He’s alive.
That’s all that matters.
I straighten up slowly, bones aching, muscles stiff. My elbows dig into my thighs as I lean forward, eyes locked on the broken brother lying in the bed beside me. My identical twin. A mirror image of me, down to our haircuts. Only my tattoos separate us. Otherwise, people always confuse us until Em opens his mouth.
That big mouth gets him in trouble way too much, shooting off too many times at too many bars, parties, and clubs. I’d give anything to hear him chirping in my ear. Now, my tattoos won’t be the only thing differentiating us.
I hate that.
He doesn’t even look like my brother. His body is covered in bandages and tubes. His right leg is elevated, wrapped from the top of his thigh down to his ankle in thick white gauze. He has a shattered femur. Metal pins were screwed into the bone to piece him back together when they rushed him into surgery.
Road rash climbs up his body from beneath the blanket. Bright red, raw, and oozing in spots. It splays across his left calf, angry, streaked with shredded skin. His shoulder is torn up on the same side. The nurse said he was lucky.
Lucky.
That’s what they call it.
When you get hit by a fucking car and thrown into a concrete pillar at 50 mph. His skull didn’t split open because that hungover idiot had the smart idea to wear his full helmet. The rest of him was so bruised and banged up that they couldn’t find a clean patch to place an IV.
I swallow hard, stomach churning. The edges of the memory are jagged. Blurry. I don’t know how long he was gone before I woke up. I just know the house was empty. His bike was gone. I fucked up.
I’m the reason he’s here. Banged up and broken. My dumbass had to fall asleep watching the Sox get murdered. If I had just stayed awake, hidden the keys, or done a hundred other things, everything would be different.
The door slams open.
“Ay carajo! Who turned off the fucking heat in here?”
I jolt upright, heart pounding, a bit from the racket but mainly from the energy coming off this chick. She bursts in like she owns the damn place. A flurry of curls piled high on her head. Coffee-colored skin glowing against several gold necklaces. A fat ass grabbing my eyes in those navy scrubs that don’t even try to hide the thick thighs scraping against each other. The sound is as loud as her sneakers squeaking with every step. Warning everyone that she’s coming.
A clipboard is clutched in one hand, a giant insulated tumbler in the other, and she slams it down on the counter. She doesn’t knock. Doesn’t pause. Just keeps talking to herself and the machines, as if they all owe her rent and are late paying it.
“Somebody turned off the warmers again? We got a boy freezing in here like it’s a damn meat locker. What are we doing, prepping him for the morgue?”
Morgue?
I stare, remaining completely still.
She hasn’t noticed me yet. Her focus locks on Emilio. Her brow furrows. Lips purse. She’s mumbling half-Spanish, half-nurse lingo as she checks the monitors, scribbles stats, then adjusts a tube near his arm. She moves like she’s done it a thousand times. No nonsense, fierce and beautiful.
My eyes dry out from how hard I’m staring.
The tight stretch of her scrubs when she leans across him. The way her big gold hoop earrings catch the light. The sound of her bracelets clinking when she adjusts the IV. Everything about her is loud and out of place in the quiet Intensive Care Unit.
Then she looks at me. Clipboard midair. One brow arched. Lips parted just slightly, like she’s not expecting to see anyone conscious in the chair beside the bed.
“Well, shit.” Her accent hits hard, and she eyes me like I’m a second patient nobody warned her about. “You alive over there, Papito?”
I don’t answer.
Don’t think I can.
She walks toward me slowly, hips swaying like she doesn’t even notice they do that. Her eyes are as dark as her hair. But when they don’t leave my face, sharp and accusatory, I nod once. She looks from me to Em and back. The same look I’ve seen a million times when people make the connection.
“You’re his brother?”
“Twin.”
Her gaze softens just a little, but she looks again. As if challenging my word, even though we’re identical and not fraternal. “Identical.”
