Omar raises an accusatory eyebrow at me, which I kiss after making sure none of the other guys are watching. I know he wants to be brave with the PDA, but I don’t need to push it.
“You know what? I’m just going to drop all of you off at the hospital and go to Buc-ee’s without your sorry asses.”
20
Omar
There’s nothing fun or sexy about being shot in the chest. I learned all about how lungs maintain a pressurized state, and let me tell you, they don’t play well with penetrating objects. At. All.
But when the guy you’re fucking, who you also kind of secretly like a little more than you thought you would, slaps a couple of specialty Band-Aids on you and then pumps you up with some sort of highly controversial, probably illegal, I-don’t-give-a-shit-where-it-comes-from substance, let’s just say there are benefits.
Anders, wearing the hell out of someone else’s hospital scrubs, hovers and takes the same vitals the nurse just took on his round five minutes ago. He, as with all the medical staff on my service, are shocked at my recovery.
Shocked, I say.
“Your ass looks really nice in scrub pants,” I observe, reaching out to pinch what I just complimented.
“I had too much blood on my clothes, and they said it was disturbing the other patients.”
“Well, Dr. Bash, you can disturb me anytime.”
Anders looks at me, his eyebrows stitched together. “Are you actually horndogging me right now?”
“Maybe.”
He checks my chart again. “What kind of pain medications have they given you?”
“Nothing crazy. Can’t one guy find another guy really, really sexy without getting accused of being high?”
“Sure…but maybe not after a gun-for-hire jackass puts a hole through his chest and brings my childhood home down on his head.”
“What can I say? It’s as if I’ve gotten a full night’s sleep followed by a triple shot of espresso.”
I run my hand up and down his thigh, which he bats away.
“Omar, stop it. I need to make sure you’re okay.”
I smirk. “The charge nurse took my vitals not five minutes ago. You’re hovering. I can give you a hard time if you’re hovering.”
“So what?” he says, sticking a thermometer in my mouth. “Maybe I just want to make sure they didn’t miss anything.”
“You mean miss anything like the fact that my bullet holes are nearly healed?” I say around the thermometer. “Or that my lung capacity is back to normal, and they didn’t even have to intervene in any meaningful way?”
Anders takes the thermometer and goes quiet, keeping his eyes on the chart.
“Hey.” I reach out for his hand. “Hey. I’m good. I’m here.”
He puts down the thermometer and takes my hand, opening his mouth to respond, but the words get stuck.
After a few more tries, his voice comes through in a broken whisper. “It’s just…I was watching the house I grew up in fall apart, and then all of a sudden you were there, carrying my whole world on your shoulders, Omar. My whole world. While your lung was collapsing.”
I pull our linked hands to my lips, softly brushing the tops of his knuckles. “I don’t know what to say to that. I just…I knew in the depths of my spirit that I wasn’t leaving the house without them.”
“What exactly happened?” he asks, finally able to look me in the eye.
“The team had taken everyone out, so I came down through the attic to get your parents and Samuel. That’s when I saw the guy trying to bust into the room. I ended him before I even realized I’d been shot. Then the house blew up, and I was knocked out for a second.”
“Fuck.”
