After Paul drifted off into a morphine-induced sleep, I sat by the bed in the white room with fluorescent lights overhead, watching over him with dry, weary eyes. This was on me. I had assumed they would be too busy dealing with the mess I’d left behind to chase after me already. Paul had paid the price for my mistake. It was my duty to make sure it didn’t happen again.
At least three people had stopped by to check on him, so news was traveling fast. After the third drop-in, I requested that no one else be allowed in, so Paul could rest.
“Chels?” Jeremy said from behind me.
I stiffened, closed my eyes, and prayed for the patience the good Lord had never given me. “How many times do I have to tell you to leave me alone before you finally listen?”
“Is he okay?” he asked me, coming into the room and completely ignoring my words…as usual. Sometimes I wondered if he even heard them. “What happened?”
“Some punks jumped him outside his office,” I said quickly, sticking close enough to the truth. While I thought I was an excellent liar, Jeremy did always have an uncanny knack for knowing when I was stretching the truth. “It wasn’t enough to just mug him, they had to beat him, too. Assholes.”
Jeremy came up beside me, staring at Paul with a furrowed brow. His hands were in his pockets, and his jaw was hard. “Some street kids took the time to break his thumbs?”
“Yeah.” I gripped my knees, staring at my brother’s hands. Bile rose in my throat, but I swallowed it back. Now wasn’t the time or the place to lose it. “Sick, right?”
His mouth pressed into a thin, tight line. “Unbelievable.” After a few moments, he let out a long breath and put his hand on my shoulder. “Let me take you home.”
“I can manage on my own.”
“That wasn’t a question. You’re exhausted, and sitting here worrying isn’t going to help Paul. You need to rest.”
“No.” I pulled free, my heart racing and my skin burning where Jeremy had touched me. His hand stayed open, palm up and empty between us. “I need to make sure they don’t come back.”
“Why would a bunch of ‘punks’ go to all the trouble of sneaking into a hospital to attack Paul again?” he asked, his perfect brown brow arching. I hated when he did that. “I feel there’s something you’re not telling me. Am I right?”
“Of course you’d think that,” I muttered, knowing I was skating on the edge of giving him information he didn’t need to know. “No. I’m just being paranoid. I’m worried about my brother.”
“He has a police guard.” He pointed out the door and I looked. Sure enough, there was a uniform outside his door. Weird. Wouldn’t Paul love to know that law enforcement was lurking? The officer waved at me and I blinked at him before I recognized him. His name was…uh…Harry? No, Larry. He’d asked me to prom. I’d gone with Jeremy. I should’ve gone with Larry instead. “Paul will be fine on his own tonight. I want to make sure you’re okay.”
I crossed my arms, forcing my attention off the officer and back to Jeremy. Paul would have to deal with it, because having a police presence around was actually calming me. For once. “I love how you continue to think that I give a damn what you want these days.”
With that, I moved closer to Paul’s side, intent on ignoring Jeremy. He’d get bored watching me watch Paul sleep soon enough.
“Fine. You want to stay?” He walked over to the other chair in the room. It had been in the corner, but he dragged it right next to mine and sat. “Then we’ll stay.”
“Seriously?”
“Dead serious.” He crossed an ankle over his knee, his heel brushing my thigh because he was so close, and leaned back as if he didn’t have a worry in the whole world. “It’s been ten years since we had a sleepover. And that last one was…eye-opening, to say the least.”
I still couldn’t wrap my head around the chain of events that had led us here, or what it all meant. Jeremy had chosen me over Mary. He was still choosing me. I guess, in a way, he always had. His mother had hated me because of my father, but Jeremy had never cared, always keeping his bedroom window unlocked for me whenever I needed to get away from my family. He had loved me. Of course, he apparently didn’t realize he was in love with me until I decided enough was enough and left. Jeremy was the love of my life.
But, man, he could be such a guy.
“Yeah, that night was definitely eye-opening.” I looked back at Paul for any signs of distress. He didn’t so much as twitch. The beeping of his heart monitor remained slow and steady. “Despite, y’know, earlier, I have no interest in repeating history.”
“Yeah. Me neither.”
I lifted a shoulder. “Glad we’re on the same page.”
He leaned forward, resting a hand on my thigh. His brown hair fell on his forehead, and his piercing green eyes called for me to give him what he wanted—me. He wore a flannel shirt and a pair of ripped jeans, and his huge arms strained against the fabric of the shirt. He was so strong, so steady, and I ached to borrow some of that strength. To let him take care of me…
Again.
“You misunderstand me.” Hesitantly, he reached out, cupping my cheek. “I plan on kissing you again, but I have no intention of losing you this time, Chels.”
I stiffened, holding my breath, because having him here, touching me, made it oh-so-tempting to lean on him for support. Just like he wanted. Just like I couldn’t. I wasn’t that naïve girl who believed in love anymore. I lurched to my feet, shaking off his touch. If only it was as easy to lose the emotional hold he had on me. “What’s it going to take to get rid of you?”
He smirked. “Easy. Let me take you home.”
“Done.” I grabbed my purse, checking to make sure the officer was still there. He was, and he looked a hell of a lot more alert than I felt. “And then you leave me the hell alone. Look forward, and leave the past where it belongs.”
Every moment I spent with him was another moment he crept closer to my heart and threatened the new beginning I was fighting so hard for. Every moment brought danger and risk to things I wasn’t willing to lose.
Like his life.