Chapter 24

When the ambulance arrived in the middle of the muddy field, Beth was still in shock about so many things. Too many things.

“Beth!” someone called, and she looked up to see Captain Carter Bowen of the Meadow Valley Fire Station and, if she remembered correctly, Eli’s friend. Beside him stood another uniformed paramedic whose name tag read JT. The stretcher on which they’d soon carry Eli away stood beside them.

“He…he…” Her voice shook.

Carter dropped to a squat next to where Eli still lay unconscious with his head in her lap. “It’s okay,” he said calmly. “I know Eli well enough that we can skip some of the general health history, but whatever information you can give me will help us get him the treatment he needs as quickly as he needs it. Was he awake when you found him? Did he tell you anything to tell me?”

Right. Right. Right.

“His lung!” Beth told Carter. “And his ribs. On his right side. He said it was a pneumo…a pneumo…”

“Pneumothorax?” Carter asked, and Beth nodded earnestly. “Good, Beth. You’re doing great. And he thinks it’s due to his ribs?”

She nodded again. “His lips…the color… Is he not breathing? Are you going to give him oxygen? Can you fix him?”

The other paramedic was on the ground fitting a metal contraption to Eli’s height before splitting it in two and placing one half of the device on his right, the other on his left.

Carter gave her a reassuring smile. “We’re going to do our best to get his oxygen levels back where they need to be. You see this?” He hovered his open palm above Eli’s chest, and Beth was able to detect the slight rise and fall.

“He’s still breathing,” she said through her own shuddering breath.

“Yep,” Carter confirmed. “That’s a good sign, and we’re going to make things even better, but we need to get him to an emergency room as quickly as possible so he has the best chance of avoiding complications. Do you have someone who can—”

“I’m riding with him!” she blurted. “I can do that, right? Eli said I could. I mean, I know I’m not immediate family, but he said he loved me, so that counts for something, right?”

He was probably delirious with pain when he said it and probably had no idea what he was saying, but Beth didn’t care.

“You’re caked in mud,” Carter reminded her as he and his partner connected the two halves of the metal stretcher-type thing beneath Eli’s back. “Looks like all those bikes tore the earth up pretty good.”

A horse whinnied nearby but was cloaked in darkness.

Beth sucked in a breath. “Midnight!”

She’d heard the revving of the motorcycle engine, a crash, and then the eerie silence that followed. She wasn’t sure what made her turn around and ride back toward the men who were chasing her. It could have been one of them who’d crashed. But somehow she knew, the same way she was sure that if she hadn’t come back tonight—despite Eli’s protestations—she might have lost them both. All she remembered was hopping out of the saddle and telling Midnight to stay, hoping like hell that she would.

And then the police were there, and Midnight was fine, but Eli…

“I’ll take care of the mare!” a male voice replied. Then out of the corner of her eye, Beth saw Boone leading her horse out of the dark. “And I’ll give the deputy as much information as I can, but she’s probably going to want to talk to you as well, Beth.”

Beth nodded. “Later, though, right?”

“Yeah,” Boone confirmed. “Later is good. Go take care of my brother, and when he wakes up, tell him he’s going to help me fix that bike.” He gave her a half smile.

Despite his attempt at levity, Beth could see the worry in Boone’s eyes.

“I’ll tell him,” she replied. “And, Boone, I’m sorry. I never meant for anything like this to happen.”

Carter and JT lifted Eli from the ground and onto the transport stretcher. The sudden absence of his head in her lap made her throat tighten.

“You saved the horse,” Boone told her. “That was all any of us were trying to do.”

“Yeah, but—”

He interrupted her by extending a hand and pulling her up from the muddy grass.

“You can’t change what’s been done,” Boone explained. “You can either learn from it and move on, or you can stay stuck in the ‘yeah, buts’ or what-ifs until you forget that moving on is even an option.”

His lip twitched into the promise of a grin.

All Beth could do was sniffle and nod as she wondered whether Boone’s advice was meant solely for her or if he was referring to his big brother as well…or even himself.

“You ready, Beth?” Carter called from over her shoulder.

Boone shooed her toward the ambulance that now had his brother closed inside.

“Thank you,” she told him. “For being here for Eli tonight.”

Then she spun toward the emergency vehicle and let Carter usher her to the passenger side door.

“I can’t ride with him?”

Carter shook his head. “JT’s driving, and I’ll be in back giving Eli everything he needs. I need room to work, and it’s safer for you up here, but I promise if he wakes up, the first thing I’ll tell him is that you’re right up front, okay?”

