“The doc thinks you need it. You’re gonna do it.”
It hurt my ribs when I tried to tug my hand away, and he wouldn’t let go. “I’ll tell them no,” I said stubbornly.
“Like hell you will.” He glared, and I thought maybe that was the first time in my life he’d looked at me like I’d actually pissed him off. It was difficult to swallow and my heart leaped.
My whole life felt like it was going off the rails, and I was humiliated when my eyes burned with tears. I drew my hospital gown up over my face until the feeling passed. Aspen tugged my collar down, and I blinked at his concerned expression. “I’ve been punched in the ribs, kicked, too. Why now? Why this time?”
“You’ve never been beat down by five assholes who were too chickenshit to take you one-on-one. Maybe if you didn’t have those freaky broken ribs the doctor would have had different thoughts, but you do. We’re going to do what that doctor says.”
“We? It’s me, not you.”
“I’m here with you, so yes, it’swe.”
“Why should I?” I asked bitterly.
Aspen stared around. “Do you want to see Vail cry over you when you die? All because you don’t trust me?” He managed to look offended, and that had me frustrated again.
Then I thought about what he’d said, and I couldn’t help it, I snickered. “If I’m dead I won’t see anything.”
He sighed and I felt like I’d won a round in a ring with him. “Don’t fight with me on this. Don’t fight it at all because you’re doing it.” He brushed his fingertips over the back of my hand, and I felt ridiculously like I was melting on the spot.
“It’s not fair,” I said and didn’t care if it sounded like I was five years old. “I don’t want to do this. I don’t want to be alone.”
Aspen bent forward and I sighed into the heat of his lips as he gave me a soft kiss, and then he leaned back just enough to smile, and my breath caught. “You won’t be alone. I’ll do my best to make sure it’s always me here, but if I can’t? You’ll have one of us. We won’t be able to keep Vail away, and Cillian and Rowen will do right by you.”
My hand convulsed in his and humiliation made my cheeks hot. “But I will be alone.”
“You’ll be asleep.” He kissed my cheek, and I smiled at him because it was... nice. Friendly. Fuck, it was damned loving. “I’ll sit here and stare at your hot and tempting body.” He shook my hand around until I huffed out a laugh. I felt like he was handling me the way we sometimes did Vail, but fuck if it wasn’t nice. Was this what it was like having someone think you were worth taking the time to be sweet? “You can have good dreams.”
“I’ll make sure you’re naked in them,” I said, going for a joke.
He only stared at me like I’d ruined the moment.
I shrugged.
Another nurse came into the room dragging equipment on a cart with her, and fear pelted through my belly, making me hold Aspen’s hand harder than I probably should. She gave me a nod rather than saying hello. “This is the ventilator you’ll be using,” she said, tapping the top. The ventilator had a gray shell and looked like a simple box, not anything that could save my life. She began to set the machine up nearby, and I stared at all the tubes coming out of it. I didn’t want to do this.
“How will I pee if I’m supposed to be asleep for days?” I asked, the question hitting me out of nowhere.
The nurse messing around with the ventilator, a tall woman with chestnut hair and deep brown eyes, smiled in a friendly way. “Oh, don’t you worry about it.”
Aspen grunted. “Catheter, they jam a tube in there.”
I covered my crotch with my free hand. “That sounds worse than the ribs!” Aspen sent me a look like I was a misbehaving kid, but I didn’t care. “Can we skip that?”
The other nurse who had been taking things out of drawers changed out the IV bag that was already hanging on the pole near my bed. She was focused on her job, which was a good thing, and fiddled around with the IV line, untwisting it. I hadn’t realized I’d done anything wrong, but she only smiled when I mumbled a sorry.
“Just relax, the medicine that puts you to sleep is in this bag. This could take anywhere from an hour to an hour and a half.” She smiled at me, and Aspen held my hand tighter as I leaned back.
“That’s good,” he murmured, resting his elbows on the bed railing. “You’re doing good, and I’m right here.”
Swallowing hard, I nodded and closed my eyes.
“I’ll be right here.”
“Why?” I asked, scared and in pain and trying desperately not to show any of those things.
“Because I want to be,” he said quietly. I couldn’t stop the tears that snuck out of the corners of my eyes, and he brushed them away while I drifted.
