at all sure I was prepared for what I would see.
I can do this, I told myself, and took in another breath. I can do this. Finally I pushed down on the handle. When I stepped inside and the door slowly shut behind me, I scanned the room and took a second to adjust to the low lighting, then zeroed in on the machines and IV poles full of drugs being pumped into Sean’s arm.
“Hey there, anchorman.”
My breath caught. I dragged my eyes up to Sean’s face and could barely believe what I was seeing. His glassy eyes were open, and a relaxed smile was curving his lips.
He was awake…barely.
“You really here, or—”
“I’m really here,” I said, and rushed over to him on unsteady legs.
As I reached his side, he took my hand and brought it to his lips to kiss. He whispered, “Good. Don’t leave,” and promptly passed out.
2
Sean
“MR. BAILEY? SEAN? It’s time for your labs.”
I cracked an eye and saw the lights were still low. A short woman in teal scrubs walked around the end of my bed and came up to where my arm lay on my chest. She had a little toolbox in hand, one that contained every kind of needle and about twenty vials, which made me wonder if I’d have any blood left by the end of it.
My side ached like a son of a bitch as I shifted, trying to sit up a little. As she dragged the portable table over so it hovered above my legs, I scanned the room. The clock read four—in the morning, I assumed—and when something in the corner shifted and caught my eye, I noticed someone slumped down in an uncomfortable-looking chair. Bailey?
“My name’s Win, and I’m going to be your nurse for the foreseeable future. I need to get some blood from you, okay?”
Sure, it wasn’t like I’d lost enough tonight. Or last night—right?
As she went about preparing her weapons of choice, I rubbed at my eyes, trying to clear my vision. I was still a little groggy from whatever awesome pain meds they’d been feeding me since I’d come out of surgery.
Surgery…fuck. I still couldn’t believe everything that had happened last night. Well, I couldn’t really remember anything that clearly, but I did remember the surgeon telling me that I’d been stabbed and was seriously lucky it hadn’t been a little higher, or things might’ve turned out a lot differently.
As in dead differently.
I shifted again, trying to get a more comfortable position, but when a sharp pain shot through my side, I realized that wasn’t going to happen anytime soon. As Win began searching for the best possible vein to siphon my blood from, my eyes again landed on the person sitting in the corner.
“My brother?”
Win glanced over her shoulder. “No. Your brother is coming back first thing this morning. That’s Alexander Thorne. We heard you saved him tonight. You’re a hero.”
Wait, Xander? What was he doing here? He’d been through enough tonight without having to sleep in some uncomfortable chair watching over my ass.
“We couldn’t believe it at first,” Win said with a small laugh. “It’s weird, you know, seeing someone in person that you watch on the news every night.”
“Yeah, I know.”
“But he wouldn’t be moved, not even to get himself cleaned up.” Cleaned up? What was she talking about? But before I could ask, she said, “Okay, you’re going to feel a small prick in three, two, one.”
I didn’t even notice the needle, my eyes now focused on Xander sitting with his arms and legs crossed, his head resting against the wall. He looked uncomfortable as hell, and after Win finished filling the millionth vial and started packing up, I said, “Do you mind turning the lights up a fraction?”
“Are you sure? I bet if you close your eyes you’ll be able to get a couple more hours in before the next round.”
“Yeah, it’s all good. If I get sleepy, the light won’t bother me.”
“If you’re sure…”
I nodded, and as she reached behind me to turn the light up enough that I could make out Xander, I thanked her.
She gave a quick smile and headed for the door. “I’ll see you in a bit.”
“I’ll be here.”
When she disappeared out into the hall, I turned my attention back to Xander. He was still dressed in his tuxedo, from what I could make out, his black pants molding to his legs and his jacket draped over his crossed arms. His tie was hanging loosely around his neck now, not in the perfect bow it’d been at the beginning of the night, and his top couple of buttons were undone.
His silver-streaked hair was sticking up all over the place, and he looked so disheveled, so unlike himself, that it made me smile. God, it was good to see him there, alive and in one piece. I’d heal soon enough. But if that motherfucker had gotten to Xander, if he’d hurt him in any way, I wasn’t sure how I would’ve dealt with it.
As if he could sense someone watching him, Xander shifted in his seat and opened his eyes. He blinked several times, and when he saw me, his eyes widened and he sat up in his seat.
That was when it happened. Xander’s jacket fell into his lap and his white dress shirt came into view—although it wasn’t white anymore.
A deep red stain covered nearly the entire bottom of the material, with blood spattered across the rest of it. His sleeves hadn’t fared much better, with patches of red soaked into the snowy-white shirt. As though he sensed where I was looking, Xander quickly rearranged the jacket to again cover as much of the blood as he could.
“When did you wake back up?”
Back up? I didn’t remember waking up before now. “A few minutes ago, when they came to get my blood.”
Xander slowly got to his feet, and when he went to take a step forward, swayed a little, then stopped and reached out to put a hand on the wall.