What was she going to do, tell Carter that she was terrified to have Eli out of her sight, that even though she had zero medical capabilities, she was so scared of not being directly by his side in case something happened? How was she supposed to just go through life from here on out not knowing at any given moment if Eli Murphy was okay?

And when Eli woke up—because of course he would wake up—how the hell would Beth explain that after her stunt with Midnight, she was on her way to New York in less than two weeks for the audition she wasn’t expecting to have until next spring?

All the questions made her head spin, so she lowered the ambulance window to suck in gulps of the cool Northern California night, to breathe in the scent of the place she’d never wanted to come to and was now devastated to leave.

Something tugged at her hair, and Beth yelped, bolting upright in…her bed? No. A chair? She squinted, eyes adjusting to the dim flicker of the fluorescent light above the hospital bed.

“Sorry,” Eli whispered groggily. “My fingers must have gotten tangled in your hair.”

Beth’s hands instinctively went to her head where clumps of her hair were still matted together with bits of mud. Then her eyes caught the small dark circle on the edge of Eli’s bedsheet where she’d been drooling while she slept!

“Oh god!” she exclaimed, and Eli winced. “Sorry!” she whispered, forgetting about the concussion, which was the icing on the cake of the two fractured ribs and—as Eli figured out himself—a collapsed lung.

Her eyes adjusted, and he came into focus. Other than one tube—which she learned was called a cannula—delivering extra oxygen through Eli’s nose and another one traveling out beneath the sleeve of his hospital gown—the one draining fluid from his chest—he still looked like her Eli. So why did she feel the hot threat of tears behind her eyes?

“You should go home,” he replied, his voice hoarse. “I’m sure Midnight is worried about you. And the guesthouse has a really nice shower.”

She sucked in a sharp breath, suddenly realizing what it was. He was awake. Eli was awake. And did he just crack a joke?

“What?” Beth asked, choking back a sob. “You’re not a fan of this look?” She gestured to her navy sweatshirt with the word HOSPITAL embroidered on it in white. She at least had to hand it to the gift shop for providing a much-needed dose of humor to her evening. Or was it morning? She pulled her phone out of the still damp back pocket of her jeans, noting the 2:06 a.m. time on her lock screen before the battery used its last bit of juice.

“You’re a little blurry,” he admitted. “But I’m positive you’re still the prettiest one in the room.” He coughed and winced again. “I mean any room,” he managed to add.

“Eli…” Beth’s voice shook on the second syllable of his name. She was seconds away from losing it, so she had to get the words out before they didn’t sound like words anymore.

“Wait,” he whispered, then patted the sliver of room on the mattress to his left. “If you’re not going to leave, then I need you to come closer.”

Her breath hitched, and she sat there frozen for several seconds. Eli responded by pressing both palms against the bed and shifting his entire body to the right, a swear escaping his lips as he did.

“Are you crazy?” she hissed, springing from her chair. “You’re not supposed to be moving!”

A muscle in his jaw twitched, and he fisted the sheet at his sides.

“You’re right,” he ground out through gritted teeth. “Won’t be doing that again. But now that there’s more room…” He gave the bed another pat even as beads of sweat broke out on his forehead.

Instead of taking Eli up on his invitation, Beth darted for the bathroom, returning a few seconds later with a cool, damp washcloth. She folded it in half and laid it gingerly on his forehead. He closed his eyes and sighed, his shoulders relaxing.

Only then did Beth gently climb onto the bed, careful to cause as little movement as possible before awkwardly leaning on her right elbow to face him. She had to use every muscle in her core to keep from toppling onto the floor.

Eli’s brow furrowed. “I might not be able to see straight right now, but I can still tell you look ridiculous.” He slid his arm out from where it was pinned between their bodies and reached behind her to lift the bed rail and lock it into place. “Now lean back,” he said. “And put your head here.” He nodded toward his left shoulder.

Beth let out a breath and let the bulk of her weight fall against the rail, then rested her head softly on his shoulder.

She watched his chest fall as he exhaled, marveling at the sight of something she once took for granted. And when she tilted her head up to look at him, she found him smiling back at her, the big, beautiful Eli smile she used to think didn’t exist. Knowing now that she had the ability to put that expression on his face felt like a superpower she never knew she wanted until it was in her possession.

“I should have listened to you and stayed away,” she whispered.

“I should have never shut you down like that,” he whispered back.

She inhaled the unmistakable sterility of high-powered cleaners, the scent of iodine and soap, and somewhere beneath it all something inherently Eli, and for the first time since her adrenaline-induced escape from the barn on Midnight’s back, Beth finally felt like she could breathe.

