“It’s okay,” I whispered.
His nostrils flared and he glared, but it wasn’t at me. No, he sent that shitty look at Brooks. “Fuck, this is so tight. How did this happen?” he asked.
“It wasn’t him.” Levi whipped around to stare at me, then went back to trying to slide the blade under the rope. “I tightened the knots when I was getting free.”
“I’m going to have to hurt you to get the scissors under the rope.” He pursed his lips.
“Just do it!” I only had eyes for Brooks.
Levi nodded and winced in apology as he worked the metal under the rope. The pain had me slamming my eyes closed, and I gritted my teeth as he cut the bands off. He quickly did the same to the other side. My hands tingled and burned as feeling rushed back into them. He dropped the scissors and massaged my palms, which had me cursing under my breath until the pins-and-needles sensation went away.
“The ambulance, it’s coming?” I asked.
Levi nodded and brushed a hand over my thigh, almost like he was thinking out loud with a touch. He jerked his hand back from my skin and gave Brooks a scared glance. “You should get dressed, and then we’ll get him dressed. I doubt he’d care too much if anyone saw him naked, not now, but he might later. He’d definitely have a fit if someone saw you, though.” He sounded a tad bitter, but not quite as bad as he had earlier in the day, and my heart went out to him, rather than hating him. He’d just saved my ass, after all.
“Yes, I agree,” I muttered, but when I went to stand and grab my trunks, I went right back to my knees because I was so unsteady.
Levi held up a hand at me and went and snagged my trunks from the floor, and then Brooks’. I turned around and sat on my ass to drag the trunks on, not interested in trying to stand just yet. My hands and wrists ached. I writhed around like an unfortunate snake until my trunks were mostly comfortable, then scrambled to Brooks.
Levi was already at Brooks’ feet, and he worked the trunks onto him. Levi had the practiced movements of someone who’d done this before, and I had to wonder how many times he’d dressed Brooks, but I didn’t ask. I was a little scared to know. Together we pulled the trunks up his body, and it was a strangely intimate thing for me to reach in and arrange his cock and balls in his trunks in a way I hoped wasn’t pinching anything. How awful would it be to wake up to nut pain? No thanks.
When we were done, I went around to Brooks’ head and put it on my lap.
“You shouldn’t really move him,” Levi said, but there were stinging tears trying to fight their way out of my eyes, and he didn’t look any better.
“Why isn’t he waking up?” I stroked a hand down his chest, then back up.
“It’s pretty clear he hit his head.” Levi gestured at Brooks’ face. “Did you see how hard the hit was?”
I glared and finished shoving the blindfold off my head that I’d forgotten about until this moment, right before I tossed it at him.
“Oh.” His face bloomed pink.
Levi and I sat there staring at Brooks as if he might slip away if either of us blinked, but then there was a heavy knock on the front door. Levi squeezed my arm before he ran to let the emergency people in.
“Brooks, don’t be mad at me, okay?” I brushed my fingers over his cheeks and beard, avoiding the blood. “But you’re not fucking awake yet, so you don’t get to be too angry,” I grumped at him as I bent and pressed a kiss to his forehead. I stayed curled there, cheek resting against him, until someone touched my shoulders. I sat up as three men made their way into the room.
Levi crouched down to wrap an arm around my shoulders, and I was surprised at how nice it was to have someone friendly to lean against while something was going wrong. He gave me a weak smile. “Ease out from under him. They’re going to take him, okay?”
Nodding, I carefully rested Brooks’ head on the floor and stood. Levi kept me on my feet when my knees tried to buckle. The men in blue uniforms didn’t acknowledge me, just got to work checking Brooks. They raised his eyelids and flashed a light in there, and no one really said anything to me, but as they moved him to a stretcher, I steeled my spine.
“I’m going to the hospital with him,” I announced to the room in general.
“Sure,” one of the men said with a shrug, and I felt stupid, but I’d been ready for a fight.
“You need a shirt and shoes,” Levi said. With a tight squeeze to my shoulders, he ran off. I was shocked when he came back and handed me sandals and a shirt, and I slipped everything on gratefully. I wouldn’t have gone to get the clothing myself because a weird part of me refused to stop watching Brooks. Once Brooks was strapped down to the stretcher, the men wheeled him out and I followed.
We were almost to the back of the red-and-white ambulance when someone shouted, “Darcy!”
I glanced up in time to see Pru racing to us across the lawn between the houses. Slim and clearly fit, it didn’t take her long to reach me. She had on a different outfit than the one she’d worn earlier, a blue sundress, and her short gray hair had been topped with a headband. She looked like she’d been getting ready to go out.
“How bad is it?” she yelled and stopped, breathless, at my side. She wasn’t confused as to what had happened, and why would she be?
“He smacked his face off the floor when he went down,” I said.
She grabbed my hand and held on while the men got the stretcher situated in the ambulance. As we stood watching, a slow anger sparked to life in me, mostly at myself. What could I have done differently? Nothing, really. Just like the Jet Ski, Brooks would have insisted he wanted to live his life, and it wasn’t like he’d been doing anything out of the ordinary when he had the seizure, simply walking across the room to me.
The anger turned bitter, and I wanted to cry. Why him? Why this man, who actually cared about me? It wasn’t fair, not for him or me.
