“Whoa, slow down. You’re at Grayson’s?”
“Yes, Addie asked me to come stay for a month and help him adjust to being in the chair.”
“Is the paralysis permanent?”
“We don’t know. He has to wait for the swelling to go down, and that could take weeks. Addie figures if I am here to help him adjust and he doesn’t get better, then they are ahead of the game, and if he does get better and can walk again, then at least it made the month he was in the chair a little easier. She thinks it’s a win-win either way.”
Ellie’s chuckles on the other side of the phone had me scowling.
“What is so funny?”
“Addie has read all of my books,” she says as if that explains everything. She knows I can’t read her mind.
“So?”
“She set you up for forced proximity.” Her laughter was full-on belly laughs now, and I heard the baby crying in thebackground. “Oh shit, sorry, Bash, Momma is just laughing at Auntie Jessie.”
“What the hell do you mean?”
“Addie is forcing you and Grayson to spend every minute together so that you both get your heads out of your asses and realize that you belong together.”
“Oh my fucking God,” I groaned as I fell back onto the bed.
Chapter Ten
Grayson
The ceiling needed to be painted.
Why had I never noticed that before? Probably because I didn’t normally lie in bed in the morning staring at the fucking thing, waiting for someone to help me get the fuck out of bed.
Last night I’d had to call Emerson to help me get into bed; you would think he’d remember to come back in the morning. Looking at the time, I realized he was probably feeding the horses. The sun hadn’t risen yet, which meant no one else had either, except me and Emerson.
Maybe I could do this myself.
How hard could it really be?
I had great upper-body strength from years of controlling six-to seven-hundred-pound animals. I could lift myself. Sitting up, I lifted one leg and dangled it over the side of the bed. Then, I did the same with the other.
Step one completed.
Nurse Sally had taught me how to do this shit before I left the hospital. She made it look so fucking easy. I grabbed the armrest of the chair and dragged it closer, putting it at an angle the way she showed me.
Step two completed.
Now, I just had to reach over and grab both armrests and heft myself from the bed to the chair. Easy peasy.
At least that was how Nurse Sally made it look.
Reality was entirely different because what Nurse Sally failed to mention was that you had to have the same amount of pressure on both armrests, otherwise you ended up on your ass on the floor with the chair on top of you. Well, actually on mystomach; the chair landed on my ass.
A-fucking-gain.
The bedroom door slammed open, and Jessie flew to my side like a tornado.
“Grayson, what the hell are you doing?”
She pulled the chair off me, and I got a look at her in a tight white tank top and skimpy little sleep shorts. If I’d had any doubts about my dick still working, he made it known loud and fucking stiff that he liked what he saw and, despite my legs not working, he was ready for duty.