“I get it now,” she continued, her barrage of I’m sorries and Please forgive mes replaced with the simple truth that up until this very moment, she’d never completely understood the man beside her. But tonight, she did.

“Get what?”

She was half on her side, half on her back, not sure where to put her arms. She couldn’t exactly wrap them around a man whose body was broken on one side, and letting them simply lie straight at her sides just felt weird. Where was the manual for what to do with your freaking arms while lying in a hospital bed with the man who loved you but didn’t know yet that you loved him back?

It was then that his left arm, which must have still been on the bed rail, wrapped around her torso like a safety belt, and she held on to it for dear life.

“I get why, when I first got here, you never wanted me to ride Midnight in the first place. And I get why you were such an asshole about letting me be there tonight.” She forced a laugh, then tilted her head toward his. “You were thrown off a motorcycle.”

A shallow laugh escaped his lips. “Is that why I feel like hell?”

Beth swallowed. “I was so scared when I saw you just lying there. And I know you’re eventually going to be okay, but god, Eli. I don’t know what I would have done if I lost you like…”

She couldn’t say it.

So he surprised her yet again when without missing a beat, he could. “Like I lost Tess?”

She pressed a palm to his cheek, careful not to tug his oxygen tube, and nodded.

“All I kept thinking about the whole ride here,” she continued, “was how I couldn’t even stand to be in the front seat of the ambulance because it meant I couldn’t see you, and I just wanted to keep you safe, which was ridiculous when I was the reason you were in that ambulance in the first place.”

He pressed his lips to her forehead, and a feeling of warmth and safety better than any blanket spread over her from the spot where his lips made contact all the way to the tips of her toes.

“I just wanted to keep you safe,” he echoed. “But we’re human. That makes us strong and stubborn. I couldn’t have stopped Tess from mounting a spooked horse in a storm any more than you could have stopped me from coming after you on a bike I had no business riding.” He buried his face in her hair and sighed. “I spent three years blaming myself for something I couldn’t control and thought the only way I could fix the past was to keep a tight grip on the present. But I think the evidence speaks for itself that I can’t protect myself from getting hurt no matter how hard I try.” He laughed, then coughed, then once again swore.

She skimmed her fingers along his hairline, then pressed her palm gently over the damp washcloth. “And you can’t keep me from sometimes going against better judgment and jeopardizing my own safety. I push boundaries.”

“I stay safely inside them. Well…until tonight.”

She smiled easily now, and god, it felt good to be like this with him, even if it was less than optimal circumstances.

“Maybe it’s not about being safe,” Beth said. “Maybe it’s about trust. Like, we have to trust each other to try—I don’t know—not to hurt ourselves or each other.”

He nodded, then let out a shaky breath. “I think it’s more than that.” He squeezed her, she guessed, as best he could with one arm and let out a sigh. “I need to learn how to let go and know that I’ll be okay.” Eli cleared his throat. “I know about New York.”

Her breath hitched, and she buried her face in his shoulder, squeezing her eyes shut. If she never moved from this position, she’d never have to face him. She’d never have to leave. And she’d never have to chase a dream she might be destined never to actually catch.

Except if Beth didn’t move, her muscles would grow stiff, and she’d be stuck.

If she never left, she’d never know for sure if she was choosing Eli or choosing to run in the opposite direction of her fear.

And if she never chased the dream all the way to the finish line, she’d always wonder.

Beth propped herself on her elbow and finally looked at him.

His glassy blue eyes nearly did her in, but she had to see this through. They both did.

“All my life,” she told him, “since I was four years old, I’ve wanted one thing—to perform in the Radio City Music Hall Christmas Spectacular as a Radio City Rockette. That was it. One thing. One silly little thing. Until now.”

“It’s not silly, Beth. Not silly at all.” Despite the inherent sadness in his eyes, Eli smiled that private yet undeniable smile she knew was only for her. “But…has something changed?” he asked with mock innocence.

She nodded with a grin. “I came to this town, and I met this…horse…”

Eli groaned and let his head thud lightly against his pillow. Probably not the best move for a guy with a concussion.

Beth laughed. “I’m kidding. I mean, I love Midnight, but I haven’t spent the past few weeks considering whether to give up on New York just so I wouldn’t lose her.” Her lips twitched, the smile on her face suddenly feeling like the biggest and boldest lie she’d ever told. Because how could she leave him…and how could she not?

