I’m not even sure she knows her husband was carried out of here in a gurney just like this one, and after the hospital stay, he disappeared.
They had to wire his jaw shut.
I regret nothing.
“I want him to press charges,” I tell Mumford as I screw a plunger into Charline’s IV.I hope I missed a bubble. “But he won’t talk to the police.”
“Ten, I know you’re hurting but quit making me repeat myself.”
Growling, I spin on him, the vials of Charline’s medicine still in my grip.
“I want him back!” I yell and throw my arms up, my eyes burning wickedly. “I don’t want him to grieve on his own and fucking rot in that goddamn bedroom alone.” I feel the hot tracks trail down my cheeks and that dark stare softens. “I wanna rot with him.”
Mumford’s shoulders lift with an inhale, those thick arms back across his chest, his gaze nailing me.
“Then rot with him, Ten,” he says softer than his exterior suggests is possible, but I know the man. The heart inside his chest.He’s a good man. “Sit with him. Sleep with him. For however long it takes.”
The sob I tried desperately to hold back claws its way up my throat.
“I’m scared.”
He drags in another deep breath. “The version of him you knew may never come back. But there’s only one way to know for sure.”
Hand held out, Mumford gestures for the vial I’m holding. The syringe I don’t recall grabbing.
The label screams at me when I read it.
It’s morphine. When did she get morphine?
I grip it tight enough the stopper at the top creaks, my fingers long ago gone numb.
Quiet.
Could I get a dose out before Mumford stopped me?
How shitty would that be?
Part of me doesn’t care. That part wants the hit of relief anyway. The bliss of fading awareness calling my name.
“Hand it over and go.”
I squeeze tighter.
He’s big. Bet I could outrun him.
The breath shakes from my too tight chest when my grip is covered by his big hand.
Tears cascade down my face as I release the small bottle and turn away, my body carrying me back down the hall to Emmett.
He’s curled up on his side, facing the wall, and still in the same clothes he was in four days ago. His hair is a knotted mess on his head—longer now and greasy as fuck—his frame even more pronounced than it was. I can practically see his shoulder blade through the hoodie.
My hoodie.
“Baby, it’s me,” I whisper thickly, swiping at my sniffling nose as I lift the blanket and climb in behind him.
I curl around him, careful to keep some distance between us.
“It hurts,” he whispers weakly, and my heart rate kicks up even more, the pounding in my ears painful.