Jesus, he looked like he was about to keel over. Actually, now that I was really looking at him, I noticed how pale he was, how red his eyes were. Xander looked like he’d been to hell and back, and I automatically reached for my blankets, ready to shove them aside and go to him—IV and stitches be damned.
Xander looked up, and when he saw what I was about to do, he straightened and said, “What do you think you’re doing?”
“You looked like you were about to fall—”
“So you were, what? Going to catch me?” He rushed to my side then reached out and wrapped his fingers around mine. “You already saved me once tonight,” he whispered, trying to blink away the tears welling in his eyes. “It’s time to start thinking about yourself now.”
I licked my dry lips, looked down at our joined hands, and squeezed. When Xander sucked in a breath, I returned my attention to his strained features.
He looked about as good as I felt. When he closed his eyes and said, “I wasn’t sure I’d ever feel you do that again,” I wondered just what kind of hell he’d been through tonight.
“Hey.” I waited for Xander’s eyes to open and then tried for a smile. “It’s over now. I’m right here.”
“I know, but— God, Sean. I’m so sorry.” He lowered his head and pressed his lips to the center of my palm, and his pain was so raw that my heart felt as though it were breaking in half.
“Xander, it’s okay,” I said, and reached for the side of his face, brushing away the tears. “I’m okay.”
“But you weren’t.” As he s
tared down at me, the fear and worry swirling in his eyes told me that whatever he’d been through tonight—whatever we’d been through—he was still experiencing it in high definition.
“You were as far from okay as I’ve ever seen you. I thought you were going to die tonight, Sean. I thought I was watching you die…”
As he swallowed in a gulp of air, I shook his hand to try to get him to focus on my face, get him to focus on something other than what he was obviously reliving.
“That all mine?” I asked, and nodded toward his shirt.
Xander looked down then quickly brought his jacket up in an attempt to cover it. “Yes. I didn’t want to leave, and—”
“Not even to get changed?” Something about that sacrifice, that devotion, struck at my very core. “Thank you.”
As Xander stroked his thumb over the back of my fingers, my eyes began to feel heavy, my exhaustion creeping back in. “You don’t have to thank me.”
“I have a feeling there are many things I have to thank you for. But my head’s feeling a little trippy, so you’ll have to tell me later.”
“I’ll be here.”
“You need rest.” My eyes slowly shut. “And new clothes.”
“Ryan’s going to bring them by in the morning.”
I smiled at the mention of Xander’s assistant. “Ryan…he likes me. You still should go home.”
Gentle fingers stroked the hair from my forehead then cool lips pressed a kiss there, and before I completely gave myself over to dreamland and drugs, I heard Xander whisper, “I’m not going anywhere.”
3
Xander
“RISE AND SHINE, you two.”
The door to Sean’s room cracked open and his nurse, Win, stuck her head inside. I blinked a couple of times and shifted in the chair that’d become my home away from home this past week.
“I have a feeling today is the day you’re going to get sprung from this joint, and you’re going to want to be bright-eyed and bushy-tailed when Dr. Marx comes to see you.”
A soft groan from the bed signaled that Sean was waking. When his eyes opened and locked on mine, everything inside me sat up and paid attention.
All week it’d been like that. If Sean was awake, he was searching me out, watching me with a look of impatience, as though he wanted to kick everyone out so we could talk and reconnect.
Whenever his eyes were on me, I knew it. My heart thumped, my pulse raced, and every fiber of my being urged me to go to him, to touch him, and I would’ve if we weren’t surrounded by people watching our every move.
But that’s where we were, stuck in a monotonous merry-go-round where every day seemed exactly the same as the one before. And since we were never truly alone, it seemed we’d both reverted to our usual roles in each other’s lives.
Bailey’s big brother and Bailey’s best friend. Two roles that allowed us to be in constant contact, and Bailey just assumed that my desire to stay with Sean was based on some misplaced sense of guilt, which wasn’t entirely inaccurate. I felt guilty about many things.
Sean being at the NPF Awards.
Sean being stabbed.
Sean lying in a hospital bed with a scar as a permanent reminder of our first date, and the fact that the date we’d been on hadn’t just been for show.
Yes, that was the one I felt the guiltiest about. Especially since it’d been splashed all over every news channel that Alexander Thorne’s date had been injured saving him from a crazed attacker. “No” and “comment” had become my two favorite words lately.
“Morning, Win,” Sean said, as he pressed a button to make the bed rise and scooted up the mattress.
“Hey there, detective.” She turned to me and smiled. “Xander.”
“Good morning,” I said as I stretched my neck and got to my feet, then I raised my arms over my head to crack my back.
“Jesus.” Sean winced. “If you’re not careful, you’re gonna end up in here as I’m getting out. That chair cannot be comfortable.”
I ran a hand through my hair as I walked to the foot of his bed and watched Win wrap the blood-pressure cuff around his bicep.
“It’s not that bad.” That was a lie. I’d decided that chair could be used as a torture device. One week sitting, and sleeping in it, would have me caving and answering anything just to get the hell out of it.