“I love you,” Eli blurted, and Beth’s eyes grew wide. He let out a nervous laugh. “I love you,” he said again, more surety in his tone. “And it’s the most terrifying thing to say or think or feel. For three years, I convinced myself that what happened the night I lost Tess and Fury was my fault. I should have known what to do. I should have protected them. I should have, should have, should have…”

He squeezed his eyes shut, and Beth wasn’t sure if it was the pain from his memories, the physical pain, or both. But she could tell he had more to say, so she did her best to remain patient even though he’d just said what he said, and she was desperate to say it too.

“So,” Eli finally continued, “I wore my loss as this badge, like it was my penance not only to display it but also to preserve it. But that badge turned into—I don’t know—a suit of armor, I guess. I shut everyone out, and they stayed out. But you didn’t.”

“It’s because I’m mighty,” she told him, her whole body both abuzz and lit from within. If she opened her mouth and a firefly flew out, she wouldn’t even be surprised.

“The mightiest,” he added.

Beth knew she was strong, but somehow having Eli see that in her during a time when she felt her weakest made her believe it even more.

He was a closed door and a closed book, and there might have even been a dead bolt or two keeping everyone out. But Beth had found a way in.

“And also,” she added, wondering if she should tell him. Or was it simply the time to let him have his moment?

No. She shook her head. From here on out, there would be nothing unspoken between them. Hell, there’d be nothing between them period.

Except maybe around three thousand miles.

“I already kind of sort of knew,” Beth admitted, then winced. “That…you love me. You sort of told me right before you passed out, but maybe you didn’t mean it then? I mean, you’d just been thrown from a motorcycle and were probably in a ridiculous amount of pain, so I doubt you even knew what you were saying. And you were concussed!” She let out a nervous laugh. “You probably don’t even remember saying it, right?” Oh god. Stop talking, Beth. But she couldn’t stop, nor could she escape, because she was trapped in this tiny bed with him spewing words she probably wouldn’t remember thirty seconds from now. “I don’t know,” she continued. “It felt like cheating to accept that declaration, so I tried to forget it. But you went and said it again, and now I think that maybe you really did love me before tonight. And just in case you think that I’m the only one mighty enough to claw her way through someone’s emotional armor, I’ll have you know that before you, I never just said all the things I was feeling when I felt them. But I feel so much with you, Eli. Maybe too much, and when you say things like you love me—twice—I don’t know… I mean, I can’t… It’s just… How do I…”

From the strained look on his face, she guessed it took Eli the entirety of her jumbled emotional eruption to lift his right arm and press his palm over her mouth.

“Sorry!” she exclaimed, her voice muffled behind his hand. “I’m hurting your head, aren’t I?” She was certainly hurting her own.

“No,” he whispered. “I mean, yes, my head is still throbbing, but that’s not why I stopped you.” He lowered his hand, letting it fall softly against his chest.

“You wanted to put me out of my misery?” Beth asked with a nervous smile.

“You looked like you needed the assist,” he teased. “But I was also hoping you’d put me out of mine.” He paused. “I…don’t remember what I said after the accident. I don’t remember much about the accident at all.” Another pause.

Beth’s stomach sank, and her expression fell.

“But,” he went on, “if I said it, I meant it. I’ve loved you for weeks already, Beth. Maybe longer. So whether or not I remember saying it has no bearing on it being true. There’s just one problem with this whole scenario.”

Her eyes widened. “It’s because I didn’t tell you about New York, isn’t it? I can explain, Eli. I wasn’t keeping it from you. It all just happened so fast that—”

He covered her mouth again, his amusement quickly turning to a look of exasperation.

“I’ve apparently told you I love you three times by now, so just answer my question.” His voice was a low whisper. “Do…you…love…me…too?”

Ohhhh. Had she not mentioned that part yet?

Beth nodded.

Eli dropped his hand, releasing a relieved breath.

“I love you, Eli.” She brushed her lips over his.

“That’s one,” he told her.

“I love you, Eli.” With another soft kiss, she told him again.

“That’s two.” He grinned.

“I love you. I love you. I love you,” she continued.

“That’s—”

But before he could finish, she covered his mouth with her palm.

“I win,” she said. Not that it was a competition. Then she dropped her hand.

“Nah,” Eli replied. “Pretty sure I just won the entire jackpot.”

Yet eventually, they were both going to lose. Beth wouldn’t think about that now, not when she had him safe and sound in this bed, loving her and letting her love him back. Tonight or this morning or whatever time it was, she had everything.

Her dream.

His love.

And a hope that someday those two things wouldn’t have to exist so far apart.