And suddenly everyone is moving at once.
Damon’s there, shoving Donna back.
Several security guards burst into the room, grabbing her and escorting her out.
Joey appears by my side, asking if we’re okay.
Frank follows after his shouting wife without so much as looking at the destruction she’s wreaked.
And a doctor is in front of us, quietly saying that Blake wants to see his brother.
Everyone’s moved…except Colt.
“Honey,” I say.
Still not moving, just frozen in place with a bright red mark on his cheek.
“Colt.”
Nothing.
I suck in a breath, release it.
Then I touch his chest.
“Honey, Blake needs you.”
And finally, finally he unsticks, moving toward the double doors the doctor came out of.
“Are you Kylie?” the doctor asks.
I tear my eyes from Colt’s retreating back and focus on the slender woman with the ink-black hair. “Yes, I am.”
“Blake wanted me to bring you too.”
My heart squeezes, but I nod, follow her through the doors, pausing only to glance over at Joey and Damon, both of whom give me encouraging—albeit small—smiles before I head into the hall, hurrying to catch up with Colt, my stomach twisting slightly when he doesn’t look at me, doesn’t acknowledge me, doesn’t touch me.
But I know it’s not because of something I’ve done. It’s the weight of those words that tore open a wound that never truly healed. It’s the hate in the eyes of a woman who was supposed to love him. It’s the violence of the moment and the loss of a slender thread of hope and…
It’s worry for a brother who means the world to him.
The doctor indicates a room and we push inside.
“Hey, bro,” Blake croaks, and it takes everything in me to keep my expression neutral. Because, hell, he’s so damned pale and hooked up to so many tubes—though he quickly proves his humor is intact. “It wasn’t my intention to swap places with you, but you know me, always an attention whore.”
Laughter bubbles up in my chest, but I swallow it down, follow Colt over to his side.
“Pretty girl in my room,” he says when I touch his hand, sink down into the chair next to his bed. “Better watch out, bro. May have to steal your girl—” He breaks off on a cough that sends the monitors going crazy and the nurses swarming into the room.
They push medication, make notes on his charts, call the doctor, and admonish him to take it easy.
“Can’t take it any easier than lying in bed.”
“Try. We need time for the new regimen of meds to start working.”
A nod.
She smiles at him then at us before slipping from the room.