As it was, I’d made sure to go for walks around the ward and down to the cafeteria to stretch my legs—but never outside of the hospital, never too far from Sean.
“You’re so full of it.” A half-smile played on Sean’s lips as he eyed me. “Isn’t he full of it, Win?”
Win looked over her shoulder at me, and then the chair, and screwed her nose up.
“I have to admit, I’ve slept in those suckers a couple of times, and they are not comfortable—and you’re much taller than I am.”
Sean chuckled. “In other words, he’s full of it and should’ve gone home to sleep in his huge, comfy-ass bed.”
“I’m just fine,” I said, not wanting to get into this discussion for the seventh day in a row.
Sean wanted me to go home and get some rest. But there were two problems with that: I wasn’t about to leave him until I saw him safely out of this hospital room, and was satisfied that he was able to do things for himself.
And I didn’t want to be alone. The last place I wanted to be was my house, where everything I looked at would remind me of what had happened.
“Don’t you need to be quiet when getting your blood pressure checked?” I looked to Win, who grinned.
“That’s a good idea. It’ll be more accurate. Zip it, detective.”
Sean eyed me as the air began to inflate the cuff, and the expression on his face was one full of curiosity, one full of questions he’d been unable to ask just yet. But I had no doubt that the second we were alone for longer than a handful of minutes, I’d be in for it. The detective in him wouldn’t let things go unanswered for too long.
“Blood pressure is one seventeen over sixty, all but perfect. How’s the side?”
Sean nodded. “It’s good. I mean, considering Marx had to sew it up. It’s still tender, but nothing like it was.”
“On a scale of one to ten? Ten being ‘Nurse Win, I’ve just arrived in the ER with a stab wound to my insides’?”
Sean chuckled. “Yeah, yeah, fair enough. Maybe like a…two point five? A three?”
“Okay. That’s good. Dr. Marx will be by soon to check the incision, but I’m pretty sure you’ll be going home today. You got someone to take you there?”
“Yes,” I said, before Sean had a chance to speak. “I’ll be taking him home and making sure he’s okay.”
Sean arched an eyebrow. “Really?”
“Really.”
“That’s good. You know everything that’s been going on here with him, so that’ll help with his recovery.” Win undid the cuff and stuffed it in the basket attached to the machine’s pole, then ran the thermometer across Sean’s forehead. “Ninety-seven point two, perfect. Right, I’m going to go and grab your last round of antibiotics. The doctor has you on pills today, another good sign. I’ll be back in a few.”
“Sounds great.” Sean didn’t take his eyes off me as Win wheeled the machine out the door. As soon as she was gone, and the two of us were alone, he grinned. “You really taking me home?”
Damn, I was in so much trouble. That lazy grin was the only thing that gave my world purpose right now, and that told me I had to tread carefully—so very, very carefully—or I could wind up losing everything I held dear.
“I am.”
Sean’s lips twitched when I didn’t move from the foot of the bed, and I had a feeling he knew the exact reason for the self-imposed distance I was keeping between us. Something he confirmed when he looked to the clock over my shoulder.
“Bailey and Boudreaux on their way?”
“I imagine so. Bailey won’t want to miss this.”
Sean nodded and tapped his fingers on his thig
h, then he said, so softly I almost missed it, “Come over here.”
God, I wanted to. It took me actually gripping the foot rail of his bed not to. But in the end, common sense prevailed. “I think it might be better if I stay here.”
Sean’s brow furrowed, and I could see the frustration but also the understanding.
“You’re the main reason I’ve been on my best behavior this last week. You know that, right?” When I merely stared at him, Sean ran his eyes down over me and sighed. “Having you this close and not being able to touch you is driving me insane. I want out of this bed, Xander. I want out of this hospital. I want to be somewhere no one else is, so I can finally ask you how you are and be able to hold you when you tell me you’re not okay. Because I can see it…”
My eyes stung, and I whispered, “I want that too.”
4
Sean
FRUSTRATED DIDN’T EVEN come close to how I was feeling as I stared at Xander at the end of my bed.
This past week had felt like an eternity. Between surgery and recovery, everyone who walked through my hospital room door had told me that my only job was to heal and get better.
Not a hard thing to do when you were laid up in bed and monitored around the clock. But switching your brain off? That was a hell of a lot more difficult. Granted, mine had been stuck on pause for a day or two, courtesy of some really kickass drugs. But once they’d worn off, and the events of that night came trickling back in, I realized that I wasn’t the only one who was in need of some healing.
Xander was struggling. I could see it on his face, hear it in his voice, and sense it in every move he made. He was here twenty-four seven, and yet he wasn’t always here. There’d be moments where I’d catch him staring off into space, the expression in his eyes tormented, and where he went during that time was what worried me.
I’d remembered most of what happened that night. The brain-numbing thank-you speeches, the suspect rushing Xander and then going head to head with me. I remembered the knife in my side before I’d gotten off the final shot, but after that, things got a little fuzzy.
